A Will of Iron

by Beutler Linda

  “Eternity,” he mused aloud.

  Darcy and Bingley stood at the front of the little church in their best frock coats. The perturbation of one fed that of the other, and the two friends fell silent.

  It is not like Darcy to be so discomposed, Bingley thought as he watched his friend twist his neck to and fro. He failed to notice his own bouncing from heel to toe.

  “Bingley, be still!” Darcy whispered.

  “Ahem, gentlemen…” The usually jovial vicar was censorious. “I believe your brides have arrived.”

  The grooms turned and lost all rational thought. They would only remember the details later, when in private conference with their wives.

  Chapter 23

  Two Gentleman and a Lady Are Surprised

  5 January 1812

  A new year starts with a new experience. Yesterday, and again today, I had assignations with Mr. C of a very different nature than the stilted cold matings previously shared. When I arrived yesterday, he was already at the cottage and had taken the risk of starting a fire in the grate. I informed him it would be our last attempt. I explained that perhaps something within me was barren—of course the fault could just as easily be with him, but a lady must be politic, as I have learnt—and I was unwilling to expend further cash with nothing to show for it.

  He quite surprised me by saying he had consulted a midwife in Hertfordshire about the getting of children. She explained to him, so he said, that women who could find it within themselves to take some pleasure from the act proved more fertile as a rule. We stared each other down for many minutes before he said, with smirking charm, “Dear Anne. I do not wish to make you love me. I do not think you want to or will. But I can make what we do more enjoyable if you will allow me certain liberties.”

  I could not resist replying, “More than I have already granted?”

  “Yes.”

  I set about preparing myself for the act as I usually do, but before I could remove my stockings, he knelt between my legs. “Allow me.”

  With the practiced hand of a French maid, Mr. C had me mostly disrobed before I knew what I was about. He loosened my corset, and my meagre diddies bounced loose in a way that quite enthralled him, though I do say so myself. He kissed them, and I am ashamed to say, I nearly swooned. He caught me and carried me to the bed.

  His subsequent ministrations were masterly. I shall not attempt to explain what I felt, or rather, the sensations he raised, and raised again and again, but it was as though physical congress, as we enacted it yesterday, was a totally different assemblage of actions than he and I had ever accomplished before. When I think what I allowed him to do… No, I shall not think of it. Except to say that, as I left him yesterday, I insisted he return today. I should blush.

  When I parted from Mr. C today, I handed him 100£ as a gift. If what we did in the last day and a half does not get me with child, it is better I never see him again. To take pleasure from the act—oh, and I have—causes the arousal of certain affections that I shall not encourage. With enough of what I experienced at his bidding, any woman could fall in love with any man, were he to care enough to entice her thus.

  I have no doubt he will use the money for the seduction of someone else. If my little extra capital allows him to make a better showing, I am happy for him.

  And as for me? I cannot help but think the midwife he consulted is a scholar amongst her profession and a credit to her sex. If I am not now with child, I shall at least know I tried my very best, and so did Mr. C. —A de B

  10 June 1812

  Rosings, Kent

  A naked Alexander Fitzwilliam stood agape, staring at his new wife.

  How he had enjoyed teasing Darcy and Bingley over the billiards table at Netherfield! He, at least, would be spared the torment of initiating a maiden. He laughed as Darcy and Bingley fretted, and imagined giving Charlotte such pleasurable sensations as she could not have felt with Collins but of which she would have read in Anne’s journal.

  “You are a virgin? Unfledged?” he sputtered. She looked so sheepish in her lovely, revealing nightgown that his alarm turned to amusement. “But how…”

  Charlotte was trying not to laugh, and she tilted her head and pushed out her lips, looking at Alexander from under her lashes. It was an expression her late husband had never seen, but then, he had never, ever, caused her to feel coy. “Mr. Collins was a man of weak knowledge, easily confused. He came to the marriage bed with no understanding at all of the female…um, uh…” Charlotte at last had the decency to blush at her deception of her late husband.

