Pemberley (15 page)

‘I had hoped for some fishing tomorrow,' said Mr Gardiner, as Elizabeth wished herself at the bottom of the sea and Lady Catherine ignored the Colonel, ‘for Mr Darcy was good enough to invite me to come again to Pemberley and try my line where the stream runs deepest – indeed, it is like a little glen down that part of the park, is it not?'

‘I do not find any resemblance with Scotland,' said Lady Catherine de Bourgh.

‘The fall of snow is not so dissimilar,' said Mrs Gardiner with a smile.

Mrs Bennet, who had been out of the room for a time, here bustled in.

‘How is dear Jane?' cried Lydia and Kitty, who sat together, discussing their costumes for the Pemberley New Year's Ball in low tones. ‘Is she delivered yet?'

‘I have never known such topics discussed downstairs,' said Lady Catherine, and she and Miss Bingley exchanged glances. Elizabeth did not miss this, and she suggested that the carriage be prepared for Mr and Mrs Gardiner's party – ‘and, Kitty, you will perhaps like to go to Rowsley for the night,' she added, for Kitty, once so improved with her long visits to her two elder sisters, seemed to have descended, after so short a time in the company of her mother and sister, to the level from which Elizabeth had so dearly hoped her rescued.

‘Oh, I should be happy to do that!' cried Kitty. ‘But what of sister Jane? Will she not be in need of us tonight?'

‘She will do well without you,' said Elizabeth; and she made to rise from the table, to lead the ladies to the boudoir.

‘I am certain it will be tonight, though Dr Mason fears it may be a breech birth,' said Mrs Bennet, who showed no sign of understanding Elizabeth's discomfiture. ‘And I am certain it will be a boy – ‘Here she broke off, looked around the table, and dropped her voice. ‘There is a sure way of procuring a boy …' Here she confided in Mrs Gardiner, who, good-natured though she was, flinched from Mrs Bennet's confidences on the subject.

‘This is not to be endured,' said Lady Catherine, rising and leading the way from the dining-room without waiting for the hostess to do so.

‘And what might the method be, of procuring a boy?' said Miss
Bingley, who now enjoyed herself hugely and encouraged Miss Darcy to do likewise.

‘Why, it comes from a Frenchwoman I once had the acquaintance of,' said Mrs Bennet. ‘They are more advanced than we are in such matters, you know.'

‘I believe there is proof of this,' said Miss Bingley gravely.

Master Roper, with some ostentation, here lifted the decanter of port, as a signal for the ladies to depart from the dining-parlour. ‘You will be interested to learn,' said Master Roper to Colonel Kitchiner, ‘that there is little that I do not know on the subject of musketry – of all military manoeuvres in the Napoleonic Wars. Indeed I consider myself a connoisseur and look forward to discussing the campaigns in which you had the honour to serve, Sir.'

‘Do you, Sir?' said Colonel Kitchiner, who was now of a deeper hue than the port; and snuffling and huffing as if pursued by huntsmen. ‘I am obliged to you, Sir – but I must …' – and Colonel Kitchiner made to rise from the table, this being accomplished with difficulty, for the wine he had drunk and the awkward placing of his artificial limb all stood in the way of success.

Elizabeth went to take the arm of her aunt Gardiner, and led the remainder of the ladies from the room; for Miss Anne de Bourgh, who had been as sickly and silent as ever all through dinner, had gone through with her mother, for coffee. As they went, their progress was impeded by an attempt on the part of Colonel Kitchiner to leave the room, likewise.

‘No, pray stay here, my dear Colonel,' cried Master Roper, who now strode to the side-table before the ladies had properly left the room, and extricated a chamberpot from the cupboard below. ‘Those wounded fighting for the Crown may at least count on this as comfort – I am sure there are many households, some of the best in the land, v/ho still provide such facilities – and if it were not for the new mode of sensibility prevalent in the country, the habit would go unchanged.'

Colonel Kitchiner was left speechless by Master Roper's offer.
Elizabeth closed the door of the dining-parlour behind her too late, as she knew, for Miss Bingley and Georgiana were now convulsed. As she led her aunt to the room where coffee awaited, she felt her own colour rise and fall, and was aware Mrs Gardiner saw it.

