Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife (21 page)

What he believed to be a particularly harmonious denouement to a particularly sticky subject was not yet at hand. Fortune had not allowed her to forget the two simpering chattermags remarking upon his “blade” at the ball. Once the fact of Mr. Darcy’s encounters was unkenneled, specifics seemed fair game to his wife. It took not a day before she made a frontal assault.

“Am I to be advised of whose charms you have known?”

“No.”

“I know ’tis ungentlemanly to repeat such things, but certainly you can understand I choose not to sit next to a lady of your intimate acquaintance at a dinner party quite unenlightened. If I am to be thought a fool, I prefer my own confidence.”

He knew well he was again entering territoire dangereux, for she had an uncanny ability to winnow information from him that he knew he did not wish to confide. Independent decision of what it best to reveal and what not to inevitably fell to naught.

“I would never invest in such a conspiracy against you,” he assured her. “I would never allow you to find yourself in such a position.”

As he said this, he took a mental inventory of the guest list of the ball to reassure himself he was speaking truthfully. Once absolutely certain of that, he sighed in silent relief and vowed to himself what he had promised Elizabeth. Because he had so naïvely expected this moment not to come, he had no plan. However, he recognised the foundation when he saw it. With all due diligence, he would make quite certain that no woman whom he had “known” would be invited to their home. (Not a problem in Derbyshire, but London might be a bit of a dilemma. Diversions abounded; he could account for his own guest lists, but not that of others.)

Thinking the matter at last closed, he shut his eyes as well. They stayed resolutely thus, however she inveigled him.

“I would not ask you to name names—that would be insupportable,” she persisted.“Perhaps you could tell me how many.”

“I could not do that,” he announced rather snippily.

“That frightfully many?”

“That is not my meaning,” he declared in exasperation. “I should have said, ‘I choose not to say.’”

“Less than five?”

As this interrogation took place atop their bed, he rolled upon his stomach and, in vain hope it would impede her, finally did draw a pillow over his head. Alas.

“More than five, but less than ten?”

The pillow groaned.

She pulled up a corner and said under it, “I am full curious is all.”

Her words elicited another groan from her encased husband. Quite abruptly, her manner changed from playful to astonished. Releasing the entreated pillow compleatly, she uttered the unspeakable thought that had just come to her.

“You had a mistress!”

In his pillowed cave, he was trying most determinedly not to listen, but he heard that. She laid back, her arms folded across her stomach in apparent readiness to accept this undeniable and painful truth. Detecting something even more amiss, he pulled the pillow from his head and looked to her. Again, she did not return his gaze.

Unhappily, he understood this must be addressed. He would rather say “more than five” than have her think he had kept a woman—and he most decidedly did not want to say “more than five.”

“I did not have a mistress.”

“You no longer have to shield me. I am not compleatly naïve. I know men have mistresses. What is the word? Inamorata? I understand they wear a great deal of rouge.”

Repeating again, with uncommon firmness, “I did not have a mistress,” he managed to encroach upon her self-martyrdom.

Elizabeth had already conjured a picture of the fancied mistress in her mind, flaxen-haired, rouged, and buxom. Her imagination had endowed this mistress with every disreputable quality one woman could possibly entertain; hence she was reluctant to abandon the idea. Nevertheless, she soon did, finding more happiness in it not being true than pleasure in assigning the nonexistent mistress poor habits.

Offering her logic for examination, she said, “You said you favoured no women of our acquaintance. What other conclusion could one draw?”

Knowing just how deep and wide the tide-pool of opportunity for carnal embrace was, he thought it best not to share that information with her just then. He chose his words with extreme caution.

“If you know men have mistresses, you must know too that there are houses where men go that harbour women with whom to…(he struggled for a non-active verb)…associate.” (Not entirely inactive, but benign.)

She sat up.

He cringed.

“A house? You mean a brothel?” she asked.

“Of sorts.”

Now, thoroughly fascinated, she exclaimed, “You visited a brothel?”

Her exclamation, however, he interpreted as contemptuous.

“What would you have had me do?” he responded sharply. “Deflower shop girls as did Wickham?”

At this, she retreated in confused surprise (thus sparing him the retorted detestable suggestion that he could have remained chaste until marriage). Upon understanding his interpretation of her remark, she hurried her reassurance.

“I did not speak to reprimand you, but in amazement. For I have heard of such places.”

Although he had a sudden, horrifying vision of Elizabeth scurrying about a bawdy-house, asking all manner of questions about the goings-on there, he was chastened. He realised his outburst was not a result of her remark, but due to his long-held contrition for not keeping his baser needs under better regulation. He had exposed this flaw to the very person whose admiration he most desired. Upon this internal revelation, his countenance reflected repentance. Discerning this, she drew to him.

In eager confidentiality, she bade, “Were there harem girls?”

“Just where have you learnt of harem girls and brothels, pray tell?”

Avoiding his gaze, she made great work of picking imaginary lint from the bedcloth.

