Pride and Prescience (30 page)

Was Parrish responsible for other events as well? The carriage accident? The fire? Darcy would have to reconsider all of his previous theories. But now he hadn’t the time. He had to warn the others of Parrish’s duplicity. He shoved the letter back into Miss Kendall’s hands. “Show this to Mr. Bingley.”

“Where are you going?”

He hurried out the door, his heart hammering. Frederick Parrish was capable of anything, and he held the trust of the entire household.

Including Elizabeth.

“There is but such a quantity of merit between them; just enough to make one good sort of man; and of late it has been shifting about pretty much.”

Elizabeth to Jane,
Pride and Prejudice,
Chapter 40

F
or the second time that morning, Elizabeth knocked at the Parrishes’ chamber. This time it was Mr. Parrish who answered. He had removed his coat and cravat; the top buttons of his shirt were open. He appeared dour, as if his earlier displeasure yet lingered.

“I am glad to find you still here,” she said. He held the door open but a little, so that she could not see inside. “Is Mrs. Parrish within?”

“She is resting.”

Elizabeth hesitated to disturb her, but thought the errand should not wait. “I believe I may have important intelligence to share with you both.”

His brows rose. “Indeed?” He studied her face for a moment before opening the door wider and stepping back a pace. “Come in.”

She noticed as she passed him that he wore some sort of medallion around his neck beneath his shirt. It appeared to be fashioned of braided hair, in several hues, knotted together.
She recalled the amulet he had proposed making for Caroline and wondered if he wore a similar article.

Caroline was abed, sitting up with pillows propped behind her. Though she opened her eyes upon Elizabeth’s entrance, they stared vacantly, as if not recognizing the visitor. Her hands lay motionless in her lap.

Elizabeth shivered. It was cold in here; the fire sputtered in the grate. Outside, heavy flakes of snow had begun to fall rapidly, casting the room in dimness. She wondered that Mr. Parrish hadn’t asked a servant to bank up the fire.

She walked toward the bed and greeted Caroline, but received no response. The wedding ring remained on Mrs. Parrish’s left hand. It looked innocuous enough. But as Elizabeth neared the ring, the skin on the back of her neck prickled, and a sense of foreboding settled upon her.

Parrish closed the door. “What is this news?”

“I think I know what ails Mrs. Parrish.”

He started in surprise, then recovered himself. “Truly? I am all attention.”

She took a deep breath, anticipating the incredulous reaction she’d received from Darcy. If her own husband didn’t believe her, what chance did she have of convincing Parrish that the very ring he’d given his wife as a symbol of his affection was the source of all her problems? But the longer she stood in proximity to the ring, the more certain she became that her intuition was correct.

“Please do not accuse me of reading too many novels,” she said, “but I believe the ring you gave Mrs. Parrish bears some sort of curse.”

He laughed. But it was not a merry sound, nor one of casual dismissal. It was a sinister cackle. His countenance changed, the characteristic openness suddenly replaced by a hardened mask. “Why, Mrs. Darcy, you are more intelligent than even I gave you credit for.”

Dread swept her. He knew. The ring was cursed, and he already knew.

“Too smart for your own preservation.”

In an eyeblink, he had a knife in hand, pulled from his boot before she realized he’d reached for it. The blade glittered in the weak firelight.

She instinctively retreated a step, evoking more laughter from him.

“That’s right—back up. Closer to my helpless wife.”

She glanced at Caroline, who lethargically observed them as if watching a theatrical. “What have you done to her?”

“Improved her disposition. Don’t you agree?”

“I concur with Mr. Kendall. Marriage does not seem to agree with her.”

“Take care, Mrs. Darcy. Or you’ll meet the same fate he did.” He spun the knife in his hand. “Only Kendall never saw it coming.”

The knife—Kendall had died of a knife wound. Parrish must have been involved in Randolph’s ritual. “You killed Mr. Kendall?”

“Does anyone else in this house have the guts?”

“Why?”

“The greedy bastard was trying to blackmail me. I told him to go to hell. Then I sent him there.”

Still gripping the knife in his right hand, Parrish brought his left forward. He grasped his own wedding ring between thumb and forefinger, and twisted it round. “Caroline, help Mrs. Darcy find a seat while I decide what to do with her.”

