Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife (63 page)

The dust had not settled from Darcy’s coach’s departure before Jane and Bingley were upon their way to Pemberley. The oblique conversation about ships and passage that had come to pass between the friends had alerted Bingley that trouble was afoot.

Their visit was a boon to Elizabeth in that she had, for the sake of appearances, been feigning composure, but with ever-increasing desperation. When they arrived, her resolve crumbled with the extraordinary gesture of embracing not only Jane (who was only mildly surprised at the greeting), but also Bingley (who was utterly astonished). The dam of suppressed hysteria burst and in a torrent, she poured out the history of Georgiana’s mysterious leave-taking and her fear that Darcy’s hasty pursuit might well tangle them both irretrievably in the tentacles of impending battle.

The entirety of Elizabeth’s explanation took place midmost in the floor, and that they stood upon a rather lovely Persian carpet notwithstanding, it did not lend substantiation unto the absurdity of the tumultuous doings. Hence, Jane led Elizabeth to be seated and bid hear the whole story again from beginning to end, possibly believing it would not sound quite so dire was it related from the sedateness of a settee. Bingley, however, stood frozen exactly where he was. Evidently, his shock was compounded by the news.

Voice trembling, Elizabeth patiently gave an orderly retelling of the occurrences (omitting the particulars of the leave-taking of John Christie). By that time, Jane was mute. But Bingley was stricken with an unlikely case of logical enquiry. Successively, he asked: How did Darcy travel unto France? With whom did he travel? How could he find Georgiana once there?

The answers, of course, were: By whatever means he could find. Alone. And, not a clue. Which was precisely why Elizabeth was near panic.

She said, however, “I can give you no account of any of it.”

Observing her increasing alarm, Bingley summoned considerable ingenuity in a lengthy answering of all of his own questions, registering a more reasonable rationale than one would suspect of him.

He concluded his recitation with the reassurance, “As you tell this, Elizabeth, it may not be necessary for Darcy to leave England at all. Georgiana may well be safe even as we speak.”

In the face of little alternative, Jane concurred with her husband, “Yes, Lizzy, he may well be returning with Georgiana this minute. Do not give way to fright.”

Somehow, Elizabeth did not really believe that it could all end so simply. The situation was unquestionably calamitous. But she gave leave to Jane and Bingley to think that they had cheered her.

Much in want of believing that they had, Jane assured her further, “If there is any man who is able to be successful in such a quest, it is Mr. Darcy. I cannot forget that he found Lydia and Mr. Wickham when they ran away. He rescued Lydia and saw them married. He is a man of just duty and much enterprise. He shall put everything to right this time as well.”

Elizabeth thought Graetna Green and battle wastelands were hardly similar undertakings and impatiently worried just who would see after Mr. Darcy whilst he was “putting everything to right.” She knew her husband was resourceful and ever cautious. But fear for one’s sister could put the most provident man in harm’s way. Too, she prayed for Georgiana’s sake that she was yet in England. If Darcy was endangered in seeking her, it could only recommend her jeopardy tenfold.

Bingley insisted upon making inquiries upon Darcy’s behalf and, had he expected protocol reckoned by her declining the initial offer, she did no such thing. Hence, he came to a right understanding of the depth of her fright.

He assured her, “I shall repair to Portsmouth immediately.”

Before pulling on his gloves, Bingley took Elizabeth’s hands in his. He spoke in a voice troubled by apprehension.

“I do wish Darcy had confided more to me. I would have much rather gone with him than to think of him alone.”

Any inexpressible vexation toward her brother-in-law was dashed with that sentiment and Elizabeth squeezed his hands in return.

“He was quite certain he could move with more dispatch alone. As much as I would be comforted to know he had the company of such a good friend as yourself, it is probably best that no one else is imperilled by this business than must be.”

Bingley almost spoke again, but there was a catch in his throat. Instead, he nodded his reluctant acceptance of Darcy’s decision and the wisdom of it. Thereupon, he tapped his hat firmly down upon his head and swiftly took his leave.

Over her objections (which were but a formality), Jane insisted upon remaining with Elizabeth.

With the sincere vow to excite Jane no further with her own discomposure, Elizabeth willed herself to be calm. Such strength of will did this endeavour employ, however, that the room began to spin. Deducing that she was about to be felled by a swoon, with great economy of motion Elizabeth tucked her head neatly in her lap.

