by Ola Wegner
Elizabeth gave a soft sigh and looked at him sadly. “You sound almost regretful. I always thought you would welcome our child.”
“It is not like that, Elizabeth. Children bring lots of responsibilities. It was a constant challenge to raise Georgiana.“
“You sound as if our child is just an unpleasant responsibility. I do not understand you. I remember Aunt Madeline saying once that when a man loved a woman he always wanted children with her.”
“I had hoped that I earned a little place in you heart, and now the child takes all your love,” he murmured bashfully, not daring to raise his eyes at her.
Elizabeth cupped his cheek and spoke gently. “William, you cannot think like this. You cannot be jealous of your own child. You cannot treat it as your rival. He or she is your own flesh and blood. Such an attitude is wrong.”
“I cannot help it, Elizabeth. You have never been so happy as my wife till now, when you carry the child.”
“That is not true. It is in woman’s nature to be happy when expecting, especially when, like me, she has a husband who cares for her, and who is so good to her. I want your child. I am so happy because the child is a part of you, because I carry the child of a man whom I love.”
“You do?” He looked into her eyes, his expression vulnerable and unsure.
“Can you not feel it? I would never be able to open myself so much to you, to trust you so, especially when we are intimate, if I did not love you.” She kissed his lips softly. “I love you, Mr. Darcy.”
***
Elizabeth left the bookshop and looked around for the characteristic tall figure of her husband. Soon she saw him talking to a woman on the other side on the street, next to the house of the local attorney.
Without much thought she went into his direction, guessing that the elegant lady was the wife of one of their neighbours.
“Will you not introduce me?” she enquired with a polite smile when she reached her husband.
Darcy turned to her, and at that moment, Elizabeth knew that something was amiss. He simply looked panic-stricken. He could not meet her eye.
She wondered what could have happened to put him into such a state, when the woman in front of them spoke in a rich, pleasantly modulated voice.
“It is a pleasure to meet you at last, Mrs. Darcy. The whole neighbourhood is so curious about you. Your husband should throw a ball to introduce you to our modest social circle here.”
“I thank you, madam. It is pleasure to make your acquaintance Mrs…” Elizabeth paused, waiting for her husband to introduce the lady to her at last.
The older woman eyed Darcy with a smile and spoke animatedly. “Oh, I can see that the famous Darcy reserve comes to voice. Let me introduce myself. I am Mrs. Clarkson. my late husband and Mr. Darcy's father were best friends for years.”
Hearing this, Elizabeth frowned slightly. The lady’s late husband was her father-in- law’s friend? But she was no more than five and thirty years old. No, perhaps she might have been slightly older, perhaps six and thirty, but nevertheless she looked very attractive for a woman her age Certainly, however, her husband had to be much older than she herself was,
“Our estate is no more than ten miles from Pemberley. You must visit me, Mrs. Darcy. I like the good company of young people,” Mrs. Clarkson added.
“We will be honoured to visit you. I thank you for the invitation. I am eager to meet all of the local families,” Elizabeth assured her.
“You are from the south of England, I hear?”
“Yes, from Hertfordshire,” Elizabeth answered.
She looked at the woman searchingly. There was something familiar in her.
Mrs. Clarkson looked like…well, yes, she looked like Elizabeth.
They were of similar height, and Mrs. Clarkson had beautiful, dark thick hair. She was not exactly beautiful, but she had very striking fine eyes. They were blue, not dark green like hers, but still very dark, under the shade of her bonnet, looking almost black. As for her figure, she was curvy to be sure, with prominent bosom and well rounded hips, but she was far plumper than Elizabeth.
“Here is my son. Harry, come here!” Mrs. Clarkson cried after the young man, who approached them rather reluctantly.
He was tall, but not so tall as Darcy, and quite handsome. Elizabeth guessed he was a year or two younger than herself.
“Madam, it is pleasure to make the acquaintance.” Mr. Clarkson bowed his head politely towards her, but he barely acknowledged Darcy.
