by Meg Kerr
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Forever, your
Georgiana
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Amaury kissed the letter tenderly – was there anyone in the world of whom Georgiana would not rather suspect evil, than to attribute it to himself? How pure was her heart! It was impossible for him not to adore her – and held it in his hands as he gave himself over to deep thought.
It must be said here that a man who had survived so long in Amaury’s circumstances was not likely to be rapidly overcome by pessimism or to accept defeat while he still stood upright on the battlefield. It was too early to despair of incarnating his happiness. His own reflections and Mr. Gardiner’s chastizement had not failed to make an impression on his mind; and yet contrition was unproductive. He knew that to marry Georgiana would be to ruin her. To marry her now, his supple brain amended, would be to ruin her. But was it beyond all possibility that there might be some change that would transform the inevitable? It did seem unlikely. He cast about again. Ruin her, but in whose eyes? The society that had already rejected him? With thirty thousand pounds they could go anywhere; make their own society. They would have each other.
He thought nothing of his promise to Mr. Gardiner not to communicate with Georgiana. He was certain of his own love, and of hers; and of her fortune; and of means of sending and receiving letters. The scoundrel! He wrote to her without reticence, describing to her his tender friendship, his eagerness for a conjugal life in which they shared a sole thought, a sole joy and sorrow, and his plans for their elopement from Lambton following the Darcy family’s removal to Pemberley.
Georgiana’s ultimate fate occupied not only Amaury but also a wide circle of her friends, witness a letter that Darcy received from Mr. Collins, which may be taken to represent the sentiments of a significant number of them.
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My dear Sir,
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I write to condole with you and my dear cousin Elizabeth on the catastrophe which has overtaken your family, of which Mrs. Collins and I have been informed by Lady Catherine de Bourgh. I am most justly reprimanded for my difference of opinion with my illustrious patroness on the subject of your sister’s marriage! Her ladyship’s sagacity is beyond that of mere mortals. You will recall an earlier affliction within the family of your estimable wife, to which the present circumstances bear no small resemblance, a similar defiance of decency and acquiescence in sin. At the time I wrote to Mr. Bennet urging him in Christian duty to throw off his undeserving child, and I ought to have no hesitation in recommending that you take the same course with your sister. And yet! I have learned the wisdom and mercy of the Lord, who is the designer of higher plans. The young lady (who I am told continued her licentious practices following her unorthodox marriage) first lost her husband and then was exiled to Canada where she will never again see or be seen by her relations. Even more remarkable, her heinous offences inspired me to indite for moral instruction a novel in two volumes, “Lydia; or, Vice Rebuk’d”, By a Clergyman, and I have just had word from a book-seller in London, a Mr. Egerton, that he will bring it out. Who could have foreseen this? Is it not wonderful how such things come about! These events show that we ought always to put our trust in our Creator, and I therefore refrain from advising that you repudiate your sister; on that head I shall be silent. There is no occasion to do more than what is right and proper, that is, to put her away from society and withdraw your affection from her. A suitable punishment will fall upon her, and I should not be at all surprised if your family were shortly to experience the comparative blessing of her death.
Yr well wisher and humble servant
Wm Collins
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CHAPTER
26
London, June 1816
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Sir Henry Mallinger had written to his wife to expect him in London at the end of May and Lady Mallinger had duly taken note. When he had neither arrived nor written by the end of the first week in June she did not however progress to the next step of doubting why he did not come or send word that he was delayed. Mrs. Hurst kindly filled this office for her sister, frequently enquiring if she were not worried by his absence and, when it grew clear that Lady Mallinger was not, demanding if she were not annoyed by his lack of consideration for his wife’s feelings. Lady Mallinger was at length driven to reply, “My dear Louisa, Sir Henry is most attentive to his wife’s feelings, and that is why he remains in Venice with her.”
When a letter did at last make its way to Lady Mallinger, it was not from her husband.
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Lake Geneva, near Cologny
May ~, 1816
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Dear Madam,
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I have to ask you a thousand pardons for this intrusion on your privacy by one who is a stranger to you.
I wish the business of writing this letter over but I am hesitating as to the how. Let me at least make a beginning.
I have been shocked with a sudden death, have lost one whom, although only briefly, I knew intimately and valued proportionably. Indeed the blow has fallen so rapidly that I am yet dull-witted from the shock; and though I do eat, and drink, and talk, yet I can hardly persuade myself that I am awake and not dreaming, did not every morning convince me. I shall miss my friend much.
You must excuse this introduction, yet I would willingly talk to you of anything else. After such an attempt to explain what must already be too clearI must inform you of the death of your husband in a distant country, without your presence to comfort or sustain him. He was, I believe, on his way to you from Italy when he stopped in Switzerland to visit me.
