Mr. Darcy's Daughters (30 page)

At this time, within the house, normally only a few servants would be up and about, but today the whole household was astir. As Camilla ran down the two flights of stairs to the drawing room—no doubt about where her cousin was; his voice was still booming out in a most military fashion—she was glad to catch a whiff of coffee in the air. Fanny began her day with a cup of chocolate, but Fitzwilliam preferred hot, strong coffee, a taste that Camilla shared, especially on such a morning as this, when it seemed she would need to have her wits about her.

Letty, looking extravagantly pretty in a pink silk wrap, rose as she entered the room, and cast herself into her arms. “Oh, Camilla, what a disaster! Now all is truly lost; whatever is to become of us?”

That answered one question; whichever of her sisters had gone missing, it was not Letty. Not that she had supposed it would be. She removed herself from her sister’s clutches. “Alethea, where is Alethea?”

“Alethea is still abed,” said Fanny, looking at Camilla with some surprise. “She is asleep; she is young, needs her sleep. We have not woken her, as she will be unable to help us.”

Thank God! It had been Camilla’s first, her most immediate fear: that Alethea had run away. So it was one of the twins who was gone. Well, she should have guessed it would be Belle or Georgina, desperate not to be forced back to the schoolroom and the rural delights of Pemberley.

“We can get no sense out of Belle,” said Fanny. “She is in her room, in floods of tears; she says she knows nothing about Georgina’s disappearance, has no idea in the world where she may be.”

“Pray, Fanny, sit down,” she said. “Here is your chocolate, drink it, and it will restore you. Tell me what has happened; how did you learn that Georgina had gone?”

Fanny sunk into a sofa, raising a hand to silence her husband. All the authority had drained from him, and he looked tired and worried.

“It was Dawson who came to tell us,” she began. “Baby is teething again, had been crying in the night, and the nursery maid was attending to him when she heard a carriage come into the square. She had a brief look at it from the window, but without taking much notice, supposing it to be a late-night reveller or an overnight traveller arriving home—it was a chaise, you see. Then she heard the staircase creak, you know how it does, and a few minutes later the front door opened and closed.”

Fanny sipped at her chocolate, then, one hand toying with the lace on her pretty peignoir, went on with her story. “The silly girl took fright, thinking of burglars and convinced everyone was going to be murdered in their beds. She let out a squeal, but no one heard except Dawson, who went to see what was amiss, comforted the girl, and very sensibly thought to check on Charlotte and then looked in to see the twins, their room being the nearest. Belle was fast asleep, but Georgina’s bed was empty, and there were drawers and cupboards open and things strewn all about the room, just as though she had packed in a hurry, as indeed she must have done.”

Camilla let out a long breath. “She has not been abducted, then, she has gone of her own accord. Was there no note, no message for us?”

“She has gone with a man,” said Fitzwilliam with certainty. “The waiting chaise, the departure at that hour, the packing, all this indicates an elopement. She left no word of where she has gone, or who she is with.”

Camilla was beyond being shocked by what Georgina had done; there was nothing that her sister might do that could surprise her.

“It was a mistake to take such drastic measures,” said Fanny, sinking her face into a delicate handkerchief and giving way to the tears she had been struggling to hold back.

The scene in the library the morning after the ball was all too vivid in Camilla’s mind, with Fitzwilliam pronouncing the sentence of banishment to Derbyshire on all the sisters. And while arrangements were being made, he laid down that Belle and Georgina must remain within doors, receive no callers and have all their fine new clothes packed away.

“The twins felt the restrictions on them so very keenly,” Fanny was saying. “Oh, where can she be? She is ruined, she will have not a shred of reputation left, and as for the rest of you—”

“I thought we were already social outcasts, quite beyond the pale.”

“Camilla, do not say so. Time would have softened people’s memory, in time you and the others could have resumed your place in society; a good marriage, you know, would set all to rights, and when your parents are back—However, the case is different now. Tell me, do you know of any man to whom Georgina is particularly attached?”

As soon as he reasonably could, Fitzwilliam hurried round to Sir Joshua’s elegant mansion in Bruton Street. There he was greeted by an aloof and uninterested butler, who informed him in frosty tones that his master was not at home.

“Of course he is not at home, not at this hour of the day. However, I must see him upon the most urgent business.”

“When I say Sir Joshua is not at home, I do not mean he is not receiving visitors, I mean that he is not presently in residence.”

“He has gone away?” Fitzwilliam’s voice was eager. “When did he go? Where has he gone?”