Elizabeth found it very odd. All the people she had been introduced to since the day she had come to Derbyshire were most amiable in their relations with her husband, eagerly starting conversation with him. She looked at William questionably, but he refused to meet her eyes, as if he had been ashamed of something. He acted terribly awkward, and was certainly ill at ease.
“We must go,” Darcy said at last in a distant voice, his gaze focused somewhere above the heads of his companions.
“If you must,” Mrs. Clarkson spoke good humouredly with a sigh, a small pout on her plump lips. She squeezed Elizabeth’s hand. “My dear, we must meet again soon. There is more that we have in common than you can imagine, Mrs. Darcy.” She took her grumpy son’s arm and walked away.
Elizabeth stared after the woman for a few moments. Then she looked up at Darcy through narrowed eyes. He still avoided her gaze.
“Did you find anything interesting in the bookshop?” he asked.
Elizabeth ignored his question. “She is one of them, is she not?”
“I have no idea what are you talking about,” Darcy said, trying to sound haughty.
“Do not play dumb with me! She was your lover.”
“Elizabeth, lower your voice,” Darcy seethed looking around.
“So it is true,” she whispered.
She turned around and ran, not looking much where she was going. Soon she heard some cries, and she felt Darcy’s strong arm going around her middle and pulling her back abruptly. Only then did she notice that she nearly ran before a passing carriage.
***
Elizabeth lay on the bed in her room, her eyes closed, pretending that she was asleep.
Thankfully she had been left in peace since they returned to Pemberley, as William was called to the stables because some accident had happened there with a newly bought horse. He tried to speak with her during their ride home, but the only words he heard from her were, 'Do not touch me. I do not want to speak with you now'.
She could hardly believe what had had happened today. It was completely unexpected. Everything had been going so well lately. They had been so happy for the last few weeks since their quarrel over the baby clothes. He had seemed to accept her condition; he had even started saying that it was a high time to renovate the nursery.
She heard the door being opened and his familiar gait. The bed dipped beside her, and she felt his hand on her cheek.
She opened her eyes and said very clearly. “I said I did not want you to touch me.”
Darcy took his hand away reluctantly but spoke softly, leaning towards her. “Sweetheart.”
Elizabeth sat on the bed abruptly and cried furiously. “I am not your sweetheart!”
Darcy placed a calming hand on her arm. “Lizzy.”
Elizabeth scrambled from the bed to her feet and cried even louder. “I am not your Lizzy either!”
Darcy sighed heavily, his watchful eyes on her as she was pacing the room back and forth, waving her arms in great agitation.
He walked to her and tried to pull her into his arms. She slapped his hands and walked from him to the other side of the room.
“Elizabeth. I am sorry. It was an accident. It had not crossed my mind you might meet her.”
“An accident you say! Pray tell me, was it an accident as well when she was your mistress?”
“Elizabeth, she was never my mistress,” Darcy growled, raking his hand through his hair.
“So, what would you call it? Perhaps your relationship with
that woman was a purely platonic one?”
“No, but… I was very young and curious back then…. And she was a widow already, and I had been enamoured with her since I had been a lad. She had often visited us with her husband... .It just happened, shortly before I went to university.”
“Oh, so it just happened!” Elizabeth exclaimed, her voice high pitched, and Darcy could swear that it had the same quality as his mother-in-law’s at that very moment. “And pray tell me why you obviously did not happen to think about me when it just happened?”
Darcy could not repress a smile. “Lizzy, how could I think about you back then. I did not know you. Moreover, you were what, ten or eleven years of age back then?”
“Oh, do not be so smart!” She approached him and pushed strongly at his chest. “I wonder what you would do and feel if one day you encountered my previous lover on the street, by accident as you say?”
“Elizabeth, do not even jest so; that is not amusing at all!”
“Oh, it is not amusing for you? Well, it is not amusing for me either! So, what would you do?” she baited him.
Darcy’s jaws clenched. “Kill him.”
She gave a short laugh. “Unfortunately, I cannot fence or use pistols, so perhaps I should simply scratch out her eyes?”