“My father had a book, actually two books, he thought well-hidden in his library. One had illustrations. I was but a girl of no more than four and ten when I discovered them.”

“Illustrations too?” he smiled, thinking of her surreptitiously reading her father’s risqué books.

Thereupon he admitted, “This place was not so exotic.”

Not really wanting to think much more of Darcy mingling intimately with the English incarnation of harem girls, she teased him, “So you did not deflower any shop girls?”

“No, I did not. The only woman I have deflowered is you, Mrs. Darcy.”

She thought of herself as deflowered for a moment and did not find favour in the term. Then she wondered about the entire devirgination process.

“What are men called after their first act of love, husband?”

“Spent.”

At this, she laughed, deciding she had questioned him enough for one sitting. So little did she like him to have gone to such a place, yet she wanted to know it all. However, she knew it unwise to over use her “wheedle.” She had the notion that this “house” he visited must be in town. They would leave for London after Easter.

Darcy would learn by spring he was not yet out of the woods of enquiry upon this subject.

For those royal and those not, clearly the least hazardous way out of France was the sea (the Pyrenees were not insurmountable, but they were a bit forbidding). From thence, the nearest port was in England. Forthwith of wriggling from beneath the besotted Lord High Executioner, Juliette Clisson fled.

She fled Paris and she fled France.

Tying the symbolic le ruban rouge about her neck, thus announcing what she had escaped, she took the most expeditious route to self-preservation. She came to London amongst the hoards of French émigrés whom, if they had left the means behind as they ran for their lives, still had the title to find consequence in England. For London did love titles, foreign well-nigh as much as their own. London was society, and, although it was not Paris, London was where English men of society played. Juliette had learnt at the foot of the scaffold that betimes serendipity sings.

Yet for the recently disavowed Juliette, no entrée into this society fell before her save for her mother’s fallen rubric. Hence, she picked up the standard of Viscountess without compunction. Had she even a small fortune, she could have installed herself independently amongst society. However, as a woman with more pulchritude than cash, she traded upon those charms.

When young Mr. Darcy’s path crossed hers, he was compleating his second decade of a very privileged life and Juliette had settled into a position of considerable pelf herself at Harcourt House. More than a few of the fine houses of Mayfair were financed through the annuities bestowed upon particularly accomplished courtesans. None were more prominent in this elite demimonde than Viscountess Juliette Clisson.

Other than that she was living in a country not her own, she had few vexations to burden her. It was true, inertia did rule most of her gentleman friends, but that was not necessarily a disadvantage. Accommodating elder effendi was a little tedious, but tolerable. It had been her study that weathering the disadvantages of dotage was preferable to putting up with their feckless heir presumptives (they could be a rowdy lot). Having secured her wealth, she no longer had absolute need to offer her services to anyone. Nevertheless, travelling in the circles of haute monde did require substantial cash outlays. Hence, she occasionally allowed herself a dalliance if one looked to be particularly lucrative or entertaining.

Either of which happened but seldom. Inevitably, men of wealth were not a particularly handsome or charming bunch. Therefore, when the considerable italege of young Mr. Darcy came under her gaze, she was, let us say, not uninterested. Indeed, a little sleuthing was in order. As Cyprian circles harboured a gossip mill more reliable than The Times, she prodded tongues. Evidently, the elegant bagnios of the West End had not entertained him. Other than his family connexions and rumour of fleeting affairs, she learnt little.

How he came by her name, she did not fancy to inquire.

Forthwith of their first meeting, an agreement with terms favourable to both was formed. He required exclusivity only when he was in town. When he was, he sent word. Clearly, he had distaste for frequenting ladies who chambered with more than one gentleman a night. (His fastidious nature revolting, no doubt, at the notion of putting into another man’s leavings.) This punctiliousness hearkened back to his demeanour in general. For when he did call, he never stayed the night. Was that because he chose not to be espied leaving in the morning daylight? Perchance he chose not to have his horses stand in wait, and his coachmen in speculation, whilst he -tarried. She had not an inkling of his motives. He remained aloof and enigmatic.

This recondite deportment did not exclude physical congress. Indeed, he was at once lusty and detached. His lovemaking was zealous and prolific, but silent. He spoke no words of desire and barely uttered a sound at achievement. Those sounds occasioned came unwillingly from Juliette’s own lips, much to her professional mortification. She prided herself upon how well she feigned passion. Her rendition of it was, she fancied, provocatively demure, with little affectation. For in her vocation, allowing oneself carnal satisfaction was a dangerous practise. It led to attachments, and attachments were only a burden.

Yet upon the consummation of their inaugural exchange of flesh, she emitted a lengthy and sincere shriek of pleasure. In her defence, he did exact the economic (and noteworthy) feat of double coitus with the same genital tumescence, imposing it with uncommon vigour. Hence, she had little time to gather her wits, much less perfect a performance. Indeed, his fervour accounted for the repeated rapping of her head inflicted upon the headboard. A true gentleman, he apologised dutifully for perpetrating such imprudent mischief. Yet he said, “Forgive me,” with all the formality had he stepped upon her toe at a dance. She found the entire occasion most disconcerting.