Caroline rose easily from the bed, in full possession of her physical faculties. She grabbed Elizabeth with surprising strength, forced her into a chair, and held her arms immobile.

“Mrs. Parrish—
Caroline
? How can you help him do this?”

Mrs. Parrish either couldn’t hear her or ignored her.

“Caroline belongs to me.” Parrish cackled again. “Her
wedding vows included a promise to obey—didn’t yours? Tsk! Terrible oversight on your husband’s part. I’ll have to give him the name of my jeweler.”

His gaze never leaving Elizabeth, Parrish crossed to a chest of drawers and removed a fistful of neckcloths. Pressing his knife to the base of Elizabeth’s throat, he instructed Caroline to bind her ankles and wrists to the chair. Elizabeth breathed shallowly through her nose, afraid the slightest movement would cause the blade to pierce her.

When she was bound, he held the knife away a few inches and ordered Caroline to gag her with the last cravat. “I really quite liked you, Mrs. Darcy. You were the only person in this whole vapid house with sufficient wit to challenge me.” He tossed the blade in the air, spinning it end over end, then reached up and caught it squarely by its handle. “Don’t attempt anything stupid, and I might let you live.”

Her heart pounding so loud that it nearly drowned out his words, she nodded.

He snickered. “Why don’t I trust you?” He handed the blade to Caroline. “Slice her if she moves.”

He crossed to the armoire with rapid steps, withdrew a valise, and set it open on the bed. From various drawers he pulled clothing, money, documents—and a dagger with a jagged blade twice the size of the one Caroline held.

A knock at the door interrupted his packing. He gestured for Caroline to hold her knife against Elizabeth’s throat once more. Unreleased breath filled her lungs. Staring at the dagger Parrish gripped, she at once prayed it was Darcy who stood outside, and prayed it wasn’t.

Parrish approached the door. “Who’s there?”

“Mrs. Darcy’s maid, sir. By chance is she with Mrs. Parrish?”

He opened the door a crack. “Mrs. Darcy isn’t here. I haven’t seen her all morning.”

“Yes, sir. Sorry to disturb you.”

He shut the door without response.

Lucy!
Elizabeth silently willed her faithful servant to get as far away from this chamber of horror as possible—yet to somehow know she needed help.

Pressed against the wall outside Parrish’s room, Darcy met Lucy’s gaze. She shook her head and shrugged—she had not been able to see inside.

Damn.

He jerked his head toward the stairs. As prearranged, the servant left to summon assistance.

Parrish’s lie that he hadn’t seen Elizabeth all morning further strengthened Darcy’s suspicions that she was in fact within. If this was what his wife meant by intuition, he was starting to put some stock in it. He only hoped the instinct that told him she yet lived was also accurate. He deeply regretted their quarrel, that their last moments together had been laced with tension and unhappiness. Dear God, if he could but hold Elizabeth safe in his arms once more, hear his name on her lips, he’d patiently listen to every far-fetched notion she cared to utter.

Cold terror clawed his chest. He had never feared for himself the way he now feared for her. Parrish was a violent man without conscience, and Elizabeth was within striking range. Common sense told him to wait for help, but he dared not allow another minute’s delay.

He cocked the pistol he had borrowed from Bingley’s desk. Bracing himself for whatever he might find on the other side, he swung wide the door and burst in.

“Mr. Darcy. I wondered when you might join us.”

Parrish calmly greeted Darcy’s dramatic entrance. Standing in the center of the chamber, he gestured with a wicked-looking dagger toward the side of the room. “As you can
see, your wife has already made herself comfortable.”

Elizabeth was bound and gagged, and—Darcy’s jaw dropped—held at knifepoint by Caroline Parrish.

“Mrs. Parrish?” Darcy struggled to comprehend the scene. He could not believe Caroline would act in collusion with the ruffian.

“Put down that pistol before someone gets hurt. My wife is a most attentive hostess, I assure you.”

Darcy instead aimed the weapon at Parrish. “I know Caroline Bingley. She would not harm Elizabeth.”

“Caroline Bingley might not. But Caroline Parrish will if I ask her to. She’ll do anything I command. Imagine that—a wife who does her husband’s bidding! Perhaps yours would get into less trouble if she followed suit.”