  “Whereas I…” The colonel raised his eyebrows, smiling provocatively. “Dearest Charlotte. I fear you will find me a good deal less easy to fool.”

  She returned his smile ruefully and stepped towards him. She held out a hand, which he took gently, watching her eyes as he bent to kiss her fingers.

  She has the prettiest hands. He was pleased to think they would touch him in ways they had never touched Collins. As she drew closer, he could better discern the detail of her nightgown, the delicate floral embroidery at the low neckline drawing his attention to a bosom of greater ampleness than her usual mode of dress led him to expect. His tumescence increased.

  “Then Collins dithered about your person to no great effect for you but sufficient to his own needs?”

  “It seemed so. He was—God rest his soul—a man of small parts. He thought he was effecting a union when he was not, and I did nothing to correct him.” Charlotte’s delicate blush deepened. She caught sight of Alexander’s manly organ and came to think she had committed a grave tactical error, unforgivable in a military man’s spouse. Had she instructed Mr. Collins to the whys and wherefores of deflowering her, she would not be faced with having the task performed by a virile husband with much less modest equipage.

  The colonel arose from bending over her hand. He stood next to her; she had to look up at him. “I shall be attentive to your comfort.” Her straight hair caught the firelight as it fell about her shoulders. He brushed the strands, fine as silk, from one side, and slowly slid his hand over her breast, caressing it. She sighed. “My charming Charlotte, did you never take pleasure in his attempts to conceive?”

  “I dared not dwell upon it.”

  “He never touched you like this?” her new husband whispered as he rolled a puckering nipple between his fingers.

  “Never,” she inhaled, finally remembering to breathe.

  “But you did not wear nightgowns such as this, I would wager.” The colonel’s breath was in her ear, inspiring her shiver of excitement.

  “No, I did not.”

  Alexander drew a tender earlobe into his mouth and applied both hands expertly to her breasts. In mere moments, Charlotte was writhing against him. In another minute, her breath grew ragged, and she tried in vain to speak his name, managing only, “Al…Alex…” Her knees gave way, and her full weight straddled his leg, her ardent parts pressing her husband’s muscular thigh. He caught her by the waist as a storm of desire raged through her, leaving her wishing for something further.

  He quietly chuckled. This should not be difficult if her capacity for sensation is so easily engaged. He sighed contentedly, pleased to recognise Charlotte would only ever be his. “Do you see the potential for pleasure in marital relations now, Mrs. Fitzwilliam?”

  “Indeed, I am all astonishment. I never dreamt I would marry for love.”

  “Nor did I, my beloved Charlotte. Nor did I.”

  Meanwhile, at Netherfield Park, Meryton

  Charles Bingley stood outside the door to his bride’s bedchamber, bouncing on his toes and rocking back on his heels. Bingley was not a pacing sort of man when perplexed. Nor was he given to running his hands through his hair in the face of frustration. He was not aware of the motion he made, for his attention was fixed upon the woman awaiting him on the othe
r side of the door.

  Bingley had not the least idea what Jane had been told of marital relations. Has she seen animals? Does she comprehend the gist of it? For all the talk he had heard and overheard, for all of the reading and gazing at pictures, and even after once spending a few hours with a harlot on his grand tour three years earlier, he still did not know quite what to do with the wholly inexperienced Jane Bennet.

  Bingley closed his eyes, still rocking on his feet. He wore soft breeches and a thin shirt untied at the neck, garments upon which no little consideration was given. He bathed and shaved, saying not a word to his valet through the entire proceedings. It was as if time crawled as he crossed his bedroom to the door of the mistress of Netherfield’s bedchamber. The expanse of twenty feet seemed more like a mile. He heard no movement. Perhaps she was not yet there although he tried to sound masterful when he informed her after their evening meal that he would meet her there in an hour. That hour was well past as he stood at the door, quiet but not still.

