by Kate Speck
Mrs. Gardiner calmly raised her hands to cease his speech. Once he sat back down, she continued, “You cannot see her because she is not here, Mr. Darcy. She returned to Hertfordshire on the first post this morning. She was determined to return home and I asked her to wait until you called on her first but when you did not turn up after waiting all day yesterday, she had her belongings packed and departed with her sister on the post at sunrise.” Darcy gasped. “She jested that she did not believe in bad luck for traveling on Friday the thirteenth and she left promptly. She should be sending word that she arrived safely by Monday, I should think.”
Darcy felt as if he could not breathe and leaned back on his seat.
“Are you well, Mr. Darcy? Lizzy told me that she had been in an argument with you but did not reveal anything else. She sent a note to Miss Darcy before leaving but she was most eager to go home to her father and to the peace of the countryside. She never did endure town for very long after her coming out. She always thought she was a hoyden as a child and once she had to behave like a proper lady, she detested town like her father and that is why she is not widely known to those in society here.”
Darcy finally gathered his strength and stood up. “Thank you for your time, Mrs. Gardiner. I will speak with my sister. I... I do not know when I will return again but please, if you... could you please send word when you hear from Miss Elizabeth? I wish to... I want to ensure she arrived safely.” He bowed after she agreed and walked out of the parlour.
As he gathered his hat and gloves, the young George Gardiner ran over and hugged his leg.
“Mr. Dawcy! Why are you going? Can you stay and play with us?” He begged.
Darcy knelt to greet his young friend, “Master Gardiner, I am afraid I have an appointment and will need to go. I do not know when I will see you again but I do hope soon. Very soon with your cousin Lizzy.” His chest pierced that Elizabeth had left him. “I must go. Oh, but before I leave,” he pulled out two small packages from his coat pocket, “Happy Christmas, George. The blue ribbon is for you and the pink for your sister.”
George hugged him and squealed in joy to show the gifts to his mother while Darcy stood and departed Gardiner House with a broken heart.
Chapter 14
“Lizzy, you are being unreasonable!” Mr. Bennet chastised his favourite daughter. “I am certain Mr. Darcy does not hate you. He did not care that you were a daughter of a poor gentleman and he will forgive you for your words and propose to you as he had always wished. Your sister will also forgive you for separating her love as soon as Mr. Bingley arrives next month.” Seeing that Elizabeth was beginning to weep again, he chuckled, “I am only jesting, child! Jane supports you and is not affected by the separation. Although she did not have a chance to bid him farewell, Madeline promised to inform him of her whereabouts and he will arrive in January, if not sooner! I would not be surprised if both young men arrive and establish themselves at the inn for a full fortnight before Netherfield is prepared!”
Elizabeth wiped her face, “For Jane, I expect Mr. Bingley will arrive as planned, but I have little hope of seeing Mr. Darcy again. I accused him of being a murderer, papa. He will never forgive me. His good opinion...”
“Is not lost forever, Lizzy!” Mr. Bennet interrupted. “You have not lost it and you will not lose it. I will wager that he is likely on horseback right now to call on you today. He must have been delayed yesterday and it being Friday the thirteenth, few, except you, would travel on such an ominous date. He is on his way here today, I am sure. Just you wait, Lizzy.” He assured her.
Elizabeth kissed her father’s cheek and left his study to begin her walk to Oakham Mount. No, papa, she thought to herself, you did not see his face. I betrayed his trust and he will never forgive me. I criticised him for being ill-tempered when he was only protecting me, and for me to accuse him of being a killer... I wounded him greatly and he knows I am unfit to be a respectable wife and mistress to his homes.
She strode briskly to her favourite vista to wonder if she would ever see him again.
~*~
“I know you wished to leave for Hertfordshire but all of the discoveries that we have found this past week will be incredibly vital to capturing the criminal.” Robert Peel comforted his friend. “Have you written to her? At least to her father?”
