An Engagement at Pemberley

by Rosemary Barton

  She paced about her room until she heard Bingley, the Hursts and Georgiana bidding each other goodnight outside her room. She waited a while longer until she was sure everyone would be asleep. She checked herself in the mirror one more time, making sure her gown was pulled enticingly low and her hair was loose and inviting. What man could resist her? Giving herself one last nervous smile, she slipped silently from her room.

  There was no sound coming from the other side of Darcy’s door. From the little she could see through the keyhole, no candles were lighting. Darcy was fast asleep.

  The door didn’t make a sound when she opened it. As she crossed the carpet towards the enormous bed, the trailing end of her gown snagged on the end of a chair and pulled it, causing a book it contained to drop to the floor with a thud.

  Darcy murmured and stirred. Caroline stayed frozen in place until he settled down again. She took a breath, the blood roaring in her ears as she looked at his naked chest, half covered with sheets. A strange mixture of fear and desire ran through her. There was still time to change her mind. Once she did this there was no going back.

  But the thought of Elizabeth lying in that bed with Darcy as his wife made her mind up for her. She was not about to allow that to happen. In only a few moments, she was under the sheets and at Darcy’s side.

  39

  As always, Darcy’s mind had been filled with Elizabeth before he slept. More than once, he had imagined her as his wife, sleeping beside him in that bed, or not sleeping as was usually the case. Now, he could enjoy such thoughts, not as a dream but as his future. In only two months, she would be with him in that bed and they would have endless nights to enjoy one another as man and wife. Such thoughts stirred him so much it was some time before he finally fell asleep.

  But even in sleep, he dreamed of her. He imagined the gentle compression of the bed as she slipped in beside him in the middle of the night. He dreamt of her warm body pressed against his, her silky hair tickling his chest. Still dreaming, he reached for her and captured her smiling mouth with his, rolling her over and pressing her back against the mattress as he…

  Something was wrong. Even in his dreams, Elizabeth was small and light. The Elizabeth in this dream was taller and less delicate. It did not feel like Elizabeth at all. Darcy opened his eyes.

  And stared into the smiling eyes of Caroline Bingley. He blinked in horror, expecting this dream to fade away as all dreams do. Instead of disappearing, she placed her hand behind his neck and pulled him down towards her, urging her to kiss him again.

  This was no dream.

  Darcy jumped away from her and stared down at her in horror.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” he snapped.

  Miss Bingley leaned up on her elbows against the pillow and gave him a heavy-lidded smile.

  “Come, Darcy. There is no need to be coy. You certainly gave me a warm enough welcome just now. Come back to bed.”

  “Get out of my bed at once, madam.”

  Miss Bingley’s smile fell. She didn’t move until Darcy snapped at her again. Frightened by something she could see in his eyes, she scrambled from the sheets and stood before him. Her gown was pulled low and she breathed heavily, standing very close to him. Darcy was not about to be distracted by such a cheap trick.

  “You were in my room last night,” he said, struggling to keep his voice level. “What do you think you are doing? Do you hope this will force me to marry you?”

  Miss Bingley’s eyes flashed with humiliation. “You will have to marry me now,” she insisted. “I am in your room in the middle of the night. You kissed me. And someone already knows I was here. You have no choice but to do the honourable thing. And you would not have responded to me as you did if you did not want me here.”

  Darcy laughed. “Is that what you think? Then you are more ignorant than I believed. I was asleep, madam. And dreaming of another. If I had known it was you, I would have dragged you out by the arm before touching you. And I am not above dragging you out by the arm if you do not leave here at once.”

  “And what happens then?” Miss Bingley demanded. “I will go to my brother at once and tell him what happened. He will insist you marry me.”

  “You think so, do you?” Darcy grasped her arm in a firm hand. “Why do we not test that theory out? Let us go to your brother at once and tell him what you have done. Let us see what happens; will he force me to marry you, or will he send you away in disgrace? I have my suspicions so I am not afraid of finding out.”

  “He would not send me away. He is my brother. He knows you will have to marry me or I will be ruined.”

  “He knows you will have ruined yourself. His other sister is already married so it is not as though you will hinder her chances. So, come along. Let us find out how he stands.”

  Miss Bingley pulls her arm free. Her eyes flashed with rage.

  “I suppose it is Eliza Bennet. She is the reason you are being so hateful You do not want to ruin your chances with little Miss Upstart. Mr Darcy, can you not see how she will ruin you?” She attempted to place a soothing hand on his forearm but he shook her off with a look of revulsion. Her eyes hardened. “Very well. If you wish to throw your life away on a woman who is not worthy of you, that is your affair. Your family will be horrified, and you will be the laughing stock of the ton, but I suppose you will be happy enough for the first year or so that it will not bother you. But next year? And the year after that? What then? What happens when it hurts Georgiana’s chances at marriage? Who will want a girl with such connections with trade?”