  Inside the lids of his closed eyes, he envisioned Jane’s angelic face as he kissed her—not the innumerable pecks on the cheek or delicate meetings of puckered lips, but when he had ardently kissed her. After luring her to part her lips for his tongue, she responded in a passionate manner, embracing him and wriggling her fingers into his collar. She admitted in a whisper to wanting to touch his neck, which she was sad to see always too tightly bound. The memory made him smile, and encouraged, he knocked.

  “Come in, Charles,” came the immediate reply.

  Bingley stepped inside the fire-lit room and turned to the bed. The bedclothes were folded down, but the bed was empty. He turned towards the fire, and he was met by fleeting impressions: waves of wild blond hair, soft breasts with firm points pressed into his hands, a wet mouth nibbling his neck, a whispered “Charles, at last…” The force of her naked haunch winding around his waist pushed him back, and they slammed the door. He returned her embrace if only to keep them from stumbling. The next sound Bingley heard was his own relieved laughter, which was soon silenced by his wife’s kisses and her throaty chuckle.

  “I hope you are not laughing at me, sir.” Her blue eyes were merry in a different way than he had ever seen before.

  “No, dear Jane. As usual, I laugh at myself.” It was beyond his power of reasoning to have intuited Jane might want him, to have felt her longing for him in the same way he had dreamt of her. His fears had been for nothing. Somehow, she was more than well prepared for this night, this moment.

  Supporting the thigh already encircling him, Bingley touched her other leg, and this she lifted, climbing him and opening herself with a giggled yelp of excitement. Thus enrobed by his formerly serene and unflappable Jane, Bingley carried her to the bed and gently leaned forward until her back was upon the mattress and pillows. He stood, and before he could fully take in her nakedness, she was up on her knees, struggling to remove his shirt, tugging at the buttons of his breeches, and bending him to her face for feverish kisses.

  Only when he, too, was naked did she sit back upon her calves, and in the dim fluid firelight, they gazed upon each other. She reached for his aroused member but just stopped from touching it, instead stroking his firm abdomen with a mew of pleasure. Bingley wanted to speak—he needed to tell her how beautiful she was—but her finger stilled his lips.

  “Nay, Charles, let us keep silent this first time…at least, no words.”

  He smiled, kissed her fingers, and pulled them away. “May I not laugh for joy, Mrs. Bingley?”

  Jane giggled and nodded, pulling him down into the bedclothes. She wrapped around him, and their eyes met in smiles as he felt her beneath him, warm, compliant, and sufficiently padded to be supremely inviting. Her breast against his cheek felt like the velvet squabs of Darcy’s landau.

  “We must order a finer carriage,” he murmured.

  Jane’s laugh was so robust that she snorted for the first time in her life. “This is precisely why we must be silent, love.”

  He rose on an elbow, one hand caressing a hank of her hair, his other hand exploring every inch of her within reach. She set no limits and observed no boundaries. Whatever he wished to do, she would enthusiastically allow. Bingley could not look away from her face. He had seen Jane appear pleased with him but never like this. Perhaps I do not know her as well as I thought. She is much more enchanting than I could even anticipate…

  Jane’s delight at his every movement granted Bingley a masterly confidence. His fingers took possession of her secret places. She writhed with approval, encouraging him to exert his ultimate right as a husband, and when he entered her, she relaxed against him. They paused for a moment, and when she met his quizzical eyes with giddy encouragement, Bingley completed their act of union with the aplomb of a man who had been pleasing a willing and responsive wife for many months, not for mere minutes.

  When she at last lay at his side with her head on his chest, he asked, “You were not hurt, sweetest Jane?”

  “No, just a very little at the first.”

  “How…?”

  “I have spent some portion of each of the past ten days secretly riding astride my father’s horse. I wished to spare you fearing you had hurt me.”

  “You are the most considerate woman that ever was.”

  “Charles, I do not wish to always be an angel.”