It is odd how few of my friends have died a quiet death, I mean, in their beds. We were sailing with my friend Shelley on the Lake when a storm suddenly approached from its remotest extremity. The wind increased in violence, producing waves of a frightful height.
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Thy sky is changed! – and such a change! Oh night,
And storm, and darkness, ye are wondrous strong,
Far along,
From peak to peak, the rattling crags among
Leaps the live thunder! Not from one lone cloud,
But every mountain now hath found a tongue
The mightiest of the storms hath ta’en his stand:6
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We attempted to run for home, but could not outdistance it. There was a gust, he was stuck by the boom, and fell. Shelley threw a rope to him but it was no use.
There is one consolation in death – where he sets his seal, the impression can neither be melted nor broken, but endureth for ever.
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“Nothing of him that doth fade/But doth suffer a sea change/Into something rich and strange.”7
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I almost rejoice when one I love dies young, for I could never bear to see them old or altered.
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There, thou! whose love and life together fled,
Have left me here to love and live in vain: –
Twined with my heart, and can I deem thee dead,
When busy Memory flashes o’er my brain?
O
Well – I will dream that we may meet again,
And woo the vision to my vacant breast;
If aught of young Remembrance then remain,
Be as it may
Whate’er beside Futurity’s behest;
Or, ~
Howe’er may be
For me ‘twere bliss enough to see thy spirit blest!8
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Yet if this provides you little comfort, of the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubt. I used
to have misgivings ~
“Post Mortem nihil est, ipsaque Mors nihil … quæris quo jaceas post obitum loco? Quo non Nata jacent.”9
~ but reflection has taught me better. The living state is ‘a soul which drags a carcass,’ but the body being material can be shaken off. That the mind is eternal seems as probable as that the body is not so. But I will detain you no more on this theme. The rest is with God.
I understand that you are on the point of adding to your family, and losing your husband at such a time must bow down your head to the earth, for you are experiencing in your youth the greatest misery of age, when your friends fall around you. But you are not withered, not left a lonely tree. Although this wretched loss creates a most sad chasm in the present, I most sincerely hope that your happiest Days are not over. I trust that the pleasurable parts of the past will be equalled, if not exceeded, by the future. You are young enough to begin again, and to retrace the laughing part of life with another.
I have taken up so much of your time that there needs many an excuse on my part.
I have the honour to be,
Your very sincere and obedient servant,
George, Lord BYRON.
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Lady Mallinger would have made an exceedingly inadequate heroine of a novel, for having reached the end of the letter she did not fall down in a swoon or become hysterical with grief. Her primary sensation was of an incomprehension, that extended past the poetry and the Latin lines. Her apparently collected behaviour was so convincing that Mrs. Hurst waited a full minute after her sister must have finished reading before asking with little curiosity by whom the letter had been sent.
Lady Mallinger was not composed. She was, rather, frozen by overwhelming calamity. She had not believed it possible that anything could make her suffer more. Yet here was this letter to tell her that when Sir John Thorn had come to her and declared that he loved her still, she was already a widow. Had she but known she was free, how different would have been that conversation! Or so she imagined. Lady Mallinger had a remarkable talent for deceiving herself.
Perhaps Sir Henry deserved no greater outward signs of bereavement from his wife. Mrs. Hurst however was really distraught when the truth was revealed and abused her sister for her callous reaction. “Caroline, how can you take it so coldly? This is shocking. It is dreadful news. You will have to quit Damson, and Mr. Hurst and I will have nowhere to go but Clifford Priory! Ugh! The mold and the damp. I quite feel entombed when I go there.” Thus was Sir Henry eulogized by his sister.
It was not long before Lady Mallinger was suffering from a violent headache, but the pain in her head was no more than a wan reflection of the pain in her mind. Then towards evening more alarming symptoms appeared and Mrs. Hurst filled with fright summoned a physician.
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CHAPTER
27
Meryton Area, June 1816
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Lord Marlowe in planning his pursuit of Miss Penelope Harrington of Bewley had decided to allow a little time to pass before he recommenced his stalk, knowing that her alertness would diminish if she had not always the hunter on her track. It was therefore the beginning of June before he once more came into Hertfordshire and imposed himself on the hospitality of the Delafords. The weather, unrelentingly cold and wet, had neither chilled his heart nor weakened his determination.
Reaching Bewley he tied his horse to a post and, finding the door not barred against intruders, he stood on no ceremony. He admitted himself and strolled through the halls, opening doors as he came upon them, but each room was empty. Once he had thus quartered the ground floor he ascended the stairs and at the top of them surprised Pen, who was just coming out of the drawing room with a dusting rag in her hand, eliciting from her a sharp squeak of fright. “What are you doing here?”
Marlowe stopped and gazed at her intently before replying in a low, eager voice, “I am drawn here by the irresistible force of love.”