  “Your concern for my sister is most touching,” said Darcy sarcastically. “We are all fortunate to have you. But my sister has a fortune of thirty thousand pounds. I do not think any potential matches will be all that squeamish about her sister-in-law. And you forget that Elizabeth’s links to trade are far more tenuous than your own. Yet I imagine you do not think I will disgrace myself by marrying you.”

  “Elizabeth,” said Miss Bingley faintly. “You call her by that name. Are you already engaged to her then?”

  Darcy looked down at her coldly but it did not quite hide the spark of joy in his voice as he answered with a firm, “I am.”

  Miss Bingley recoiled and sat heavily on the bed. She stared at the floor in front of her. “You have thrown yourself away,” she said. “She is not worthy of you but you have allowed your desires to rule your head. She will disgrace you.”

  “That is my future wife you are referring to. I would advise you to show more respect.”

  Miss Bingley hardly heard him. She looked so distraught that just for a moment, his rage wavered and he felt pity. But as she reached for his hand, her eyes wild, he recalled that this woman would have forced him to marry her with no regard for his feelings or Elizabeth’s as long as she had what she wanted. He would not waste pity on a person like this.

  “I am marrying Elizabeth,” he said in a steady voice. “No matter what might have happened here tonight, I would have married her. Nothing you could have done would have changed that. So I will tell you once again to leave if you do not want everyone to know you threw yourself at an engaged man to coerce him into marriage and you failed miserably. I imagine you do not want that.”

  Miss Bingley stood up again. “If I am found here and you do not marry me, no one would think well of you. Your precious honour would be destroyed.”

  Darcy’s eyes were like flints. “If you do not leave right now, I will throw you out. And I will rouse the house so everyone will see what you attempted to do here tonight.”

  When Miss Bingley still did not move, Darcy made to grab her arm again but she pulled it out of his reach. Marching towards the door, she stopped and turned back. “You will regret what happened here tonight. And you will regret asking such a woman to marry you. And you will have no one to blame for your misery but yourself.”

  Darcy started towards her but she turned away quickly. “I am leaving. I am leaving.”

  After she was gone, Da
rcy sat heavily on the bed. He almost trembled with rage. To think, that selfish, grasping woman would have forced marriage on him and destroyed his happiness and Elizabeth’s forever. Something had to be done about her. And he was not about to allow her the luxury of several hours to come up with a story to absolve herself. He strode towards the door and down the hall to Bingley’s room.

  40

  Elizabeth found it hard to hide her excitement when she told her aunt and uncle of their invitation to Pemberley.

  “But why should Mr Darcy do that?” Aunt Gardiner asked. “Does he have a particular reason?”

  “Do not tease her, my dear,” said Uncle Gardiner. “I am sure we shall know why soon enough.”

  Elizabeth smiled and kissed him on the cheek. “So, you agree? We shall stay at Pemberley?”

  “I do not see why not.”

  And now, Elizabeth’s heart soared as the carriage turned the bend to bring Pemberley before them. For the first time, she saw it as her future home. This was where she would live day after day with the man she loved. It was where her children would be born and where she would grow old. It would become the dearest place in the world to her because of all the future memories she looked forward to making there.

  Oddly enough, Darcy was not there to greet them when they arrived. Footman emerged to help them with their trunks as Elizabeth looked around in disappointment. Where was he?

  More strangely still, there was another, smaller carriage already before the house with trunks piled into it. Elizabeth looked closely to see the initials C.B imprinted on them. Charles Bingley. She hoped he was not going away already.

  From a nearby rose garden, there appeared to be some commotion going on. Elizabeth could not resist drawing near to see what was happening.

  “How could you, Charles?” Miss Bingley’s eyes were red and they bulged with rage. “How could you choose him over me? Am I not your sister?”

  “A fact that I have come to regret more and more as the years pass by.” Elizabeth flinched at the tightly controlled rage in Bingley’s voice. “You have disgraced yourself and me. You will leave here and you will not return again until or unless I say so. You are not welcome in London. You will stay with our aunt in Scarborough indefinitely. You miscalculated badly and now you will feel the consequences of it.”

  Miss Bingley’s hands were balled into fists. “How can you be so hateful? My reputation has been compromised and you will not remedy it. Any decent brother would have ordered him to marry me but you, weak coward that you are, you capitulate to him like I am nothing.”

  “Don’t be foolish, Caroline. I have had quite enough of your tantrums over the years. You attempted to compromise yourself. It didn’t work. You are fortunate Darcy only spoke to me instead of disgracing you publicly. If he had, I would not have blamed him.”

  Miss Bingley stared at her brother as if she had never seen him before in her life. Elizabeth’s heart raced. What was the meaning of all this? Compromise? Had Miss Bingley attempted to make Darcy compromise her so he would marry her? Would she really stoop to such a low?

  Miss Bingley turned in her direction. She drew back quickly and was about to walk away when Miss Bingley came upon her.

  “Listening around corners,” she said. “That is precisely the sort of low behaviour I would expect from someone like you. I suppose you heard all that, did you? And I suppose you think you are very clever?”

  “I do think I am rather clever, yes,” said Elizabeth. “But I am not sure why you are behaving as though I have anything to do with your actions. I am not the one who tried to induce a gentleman into marrying me.”

