by Beth Poppet
At this, Jane began to cry softly into the hand that was not clutching her son to her bosom, and her aunt moved to embrace her so that her head might fall on her shoulder. “There, there, sweet girl. Listen to your much older and wiser aunt. There is no need to punish yourself for what has passed.”
“I did not love him,” Jane lamented. “Not properly. Not as I ought to have.”
“That is utter nonsense, my dear. You married him, you kept his house, you bore his son, and I know you never spoke ill of him all the days of his life, despite feeling no grand attraction to the man. I most emphatically disagree with your assessment, Jane. You sacrificed your own heart in order to serve a husband you were not romantically inclined towards. If that does not evidence the most selfless kind of love, I don’t know what would. It does no good to speak ill of the dead, so I will say nothing of his own motives for matrimony, save that from your mother and sisters’ account it was mostly to please his patroness and not from a position of romantic feeling, either. I am certain you were the best wife he could have hoped for, and you would not blame him for remarrying if your roles were reversed, would you?”
Jane raised her tearful face to consider a moment. “No. Of course, I would hope that he would marry again. Someone better than I. Someone to truly love him; not just out of duty but out of natural tenderness and affection.”
“There,” Mrs Gardiner said as if it was all settled, dabbing Jane’s wet eyes with her handkerchief. “In light of that, what do you say to my advice now? Will you accept Mr Bingley’s charming ways and stop fretting over what has passed?”
Jane put on a bleak smile. “I will try not to feel too guilty in my enjoyment of a good man’s company, but I still will not dream up a future where there may be none.”
“Well,” her aunt sighed, but not in disappointment. “That sounds a bit more like my Jane.”
Mrs Gardiner’s suspicions regarding Mr Bingley’s depth of feeling were by no means quelled when the gentleman in question decided to stay at Pemberley when his sisters vacated. Jane maintained it was merely convenience, as he said he did not wish to “saddle Caroline with my clumsy limp for a good spell.” This was fairly believable too, as Miss Bingley made no secret of her eagerness to be back in London and running things as she saw fit and proper. Netherfield Park would remain empty for the time being, as neither she nor Mrs Hurst would suffer that savage location from which to host their own balls and parties. Mr Hurst was indifferent on the matter, perhaps with a slight reluctance to being parted from the generous stores of Mr Darcy’s excellent wines and made to return to his own provisions.
Though both sisters shared in the derision of their inferiors, in making herself out to be Elizabeth’s rival, Caroline’s snobbery was remembered even months after her departure, and Elizabeth delighted to bring her name into any occasion by which she felt it possible to have missed the mark in her own dress, deportment, or interactions with higher society. This was a tactic especially employed during private moments with her husband, as more often than not it would cause him just enough irritation to gruffly declare he did not care what Caroline Bingley would have done, as he had married Elizabeth Bennet. The remonstrances to follow were of a most pleasing nature to Elizabeth and did nothing to discourage her continued teasing.
“My new lady’s maid tells me that the curls I wore to the Crofton’s are not quite the thing anymore,” she remarked one evening after dining with the family in question. “Caroline would have been most amused by my country fashion. I’m almost sorry she was not there to point it out so that I could have laughed it away with some defiant retort rather than found out after returning home.”
Mr Darcy was penning a letter to his solicitor despite the hour being late and the candlelight lessening. There were one or two matters of great import that he did not wish to forget to address. Although seemingly engaging all his faculties to finish his letter of business, Elizabeth’s remark did not go unheard. “No one who had the pleasure of observing you tonight could find anything wanting, regardless of the way your hair was curled,” he murmured to the inkwell.
“Hm,” she hummed, making a pretence of observing the curios locked in the cabinet before her, though her real aim was to study her figure. “You won’t be saying so when I begin to grow round and plump.”
“Have you been neglecting your daily walk?” he questioned, not even raising his eyes from the words hastily scratched out by his hand.
“No, sir, I have not,” she responded with amused indignance. “The expectation of my increase in girth may be attributed entirely to you.”
The accusation caused him to turn sharply in his seat.
“What?”
Assuming he understood her implication, he replied with an aggravated scowl, “I realise that our cook here makes richer food than you were previously accustomed to, but your lack of self-control in the face of sweet indulgences can hardly be blamed on me, Mrs Darcy.” He turned partially back to his unfinished task, uncertain if his defence was sufficient or if his wife would require more.
Elizabeth attempted to hide her growing smile with little success. “Now you are cross with me as you never use my married title in private unless you feel wronged.”
“And what of it?” his deepening frown only increased Elizabeth’s mirth. “Am I expected to thank you and call you pet names while you accuse me of neglecting your health?”
“Mr Darcy,” she said with a slight toss of her head, “though you are the most intelligent man I have ever known, you can be exceedingly obtuse at times. I am trying to tell you that I am with child.”
“Exasperating woman!” he declared, abandoning the desk and his employment there to come grasp her around the middle. “Why did you not say so and spare me your riddles?”
“I should much prefer to tease you,” she freely admitted. “I had hoped to tell you in a far more private setting, in as shocking and indiscreet a fashion as possible, but you insisted on coming here directly to write your letter. It is not my fault that you always see to duty before pleasure.”
