The Plight of the Darcy Brothers
Read The Plight of the Darcy Brothers Online
Authors: Marsha Altman
Copyright © 2009 by Marsha Altman
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Altman, Marsha.
The plight of the Darcy brothers / Marsha Altman.
p. cm.
I. Austen, Jane, 1775-1817. Pride and prejudice. II. Title.
PS3601.L853P57 2009
813'.6--dc22
2009017531
Printed and bound in the United States of America
VP 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Chapter 1: The Master of His Realm
Chapter 2: Dark Clouds at Brighton
Chapter 3: The Sad Tale of Mary Bennet
Chapter 5: The D'Arcy's of Normandy
Chapter 6: The Account in Question
Chapter 8: The Last Monks of Mont Claire
Chapter 10: His Royal Highness
Chapter 11: Appointment with a Doctor
Chapter 18: The Would-Be Priest
Chapter 19: Brian Maddox Rides Again
Chapter 22: The Sad Tale of Mrs. Reynolds
Chapter 23: The Worst Kind of Call
Chapter 25: The Darcy Brotherhood
Chapter 27: Sympathy for the Devil
To Mary Anne Dietrich, my sixth grade English teacher,
for believing in me.
And
To Kelly, Madison, and Hannah Scott,
for being really understanding when their mother disappears
behind the computer to edit for me.
THE MASTER OF HIS REALMLOOKING OUT ON THE lands of Pemberley and surrounding Derbyshire as a king would his kingdom, and surveying all that was within his grasp, Fitzwilliam Darcy would normally breathe in a deep sigh of relief that all was under his control. He was the master of his own fate. He had been a loyal son, a diligent student, an excellent outdoorsman, a suitable gentleman, a good friend, a loving husband and brother, and now was a caring father as well. He handled every situation that had arisen, no matter how trying, usually with the utmost civility and control—not always, but usually.
Darcy supposed, with what little emotional distance he had left in him, he could look back on the matter and say that one who tempted God forced the Lord's hand to prove that Mr. Darcy of Pemberley and Derbyshire was
not
, in fact, the master of his own fate. He just wished it could have been done in a manner that was a bit more… subtle.
“Brother?”
He didn't turn to address Georgiana properly when he heard
her voice. That would have required him standing, and he did not have the inclination to move. Manners would just have to suffer. Manners were gone from him entirely. “Yes?”
“Do you want something?” she stammered. “I mean, may I get you something? You've—you've just been out here a long time.”
Her,
serving
him? Didn't he have a well-paid staff for that?
No
, he remembered, he'd shooed them all away. “No, thank you. Is she awake?”
“No.”
Good. “
I'm fine. Thank you for inquiring.”
She took that as a dismissal, which was good enough for him; he was not interested in having a conversation with his sister, or anyone for that matter besides Elizabeth, and then he had no idea of what to say. There hadn't been a course for this at Cambridge.
What a waste of time; studying literature when it all amounted to nothing.
He should have gone to medical school. He should have had a profession as a doctor and not been a uselessly idle gentleman who could do nothing of any worth in a crisis.
Georgiana had returned, because he felt her soft touch as she put a blanket over his shoulders. There was a chill in the evening air, but so far his mind had been elsewhere. “Just so you don't catch cold,” she said, and disappeared again. Maybe she didn't know what to say
either
. Not that the situation didn't merit excessive confusion or sorrow. That it had been unexpected, however, just proved fools of them all.
Elizabeth's courses had descended on her when they shouldn't have, four months into her term. He could only think “courses” because that seemed a less vulgar way to describe it than just bleeding, which was what it was. And pain. She had been a
little stoic at first, but she did nothing to hide her alarm and rang for the most knowledgeable woman on these matters on the grounds, which was Mrs. Reynolds. Elizabeth was dismissive of his worries, perhaps fearing they would eclipse her own, and might have tried to ignore her condition entirely if it hadn't continued, and if pain hadn't set in. By the time the doctor arrived, their child was gone, though the doctor insisted on not calling it that, or having them call it that.
This was not the first time, but it was drastically more painful. Elizabeth's first term after giving birth to Geoffrey had also ended quite abruptly, and though that was startling, they had remained upbeat about her future prospects. The second term proceeded further along, so much so that Darcy would swear to her he could see a difference in her, even if she could detect none, and would whisper encouraging words to her at night.
That the Darcys' hopes for a second child had disappeared again for no apparent reason and in a chamber pot hit them both at a level they hadn't expected. Elizabeth was a normal woman and, in the course of their marriage, could expect to miscarry, perhaps as often as she carried to term. That her mother had never done so was a wonder unto itself, with all of the emphasis on the lack of sons in the Bennet family, Elizabeth admitted, between sobbing and being forced into bed from exhaustion.
This was not a formal mourning; no one had died, and there was every temptation to close ranks, at least for the moment. Nonetheless, from the very first look he had at the amount of blood she was losing (and where she was losing it from), Darcy had called for Dr. Maddox, who very unfortunately lived in Town and, therefore, could not appear in Derbyshire at a moment's notice. They had to settle for the local doctor, who
was perfectly competent and on whom they had relied in the past, but Daniel Maddox still seemed a magical wonder who could save everyone and do no wrong. He had, in the space of three months, saved both Darcy's and his own brother's lives. But no, Dr. Maddox was in the south, and the message would not have reached him before all was over and done. If he did apply to Pemberley, it would only be to give his regrets as a relative for the unhappy circumstances.
Elizabeth had to tell Jane; of course, everyone would have to be told, because everyone had been told Elizabeth was with child some time before, but there was an order to imparting the news, and letters could not be formally set out like party invitations. It was more that Elizabeth demanded no one see her and then finally cried for her sister, leaving Darcy to fill in the order of the correspondences. In the shortest note and with his most precise and ordered handwriting, betraying nothing of what he felt, he wrote to Longbourn with the unhappy news and left it entirely to the Bennets' discretion as to who would come. Mary Bennet was still on the Continent, and Lydia was still the wife of George Wickham and, therefore, did not enter into his thinking.
He wrote to the Gardiners even more briefly, barely more than a line. The Hursts he would leave to Bingley, to whom he had applied by courier. The Bingleys had arrived within the hour. The only reason Darcy was willing to leave Elizabeth's side was because her sister had joined her. Whether they were talking or not was none of his business.
He was genuinely both happy Bingley was there and not in the mood to have a conversation with him, something he had made known mainly (he hoped) by inflection when he addressed Bingley, and then by disappearing onto the balcony outside
his rarely used bedroom. He remembered through a haze that gentlemen did not show their tears, and that much stuck with him enough that he took the privacy afforded to him by Jane's arrival to disappear.