So this was the act of love.
She felt as if she had just fallen off the roof of a barn and he had not extended his hand to help her to her feet. Lying there, desolate and resentful, she was uncertain whether to turn her back to him in a sulk, or simply smite him with a pillow.
In fortune, she had not the time to exact either recourse when he reached for her and drew her tightly to him.
He buried his face against her neck and stroked the small of her back, saying, “Forgive me, Lizzy. Forgive me.”
Even in the winter night’s chill, perspiration crept down his neck, and his damp hair now curled into sweaty ringlets. Instinctively, she wiped his forehead with the hem of her gown (which had lodged conveniently beneath her armpits), silently granting it best to withhold judgement until better informed of just what had come to pass. But forgiveness should not be an issue. Pain was the price to be paid of becoming a wife. She knew that. He must as well.
“Am I to consider myself now taken?”
He smiled hesitantly, then stroked her face, “Yes, Lizzy, you are now taken. And you are mine.”
Within the confines of courtship, she had been “Elizabeth” to him, her name spoken with precise eloquence. But when their intimacy rendered her unto him “Lizzy,” he lowered his voice huskily, the “z” sound tingling her toes. Peculiar how that small alteration allowed her to dismiss the entire issue of his post-coital disengagement. She announced to him that which he undoubtedly already knew.
“You have hair upon your chest.”
It was there, but still sparse, promising the years would thicken it. She let her fingers inspect the thatch, allowing her to appreciate his bare chest clandestinely. His intrigue, however, did not lay with hers in his chest hair.
“Pray, can you bear it, Lizzy? I fear I must have you again.”
Her admittedly limited education upon matters of amour had not included consecutive acts, hence this query was received by her as something of an astonishment.
“You can do it again?”
A pride of some consequence pressing against her thigh announced, indeed, he could. Had not Lydia insisted “it” became flaccid upon effecting achievement? Elizabeth chastised herself silently for listening to anything Lydia told her, then turned her attention to the matter at hand.
Concurrently trying to contain a smile and speak sternly, she said, “I will gladly -suffer your love once again upon one condition.”
Already of a mind he would acquiesce to any proviso, he had commenced to kiss her neck, but said, “Pray, ask anything of me.”
“I found the velvet of your tongue quite unobjectionable.”
He allowed that condition was agreeable. And this pact initiated a night of serial coitus, each successively more privileged than the previous, her gown soon cast aside altogether. Her nether region was still sore, but she would not admit to it, for his repeated lubrications did relieve the chafing.
The corner of the sheet he used to gently wipe the excess revealed, however, the blood her body had let, reminding him of the very thing she sought not to reveal. He laced his fingers through her hair and soothed her with repeated adulations of her beauty. Still, he was apparently confounded by the briefness of her womanhood.
To her increasing unease, amongst his purlings of love, he repeated, “You are so small.”
9
Tom Reed was slightly akilter as he quitted the tavern. Hence, when he hit the door hard with the flat of his hand, it took its revenge upon his nose before he could clear it. In retaliation, he hit it hard again and this time when it was flung open, it stayed flung. Reed looked at it in smug satisfaction for a moment before he turned his gaze out onto the street.
One of his most trustworthy mates assured him that if he hung right past the knacker’s shed, he could find a cockfight. He had done his best to entice Jack Lewis to join him. But Lewis would not budge.
“Ain’t got time fer such, Tom. Aye gots to wait ’ere fer them gem’men. Make good money wi’ ’em.”
Pock-marked and snub-faced, Lewis was a bit fleshy for society’s newest darling pastime of fisticuffs. Reed snorted at the presumption.
“Whot’s fightin’ if yer got rules, Jack? Brother of the Ring! What flummery! Yer’ll git yer bowsprit smashed!”
“Aye’ve got me plans, Tom. Aye be no fool.”
“Yea? Well, Aye’druther be a fartcatcher than a ninnyhammer w’ beat conk.”