He growled in that impatient manner she so adored and administered several punishing kisses on her expectant lips. “But how can you be certain?” he queried after his ministrations. “Shall I send for the doctor?”
“You may if you wish, but there are certain tell-tale signs that cannot be mistaken.” Her eyes narrowed with meaning. “And the lack of a regular monthly occurrence that confirms my own suspicions.”
“What am I to do?” he asked, lines of worry setting in around his eyes and forehead.
“Do?”
“We must prepare, of course,” he said with decision. “The nursery should be repapered. Georgiana will like to assist, I think…”
Elizabeth held up a finger against his anxious fretting. “Dearest, there are months yet before we need worry about preparations!”
“It can never be too soon,” he countered.
“Hm. Perhaps I would like a physician’s confirmation after all,” she laughed, “before you start to turn our lives upside-down just after we finally started to settle into some form of normalcy again.”
“Elizabeth, my love, if you wished for all to go on as before, you should not have told me of your condition.”
“Do not make me sorry I did,” she cautioned. “No one else knows of it but Jane.”
“When did you tell her?” he asked, doing a poor job of hiding his soured mood.
Elizabeth was all merriment. “There’s no need for jealousy. Jane was the first to suspect, and she was the one who told me there was something amiss. Now,” she batted him playfully, “will you hurry your letter along so that we may celebrate more properly in our chambers?”
“Soon, my love.” He tightened his grip on her and pressed a kiss to her temple. “I have but a few more lines to put down.”
“There is something far less joyous I must speak to you of as well,” she confessed. “I’ve had another letter from Mrs Wickham.”
; The displeasure in hearing that name uttered was evidenced in his sigh, “Yet another poorly veiled demand for funds?”
“I’m afraid this time it’s an invitation to Pemberley she’s wheedling for,” Elizabeth shared his unhappy expression. “Her husband will be occupied with training and musters, so she would be travelling unaccompanied, otherwise I would not even consider it.”
“Entirely unaccompanied?” Mr Darcy raised his eyes in barely suppressed disapproval.
“I’m afraid so. She writes that no one cares about such things as chaperones anymore, and as she’s a married woman of the world she does not fear travelling by post as a woman alone. I assume it’s her ploy to obtain funds for safer travel, as none of her family will countenance her taking foolish risks when something might be done about it. I had hoped to invite Kitty and Mary back to Pemberley for Easter, but I suppose we could host one more sister of mine if you’ve no objections.”
“I am not certain we are able to host anyone,” he responded gruffly. “I’ve written to Lady Catherine in the hopes that she might finally acknowledge our marriage and accept my visit to Rosings Park as she has done every year prior. I know she is lonely and does not like to travel overmuch for Anne’s sake, but I will not give her the pleasure of attending her without you by my side.”
“Well,” Elizabeth uttered with finality, “then I shall wait for Lady Catherine’s reply, and if we are for Rosings it will give a ready excuse for refusing Lydia’s request.”
“Will the colonel be joining us at Rosings?” she asked suddenly, once he’d returned to his desk and the letter.
“Why do you ask?” he grumbled, this time raising his eyes to her warily.
“No reason of great significance.” Something like practiced innocence marked her features, but to him it looked too practiced.
“If I did not know any better, I might be jealous of the special interest you seem to take in that man’s affairs,” he complained.
“No more than I take in Mr Bingley’s, or any other good friend of yours,” she said in her defence. Then, with a more laughing tone, “Although the list seems to make an abrupt stop after those two gentlemen.”
“Since you insist on knowing,” he answered, “The colonel will be a guest at Rosings as well. Do you intend to bring him back with us and try to match him with one of your sisters?” Mr Darcy resumed his writing, evidently not overly concerned with such a prospect.
“Heavens, no!” she cried, “You know he must marry wealth as well as charm and beauty. None of my sisters possess all three virtues and are therefore unsuitable. Whether Mary will ever be anything more than self-satisfied with her own flaws and allow herself to become either charming or lovely, I cannot say.”
“Mm.” Another dip of the pen. “You have a way of making the monetary requirements seem less necessary in the face of the latter inducements. I did not know if poor Arthur was safe from your matchmaking designs.”
“You are all flattery, Mr Darcy,” she spoke low into his ear, causing him a momentary lapse of thought before signing his missive with a flourish. “But if possible,” she said prudently, “I find it preferable for both parties to possess all the desired virtues. You and I are made of heartier stuff than most, and the colonel has admitted to me before that he does not intend to take a wife who cannot support his current lifestyle.” She grew more animated in seeing the dreadful letter of business was finally sealed and addressed, and she would soon have her husband’s undivided attention again. “Yet I still wish to have him back with us after he has fulfilled his obligations to your aunt,” she added.
“Very well,” he relented. “Our home is entirely at your disposal. Host all the eligible men from the neighbourhood if you feel so compelled.”
“I will do no such thing in my condition. I want only people I am fond of about me for the next handful of months. My own family being the exception.”
“Elizabeth,” he said seriously, turning to take both her hands from around his neck and keep them locked in his own, “I cannot tell you how happy I am to know that you are with child.”