“I am not at liberty to disclose details of Sir Joshua’s whereabouts. If you care to leave a message—”

“Damn it, you oaf, this is important. How long is he to be away?”

“It is not for me to say.”

Try as he might, Fitzwilliam could gain no more from the stolid figure, and, cursing in a manner most unusual for him, he turned away to go back to Aubrey Square, in the hope that his womenfolk might have got some sense out of Belle. Thumbscrews and hot coals from a brazier might not be out of order; who would have thought a pack of girls could bring so much trouble down on a man? One thing was certain: Charlotte would be allowed none of her cousins’ freedom of thought or behaviour as she grew up. Could you still send girls to convents? Until they were eighteen, perhaps, or better still, twenty-five or so?

Once Fitzwilliam was out of the way, on what both Fanny and Camilla suspected would be a fruitless errand, the two of them set to work. They felt sure that the twins’ maid knew more than she had let on.

Fanny rang for Dawson. “Dawson, what news have you gleaned from the other servants? Do any of them know anything useful?”

“Sackree is this very minute shaking that wretch so hard that it will be no surprise if all her teeth rattle about in her head,” said Dawson approvingly. “She’s bound to know more than she’s saying. Figgins has popped over to the stable to talk to her father and to the stable lads, not something I approve of, hobnobbing with the riffraff out there, but she may learn something of use. One of the footmen knows a man in Sir Joshua Mordaunt’s employ—seemingly the underfoot-man there comes from the same village as he does, so he has run to Sackville Street to see what he can find out.”

In the house in Albemarle Street, Sophie and her mother were taking a late breakfast.

Sophie toyed with a piece of toast, crumbling it in her fingers, brushing the pieces on to the cloth. A glass of milk, still full, stood beside her plate.

Mrs. Gardiner was brisk as she drank her tea and looked over the morning’s correspondence; she did not want to show the anxiety she felt about her daughter. “Eat, my dear. It will be a busy day, with the dressmaker this morning to fit your wedding dress, and this afternoon, you know, we are to drive out to Hampton Court.”

“No, we aren’t.”

“Aren’t what?”

Sophie pushed her plate away, like a child. “We aren’t going to Hampton Court. I don’t want to go to Hampton Court, and I don’t want to see Wytton. Not today.”

“Such a beautiful day, and the grounds there are always so pleasant to wander in.”

“I don’t want to have a fitting for my wedding dress, either. I’ve already been to Madame Lucie three times. That’s enough.”

“A wedding dress must fit perfectly.”

“What does it matter? I shall only wear it for a few hours.”

“That’s not true; of course you will wear your wedding dress several times more, when you dine out as a bride. It is expected of you.”

Sophie shrugged and got up from her seat. “Silly old tabbies and fusspots. Why should they care how I am dressed? Why should I care for their opinion?”

Mrs. Gardiner’s attention was diverted as she heard voices in the hall, and Sophie made for the door, eager to slip away. Before she reached it, however, it opened, and her father came in, a frown on his face and a letter in his hand.

“Are you not at work this morning?” asked Mrs. Gardiner, surprised to see him at this unaccustomed hour.

“I have come directly from there. I have received a letter with the most disturbing news—I must go to Aubrey Square, but I wished you to see it first.”

“Another missive from Mr. Darcy, I suppose,” said Sophie. “I hope you have written to him and told him what a dreadful creature that Belle is.”

“Belle?” said Mrs. Gardiner, sounding surprised. “You mean Camilla, you are speaking of Camilla.”

“They are all the same; there is nothing to choose between them when it comes to men.”

“Listen, I beg of you,” said Mr. Gardiner. “This is not from Darcy, it is from Fitzwilliam, and so ill-written that I can hardly make sense of it.”

“I do not think he can have anything to say that I wish to read,” said Mrs. Gardiner. “Unless something has befallen poor Fanny.”

“No, no, this is nothing to do with Fanny. Read it, read it.”

“Tell me what has happened, Papa,” said Sophie, now very curious. “Surely my cousins cannot be in further trouble.”

“Very dire trouble, for Georgina has eloped—run away—gone off at dawn in a chaise and four.”

“No!” Sophie clapped her hands to her cheeks. “She has run off with Sir Joshua, that’s what she has done. The slut!”

“Sophie!” cried Mrs. Gardiner, looking up from the brief letter. “You are not to say such a thing.”

“It is the truth. They are all sluts, all of them except for Alethea, and I dare say she will be just the same when she is let out of the schoolroom.”

