Darcy & Elizabeth (11 page)

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Elizabeth was by nature's design gregarious and had, as a rule, enjoyed the company of all her neighbours. But the rigours of childbirth and those difficult months preceding it had tried not only her health, but her patience. Her husband bid her stay to her bed—that so soon after the loss of her father she need not suffer the company of anyone beyond her own choosing. But those scandalous events that surrounded the Darcy name (both past and upcoming) conspired against privacy. However distracted she was, and whatever lack of comeliness she felt, it was imperative to see and be seen. Indeed, as Mistress of Pemberley, it was her duty to set aside any inconvenience upon her vigour or disposition and receive those who called with compleat cordiality.

She steeled herself for this daunting obligation by tightening her corset and squeezing her form into what she deemed the less unattractive of her two frocks. She gazed into her looking-glass with no small abhorrence of what she saw, but she had no time for a sulk. When the bell heralded each caller, she heaved a sigh, pinched her cheeks, and patted her hair. It would have to do.

There was a time when there was no need of coaxing colour into her cheeks—she arose each morning in that fine state of blush. That reminder did little to lift her spirits for what would, without fail, be a trying, two-pronged ordeal. She would have to suffer the inspection of her person and her children by parties determined to find them wanting, and then endure the recitation of their remedy.

This was no small aggravation. As a first-time mother, she was all but offered as a sacrificial lamb to the altar of Childrearing Admonishments. With her mother still in deep mourning in Hertfordshire, she hoped that she would be spared outrageous cautions and insipid counsel upon the fostering of children. Regrettably, she was not. Even her friend Charlotte Collins came all the way from Hunsford to stand as another holder of the Office of Knower of All Motherly Wisdom. Whilst she schooled Elizabeth, young Chauncey Charlemagne Collins (still cock-eyed and largely bald) sat by his mother's side screaming for another sweet. (Charlotte's remedy for Chauncey's skewwiff gaze was a special large-billed bonnet. Hanging from mid-most of the brim was a ribbon upon which a small silver spoon was fastened—much like a plumb. It was an imaginative device, but largely unsuccessful.) The sight of so unsightly a child so badly behaved incited within Elizabeth both abhorrence and pity in equal measure.

At one time, she and Charlotte had been the best of friends. Although Elizabeth clung to that fallacy for several years after the actual demise of their bond, she eventually began to admire the distance that separated their homes. If blame were to be laid for the loss of that friendship, it would have to fall to the fostering of pity one for the other. It might have been expected that a woman whose Christian name was as often as not preceded by the modifier “poor” (and whose child was referred to as the “unfortunate son”) was who was pitied. It was not. Indeed, Charlotte saw herself the owner of all good things—a secure living, a modest home, no husband to bother her, and a son to whom she could dedicate her life. It was Lizzy who was to be pitied. It was Lizzy who was barren.

Once Elizabeth was blessed with children, Charlotte's heart closed as surely as if money had been lent. Elizabeth had long laboured under the axiom that love is blind and friendship closes its eyes. But when Elizabeth committed the ultimate affront by obtaining one gift that Charlotte had owned above her, Charlotte felt the bond between them fissure irreparably.

Elizabeth perceived that a coolness had settled between them. Despite that, she endeavoured to be as polite to Charlotte as to all others who came to call. She reserved exposing her true feeling upon this one issue to the sympathetic ear of her aunt, Mrs. Gardiner, who was wont to remind her, “What is it the poet said? ‘In the misfortunes of our friends we always find something that does not displease us.'”

It was a sadness upon which she had little chance to dwell. For much to her exasperation, another axiom was proven again and again. That was the Rule of the Second-Guesser—wherein the more disputable the advice and the greater the fervour with which it was delivered, the higher the likelihood that she who rendered it was childless. Increasingly, it was all Elizabeth could do to listen to such twaddle with civility. Indeed, her ear heard very little from feminine discourse other than unsolicited advice and indecorous inquiries. It was these conversations that influenced her that she just might favour the conversation of gentlemen, for now that Mr. Collins was long dead, she had yet to hear a gentleman inquire after the colour of a baby's stool. On the worst of these days, had it not been for Lady Millhouse's continued good sense, Elizabeth feared a compleat loss of respect for her sex.

On the other hand, the relative curiosity of twins was reason enough to incite exceptional interest in two such handsome babes. In a harrowing era for women to give birth, carrying twins to term was altogether extraordinary. If the story that was told far and wide was any approximation of the truth—that this particular confinement had come to parturition in a chaise
and four on the road between Wigston and Fleckney—it was all the better for the telling and certainly did not diminish the popularity of their inspection. Darcy suffered the occasional nudging allusions to his own potency with expected ill-humour. As for Elizabeth, she rather enjoyed her repute. She all but beamed with pride over her accomplishment. Mr. Darcy believed that the only vanity he had ever known of his wife. And because he attributed it to her earlier procreative failures, he looked upon that single immodesty with considerable forbearance.