“Lizzy, be reasonable.”
“I do not want to be reasonable! You should have perceived you would meet me one day, and that I would meet her one day, and you should not have involved yourself with her in the first place!”
Darcy stared at her with his mouth agape, his forehead creased as if trying very hard to follow her reasoning. At last he gave a weary sigh and started again patiently. “Dearest, pray, believe me. I have not talked with her for many years now. She saw me in the street; it would be impolite to pretend she was not there. Her husband was…”
“I heard who her husband was!” Elizabeth exclaimed and ran to her vanity. She took a jewellery box he had given her in the first days of their marriage. Soon the box hit the wall, passing slightly next to Darcy’s ear.
“Elizabeth!” Darcy cried in astonishment.
But the only answer he was given was the music box, silver hair brush, crystal swan, and the small volume of poetry thrown in his direction as well. Unfortunately, due to Elizabeth’s great agitation, her aim was poor and none of the objects reached the attempted target.
However, when she took the heavy vase full of water and flowers, Darcy approached her decidedly.
“That is enough. You will harm yourself.” He took the vase from her, putting it back on the small table where it belonged.
Her hands empty, Elizabeth attacked her husband, hitting him with her small fists wherever she could reach. Darcy bore the attack calmly for some time, but then he grasped her wrists gently, but firmly, and hugged her to him, tightening his arms around her even more, each time she tried to free herself.
After a long moment, her breathing evened, and she stood in his embrace calmly, her face buried in his chest.
“My love, she is nothing to me,” he murmured into her ear. “I was very young when she and I… It happened ten years ago, and lasted only a few weeks. I soon left for university, and have seen her but a few times since then, and only in the company of others. You are the only woman in my life, now and ever. I love only you. I love you and our child.”
Chapter Eighteen
Elizabeth was standing sideways in front of the floor length mirror, her nightgown drawn tightly around her middle, looking carefully at herself with a slight frown on her forehead.
“You are feeling well today, Lizzy?” Her husband’s voice came from the bed.
“Yes,” she answered, smoothing the nightgown over her belly.
“No nausea? No dizziness?”
Elizabeth shook her head, and glancing one last time at her reflection, she walked to the vanity and started brushing her hair. “No, I just felt tired in the afternoon, so I took a short nap.”
“So, you are feeling well now?”
“Yes, I am.” She smiled at him and approached the bed, slipping under the covers. Already settled, she started drawing her nightgown up. To Darcy’s great dismay, her progress was stopped just below her breasts. She lay on her back beside him with her middle uncovered. She pushed the covers almost to the line of her hipbones, baring her lower abdomen.
She raised herself to her elbows, and staring at her middle, asked. “Do you think it shows?”
“Shows?” he repeated blankly, staring longingly at her navel.
“Yes. The baby. Has my middle thickened?”
Darcy smiled, kissed her temple, combed a few of her curls away from her forehead, and spoke. “Lizzy, it is too early to see anything.”
Elizabeth’s big eyes stared at him eagerly. “But it could already be the fourth month. My last monthly bleeding was before our wedding, so if I conceived in the first days, as Doctor Johnson perceives, the baby is now over three months old.”
Darcy placed his hand on her belly, stroking it lightly in a circular motion. “Lizzy, I cannot notice any change yet; you even seem to be thinner.”
“Yes, I have lost some weight due to feeling sick so often.”
Darcy lifted her gown higher, baring her breasts. He dipped his head and gently kissed one dark pink nipple.
“These are definitely bigger.” He stroked her breast with the back of his finger.
Elizabeth hand dove into his curls. “And more tender.”
“Does it hurt when I touch them?”
“No, but could you please not squeeze them as you usually do. It is very pleasant normally, but now…”
“I shall not,” Darcy said to her nipple, suckling on it gently.
Elizabeth gave a sweet sigh, closed her eyes and relaxed under her husband’s gentle caresses. However, after a few moments, her fingers stopped combing through his curls. “William...?”
“Mhhm…,” Darcy murmured from his occupation of placing tiny kisses on the underside of her right breast.
