B006O3T9DG EBOK (32 page)

This time, hubris was forgotten. In its place, was a very sincere plea.

He cried, “Pray, use all your skills, but save what you can of my manhood.”

Mrs. Younge placed a sovereign and a few pence on the table. Chubbe was well-satisfied that she had the means to pay him and proceeded to reorganise Wickham’s genitals. Mrs. Younge clung to the periphery of the procedure, not daring to take a closer look.

“More rum!” Wickham called out to her. “And see that he takes but one ball, Henrietta! Dare not take them both! I would rather die!”

“They all say that,” remarked Chubbe dryly (having similar experience as the apothecary).

Mrs. Younge had pressed her apron to her lips
,
took her money, and fled the room. Witnessing her poor George writhe with pain was more than she could bear. Taking the bottle of rum that dear Wickham had been nursing, she upended it. When the surgeon finished his handiwork, he found Henrietta Younge’s head resting on the kitchen table, a pool of drool beneath her chin. Carefully and quietly, Chubbe slid the coins from the table (lest the patient take a turn for the worse). He stopped long enough to ascertain if any rum was left. Seeing that it was empty, he took his leave.

When Mrs. Younge awoke, Wickham was stirring from the mixture of opium and alcohol he had ingested. When it wore off, George Wickham was, that month and many more thereafter, afflicted with every suffering he had lied of enduring in France. Such irony was lost on him. It, along with contrition, was adrift in a sea of narcissism and drugs.

When he finally emerged from benumbment, trusty Chubbe announced him a fortunate man, indeed.

“The ‘whiffles’,” the surgeon said enigmatically.

“The
what
? I do not take your bloody meaning!” Wickham cried.

The effort to speak tore at his vitals. Knees up, he rolled upon his side and howled like a hound in heat. Chubbe felt obligated to sit beside him in a straight-backed chair until the groaning subsided. Whilst he did, he crossed his legs and took a deep inhalation from his cigar. When Wickham ceased his lamentations, Chubbe repeated his diagnosis.

“You were saved by a propitious case of the whiffles.”

Chubbe explained that the whiffles was an instinctual reflex of the scrotum. When under attack—be it by cold air or, as in Wickham’s situation, gunfire—the scrotum contracts. Wickham recognised the condition immediately and wondered if that filthy case of undescended testicles he had braved as a youth had played a part,

“You lost a ball,” opined Chubbe. “But the whiffles and my superior skill has saved the other.”

Wickham thanked Chubbe with the finest grandiosities that it was within his power to offer.

The medical field had a second axiom when it came to speculating the probable remuneration of a patient. Dead patients were the worst credit risk, but those who waxed most eloquently about a physician’s expertise came in a close second. Mrs. Younge had paid him for his proficiency. Chubbe hoped, however, the propitious outcome brought about by his skills might influence added remuneration. He turned to her again, as she was hovering just beyond the door. She gave him a couple of pence more and he left his patient to reflect upon the mutability of life.

Awaiting repair, Wickham had a great deal of time for reflection—had he been disposed to introspection. As he was not, he spent two months in bed with his remaining testis swollen the size of a muskmelon (gladly accepting leeches in places he cared not to recall) and plotting his own sort of revenge. The unlikelihood that he survived at all, much less that he kept one good ball meant that he was a walking (or rather, limping) miracle.

However, he spent little time pondering how, or whether, the supernatural intervened upon his behalf. He knew good works or godliness had little to do with life or death. As a man of cards, he believed in luck above all else. And if one believed in the God of Chance, it must be premised that one had to play the hand one was dealt—for better or for worse.

———

As months turned into a year, he tallied his injuries. The large contusion marring his forehead had faded. The small bones of his right foot that had been splintered by a small bore pistol still caused him a tender foot. The gunshot wound to his privates had left him half a eunuch, but had not rendered him dead.

Along with a few truly monstrous memories, he had a renewed sense of purpose and reminded himself of a long adored adage.

“One must seize the moment else another shall rule the day.”

Opportunities came about when one least expected them. What was important was that one recognised the bloody buggers when they came round. (As they were often disguised as labour, he did not always take heed.) Whether he was even half a man was yet to be learnt.

There was his greatest concern. That a man without vitals, and all the privileges to be annexed thereof, was truly no man at all.

Chapter 44

Music for the Dead

The forenoon after William had been laid to rest, Elizabeth had awakened with the dawn. Her first thought was to reach out for the reassurance of her husband’s warmth, but he was not there. She presumed he had arisen before her.

But he had not.

Still dressed in his boots, Darcy sat slumped in a side chair fast asleep. Elizabeth was pondering awaking him when she noticed his dusty boots and begrimed coat. As he had fallen asleep in such a state, he must have been overtaken by exhaustion. She did not know where he had gone the night before. Nothing else could account for the state of him save taking a ride on Blackjack. The chance of him taking such a perilous, night-time ride affrighted her. Yet, she knew that if he had, his motive was understandable. To run free of their grief, for but a few moments, would be a godsend.

