by Gail McEwen
The sky was just beginning to lighten when they made their way back over the lawn, so quiet now, with the heat and damp of yesterday’s revel clinging to the branches and grass as sugared frosting. The clear crisp air and the industrious siskins chattering in the hedges, defying the cold and the hour of the day, seemed to chase away the last of the cramped muscles and headaches. They reached the house and they made their way to her ladyship’s rooms as quietly as possible for a few hours of warm and companionable sleep before the house came to life once more.
Breakfast that morning was extraordinary. Everyone of the party at Pemberley House had come down, including Flora the dog, who was happily hunting for crumbs under the table. Lord Baugham made a fleeting inquiry to his host whether there were any fences to inspect or sheds to repair, but his friend merely sent him a glance.
“That would not be appropriate this morning,” was all Mr Darcy would say and, however his lordship claimed that made no sense, it was all he was going to be offered on the subject.
Not that he was overly disappointed. By mutual and silent agreement, the previous day was hardly touched upon. Darcy seemed in a splendid mood, fussing over his wife like she was made of fragile glass. It had turned out well. Pemberley had a new acknowledged mistress and with those duties well and truly disposed of, what was not to be pleased and proud of in Mrs Darcy?
His wife noticed the little circles Mr Darcy was running around his wife, too, and she sat with a smug smile on her face and sipped her coffee in silence. Miss Darcy, then, was the chattiest one. She was the only one who volunteered a public opinion on the success of the previous day.
“I don’t think they would have appreciated it all going off without a hitch, really,” she thoughtfully said and fed Flora the last of her bun. “Strange, but there you are, I suppose.”
Baugham raised his eyebrow at this unexpected insight into human nature and public days and retreated to the window to sip his coffee. It was a grey winter day and the white hills in the distance merged with the white sky above. Here and there patches of green or black ghostly trees stood as if in suspension, bracing themselves for more wind or snow and waiting for spring. They seemed stoic about it. Probably because they had done it before through the ages.
A flock of black crows lifted from one of the elms on the lawn and the tree shook a little from the relief before returning to its usual motionless state against the grey. Something warm, bright and human sided up to him in the draught of the window.
“A penny for your thoughts?”
He smiled at her. “You expect to come by them so cheaply?”
“I don’t know. Are they worth more?”
He ignored the question.
“What is it you see out there?”
She was in a chatty mood. He looked past her and saw that Miss Darcy had left the room and that Mr Darcy was carefully spreading butter and jam over a piece of bread for his wife while she looked on and fiddled with his sleeve. He sighed and turned back.
“There, over there, about sixty miles or so, is Cumbermere.”
She looked out over the quiet fields and then she put her arm through his. “Yes. I suppose it is,” she said.
So we’ll go no more a-roving
So late into the night,
Though the heart be still as loving,
And the moon be still as bright.
— Lord Byron (1817)