Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife (74 page)

Georgiana started at this and the bare arm she was slathering with soap slipped from her grip. Fitzwilliam, either used to Georgiana’s ministrations or unaware it was she who was bathing him, had started as well. The provocation of Darcy’s shouting out Georgiana’s name in such an alarmed manner incited Fitzwilliam to believe they were somehow in harm’s way and he flailed about in search of a weapon.

Georgiana endeavoured to calm him and said, “See what you have done?!” over her shoulder to Darcy.

Thereupon, with indignant impatience, she met her brother (who stood yet agape at the door) and led him firmly back to the drawing room, indicating there he was to stay.

He, however, was mid-sputter, “Georgiana, how can you behave in such an improper, incautious, indiscreet manner?! Have you gone mad?!” (Both brother and sister’s remarks were more in exclamatory than query.)

She answered him slowly, mouthing her words in careful deference of his ears, “I am a nurse. How do you fancy the wounded to bathe?”

“You are not at the hospital now, and Fitzwilliam is not some anonymous patient. Have someone else to do it.”

“Who do you propose? A maid. You?”

“I would sooner do it than have you.”

Raising an eyebrow, she allowed them both to picture Darcy giving Fitzwilliam a bath. He might, perchance, oversee a bath, direct a manservant, she silently considered, but not bathe Fitzwilliam himself. Just as certain he would, as Georgiana thought not, Darcy stood his ground.

Georgiana heaved a sigh at her brother’s lack of understanding. Truly, she had no way of explaining to him what she had seen and done since she left Pemberley. How altered she was. Forever altered. She opened her mouth to try to explain, then shook her head of the notion.

Instead, she said, simply and with finality, “I shall nurse him.”

Darcy thought he saw what he considered an unhealthy degree of determination in his sister as she quitted the room. Perchance she was mad, he worried, for she certainly was not behaving in a rational manner. All the blood and death were enough to falter the hardiest of sensibilities. Yes, there was no question. His sister had gone daft. He had rescued her from the hospital, but he saw no way, save binding and trussing her as if a turkey, to save her from herself.

Fitzwilliam had been aware of Darcy’s continued presence, but Georgiana had not told him of her brother’s deafness. His outburst caused her to explain it. After the cursed bath, Darcy came again to the room and drew a chair next to the bed. Fitzwilliam reached out his hand and Darcy took it and held it, but not in feminine fashion by the fingers. This was a masculine gesture, designated as such by the grasping of the thumbs.

Just beginning to allow himself to believe Fitzwilliam would live, Darcy only then began to place himself in Fitzwilliam’s proverbial boots. Survival was not always paramount. Life and living coexisted independently. Darcy thought of his own privilege and imagined living crippled and blind. It was unthinkable. For Fitzwilliam, it was worse yet. The younger brother of the Earl of Matlock would sit in bemedaled boredom in the sunroom at Whitemore and waste away.

Darcy cleared his throat several times before he could talk. Fitzwilliam acknowledged the emotion by a subtle pressure from his hand. All that he could muster to say was the observation of the ridiculous irony of their situation.

“What a sorry pair we are, Fitzwilliam. You cannot see, and I cannot hear. Together we make just one good man.”

Fickleness of chance does betimes favour the infirm as it did at that moment. For had Darcy been able to hear, he most certainly would not have welcomed the reminder when Fitzwilliam laughed softly and made an assertion.

“At least I’ve got my ballocks, Darcy. At least I’ve got my ballocks.”

A perturbation for Georgiana’s brother, possibly. But a substantial consolation for Fitzwilliam.

Within a fortnight of Elizabeth’s return from London, a portentous envoy hastened to Longbourn. This legate had the duty to inform Mrs. Lydia Bennet Wickham of her husband’s valorous (if ultimately fatal) Napoleonic campaign.

Late of her father’s house since Wickham’s loudly lamented embarkation to Belgium, Lydia had been enjoying an extended holiday at the expense of her parents’ nerves. Beyond the use of her husband’s reluctant sallying forth into battle as a platform of self-promotion, she had not once considered he might actually be killed. Hence, upon learning of this serendipitous turn of events, she fell into a dreadful swoon. However her mother and father endeavoured, no vinaigrette-of-hartshorn could influence Lydia from the throes of bemoaning, bewailing bereavement.

In lieu of sending a cold post announcing their brother-in-law’s demise, Mr. Bennet went to Derbyshire to tell Jane and Elizabeth himself. He undertook the journey solely to soothe the precipitousness of the message. This was an admirable intention, however, as a renowned poor traveller, his unannounced arrival was more ominous than any express.