It was a temptation to try to move him to the bed, but that might wake him. Allowing him a bit of sleep was the only solace she could fathom for him then. His hair had fallen upon his forehead and she would have liked to brush it back from his brow, but dared not chance disturbing him. Rather, she repaired to the nursery to give her children what she could of herself before she had to be strong for others.

Elizabeth spent most of the morning in a bit of a daze, hence, it was her sister, Jane, who took her hand and led her to the stairs. It was Jane who called for Hannah. It was Hannah who tried not to gasp. Together, Jane and Hannah went about removing Elizabeth’s gown. They were halfway through the process of removing her soiled dress when Elizabeth finally realised what was amiss. Looking into her glass, she saw milk stains on her bodice.

———

It was afternoon before Elizabeth realised that her husband was nowhere to be found. He was the port she turned to in any storm and her last vestige of fortitude was fast dwindling away. So in his absence, she fled for the stairs and the solace of their chamber.

Having held out hope that he might be hiding from visitors too, she was doubly disappointed not to find him there. No doubt, he had gone out on Blackjack again. She forgave him that. (Indeed, given the opportunity, she would have encouraged him to take an hour in the saddle.) His riding boots, however, still sat where he removed them, untouched by Goodwin, and reminding her of his begrimed state that morning.

Suddenly feeling both bereft and forsaken, she fell to the chair that her husband had recently occupied. Face in her hands, she was overcome. It was as if the levee of her soul burst, tears began to pour from her eyes. Mortified by her compleat want of restraint, she mopped at them with the hem of her skirt before fumbling for a handkerchief from the table. When she had it in her hand, she saw that it was folded squarely. However, it was of coarse cotton, not delicate lawn. Indeed, it was so out of place that she was in want of looking at it more carefully.

Her weeping arrested, she wiped at her eyes with the back of her hands.

Placing the cloth in her lap, she knew not what to make of it and glanced to the table from whence it came for clues. To her, it looked to have been placed thusly for some particular reason. Initially, she did not see that it had been positioned next to her beloved silver box. When she did, a chill ran the length of her spine. Settling herself, she carefully took a corner of the handkerchief and turned it back. The chill then turned to a shiver and the shiver became a shudder. It travelled from her back, down her arms, and thence to her hands. Her fingers trembled so relentlessly that she feared that she might spill the treasure within the muslin.

His hair—Willy’s lovely silken curl!

She covered her mouth with both her hands lest she cry out. She had something of him above memories after all!

Only when she dared take the cloth in her hand and unwrap it fully did she wonder by whose hands it was brought. The answer to that came to her immediately. She also understood what her beloved husband had done to obtain this, her most treasured gift.

The magnitude of his sacrifice brought her to her knees.

“Oh, my dearest love! When I am lost, you find me; when my soul is rent, you are my balm.”

Although she wanted most desperately to say these words to him, she could not. She must forego such sentiments. Her husband would not want his gallantry acknowledged. After placing a ribbon around the precious lock of hair, she laid it on top of the cotton handkerchief next to the silver box. He would see it and understand. The colour of the ribbon about William’s lock of hair was white.

That night, she watched from the bed as Darcy went to douse the light. He stopped when he saw the lock of hair. He said nothing, but touched it tenderly with the back of his forefinger.

She said, “Just when I think I cannot love you more, I am astonished once again.”

Opening her arms, she bid him come. They did not make love, nor even whisper sweet tidings. They held one to the other and took whatever restive sleep they could.

Chapter 45

The Key

The Darcys did not soon find comfort within the walls of Pemberley. For as others took their leave, another relation this way did come.

Not without ado, Mrs. Bennet hurried from Hertfordshire to shine her light of comfort upon the aggrieved family. As she was the grandmother of the dead child, she knew her place was at the forefront of such rituals. She scurried to Pemberley as fast as she could gather the proper wardrobe. She arrived two days after the burial.

The good lady could have salved her grief at home, but hers was the sort that liked to be fully admired. Having missed the interment, she did not sit in a window seat and daub at her tears. In truth, Mrs. Bennet disliked any event wherein her nerves and fits were not prominently featured. Therefore, as a rule, she suffered funerals of the immediate family better than those of mere friends. She wept copiously, lamented loudly, and beckoned for her salts whenever there was a lull in the wretchedness.

After accepting his mother-in-law’s effusive condolences, Darcy bid Georgiana to play the pianoforte, specifying her selections not be melancholy. Elizabeth withstood Mrs. Bennet’s company more than an hour ere she was overtaken by a headache.

Mrs. Bennet did not concede the advantage all that easily. Although Jane did her best, no one could stop her from what would be the apex of her exhibition. It was supper before there was a decent enough audience for her to threaten a swoon. She held it at bay until in the parlour that evening. When she finally did faint, it was no small back-of-the-hand-to-the-forehead capsizal. She keeled over with such élan as to twirl a full revolution before she upended herself into the arms of a burly footman. With all due respect (and gritted teeth), Mr. Darcy requested she keep to her chambers lest she make herself ill. Oftentimes sad tidings were too much for such fragile sensibilities as hers.