This manoeuvre did not encourage Jane’s own composure, thus all the colour that had so recently taken hold of her countenance drained.

“Lizzy!”

So precipitously did Jane lose her hue, upon her exclamation, she followed suit, lest she swoon herself.

“Lizzy, you must cease your fright, lest you fall ill,” was Jane’s advice from the vantage of her own disorder.

With seeming synchronicity, they both sat up and looked at the other in sisterly consolation.

Regaining her senses, Elizabeth saw that the vow of silence she had only recently taken on the matter of her condition could be cast happily aside in defence of her sister’s own well-being.

“Fear not for me, Jane,” Elizabeth said, not unmindful of the complexities that request would entail.

The remark was unexceptional, but her sister’s tone was not. Jane’s countenance was a bit wary, quite apprehensive of what calamity might yet befall.

“Pray, allow me to tell you one happy bit of news,” Elizabeth said.

“Pray, do.”

Elizabeth then both enlightened and burdened her sister with the news of her impending confinement.

The first tumult of joy and subsequent turmoil of trepidation that such news provoked nearly brought Jane to a swoon once again.

“Oh Lizzy! That is the most happy news!” Jane said as she finally reclaimed her senses, “Mr. Darcy must be so very...”

“I have not told him, Jane,” Elizabeth said and then spoke what Jane could not, “I could not burden his trip with so uncertain a business as this.”

“He does not know?”

“No. I have only told you. I want no one more to know of it until I can tell my husband myself,” thus, reinstating her recently abandoned vow.

The duration of Darcy’s absence quite uncertain, Jane did not query the feasibility of Elizabeth’s wish. Hence, their evening was spent alternately laughing and weeping. By midnight, they were both quite foredone, Elizabeth from the ordeal she was enduring, and Jane by the forced pretence that there was no question that all would be well.

Jane insisted Elizabeth must retire. Nevertheless, Elizabeth was reluctant to dress for bed. Knowing it unreasonable, she held the unlikely hope that lengthening her days would shorten the nights she would have to sleep alone. Jane offered to take sleep with her, but Elizabeth shook her head. Their bedchamber had always been hers and Darcy’s sanctuary. It was theirs alone. Elizabeth did not want to share that with anyone, not even Jane.

Yet, thither did she go, only to find even greater disconcertion once she gained the room. For both sides of the bed had been turned back as if in readiness for them both. Elizabeth walked to it and sat, not on the side she claimed, but upon Darcy’s. There, she lay back, closed her eyes and placed the flat of her hand upon her stomach, feeling the small swell there.

Thus, reassured she was not mistaken, she wondered for the hundredth time if she should have told him of the coming baby before he left. Would it have caused him more concern or less? She weighed it in her mind and could not be certain. He could be very single-minded, it was one of his strengths. And he would need all the single-mindedness he could prevail upon for what he had to do. Now that it was done, -Elizabeth was disposed to think it indeed provident that she had not told him. At that moment, however, that was of little consolation.

Albeit it was a serious (if indecorous) consideration, she decided that she could not sleep in her clothes the entire time Darcy was away and she rose to go to her dressing room. Yet, she tarried in obstinate procrastination. If she sat dressed upon the edge of the bed, it was yet the day he left and not the night he was gone. At her feet, she glimpsed a bit of white fabric peeking from beneath the bed. Raising the bed-skirt (and trying not to notice the mirror yet beneath their bed), she took a garment hiding from thence and held it before her. She recognised it as the shirt Darcy had worn the day before. In his haste to leave, it had been very nearly kicked out of sight. Goodwin would have been contrite at his lapse of diligence with the laundry.

He would have had he learnt of it. But that knowledge would be refused him. For Elizabeth thought it a gift of greater worth than any jewels Darcy had bestowed upon her. She lay back and held it to her face, taking a deep breath of her husband’s scent. It brought her to tears. But they were not the tears of dismay, but of exultation. For his aroma reminded her that though he was not with her, he was yet alive, and, somehow, it made her believe that he would return.

Nothing could make her relinquish such a treasure to the wash.