“Love!” said Pen in alarm. “But how did you get in?”
“Your door was not locked, and not wishing to put your servant to the trouble of answering my rap, I simply entered.” As he spoke he began to advance towards Pen, and she retreated at the same rate. “Your glances contain a dangerous poison, and the only cure is to see you.”
“Me!” said Pen halting in astonishment, not only experiencing some bewilderment at the alteration of his language in addressing her but also being absolutely unable to recognize herself in his description.
“To be in your presence was formerly merely a delight, now it is a need. When I first met you, I was far from foreseeing my fate at your hands.”
Pen was speechless; but she instantly saw the miscalculation of being also motionless, for Marlowe quickly closed the gap between them and reached for her. She moved hastily away and, attempting to speak in measured tones, said, “Lord Marlowe, how can you talk this way? I have done nothing to try to – to – attract you.”
“Can it not have occurred to you that you have bewitched me?”
“You must not speak like this to me any more.”
“You forbid me to speak of my love, but in what way do I merit this reproach? What have I done but yield helplessly to the feelings that your beauty inspires? How can you blame me for your ascendancy over me? I can no longer worship you in silence.”
Pen said with what dignity she could muster while holding a rag and walking backwards, “You were very wrong to come to my house uninvited and unwelcome. You cannot stay. I have asked you to go and you must do so at once.”
Even the extremity of this reproof did nothing to deter him. “You would order me to deprive myself of your sight, when I have no joy but to look at you? I must obey you, for your dominion over me gives no choice but obedience; and yet – when I have before me the example of your candour, I cannot cling to dissimulation myself. My obedience carries a price: that you permit me to reveal my heart to you.”
“No, really you must not. I do not wish to hear. I pray you to withdraw now.”
“What, you are not afraid of me, are you? How can you be afraid of one to whom love permits nothing but your benefit?” He stretched out his arms to her in appeal. “A man who adores you and over whom you hold absolute sovereignty?”
“Of course I am not frightened of you,” said Pen in growing apprehension.
“Of what then? Of my love? How can you pretend to fear that of which you are the sole cause? How can the sweetest, the purest of feelings cause you fear?”
“I did not ask you to love me; I do not wish you to love me. Please do not talk about it.”
“Let me speak, to refuse to hear me would be an injustice of which I am sure you are incapable.”
“You must leave, or I will call for my servant.”
“Ah, I know what it is.” He put his hand to forehead as if experiencing acute discomfort there. “Your imagination is creating chimeras. You do not distinguish between what you believe I was and what I am now. How can I convince you that I am not the odious portrait you have drawn of me in your head? Have a little courage and it will disappear.”
“There is no need, sir. I have drawn no picture of you.”
“You compel me to defend myself. My ardour is respectful, and even the strictest virtue should not fear it. If I have erred, am I not sufficiently punished by the tortures of love that I now suffer? Tell me that you pity me; tell me that you pardon me.”
“I pardon you, now please go.”
“And that I will have your compassion for the future.”
“Yes, if you like. But you must go.”
“I obey you,” said Marlowe, without making any movement towards the stairs
, “even though I see you taking pleasure in my torment.”
“Oh no, I do not, at all!”
“Then give me a moment’s relief from this agony. I ask only the smallest sign of the compassion you have promised. One kiss, and then I will go instantly.”
Need forced her to overcome her unequivocal confoundment at this request and articulate a refusal. “No, I will not kiss you! I asked you to leave and you said you would obey me.”
“And so I shall. But not until I have received the kiss.”
He bounded forward and seized her hand taken in a strong grip that she could not easily break. Now she was truly frightened. “If I kiss you, do you promise you will go away immediately?” she said in a quaking voice.
“One kiss is all I ask.”
He guided her trembling arms around his body, and pressed his own against hers. She surrendered, but yet resisted, so that the kiss was taken rather than given. But once in possession of the kiss, Marlowe did not keep his promise: he was far beyond the reach of any sentiment of kindness or honour, and the opportunity to remake the contract in his own favour was too good. A skirmish ensued. But Pen despite her fear was determined to give no more on her side than she had agreed; and although Marlowe was undoubtedly the stronger, and although he followed his axiom of One hand for force, One for love, he was not accustomed to dealing with young ladies of birth who did their own washing and sweeping, or who were quite as nimble as Pen, and he suddenly found his arms empty and his charming quarry on her way down the stairs.
She fled and he followed, but Bewley was a large house and she had the advantage of knowing the terrain. Although he searched for some time he did not find her. Reluctantly he departed on his horse. He was not downcast, for all had gone just as well as he had hoped in a first foray. He would have been rather disappointed if the stratagem of the kiss had succeeded, for, a true hunter, he preferred to make his kill after a thoroughly rewarding chase.