Mrs. Gardiner and her husband exchanged glances. “You will go round at once, of course,” she said. “Do they have any idea of their destination?” She quickly scanned the rest of the letter. “No, I see they do not. Sir Joshua has left London; that is in itself suspicious.”

“Yes, but we are no further forward if we cannot discover when he left and what his destination was. If his servants will not say, I do not know how we can find out.”

“Someone in Fanny’s house will know. Never did a girl run away without some member of the household being in her confidence. Her sister, a maid—” She rose quickly from the table. “Sophie, ring the bell for Jenkins. I shall want the carriage in ten minutes.”

“The fitting is not for an hour,” Sophie said.

“We shall have to forget the fitting for today.”

“So where are you going?”

“To Aubrey Square, of course.”

“Aubrey Square! But why? Yesterday you were going to have nothing more to do with the Darcys.”

“They are family, and they are in grave trouble. The rest is bad enough, but this will reflect on us all, and will, if Georgina is not apprehended, bring Darcy post-haste back to England. He left his daughters in our care as well as in the Fitzwilliams’. Mr. Gardiner is named joint guardian of them, you know, while Darcy and Elizabeth are abroad, and a poor show we have made of our duty, between us all. I have been too wrapped up in your wedding; I have left Fanny to cope alone, and with young children of her own, how could she ever take proper care of five headstrong girls?”

As she was speaking, she walked into the library. She sat down at Mr. Gardiner’s desk, quickly wrote a few lines, sealed the note and handed it to Jenkins.

“Have this taken round to Mr. Wytton’s house, Jenkins, at once. If he is not at home, the footman is to enquire where he may be found and take the note to him wherever he is.”

“Why are you writing to Mr. Wytton, Mama? Does he have to be told everything that happens to the Darcys? Is he so interested?”

“It is to beg him to excuse us from our drive to Hampton Court.”

Sophie’s face brightened; at least she had got out of the excursion without yet another argument with her mother.

Camilla watched the two women on the sofa, alike in so many ways, so sure of their roles as wives and mothers and protectors of the status quo.

“Well, my dear Mrs. Gardiner,” Fanny was saying, “we know more than we did when Fitzwilliam sent round to Mr. Gardiner.”

The twins’ maid had, in the end, broken down and confessed that she had known that Miss Georgina was planning to run away, although she didn’t know where to, or whether she was running off with a man.

“A likely story,” Sackree had said, unimpressed. “Miss Georgina wouldn’t go off in a chaise of her own accord; she wouldn’t be off at that ungodly hour without there was some man making the arrangements.”

“Tell us who she’s with, you snivelling little piece,” said Dawson, giving the maid another vigorous shake. “You shan’t keep your place here, if I have anything to do with it, or if you do, you’ll regret it; we’ve no time for a dishonest servant. But if you was to tell the truth for once in your life, who knows, you might be given a character of some kind.”

The sniffs stopped for a moment and the maid’s slightly protuberant eyes looked resentfully out from behind a rather grubby apron held up to mop her flowing tears.

“I don’t need no character. I’m going home to my auntie, to help on the farm; they’ll be glad enough to have me, and when my mistress comes back, she’ll take me on again.”

“Your mistress come back!” Dawson’s voice was full of scorn. “Fat chance of that, and what kind of a household might she be setting up, pray, seventeen years old and gone off with a married man?”

“How do you know he’s married?”

Sackree edged Dawson aside and put her face only inches from the maid’s tear-stained one. “Because she’s run off with Sir Joshua Mordaunt, that’s how we know, and he has a wife alive and living in Hampshire.”

“Then it’s not him as she’s gone with, for she said as how she was going to be wed.”

“Not to him, she isn’t.”

“Maybe she can marry him abroad; they can do anything there, they are all heathens and Papists.” Then she gave a great wail and buried her face in her apron, inconsolable and beyond any further questioning.

Sackree let her go with a dismissive shove. “There, Miss Camilla, I don’t think you’ll get any more out of her, although if you don’t mind my speaking frank, Miss Belle knows a deal more than she’s letting on.”

Sackree and Dawson could hardly set about her the way they had done with her maid, although Camilla almost wished they might. It was Alethea, sauntering into the room in her unconcerned way, who gave them the information they wanted. “Georgina will be in France,” she said offhandedly. “With Sir Joshua Mordaunt. He has a house in Paris and another somewhere in the country. They will have gone there.”

How did Alethea know this?

“I keep my eyes and ears open, and Georgina is such a fool, she thinks I don’t understand what she and Belle are talking about. I don’t know why you are all making such a fuss. Let her stay away. Without her, Belle may turn into a sensible human being.”