  Miss Bingley took a step towards Elizabeth. She was much larger than her and towered over her but Elizabeth would not be cowed. She glared back at the taller woman with defiance and refused to step back.

  “You have ruined him,” she said. “You will not be received by his family. Your selfishness will make him unacceptable to London society. But I suppose you do not care about that as long as you have a wealthy husband.”

  “If Mr Darcy does not care about that then I do not see why I should concern myself with people unconnected to me,” said Elizabeth. “I am sure Mr Darcy appreciates your concern but I do not believe anyone needs the advice of a woman who would stoop to your depths.”

  “Miss Bingley,” snapped a familiar, beloved voice. Both woman turned at once to see Darcy striding around the corner. His eyes were dark with rage. “You will cease abusing my betrothed. And you will continue readying yourself to leave Pemberley at once. I want you gone from here within the hour.”

  Elizabeth’s heart leapt to see him but her eyes traveled past him to see her aunt and uncle who had followed him. Their eyes widened but they said nothing.

  “I only wish to protect you, Mr Darcy,” said Miss Bingley. Her lip trembled and her eyes filled with tears. “Do you not see I am the only one here who cares about you and has your best interest at heart? Do you not see I am the only one who would not see you disgraced?”

  “You are abusing the woman I love, and who I will marry, and you attempted to force me into marrying you. It is not a concern I value all that highly.”

  Miss Bingley had stepped away from Elizabeth. She hung her head. “I love you,” she whispered. If anyone had not known her, the sight of her would have torn at their hearts. Fortunately, no one present was fooled as to her true nature, and Darcy only smiled.

  “You do not know the meaning of the word,” he said. “I love Elizabeth and she loves me. That is the love that matters here. Not your false coin. Your carriage is waiting. I suggest you be on it if you wish to have a roof over your head tonight.”

  Miss Bingley’s mouth pressed into a flat line and she stormed away. She paused and looked back at Darcy and Elizabeth. “I shall look forward to hearing how your wife disgraces you,” she said. “Do not think I will feel any sympathy for you when it happens.”

  “Goodbye, Miss Bingley,” said Darcy. His words were weary, too tired by the affair to feel any more anger. Miss Bingley shot Elizabeth one last hateful look and she was gone.

  Darcy opened his arms to Elizabeth and she stepped into them at once and pressed her face to his chest.

  “That was a nasty little scene,” she said. “What brought it all about?”

  Darcy pressed his lips to her hair. “I will tell you soon.”

  Bingley came around to join them, his face shattered.

  “I am so sorry, Darcy. Miss Bennet —“ He checked on seeing Elizabeth. Darcy nodded.

  “I will explain all to Elizabeth,” he said. “Why don’t you go in search of Georgiana? I know she hoped to ride out today.”

  Bingley nodded. He started to walk away but stopped and looked at them with a smile.

  “How well and happy you look together,” he said. “I hope I am so fortunate if I ever enter the marriage state.”

  Elizabeth thought of Jane and smiled. “I am sure you will, sir. We shall have to see what we can do about it when we arrive in Hertfordshire.”

  Bingley returned her grin. “I am looking forward to it.”

  Only Mr and Mrs Gardiner remained. Darcy dropped his arms from around Elizabeth and turned to them apologetically.

  “Please forgive me for what you have just witnessed…”

  “There is no need for that,” said Mr Gardiner. “We had our suspicions, did we not?”

  His wife smiled. “We discussed them at length last night. We thought you would tell us about it in your own time.”

  “We wished to wait until we had Father’s permission,” said Elizabeth.

  Mr Gardiner grinned. “I understand perfectly. But as your closest male relation in attendance, may I offer my provisional blessing in his place? I will write to him myself and tell him none of us could have chosen a better match for our dear Lizzy.”

  “Now, we should go inside, my dear, and leave the young people in peace,” said Mrs Gardiner.

  Elizabeth leaned forward to kiss her aunt and uncl
e before they went away.

  “That is not how I hoped to welcome you to Pemberley,” said Darcy. “Nor is it how I hoped to tell your family. I am sorry for that.”

  “I am not,” said Elizabeth. “We are together and we have my family’s blessing. The person who would have come between us has been sent away so she cannot cause any more mischief. What could be better than that?”

  Darcy smiled and hugged her. “I am the most fortunate man in the world,” he said. “How soon can we marry? I do not think I can wait very long.”

  Elizabeth grinned. “Let us not wait on my father’s reply. Let us follow it down to Longbourn so we can tell him in person. We can call for the banns to be read right away and be married within the month.”

  Darcy kissed her fiercely. “Even a month seems too long. Come. We must tell the rest we are preparing to leave for Hertfordshire. They may follow on or remain here as they like.”

  “Oh, that won’t do at all,” said Elizabeth as Darcy took her hand and pulled her towards the house. “Mr Bingley must come with us.” At Darcy’s puzzled look, she grinned. “There is someone I am very anxious for him to meet.”