Lewis only cackled and Reed betook himself out the door. In his inebriation (yea, even sober), Reed was not entirely certain of right from left and he reeled in the wrong direction.
Brimming were the streets of St. Giles Parish that night. Reed bumped into several people. Fortunately, they were in no closer claim of their wits than he and, by unspoken agreement, simply righted themselves without offence. As a man suffering from the convergence of an ursine bearing and caprine appetite, Reed routinely thumped anyone so presumptuous as not to clear his path. However, that evening his unsteadiness was fuelled by gin. That always left him in better temper than ale.
The happy crowd was about, as was Reed, by reason of a hanging outside Newgate Prison that afternoon. (Sentimental celebration of blood lust always included a fair amount of drink.) A number of folk claimed the multitude that day was as large as the one that witnessed the Haggerty/Holloway double noose in ’07. Reed disputed that. Whereas nearly thirty people were crushed to death in the melee at that illustrious execution, not a soul did he spy trampled in today’s mayhem. Undeniably, the entire spectacle was a disappointment. Only a pickpocket and sheep thief were hanged. ’Twas hardly bloody worth the bother.
Dual disappointment for Reed was that both were men. He had heard that the legendary Maggie “Snags” was to swing. Miss Snags (affectionately named thus by reason of her teeth, which she filed sharper than a shiv) had a propensity to use them somewhat gleefully upon those who crossed her. She was but a malmsey-nosed dishclout, but it would have been diverting to watch some petticoats dance about.
Hence, the single consolation of amusement was that the pickpocket was a portly man, his weight causing his decapitation. Reed cheered along with the crowd.
A speculation visited Reed briefly as to whether he might have access to either of the bodies once they had been thrown upon the tumbrel. He dismissed the idea by reason of there being too many constables about. Pity, for it was an undisputed truth that nothing had more power of luck than the right hand of a hanged man.
Here in front of him twirled two such amulets. The men guarding the bodies watched Reed as conscientiously as Reed eyed the corpses, thus convincing him they had already made monetary arrangement for adoption of the hands. In his -disappointment, Reed looked up from the scuffling, cursing mob to the higher climbs of the inns surrounding the square. In those windows, he could discern the faces of the rich who watched the spectacle in unbesmirched self-righteousness from their rented seats.
He looked up, but did not tarry with his gaze, for if the moneyed class did not want to admit to more than a casual interest in such a lowborn exhibition, he knew them safer of their purses. Even Reed kept a close eye out for pickpockets; an assembly such as this was a fountain of fortune for the light-fingered. His own private little joke, he pretended a lack of vigilance in the hopes of luring an unsuspecting thief, happy for the opportunity to pound anyone. Either he looked too unprosperous or much too barbarous (possibly a combination of both), for no one bit. A few fights had broken out and Reed could not even break through the barrier of bodies to join the brawl.
*
That night upon Dyot Street, he gazed upon the throng of people and recollected why they were there. The execution was a reminder of his recent incarceration and was he of any sort of introspective persuasion, he might have understood his unusually intemperate turn. The gin turned a little sour in his stomach as he contemplated Newgate and vowed never to be taken there again. He was not so deep in thought as not to hear the coarse whistle of a young boy, who spieled, “What
d’ye want, gem’men? D’ye like the dogs? We got ’em ’ere, gemmen. We got ’em ’ere.”
Reed bethought the notion of entering the shabby wooden building. Betimes he was partial to watching terriers take on rats. A particularly ruthless bitch brought him a gold coin once. But he did not keep it long. As it happened, that had led to his imprisonment. Had he not wagered and lost it, if that joker had not angered him by winning it, he would not have had to throttle him. Was it his fault the bloke bled out? He did not throttle him all that hard, even kept his knife put away, he did. But the bloody constables took a sorry look at it. Blamed him. Took him in, locked him up. Had he not had the gumption to garrotte that guard, he would be picking oakum or on the Newgate treadmill still. Or, perhaps, would have fed the crowd more sport with one more noose filled.
Hence, no, he did not favour wagering upon the dogs.