The first to benefit from this harbinger of obituary was Jane. So roundly distraught was she, it was decided that she, Bingley, and Mr. Bennet should all go together to break the news of Wickham’s death to Elizabeth. However, having spent precious little time in prayer for Wickham’s uniformed hide, the arrival at Pemberley of the baleful trio well-nigh incited Elizabeth into a swoon herself. Fortuitously, her father foresaw she might think they brought ill-boding for her husband’s life. Thus, he blurted out that it was not Darcy, but Wickham, who was heels foremost.

“Dead? Wickham?” she repeated incredulously.

“Gathered to God,” assured Jane.

Hearing this revelation in the grand foyer, Elizabeth abruptly planted herself upon an ormolu ottoman and commenced to weep uncontrollably. Bingley, Jane, and Mr. Bennet took turns looking at each other quizzically at this unprecedented outburst, having it upon good authority that Elizabeth was not particularly fond of her brother-in-law. It was in the domain of this reflection that Mr. Bennet understood her true grief. That of newly exacerbated apprehension.

“There, there, Lizzy. Mr. Darcy is quite all right. It is only Wickham…” Mr. Bennet consoled.

“Papa!” Jane admonished.

“Yes, yes, Jane. She knows what I mean.”

Yes, she did know what he meant, and having her father there to attempt to put his arms around her well-burgeoned stomach was more comfort than she thought possible to obtain. Mr. Bennet had ascertained from Bingley that Elizabeth had learnt Darcy was alive and at Roux’s villa upon the eighteenth of June. He hastened to assure her that word had it that the fighting had ceased but for skirmishes upon the sixteenth. Hence, the worst was over and Darcy had survived.

Letting out a breath so deep it very nearly did make her faint, Elizabeth allowed herself to believe for the first time Darcy was finally out of harm’s way. Thus, all put upon a sorrowful face and (in Jane’s case, sincerely) set about mourning Lydia’s husband.

It was decided over supper that this must be done in person and post-haste. But not so hastily lest Mr. Bennet not be able to rest adequately. Jane and Elizabeth had observed his puffy face and swollen ankles with trepidation.

“Just gout, my daughters, just gout. A rich man’s affliction for certain, and what a mischievous game is played when such an ailment is visited upon such a lowly gentleman as myself!” he protested jovially.

Perchance it was merely the intensity of the summer air and not the spending of emotion of which Mr. Bennet was always so parsimonious that caused his heart to grieve him. In such a plight, rarely is it questioned whence it came. Elizabeth only knew one minute he was smiling over his meal, the next he was not. Slowly, he brought the palm of his hand to his chest and pressed it there. With that gesture came a grimace of pain.

“Papa!”

Elizabeth and Jane both leapt up, but Mr. Bennet’s forehead had not brushed the table before Bingley reached him. A subdued bedlam ensued as servants were called to carry him upstairs and a rider dispatched for the physician. Once he was carried to a bedroom, he was presumptuously stripped to his small clothes, night-shirted, and sequestered into a sickbed, protesting cheerfully every step of the way. Both Elizabeth and Jane were affrighted to their shoes.

Thus, he assured them, “’Tis merely dyspepsia, my dears, I have not the neck for apoplexy.”

Elizabeth almost smiled at that, but Mr. Bennet’s face was contorted by another stab of pain. At that, even he gave up the pretence that nothing was wrong. His face took upon a cast of greyish-green and he lay back.

“What can I get you Papa? Calomel? Bitters?”

Dr. Upchurch (Carothers had been gathered to God the previous autumn) arrived directly to investigate the complaint and that done, he offered little encouragement, “I believe the gentleman is losing ground.”

His daughters’ distraught countenances announced the doctor’s unfavourable diagnosis. Mr. Bennet reminded them that the doctor’s vast medicinal bag of tricks had yet to be employed.

“He has come all this way in the dark. He shan’t lose a patient so easily. Once dead, we are notoriously slow in paying his fee.”

Although he was noticeably weaker, his good humour demanded a lack of pessimism. Moreover, Elizabeth reasoned, if he had suffered a stroke she knew there would have been some paralysis. Thus, she did her best not to think of the fear she had seen in her father’s eyes, believing, somehow, that if he could live through the night, he would rally.

Jane and Elizabeth sat up with Dr. Upchurch as he periodically took Mr. Bennet’s pulse. Each time he did, he raised an eyebrow and shook his head. But Mr. Bennet’s breathing lost its pant and deepened before dawn. Elizabeth thought it a good sign.

“I did so want to outlive your mother, Lizzy. What will she do?” he queried. “What will she do?”

She could not believe that her father would be taken from her and allowed herself to join Jane in an uncomfortable upright nap. When the day did break, her father’s face was turned to the light of the window. Seeing him, Elizabeth rose and placed the back of her fingers against his cool forehead. Softly, she called his name. He did not hear it.