Darcy replied, “No, I attempted several times but I could not finish it. I do not know what to say to her. I know I should beg for her forgiveness but to put it in writing; to tell her of my past on parchment is not how I wish to reveal it. I only wish I had run to her after I awoke, even if it had been the middle of the night after the ball. I am ready to leave for Hertfordshire every morning to see her but my fear that she will not hear me prevents me from departing. She left me, Peel. She left without word and she might wish to end it all. She wrote to Georgiana that an urgent matter called her home but she mentioned nothing for me and she probably despises me. I do not know how I will face her.”
Darcy rubbed his waistcoat pocket where he still carried his mother’s ring. “I have hope whilst I am away from her. If I go to her and she rejects me, it is over. She has spurned me before when I first confessed to her that I loved her, Robert.” He sighed then continued. “I told her I was in love with her and she accused me of sleeping with Mrs. Younge. I tried to walk away from her but then she took ill and I thought she was going to die. Everyone around me died, Robert. I am protective of my sister and she is guarded now, but I made the mistake of hiring a charlatan who lied to get into my household and even that woman is dead. Perhaps I am meant to be alone. Elizabeth nearly died when she was standing next to me. Until we capture this J.W., I am better off alone.” He returned to the stack of papers on the desk. “No; I cannot see her until my curse is lifted.”
“I am sorry, Darcy. I did not know she had accused you of bedding Mrs. Younge. How did that come about? You did not actually...” Peel began to ask.
“Heavens, no! What do you take me for?” Darcy replied. “No, she had witnessed her with J.W. and failed to realise that the two doors that she walked down the corridor would not give me enough time to make myself presentable and sit brooding in my study two minutes later.” He chuckled. “No, she thought me the worst of men and told me that George Wickham...” he froze.
A moment later, he gathered his thoughts and looked through several of the papers scattered about. “She said that she had heard of my dishonour to keep the living from Wickham. He spun his pathetic story and told only his version to make her believe I was hateful and jealous. But when did they meet? When did George Wickham return to London to make Elizabeth’s acquaintance? He was in Derbyshire and demanding more money the last time I saw him.”
Peel looked through several notes and commented, “My men reported seeing Wickham lurk about in London. He is known to many because of his debts. Do you believe Wickham is connected to Allens?”
Darcy huffed, “That fool Allens married Caroline Bingley yesterday and they left for Ramsgate immediately after Mrs. Allens, his mother, disowned them and vowed to never see them again because of all the trouble they caused. Richard took that nitwit aside to interrogate him and he swore that he did not kill his cousin for the inheritance. Allens did not seem to know anything about how Donohoe died but only about the birthmark. Richard thinks Allens hired someone to kill the cousin but since we have no evidence, there was nothing else we could do.”
“Is Wickham capable of murdering someone? Murdering seven people?” Peel asked. “Then who is J.W.? How does he fit into all this? I thought we were getting closer but now we have another player in this investigation.”
“But we are closer, my friend.” Darcy replied. “Since reviewing the notes and tracking down Lawrence Smith, we have guessed that the second victim in the River Thames murders is the same Lawrence Smith who was bribed into keeping Donohoe’s identity a secret and released the body to Samuel Allens. He was last seen flaunting some wealth and then suddenly disappeared, never to be seen again an
d neglecting to write to his mother in Dover as he had done weekly for the past two years. He is connected to Jacob Donohoe and Mrs. Younge is connected to J.W. This is more information than we had before and we are closer to capturing J.W.” Darcy added. “Allens is being monitored closely and we now know George Wickham might be linked to the crimes as well. We will get to the bottom of this soon. The men and women of London are fearful and I know you have been working with the Home Secretary and assigned an honest magistrate to work on solving it. We will continue to investigate from the shadows and we will find...”
Colonel Fitzwilliam abruptly opened the door just then and entered Peel’s study. “It has happened again. Three people dead. The King’s Arms, East End.”
Darcy and Peel swiftly ran out of the room to have their horses saddled and rode to the horrifying scene, where a man in his fifties, his wife, and their servant were murdered in the tavern.