* * *

The second day was no easier to endure than the one before, but with the covert aid of her husband’s soiled shirt, eventually Elizabeth made herself cease her obsessive contemplation of what was and stopped brooding, at least aloud, upon that over which she had no control. Jane, perchance in want of diverting Elizabeth, or possibly because it could be put off no longer, recommended that they make final arrangements for the baby that Bingley’s woman (Elizabeth could not think of that loose woman in a less derogatory term) had birthed to be brought to Pemberley.

Logistics were a quandary, but in time, it was decided that Elizabeth, Mrs. Reynolds and Georgiana’s lady-maid, Anne (nervously idle since Georgiana’s disappearance), would go to get the baby. Approval of the arrangement had already been obtained, hence, the formality of bringing the bantling to Pemberley was all that was left to do. As Jane waited anxiously at the house, the other women set out in the coach.

* * *

It was less than a half-hour’s ride by road, but it was uncertain terrain and the bouncing of the coach made Elizabeth queasy. As they arrived and the others were handed out of the carriage, Elizabeth fled upon her own out the opposite side and very nearly retched upon her shoes. Her discretion was for naught, for when she raised her head from her knees, there stood Mrs. Reynolds proffering a handkerchief. The look the old woman bore supposed she did not believe her mistress was suffering from simple dyspepsia.

Elizabeth gratefully took the handkerchief and allowed, “Perhaps it was best that Mr. Darcy travelled without my company.”

Mrs. Reynolds only gave a single nod. But Elizabeth knew if a short coach trip made her ill, the rough waters of the Channel might well be lethal. Thus, her husband’s resolve to have her stay was re-evaluated. (Elizabeth found it was much easier to acquiesce in his absence.) Even the contemplation of the sea encouraged her nausea; hence, she turned her attention to the house.

When she gazed upon the cottage, she was reminded of the days she had spent at the crest of the hill overlooking it and its inhabitant. From a distance, it had looked neat, even pretty. But distance had lent its only beauty. In truth it was dingy and in disrepair, with fowl wandering in and out of a broken door. A vision of Bingley upon that dilapidated threshold crossed Elizabeth’s mind, but that thought was more upsetting to her stomach than open water and she hastily dismissed it.

It was an unspoken assumption that a woman of her station need not go into the cottage herself. However, Elizabeth abhorred the presumption of taking a baby from its mother without giving her leave to look upon the person who undertook her child’s life. Inside, various family members of the woman had gathered and stood in a reverent semicircle in front of the fireplace. Her father, hat in hand, introduced himself and his wife and then merely pointed to the room where his daughter lay. The young woman’s mother opened the low door to the bed-closet and Elizabeth dutifully followed her in.

Lying under a faded quilt was the woman that Elizabeth had seen from the promontory. Beside her was the baby. Much like the cottage, at a distance Bingley’s woman was pretty. But even in the dim light of the room, Elizabeth could see her shrunken skin and the incongruous glittering of the eyes that announced her lungs were stealing her life. Elizabeth was shocked at her appearance even though she knew her to be ill, somehow expecting her yet to look the part of a scarlet woman. She was really only a girl and the only thing obscene about her was the handkerchief spotted with blood that she had held to her mouth.

The baby sat solemnly next to his mother, eyes wide, looking at Elizabeth. Contradicting his mother’s sickly pallor, the baby was rosy-cheeked and hefty. The girl’s mother lifted him from the bed and handed him to Elizabeth with an announcement.

“The boy’s name is Charles.”

“Charles?” Elizabeth repeated.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Mortified, Elizabeth was faced with yet another quandary. Her governing principle was not to cause any undo distress, but there was no way she was going to introduce this infant to her household under the name of “Charles,” even if it was a common name.

“Pray, does he have another forename?”

In fortune, he did.

“Hello, Charles Alexander,” Elizabeth said.

In answer, the baby reached out and took a firm hold upon her earring. At this audacity, his grandmother gasped. But Elizabeth only smiled tolerantly and unfurled his tiny fingers one by one until she was free from his grasp. Elizabeth did not know if Alexander’s mother or her family knew of her connexion with Bingley, but thought it probable (especially after the name conundrum). And they all appeared both terrified and heartbroken, so if they were resentful, too, it was difficult to determine. An awkward silence ensued and as all other topics were threadbare, Elizabeth inquired of the girl her name. She said her name was Mary.