Elizabeth's thoughts were so filled with anger that she must needs recall the pain and struggle at this very moment suffered upstairs by her dear sister Jane, and she determined to go straight to her, when Mrs Gardiner was settled. But for now – ‘how dare Master Roper commit such vulgarity in my home?' – and here Elizabeth saw herself for the first time truly the mistress of Pemberley, just when she doubted Mr Darcy and thus her own future happiness there. ‘How can it be permitted that this odious young man takes on the mantle of Mr Darcy; even goes so far as to invite a man so dreadful as Colonel Kitchiner, who, for all we know, sees Mrs Bennet as a rich widow and comes to her for her fortune, out of nowhere? And Georgiana! What has come over her?'

These thoughts of Elizabeth's, which resembled the wild flurries of snow falling outside – for they raced and whirled and could not come together with any calmness – were put to an end by her mother's arrival in the boudoir, where Lady Catherine and her daughter took coffee.

‘The gentlemen are at their port,' cried Mrs Bennet on espying the two ladies sitting quietly, ‘and my daughter awaits me upstairs. Can your ladyship be kind enough to pardon me if I go up to her directly?'

Elizabeth was now the subject of conflicting emotions, for her desire to remove her mother from the company of Lady Catherine was matched by the desire to save her poor sister from Mrs Bennet's attentions in childbirth. She paused a moment, therefore – which Miss Bingley was quick to see. Elizabeth's distracted air for the picture of the gentlemen at port was so repulsive to her, with little to choose between Master Roper, the dreadful Mr
Wickham, the preposterous Colonel Kitchiner, and only poor Mr Gardiner a true gentleman in all the company – gave Miss Bingley all the opportunity she needed, for she now remarked, in a sweet voice, that she was sorry not to have heard the end of Mrs Bennet's tale of a Frenchwoman.

‘A Frenchwoman?' said Lady Catherine, looking up. ‘Which Frenchwoman would that be, pray?'

‘Not
the
Frenchwoman,' said Miss Bingley, with a knowing look at Georgiana – who this time looked away, uncomfortable. ‘An acquaintance of Mrs Bennet, Lady Catherine.'

‘Ah yes,' cried Mrs Bennet, who was always happy to have any affliction, of the nerves or the body, and any remedy, however unproven, to be discussed at length: ‘I recall perfectly. To ensure a boy – I am told a douche with vinegar is just the thing!'

‘This is advice we will not forget,' said Miss Bingley – who threw a mocking glance at Elizabeth as she spoke.

‘I am driven to my bedchamber,' said Lady Catherine, rising.

‘This advice must be useless to those to have not secured a husband,' said Elizabeth with spirit, ‘and equally so for those who have lost one. Mama, I advise in turn that you take yourself to bed and rest, tonight – I will stay with Jane.'

‘I think we are not needed here,' said Miss Bingley, rising also.

The party thus retired at an earlier hour than usual – but not before a report of driving snow in the park at Pemberley had made a necessity for Elizabeth of arranging for the Gardiner party to stay overnight. It was unpleasant, exceedingly so, to think of Darcy returning the following day to find Mr Wickham under his roof; but it could not be helped.

Jane was in considerable pain; her labour progressed but slowly; and after Elizabeth had sat with her an hour – with Dr Mason ever in attendance, and Charles Bingley, whiter in the face than Elizabeth had ever seen him, pacing the ante-room and coming in from time to time – she resolved to go to her room and try to sleep a while. Leaving instructions that she should be woken if there were any developments in her sister's confinement, she went down the corridor and turned to go into her room – then, on an impulse, opened the door of Darcy's room and went inside.

Since their marriage, Darcy had inhabited his room very sparsely indeed; and it was empty and cold, with the curtains round the four-poster bed tied back to the posts as if in recognition that their proprietor would no longer find any use for them. The curtains at the window were also drawn back so that a new moon shone in, with a star at the tip, over the snowy park and trees. Pemberley lay in a deeper hollow now, with the snow all around it; and Elizabeth feared suddenly that its master would not return; that he was hurt, or had fallen, his horse prey to the monstrous accumulation of snow in the lanes between here and Matlock. Elizabeth sighed, and went to stand by the bureau, where pens and quills and paper were laid out, for the use of Darcy's correspondence, each sheet engraved with the picture of Pemberley House and coat of arms of the Darcys, entwined with those of the great line from whom Lady Catherine and Darcy's mother, the late Lady Anne, were descended; and she sighed again as she looked out on the moonlit park and wooded hills that were her new demesne.