But his misdirection did find sight of a familiar barmaid heading out for home. Frumpy and cheap, she had been his major source of quim since his “parole.” He came up behind her, slapped her backside, and slung his arm over her shoulder.
“Abby me luv, where yer off to?”
“’ome.”
“Yer need company, donna yer?”
“Yer spent all the company me needs, Tom Reed. Yer pockets are at low tide, are they not?”
“Not so flat as that.”
At that somewhat wavering reassurance, Abigail Christie acquiesced to his company. When they arrived at her rooms a little ritual was enacted. She motioned to her boy to away and he disappeared behind a curtain with an armful of dirty babies. With great economy of movement, she found a bottle in a cupboard, and set it unceremoniously upon the table. She produced two handleless cups, clunked them down and poured the drinks without looking.
“Yer lay yer whiskey down better’n yer do yer men,” Reed laughed.
Abigail appeared either uncomprehending of, or unamused by the joke. They emptied a few, thereupon Reed followed her to bed.
Reed had more or less taken up residence in the shabby lodgings, but he was never moved to ask about the father of her children. He surmised her husband was at sea. Fair enough. So long as she would let him in her bed for the price of a pint, he was in want of knowing nothing more.
*
By the time the sun made its appearance upon the narrow streets the next morning, it was nearly noon. The yellowed newsprint over the window kept out most of the light but none of the cold, and Reed awoke disgruntled and particular to his bearish inclinations. Scowling and scratching himself without looking about, he reached for his breeches left dangling upon the bedpost. He shook them out to put them on, then stopped before he had put a foot down one leg. He shook them again. He reached down and impatiently searched for the purse that had been pinned to his trousers, but to no avail. They were quite empty.
“Woman!” he bellowed.
If his menace was compromised by a costume consisting of ragged homespun and gaskins, he was quite unaware of it. He began to barrel about the room for someone, anyone, upon whom to vent his displeasure. No one came into sight but the same boy he had seen the night before.
“Yer there! Boy! Where’s yer mother?”
The boy feigned ignorance, angering Reed further. Grabbing him by the neck of his shirt, he shook the gangly youth.
“Where’s yer mother?”
“Donno, sir!” the boy answered.
Reed jangled the boy until he was certain he could hear his teeth rattle. Before the lad stopped vibrating, Reed struck him backhanded. A ribbon of blood trickled from one nostril, but the boy neither yelped nor cried.
At the commotion, Abigail intervened, attempting to calm Reed.
“Leave the boy!” Abigail called out angrily, thought better of it and said calmly, “Leave the boy.”
Reed’s interrogation was then aided with his fist full of her hair. Hence, its brevity.
“Was gonna buy us some tea and buns fer breakfast s’all,” she explained sourly.
“Aye donno want no tea and buns and Aye ain’t payin’ fer none fer yer brats.”
This, clearly, was of no extraordinary surprise. Abigail tugged a dress on over her chemise and gave up her sad attempt at coaxing a coiffure by dejectedly pulling the rags she used in place of curl-papers from her hair. Only about half had withstood Reed’s fit of pique.
“Collector’ll be ’round for the rent, too,” she added.
As Reed’s reaction to that bit of news was no more than a bit of hacking and snorting, relieving his nasal passages of the remnants of his hangover, Abigail announced an alternative plan.
“Yer don’t help with payin’ for the lodgin’s, we’re leavin’.”
“’ud’s naggers if Aye give a damn.”
Contrary to his profession of lack of interest in her domicile arrangements, Reed glared at her and began to pick his teeth with a fierce-looking dagger. Initially, his undisguised threat was unseen, for Abigail was trying to arrange her stockings to hide the holes, a diligent but ultimately unsuccessful endeavour. He kept picking until she finally saw the blade. The intimidation incited Abigail to chatter on nervously.
“We’ll head for Derbyshire, a goodly distance but Aye got kin there. Aye worked at Pemberley when Aye was the merest chit of a girl. Richer than God, them people are.”