“Are you sure it is safe now… with the baby?”
“Lizzy, I shall be careful and do it very…” a kiss on her nipple, “very...” another on her shoulder, “slowly….” The last kiss was placed on the underside of her jaw. “And gently.”
Elizabeth looked into his eyes. “Yes, but if we hurt the baby?”
“Lizzy, I will not hurt the baby,” Darcy spoke evenly.
“How can you be so sure?” She sounded distressed. “Have you talked with the doctor about it?”
“No, Lizzy dear, I have not. But we have known about the baby for only a month, have we not? You said yourself that you had to be with child earlier than that. We were together every day for the first months and nothing bad happened.”
“Well, that is true,” Elizabeth agreed with relief evident in her voice.
“Do not worry, dearest. He or she is safe and sound inside you,” he assured, spooning behind her, rubbing himself against her bottom.
Elizabeth lay compliantly in her husband’s embrace for some time, and judging by her soft sighs, she was clearly enjoying his ministrations, when he felt her to stiffen once again.
“William, but if you scare the baby?”
Darcy raised himself on his arm and mouthed incomprehensibly. “What?”
Elizabeth rolled on her back, drawing the sheet over her body. “Yes. The baby is inside me, so it feels everything that I can feel. So it can get simply terrified when you…”
“I terrify you?!” Darcy interrupted her, looming over her.
“No, of course not.” Elizabeth gave him a reassuring smile, cupping his cheek. “But all that shaking and thrusting. And it can hear you when you grunt, moan and cry ‘Lizzy.’ The baby may think that something dangerous is happening. And what if it sees you?” Elizabeth’s eyes widened, resting on his sheet covered lower body.
Darcy lay heavily on his back, his eyes closed. The moment passed before he spoke again.
“Elizabeth, I truly cannot comprehend how
you can pronounce all that nonsense and, what is even worse, believe it? The child is too small to hear or see anything.”
“How can you say this? I am sure the baby feels everything!” Elizabeth cried fiercely, sitting up. “You cannot pretend it is not here with us now!”
“Elizabeth, be reasonable. Good God, you sound like your own mother at this very moment,” Darcy murmured as if to himself, his hand covering his eyes. He sensed her scooting away, and soon the sound of quiet weeping came to him.
“Oh, no. Not that.” He rolled to her, pulling her into his arms. “No, please, Lizzy, I apologize.” He kissed her wet cheek, holding her tightly. “My love, do not cry; you know I cannot bear your tears. I am sorry, I should not have said that.”
“I truly think that the baby can feel everything,” Elizabeth squeaked into his bare chest.
“I know, sweetheart, I know,” he said, rubbing her back.
Darcy sighed wearily and looked at the canopy, holding Elizabeth pinned tightly to his side. When he looked back at her again, her eyes were closed, and she was breathing deeply, something like very quiet snoring was escaping her.
***
The next morning, Darcy woke up early. Elizabeth was curled by his side, sleeping soundly. He tucked the covers around her carefully and slipped out of bed slowly, so as not to wake her.
When he returned to the bedroom, he was already dressed and groomed for the day ahead of him. He sat beside her on the covers and leaned over to kiss her forehead. She stirred and her eyes opened.
“I have awakened you, I am sorry,” he said.
Elizabeth closed her eyes again, a small smile creeping on her face. “No, I have not been asleep for some time. I have noticed lately that I always seem to wake up when I cannot feel you beside me.”
Darcy brought her hand to his lips. “I must go to inspect the work on repairing the fences before winter on the north side of the estate.”
Elizabeth stretched, yawned and rolled onto her back. “I feel guilty. You work so hard, and I just do nothing all day long, apart from taking naps, perhaps.”.
Darcy lifted her hand to his lips again. “There would be little sense to my life without you, Elizabeth, you know that.” He continued playing with her fingers. “Moreover, Mrs. Darcy, your role is very crucial, you carry the heir to Pemberley under your heart, after all. But seriously, you should make the best of this time, my love; when the child is born you will have little time for rest.”