“Then do not try,” she smiled invitingly. “But do come to bed and show me.”
∞∞∞
Lady Catherine’s reply to her nephew came swiftly, a marvel considering the number of pages she used up to make her answer known; an unequivocal refusal to allow “that woman” to darken her doorstep and heap insolence upon shame to her household. Now that she’d been given time to reflect since Mr Collins’s passing Lady Catherine was convinced that Miss Bennet’s behaviour must have contributed to that poor man’s early demise, and she was grossly insulted that Fitzwilliam would expect her to allow a woman with such a blackened soul to pollute the grounds of Rosings with her grasping trod.
Elizabeth laughed heartily at this theatrically dark portrait of herself, which put her husband a little more at ease, though he still simmered a while over the injustice of his aunt’s obstinance. He was in no mood to countenance the last part of her letter, which demanded he send Georgiana to Rosings if he was not willing to come himself, “for” she wrote, “I am a reasonable and forgiving woman and I see no reason to punish Georgiana for the sake of your sins, Fitzwilliam. I am prepared to receive her at the usual time, but be sure to send her with her guardian, for I will not abide young ladies travelling unaccompanied. Such a flagrant disregard for propriety and safety may be acceptable to those you have recently chosen to call your relations, but I find it monstrously unwise and unseemly.”
Elizabeth, however, saw no reason for Georgiana to decline the invitation as long as it was an agreeable plan to her. She reminded her husband that Lady Catherine was not a cruel sort of person, and it might be more comfortable for Georgiana to avoid the house so long as Lydia was within. Being that Elizabeth looked so favourably upon the invitation, the task then fell to her to present Lady Catherine’s wishes to Georgiana, thus sparing her husband the burden. This, she intended to do just as soon as they had all breakfasted together.
Her plans were disappointed however, by a mild headache and an unpleasant twinge in the stomach. She would have ignored them for the sake of breakfast, but she made the mistake of telling her husband of her ailments, and he instructed her to return to her bed and dine on the fruit he would send up to her room.
She was rewarded by her compliance, for rather than the servant she expected it was Georgiana who poked her head in the door.
“Fitzwilliam told me you were unwell,” she said in the soft and pleasant timbre suited to a sickbed, “so I asked him to let me come instead of Lavinia. I hope you do not mind.”
“Mind? Not at all! You are precisely the person I had hoped to see this morning! Would you join me here?” she patted the empty expanse of bed, indicating her desire for a decidedly informal conversation.
There was some rustling and rearranging as Georgiana had set the tray down on the floor while she’d asked after Elizabeth, finding it a rather large and cumbersome tray and not knowing quite how to manage both the balancing of tray and door.
With the bounty safely deposited on the bed before Elizabeth, the door was shut again, and Georgiana bounded girlishly to her side. Lizzy had never seen her so unguarded, and it made her glad that it was possible.
“I admit, I had hoped you would want some company,” Georgiana said with barely a hint of her shyness. “It is exactly what I should want were I bedridden, and it is all I really know to do for someone who is ill. Fitzwilliam used to smuggle fruit up to my room when I was laid up with a headache, and he stayed and sat with me until I grew tired and slept.”
Elizabeth laughed warmly, selecting an especially ripe looking morsel. “Your brother would have everyone else believe he is a perfect bear, but you and I know the truth of it.”
“Oh, and I’m so glad that you know as well as I!” Georgiana smiled in turn. “He has always been the best and kindest of brothers! But are you very ill?” her smile faded upon the query. “Fitzwilliam said it was a headache and sto
mach pains. Is there nothing more I can do for you? Or—ask the servants to do?” she added blushingly.
“No, it is a very mild headache, and the pain had passed almost as soon as I’d come back to bed. You see I have not even undressed or had the covers turned down. I only needed a moment to rally, but your brother is quite determined to make a delicate lady of me.
“Besides,” she said pointedly, “there is not much anyone can do for me until my time comes.”
Alarmed, Georgiana set down the slice of fruit she had taken up, “Your time? What do you mean? You are not… not so ill as to die?”
“No,” Elizabeth assured her with a twinkle in her eye. Then, in a more sombre manner, “At least… I hope it does not end that way.”
Georgiana took several moments of puzzled reflection before she could work out what was being alluded to. “Oh!” she cried at last, “Then you are to have… that is… how wonderful! But are you not frightened? I have heard how hard it was for Jane.”
“Yes,” she remembered, “Jane had a dreadful time of things, and it was painful to watch her toil so, but if the midwife who attended her is to be believed, her fears and doubts regarding her situation may have contributed to her hardship. Mrs Emery would take me aside and say it was a pity Jane was so unhappy, for in her experience there was nothing like joy and hope for the future to shorten a woman’s travails.”
“Mrs Hurst says her friend had a London doctor attend her who came highly recommended. Should you like me to find out his name for you?”
“No,” Elizabeth made such a face that Georgiana struggled to keep back a giggle. “I should not like that at all. I am not certain I could trust anyone that came highly recommended by Louisa Hurst. I would sooner take childbirth advice from Lady Catherine.”