Despite all the confusing incongruity of ritual, she quite eagerly awaited his return. That should have alerted her to the possibility of emotional involvement in what should have been strictly a matter of business. With any other gentleman, she would have laughed at such indiscriminate doings and been mindful not to repeat them, not connive to continue. Nevertheless, she connived, continued to see him upon subsequent nights, and allowed him to satisfy her.

Their financial arrangement never altered.

Truth be known, she would have seen him without compensation. She fully believed he knew that. Therefore, that consideration was paid befit his notion of what characterised their relationship, not hers. Regardless, even after several years, he made no lasting provision for her. It would have been simpler to pay her an annual sum—the length of their acquaintanceship would have warranted it. However, he preferred not, perchance thinking it would be an indication of allegiance of some kind. An encumbrance. Howbeit his visits were sporadic and guarded, she knew she was in effect, but not in situation, his mistress.

In not daring to repeat that observation of her surrogate mistressdom to young Mr. Darcy, Juliette avoided a blunder in twofold measure. First, pointing out to him something he obviously did not want noted, and secondly, having him think she was suggesting he keep her. If that was what he wanted, she knew he would have offered.

Indeed, she did not believe he wanted the burden of fidelity to one woman in any manner. That, perchance, was a measure of his appeal. She had certainly accommodated more handsome lovers, some quite libidinous and equally well-timbered. Darcy, however, was entirely inexplicable. His courtliness disguised a fierce ardour that was, in itself, remarkable. Even she had not plumbed the depths of his passion. Was it ever excavated, she hoped to be the one to enjoy the eruption.

Which she knew to be a foolhardy fantasy.

Initially she told herself her interest in prestigious young Mr. Darcy was no more than a certain amused conceit that the most desirable bachelor in England chose to spend time with her. Even after she admitted to herself that it was more, she redoubled her efforts to appear, if not actually to be, dispassionate. She made certain she awaited him with a practised look of indifference and despised herself for her weakness. If -anyone dared imply it, she knew enough to offer no protestations and let it pass.

Their association, however, came to a close in a most unsettling manner.

He appeared upon her doorstep without his card preceding him. As closely as he adhered to convention, to present himself unannounced was unprecedented. Yet, as it had been a half-year since their last encounter, she anticipated an inspirited, possibly rhapsodic, frolic. However, it was not to be. He was sullen and unusually withdrawn. It occurred to her that upon his previous visit, he had bestridden her perfunctorily. He arrived, came, and then left.

That night, she afforded him every seduction, every allurement, but all was for naught. Her every art was ineffectual. He refused to disrobe or appreciate her denudation. Thereupon, when she had nearly given up on amorous congress, he heaved himself upon her and heatedly, almost savagely kissed her. Then, quite abruptly, he rolled away and sat back against the headboard.

He looked at her rather solemnly, but made no other move toward her. Taking the vacant initiative, she moved atop him and ran her hand down his body, if only in reassurance that she had felt his arousal. Indeed, she had made no mistake. That in and of itself was confusing. It was not unheard of for a man to have the will, but not the means. However, Juliette had yet to encounter this specific manifestation. For his virile reflex was quite evident. He had the means but not the will.

Simultaneous to her deduction, he drew himself from beneath her and off the bed, then bid her good-bye.

As he took his leave, she reclaimed her detachment and placed it upon her face before the door had closed behind him. That, however, had been a useless, and then again, helpful exercise. Useless because he did not give her a backward glance, and helpful in that she saw, indeed, that she needed the practise.

* * *

In the weeks that followed, she often thought of that evening and pondered what provoked his departure from Harcourt and her life. The possibility that he was in unrequited love was given cursory consideration, and then abandoned. How could any woman Mr. Darcy fancied spurn him?

Nevertheless, she learnt in due time that he was engaged. He was engaged to a Miss Bennet of Hertfordshire. Through persistent query, Juliette uncovered that the lady in question was reputed to be quite a country beauty. She heard too, that she was not nearly so well-born as was Darcy. That was quite astonishing, for Juliette knew well of his dedication to his station. Men of rank always believed it unacceptable to marry for passion (hence, her very prosperous life).

It would have been an amusement to see just what sort of woman had pierced the froideur surrounding Mr. Darcy’s heart so compleatly. Just a curiosity, of course.

One certainty was that their relationship had ended. She did not need to read the missive from his solicitor to know it. Married, he would not return to Harcourt. His scruples demanded such. And had they not, she felt certain that if he would not couple with her when in unrequited love, he would most assuredly not once it had been found.

If Miss Bennet had managed to make Mr. Darcy love her, once she tasted of the delight of his loins, she would know she had gained a husband of great fortune far beyond his wealth.

When questioned later why Mr. Darcy no longer called, Juliette would foster a brief smile and answer, “C’est la vie.”