  “Duly noted, madam. There is a mystery to you, Mrs. Bingley, which I shall enjoy solving.”

  They smiled at the notion of such a thing, and continued smiling well into the night.

  Chapter 22

  Fitzwilliam Darcy is Surprised

  1 September 1811

  Ugh! Well, tis done, and let us hope the consummation enacted today need not be repeated much more often. What a ghastly business! How do women bear it? And why? Is the urge to procreate so strong that the ridiculousness of the act is forgiven?

  Wickham arrived expecting to enact a seduction, ever ready to charm. I quickly informed him charm was not necessary. After lying on the cot, I lifted my skirts and asked if the smallness of the bed was insufficient for our needs, and gave him the opportunity to suggest otherwise. He was in a mood to acquiesce, and knelt between my legs, leering. He made to touch between my legs, saying some nonsense about preparing me, but I could easily see, what with the bulge in his trousers, that no encouragement was needed for him. I informed him that, if he was ready, I was likewise. He would have argued, so I moved his hand away and spread my legs further. This was enough encouragement. He unbuttoned his breeches as I looked anywhere else.

  He asked if we might loosen my bodice, but I could not see the use of that, my chest having no orifice that would effect conception. I shook my head no. He chuckled and stroked my thighs. “You will give me no joy, madam?”

  “Taking a wealthy virgin is insufficient inducement? I would not have thought so,” I replied.

  “Saucy!” he said, the scoundrel.

  Rather suddenly, he bent over and pushed his apparatus at me, I suppose thinking the decidedly unpleasant sensation of his rubbing it on my thighs was somehow necessary for my willingness. I said nothing, which was enough, and just as he was to commit the act, it all became ticklish, and I wriggled against my will. This displaced his aim, and he bashed his member against the bend of my leg, spending himself in my short hairs with a curse.

  “You moved,” he said in what was a decidedly accusatory tone.

  “You were tickling me. Begin again. I shall be still.”

  He informed me it would take some minutes, which vexed me greatly. The fluid already emitted oozed around on me, a waste. I asked after the possibility of somehow getting what was already done into the proper place, which elicited an annoying, indeed disparaging, laugh. Were I not already lying there compromised, yet not quite, I would have left him to amuse himself.

  “Hurry up, then.”
>
  He huffed. “It would help if you would touch it.”

  Now it was my place to laugh. “No, Wickham, that will never happen. Do what you must, but you will have no such assistance from me.”

  He cursed once more, arose, and stood with his back to me. I soon surmised, given his actions, that he was touching himself, and vigorously too. After a time, he turned back to me and flung himself down. With a jerk and a groan, his hands held my hips, the weight of his body drained the breath from my chest, and I was no longer a virgin. He thrashed about, causing me all of the discomfort I had been led to expect, and did finally spend himself in the proper place.

  “There, madam. I would ask if you are satisfied, but that is not your intention.”

  This sentence I did not at all comprehend, so I replied, “Let us hope you were successful.”

  We both stood. He buttoned himself and put on his rather worn frock coat. Seating his hat with a nod, he enquired, “Tomorrow?”

  “At the same time,” I said. I was arranging my skirts. The substance dripping from between my legs felt disgusting.

  He was gone. I took up the towelling I had brought, and cleaned myself thoroughly. There was some blood. I inexplicably stood trembling for some moments.

  I suppose I would never do it again had I not my present goal in mind. But I must continue until my courses stop coming. I am told that is the first sign.

  It is all too arduous. When I returned home, after finding the bench of the phaeton most cruel, I gave my usual excuses and made for my bed. It was all too revolting and outrageously silly. Once alone, I laughed—A de B

  10 June 1812, Darcy House, London

  Darcy entered the bedroom to find Elizabeth under the bedclothes. Only her head, shoulders, and arms were visible. She wore a rough raw muslin nightgown with long sleeves. Of all his hopes for this night, Darcy had not prepared himself for this, that she of all women would be reticent.