Parrish was bluffing. Had to be. Darcy had known Caroline for more than a decade, and while she did not harbor any great affection for Elizabeth, physically harming another person was not in her nature. He held the pistol steady.

“Don’t believe me?” Parrish slowly brought his hands together and twisted his ring. “Caroline, run that blade down your own cheek.”

Caroline lifted the knife. In a motion too swift for Darcy to prevent, she scratched the side of her face. A thin ribbon of blood welled and dribbled down her cheek. She returned the blade to the base of Elizabeth’s throat.

“If a woman as vain as my wife will disfigure herself at my command, do you doubt what she’ll do to your precious Elizabeth?”

Darcy, nauseated by what he’d just witnessed, stared at Parrish. What kind of monster was he? And what sort of domination did he hold over Caroline? He looked at Parrish’s ring. He’d fingered it before issuing the vile order. Glancing back at Caroline, he noted that she still wore her own wedding ring. Was it possible that Elizabeth was right?
Could the rings possess some mysterious power?

Parrish laughed, a malevolent, sickening sound. “Realization dawns on stuffy English intellect. Your wife caught on much faster than you. Now, speaking of the little lady—if you love her, put the pistol down.”

Slowly, Darcy set the pistol on the floor.

“Fool.”

“How is such a man to be worked on?”

Elizabeth to Darcy,
Pride and Prejudice,
Chapter 46

E
lizabeth ignored the lump in her throat, not daring to swallow it. The tip of Caroline’s knife pressed into her flesh. Perspiration trickled down her throat. Or was it blood?

Parrish kicked the pistol toward Caroline. “Here, darling—I think even you can figure out how to use this.” The weapon scudded across the floor, coming to rest near Elizabeth’s foot. Elizabeth, hoping to kick it under the bed, strained against the bond at her ankle, but it held fast. Caroline set her knife on the night table and picked up the gun.

“If either of them tries anything, shoot the other,” Parrish said.

Elizabeth hadn’t known such wickedness existed in the world. She dared not look at Darcy. He’d already relinquished his weapon because of her; she did not want him to see the terror she felt for him and herself. Nor did she want Parrish to know that in threatening him he’d found her greatest vulnerability.

Her mind raced, trying to devise a way to help her husband.
She couldn’t speak, couldn’t move . . . much. She tested her wrist constraints. The left secured her tightly to the chair arm, but she found the right just loose enough to allow slight movement. If she proceeded very slowly, so as not to draw Caroline’s notice, perhaps she could reach her pocket—and the housewife inside. What she hoped to accomplish with sewing notions she knew not, but attempting to reach a pin or needle seemed more useful than doing nothing.

“Parrish, there is no reason anyone has to get hurt.” Darcy held his hands before him in a show of cooperation. “Let my wife go, and we can settle this like gentlemen.”

“Like gentlemen?” Parrish snorted. “And just what does that mean? Shall we repair to the drawing room for tea? I’ve endured enough foppish English manners. I’ve got you and your wife at gunpoint, man—let’s drop the phony civility.”

Darcy straightened and took a step toward Elizabeth’s side of the room. “All right, then. Tell me what it is you want.”

Elizabeth worked her fingers closer to her pocket. They reached its edge.

“First, I want you to stop moving toward your wife. Do you think I’m stupid? There—” With the dagger, he pointed to the other side of the room, near the sputtering fire. “I want you there.”

Darcy moved where he indicated. Just a couple feet from the flames, his form cast long shadows on the floor.

To keep both eyes on Darcy, Parrish now had to stand with his body turned away from Elizabeth. She dipped her fingers inside her pocket. They brushed something, but not the expected housewife—a chain . . . Professor Randolph’s watch. She nearly cried in frustration. Of what possible use was that watch right now? She pawed it until it slid into her palm. Perhaps she could move it out of her way and yet reach the housewife.

“Second,” Parrish continued, “I want money. Lots of it.”

“How much?”

“How much do you have?” Parrish ran a fingertip along the flat of the blade. He cocked his head as if an idea had just occurred to him. “More to the point, how much is your wife worth? She’ll be taking a little trip with me, you see, until a generous sum finds its way to us. I’d planned to just bring Caroline—we never had a proper honeymoon, you know. But adding Elizabeth could make things far more . . . exciting.”