“You were never a chit of a gerl, Abby,” leered Reed.
Unexpectedly, his tone altered. He lay back across the dishevelled bed and ruminated.
“Pemberley? Me brother boasts him a place on that coach. Said they weren’t all that rich. Stays behind the house here in London.” He lay there silently a moment and then bid Abigail, “Yer say it’s a fine place, eh? Very rich?”
“The finest. The richest,” she assured him. “Didn’t yer brother tell you?”
No, his brother did not tell him. Not surprisingly either, Reed thought, knowing his brother had little gumption and no enterprise. Suddenly, better humour favoured him with a near-smile. This odd alteration of his features struck mother and son identically. They both recoiled.
He stood with a distant look upon his face, then slapped her behind again and said, “Thanks to yer, Abby.”
Abigail had no idea what he was thanking her for, but she spoke not a word of question. Few people in the bowels of London questioned fate when it smiled. And providence looked quite happily upon Abigail if she escaped either a beating or a dip of Reed’s wick. She did not watch as he walked out the door and up the street whistling absently.
“There goes a no-good muck of a man, John.”
Without further comment, both began a furious compilation of meagre possessions to stuff into a dilapidated holdall.
*
Reed took advantage of the cold weather by stealing a ride clinging to the foot-board of a closed carriage. He dropped to the ground as it rounded the corner of Haymarket and Monmouth, strolled up the street whistling until he spied a red brick mansion, and presented himself at his brother’s quarters in back. When told he had a visitor, Frank Reed came directly, but seemed less than pleased when he recognised his guest. They had not seen each other but once since Tom’s flight from justice as Tom had hit Frank up for half a crown. Knowing his brother as he did, Frank did not suppose it was a loan.
At Frank’s dour countenance, Tom slapped him upon the shoulders, assuring him he had not come for more money. He wanted more than mere cash. Tom wanted Frank to open the bank.
He set about his plan post-haste by pressing Frank to promote him for the position of footman, that situation to become available forthwith. Tom took out his ever—present knife and commenced to pare his nails with it in front of the coachman who rode next to Frank. The intimidated man loved his life more dearly than gainful employment, took the hint, and fled.
Contrary to his brother, Frank had been a dependable and complaisant employee, hence, when he gave assurances of his brother’s character to the rather prissy houseman, it was accepted as true as any other tale told in London. The houseman sa
w that the brothers held the greatest want of footmen, that of the same tall height and good leg. Additionally, Tom fit the newly vacated jacket. Could there possibly be anything else wanting? As easy as that.
Reed fancied the runty houseman’s eyes spent a little more time than necessary looking him up and down than professional appraisal would have demanded. The position attained, he swaggered away, complaining over his shoulder to his brother who plodded sullenly behind.
“That nimminy-pimminy looks like that at me again, he’ll be-a eatin’ his danglers for dinner.”
Frank Reed cringed at what he considered more than loose talk. Reed noticed his head hanging despondently as he walked.
“Ah, Frankie, me boy,” he reassured him, “they’re a waste on ’im anyways.”
10
Yes, he could do it several times more than once, and with no little vigour. Light was barely filtering into the room, but Elizabeth was awake and contemplating that new understanding.
One might reason, considering the sumptuousness of the accommodations, her first observations when she awoke in the Darcys’ palatial townhouse would have been of the furnishings (opulent), the wall coverings (lavish), the paintings (extraordinary), or the appointments (exquisite). But, by virtue that opposite her in the silk-sheeted bed reposed the handsome figure of Mr. Darcy, it would be understood if no competition existed.
Gaze she did upon her new husband, but from across the distance of a pillow. It was a test to keep from cuddling herself against him. His respiration was deep and peaceful. She dared not trespass on his sleep, for she knew surely he must be quite bedone by his endeavours. And as his thoroughly enthusiastic compatriot in amorous congress, Elizabeth supposed she should be weary as well. But as he was the verb of this act of love and she, the direct object, his flagging strength could be excused.
Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife Page 8