~*~
“Darcy, Colonel, this is Aaron Graham, my man that I have been working with. He is the Bow Street magistrate and has contributed significantly to our own private investigations.” Robert Peel quietly introduced him to Darcy and Colonel Fitzwilliam.
“Graham,” Peel turned to the magistrate, “you know secrecy is of utmost importance and no one must know that we are involved. I am on holiday from Parliament and Darcy is only a gentleman who is invested in finding the killer and has been financially supporting our research. The colonel is under orders to keep the peace in London and no one can know that the military is assisting in this endeavour.” The older man nodded. “Tell us what you know.”
Mr. Graham cleared his throat and walked the gentlemen through the tavern. “A constable was alerted when he heard someone shouting ‘murder’ and a large crowd congressed to see if they could capture the criminal, when John Turner, a lodger who has been living upstairs for the past eight months, was seen climbing down on a rope of knotted sheets and crying frantically. He was completely naked for some reason and I have him sitting with one of my trusted men to calm him. Several men broke through the locked door and found the bodies, with the tavern owner’s head beaten and his throat slit and his hand nearly hacked off.” He showed them the pool of blood then walked to another. “The wife and maid were found here in the parlour, also with their head smashed and throats cut. Two men searched the rooms and found a fourteen-year-old girl, the granddaughter, still sleeping in her rooms and untouched. She slept through the entire ordeal, sir. The bodies were placed on the beds and the girl was taken out, and the fire bells were rung for the London Bridge to be sealed off to prevent the escape route.”
“Was anything found inside any of the victim’s mouths?” Darcy asked.
Graham answered, “I do not know, sir. I will have someone take a look.” He whispered to a Bow Street Runner before heading outside with the group.
He led the gentlemen to the parlour next door and showed them John Turner, who was shaking and sipping tea laden with a drop of whiskey.
Graham continued, “If he had been the perpetrator, he would have some blood on his body, even if he had discarded all of his clothes quickly, but not a spot of it is visible. Not on his head, hands, nails, anywhere else. His room was inspected and his clothes are piled on the chair, like he said. I believe he may have had a prostitute in his room and why he was naked in the middle of December, but that would have been earlier in the evening. One of the neighbours mentioned possibly seeing a woman walking out an hour ago and a woman could not have done all of that, especially alone.”
“What were the names of the victims?” Darcy asked, as he wrote down his own notes.
Graham reviewed his pad, “John Williamson, his wife Elizabeth, and the maid, Bridget Anna Harrington,” he replied.
Darcy wrote the names down and underlined the ‘J’ and the ‘W’. “Interesting,” he commented. “Has John Turner said anything else?”
“Yes, sir.” Graham responded, “He said he overheard the tavern owner complain to the parish constable that he saw a man wearing a brown jacket lurking around and listening at his door. Turner heard the grievance from his window which was cracked open due to being heated and then he soon fell asleep, only to hear noises downstairs. He opened his door to peek out and saw a man, about six feet tall with dark hair, in a flushing coat standing over Mrs. Williamson’s corpse. That is when he screamed out and chased the man away.”
Richard Fitzwilliam spoke out next, “Keep Turner under surveillance and report to us if his story changes. We cannot rule him out yet since we do not know why he was naked. He might have very well disposed of the clothes and we will need daylight to have the place turned inside out.” He nodded to Darcy and Peel, “This is going to be a mess. An absolute nightmare.”
“I will visit the Home Secretary now, gentlemen. Graham, I will leave you in charge. Keep our involvement out of it and let us know if you need additional resources. We will do everything we can to get you what you need.” Peel confirmed.
“At least this may not be related to the other murders.” Darcy blew out his breath. “It could be completely random and a madman seeking revenge. Oh, Mr. Graham,” he called out to the magistrate, “what was the murder weapon? Their heads were smashed. What did the killer use? Did we find the knife?”
“It was an iron bar, sir,” Graham replied. “We do not know where it came from and perhaps the killer brought it himself. No knife, sir.”
Darcy sighed, “What a terrible way to die. Thank you, Mr. Graham.”