Gently, she closed his eyes and then kissed his forehead. With stealth and determination, she recovered her seat next to Jane who was yet asleep, thus allowing her another hour of being a father’s daughter.

* * *

Rather than returning to Hertfordshire to comfort Lydia, they brought renewed grief. Their small cortege followed Mr. Bennet’s coffin slowly as it made its way upon a black caisson. The plumed feathers atop the funeral horses’ heads bounced -ludicrously. Yet Elizabeth could not keep herself from being entranced by their dance.

Ever fretful, Jane was concerned for Elizabeth, for the only tears her sister had shed were the very few that dropped from her eyes at his bedside. She feared her sister was slipping into the same melancholia from whence she very nearly did not recover after the death of her baby. Talking to her had not made head-way, for she responded appropriately, but with dispassion.

At Longbourn Mr. Bennet’s coffin was set in the parlour, and as his body had been laid out at Pemberley, his family had nothing to do but keen.

* * *

In her childhood room, Elizabeth sat upon the side of the bed patiently awaiting for the others to retire. In time, when the house was quiet, she drew the shawl about her (indeed so well-worn it was getting a bit thread-bare) and padded barefoot down the stairs. Candles had been set at the base of the chairs that were fashioned into a makeshift bier supporting Mr. Bennet’s coffin. They were the only lights in the room. Mary sat at her father’s feet, a Bible clutched in her fingers, eyes shut tightly in prayer. When she heard Elizabeth, she silently rose and moved toward the stairs, her post replaced.

As she sat, Elizabeth placed her hand upon the smooth wood of the casket, then rested her cheek against its coolness. Time had suspended, thus she was unaware of how long she had been there when she heard her mother’s voice, strangely softened.

“How shall we manage without him, Lizzy?”

Elizabeth did not raise her head, merely turned it by way of her forehead to rest upon her other cheek and looked toward where her mother had sat unobserved. Odd, Elizabeth had never known her mother to sit anywhere silently, as she did then.

“His last thoughts were of you, Mama,” Elizabeth said, trying to contain any bitterness.

Her mother said nothing.

“He said he was concerned for you, was he to die.”

Her mother nodded, and yet sat silent. A substantial anomaly.

Elizabeth told her, “Do not fear, Mama. Jane and I shall take care of you, you will always have a home. I know of a house upon Pemberley you would like…”

“Thank you, Lizzy, but I cannot think of that now,” her mother answered.

Elizabeth could see the rivulets of her tears gleaming in the candlelight. They sat in silence for some time before Elizabeth heard her mother sigh.

“No better man, my Lizzy. No better husband.”

At this, Elizabeth returned to her alternate cheek, unable to look at her mother any further.

“How soon was it,” she thought, “that the dead are brought to deity in the eyes of those who in life found them little regard.”

She thought she had said it only to herself, but apparently did not, “That is not what you told Lydia.”

“I told her what, Lizzy?”

Elizabeth did not want to quarrel with her mother. Particularly not over her father’s yet uninterred corpse. But she could not remain silent just then in the dark. Had it been day and she were able to look at her mother’s familiar countenance, she would remember whose daughter she yet was. In the pitch-gloom of the night, it was easy to forget she was a daughter still.

“That is not what you said to Lydia,” she repeated, a little louder. “She said you told her Papa was faithless to you.”

“Oh that Lydia. She told you that? That was not for your ears. She despaired so of Major Wickham. I thought she would not if she believed all men were as he.… It seemed right at the time Lizzy, for she was so very wretched. Was I amiss?”

Albeit it was the single time her mother had ever questioned the righteousness of her own actions, Elizabeth could not bring herself to tell her she was, indeed, quite wrong. The logic of disparaging her father to his daughter to ease the sins of her husband was lost upon Elizabeth, as was all her mother’s reasoning.

But in the hours she sat at the foot of her father’s coffin, in her father’s house, she had the luxury of objectivity she had not held for some time. There she was Elizabeth alone, and not Darcy’s wife. Having been so angry with her mother for so many years, the lucidity with which her own culpability came to her in the dark room was startling.

She had blamed her mother for Bingley’s infidelity to Jane as much as Bingley himself. If she was honest, she knew she held her mother in reproach for the only serious rift betwixt herself and Darcy. The mere repeating of an accusation against her father had shaken her supposed august trust of her own husband. Had she no more fortitude than Lydia? She who found comfort in such a scurrilous story?

Elizabeth turned and looked at her mother again. Mrs. Bennet sat with her head resting against the back of the chair. She looked broken. Vulnerable. Again, Elizabeth closed her eyes, not in defence of the woeful sight, but of her own introspection.