For some reason she could not define, she recalled Lady Catherine's strictures, on her visit to Longbourn, that Pemberley or the shades of Pemberley – should never be polluted by such as Elizabeth and her mother's family. And she smiled and thought of the times she and Darcy had laughed together at the insolence of his aunt. She had to confess, also, that she
had
brought some pollution to the place – for Mrs Bennet was so infinitely at her worst, here, and furthermore, without so much as asking her daughter, had invited the dreadful Colonel Kitchiner to the house. Perhaps, thought Elizabeth, there are truly those such as Lady de Bourgh who know best in these matters: perhaps Darcy's marriage to his cousin Miss de Bourgh would have brought him greater happiness – for there would have been an absence of pollution then – and Miss de Bourgh's fortune, to keep the air even cleaner; and he would not have gone off in an ill humour, as Elizabeth knew full well he had, in consequence of the vulgarity of his mother-in-law.

But Elizabeth's spirits were low and now she told herself she should go to her room and rest – for she must be ready for Jane and, more importantly, she must keep Mrs Bennet from attending her sister. She was fatigued; that was it: the ill manners of Miss Bingley and the new attachment formed by Charles's sister with Georgiana had proved dispiriting; and both strength and courage were needed tonight. Tomorrow was Christmas: the birth of the Saviour would be marked by the birth of a child to her dear Jane – as modest and lovely as any mother could be; and this gave her strength, at a time when the shades of Pemberley seemed indeed to have all turned against her.

Elizabeth went to the door and walked out quietly into the corridor. To her surprise, she saw Georgiana, in her nightgown, standing by the door of her room. Her face bore an irresolute expression – Elizabeth glimpsed her before she was seen in return – and, as the girl heard a footfall coming towards her, she started and stepped back.

‘Georgiana?' said Elizabeth gently. ‘What is the matter?'

‘I am come to say I have been most ungracious in the last days,' replied Georgiana; and, as she was then overcome by tears, she permitted Elizabeth to put an arm around her and lead her into her own bedchamber.

‘My dear Georgiana,' said Elizabeth – and here a maid appeared, sleepy-eyed, to brush her hair and was told with equal gentleness to go off to bed. ‘My dear sister, when we are young so many new notions come into our minds – we take against people and for people – and, truly, Georgiana, you have full licence from me to feel as you do.'

‘But why, Lizzy, why are you so good to me?' cried the girl, kneeling by Elizabeth's chair at the side of the fire, which burnt still brightly. ‘I do not mean to mock Mrs Bennet, I give my word I respect your mother and am led to all this without knowing where I go!'

‘Lady Catherine warned that Pemberley would be polluted by my mother,' said Elizabeth gravely – and at this both she and Georgiana burst out laughing. ‘Now, my child, go off to bed – and think of it no more.'

Georgiana showed by her shy embraces and smiles that her sister-in-law had restored her to calmness. As she went to the door, Elizabeth said: ‘I would like to ask you something, Georgiana. Do not answer me if you cannot.'

Georgiana replied that she would answer anything she was asked. ‘Though there cannot be any secrets from you here, dear Lizzy – you have brought such a clear, fine air to Pemberley.'

‘I ask if it was possible that Darcy was in the village at about three after noon today,' said Elizabeth. ‘For I swear I saw him there when I walked in to enquire of the party for the children of the men who work the land here.'

‘I do not think so,' said Georgiana – very quickly, as Elizabeth noted. ‘He is gone to Matlock; the parson has died and he must find another incumbent for the living.'

‘Then I am mistaken,' Elizabeth said; and, embracing Georgiana once more, she closed the door and prepared herself for sleep.

But it was long in coming. She waited, half of her alert, for the summons to Jane's childbed; and, for the rest, a puzzle lurked that she could not solve – for the reason that she could not know its nature. There was the dreadful episode of Mrs Benner's recommending a douche – Elizabeth's eyes opened wide at this as she recalled it and she blushed there, alone, in the darkness – there was the talk of the Frenchwoman – and then, surely, the look Miss Bingley had given, at another Frenchwoman spoken of, but without a name. There could be no answer to this, and no rest if she were to dwell on it; so at last, when Elizabeth had banished from her mind the recurring picture of Darcy's return and his discovery of both Wickham and Colonel Kitchiner at liberty under his roof, she slept.