“Oh, by the way, sir,” Graham added, after one of his men whispered something in his ear as the gentlemen turned to leave, “I was just told that a handkerchief was found inside John Williamson’s mouth. Stuffed in deep. Not sure what that has to do with it but I had one of my men check it while we were speaking and he just confirmed it.”
“Thank you, Graham. Keep that piece of news to yourself only.” Peel commanded.
Mr. Graham bowed and left the men to return to the investigation.
“Damnation!” Darcy cursed. “It is the same. It is the same Ratcliff Highway murderer.” He looked at his friend and cousin. “Ten. This man is responsible for ten murders!”
~*~
“Lizzy,” the young man called out, “what can I do to make you smile? Are you not happy with papa’s engagement?” He sat down on the couch and squeezed her hand in concern.
Elizabeth embraced her brother, “Oh, Brandon! No, not at all! I adore Mrs. Howard and she will be a wonderful mama to us all. I could not be happier that papa is going to marry such an elegant and kind lady.”
Brandon’s eyebrows furrowed, “But you have been so melancholy and I do not know what is wrong. I remember Jane being so sad when Mr. Goulding passed and you look the same. You are the funnest sister of all but even Lydia is afraid to tease you since you have been so fickle.”
“Most fun. Not ‘funnest’, silly brother.” Elizabeth smiled softly. “Thank you for comforting me, Brandon. I have been not myself lately but with you home and the Gardiners to arrive tomorrow, my spirits will certainly be lifted up and I will return to my usual self. There are so many happy events, with Christmastime, papa getting married, and Aunt Madeline has also written that she is expecting again, I am extremely happy for all of the blessings around me. I believe children in Longbourn is exactly what I need and having you home for Christmas is wonderful. I will be well. I have made some terrible mistakes while I was in London and I know not if I will be forgiven, but with the yuletide celebrations and the new year approaching, I will pray for a new beginning and to find happiness again. All will be well.”
“Are you going to be married off, too, Lizzy?” Her brother asked, “All Kitty and Lydia can talk about is officers and getting married and that Jane will be soon moving to Netherfield. I heard Mrs. Johnson tell them that the men of the militia are not wealthy and Lydia was pouting all day that she wanted to marry a handsome officer with loads of fortune so she could attend balls and parties every day. Papa threatened her to send her
off to school if she keeps behaving like the silliest girl in England.”
Elizabeth laughed, “I have heard her as well and I believe she is coming to understand that fifteen is too young to marry. With papa getting married two days after Boxing Day, she will have not only Mrs. Johnson but also the new Mrs. Bennet to teach her. No, Brandon, I have no plans of getting married soon. I wish to marry for the deepest of affections and the only man I... no, I will be home for quite some time, I should think.” She sighed.
“Well, I will protect you, Lizzy. I will not let anyone unworthy take you away from us.” Brandon hugged his favourite sister and stood her up. “Come now, Lizzy. You have been indoors too long. Let us go throw some pebbles into the pond. I have learned to skip stones and I want to show you. I might finally best you at something, sister!”
Elizabeth laughed and walked outside with her dear brother to play with him and take her mind off of Mr. Darcy. She now accepted the fact that after a week of being back at Longbourn with no visit or even a letter to her father, Mr. Darcy was likely terminating his courtship and she would be alone. She was determined to be a doting aunt to Jane’s children and would never marry. She had lost the one man she loved in the world and she knew it was all of her own doing.
Chapter 15
The Gardiners greeted the Bennet family with merry laughter and numerous packages for Christmas gifts. The younger Bennet girls fawned over Charlotte who had turned three years old the day before and placed ribbons in her hair, while George followed after Brandon and attempted to emulate the young man whom he idolised.
Jane and Elizabeth embraced their aunt and asked after her health. After confirming that she was doing very well at four months into her pregnancy, Elizabeth commented, “I saw that you have brought too many presents, Aunt Madeline. You should not have troubled yourself so. We are appreciative of your love and having you here at Longbourn is our gift.”