They were handsome babies and the Darcys were prouder than either admitted to have them seen to advantage by all and sundry. There were, however, precautions.

All such visitations were not left to chance. By predetermination, the babies were carried in only long enough to allow adequate admiration before they were whisked away. This absenting was enforced lest overly enthusiastic admirers take the notion of picking one up—both their parents were most attentive to the possibility of airborne indisposition. Most of their guests were respectful of the quarter-hour limit good society observed. Some, however, did not scruple to overstay their welcome. Regrettably, such was the eminence of the Darcys' position; some who called were mere acquaintances.

Was sickness and sycophancy not trial enough, Elizabeth was exceedingly mindful that amongst those mere acquaintances were a portion of gentlewomen who came less to admire Mrs. Darcy's newborns than to find satisfaction in seeing Mr. Darcy's wife looking out of bloom in an unbecoming gown.

Although Elizabeth had believed herself long past suffering vexation by fawning females lusting after her husband, her post-pregnancy throes contributed to a marked intolerance of such activity. Although she was most attentive to such a possibility, she saw no lady daring outright seduction. This, Elizabeth was certain, fell less to the lack of trying than to Mr. Darcy simply absenting himself as a target. With enough notice, he made certain to be away during such calls. If visitors were absolutely unavoidable, he accepted their compliments politely and bid them good-bye. When escape failed, Mr. Darcy employed his time-honoured remedy for fawning persons—a well-placed glare. However, that ploy was most effective with the male of the obsequious species. When her husband levelled his annoyed glower upon a lady, occasionally she mistook it for a gaze of another sort. As nothing incites feminine passion more than a gentleman simmering with desire, this particular misapprehension at times elevated simple coquetry into outright advances. Thus a small matter fast became unpropitious. Mr. Darcy, known as a man of understanding and judgement in all other things, refused to suffer such impropriety with any part of amiability. Indeed, the more obvious the flirt, the greater was his vexation.

If anyone should have been the injured party, Elizabeth thought it should be the wife—yet invariably it fell to her to marshal a rescue. Upon occasions past, she proffered the mischief-maker a kind countenance, a gentle word, and unambiguous redirection. Her good humour in such circumstances, she supposed, had sprung from the fact that she understood full well the allure of a reticent man, particularly one of burnished complexion, dark curls, and ample
italege
. Such a man (who was not only handsome, but rich as Croesus) sent feminine hearts aflutter and their nether-regions aquiver, too. Her own gaze alighting upon him across the room still sent a little frisson through her own heart and parts beyond after over half a decade of marriage.

Darcy's recent design for superintending unmanageable females by absenting himself did not aid hers, however. When once their talk with her was strained, but benign, of late there was an alteration in their discourse. They were soon given to alluding not to only Mr. Darcy's specific whereabouts whilst away, but the identity of his companions and house he abided. Maddeningly, these were only intimations. No one was quite bold enough to ask directly. She was powerfully unhappy to have to weather such insinuations alone.

The general crankiness attendant on hormonally inflamed emotions left her ill-tempered even without good reason.

As she sat in company praying that her chemisette did not betray the stains from her leaking breasts, she looked far too meanly upon the elegantly coifed and gowned ladies before her, certain each and every one was a rival for her husband's esteem. Whilst bearing a smile of such determination that it made her cheek twitch, she self-consciously rearranged her shawl to cover her protruding abdomen. Compared to her company, she was certain that her linen cap and the cut of her gown were dowdy and sad. It occurred to her for the first time the power of knowing oneself perfectly turned out—it could beget a feeling of inward tranquillity that even religion was powerless to bestow.

It was not her present situation that incited these disharmonious emotions. They had begun to grow a half-year before when she sat in the same attitude upon a bench in a park in London. The company she kept that day was far better gowned and far more beautiful than any lady of Derbyshire. Indeed, she was absolutely exotic—and French. Elizabeth would never forget the lilt of her voice nor the litheness of her form. Nor would she forget that lady's intimate connection with her husband.

Through war, pestilence, scandal, and death, Mrs. Darcy's mettle had persevered. It would not come immediately, but she would eventually understand that like most tribulations, those that were not forgotten were endured. And even those that were endured would eventually be winnowed out.

There were answers owed by her husband, and she intended to have them. It had nothing to do with her present distress. In no way would she risk the accusation of jealousy. When she spoke the name of Juliette Clisson, he must be both in good humour and unsuspecting. In want of the utmost candour, timing was all.

Lady Catherine's Story

Descended from the same noble lineage as her nephew, Lady Catherine de Bourgh was also a woman of great fortune. She was sister to Darcy's mother and had made a very advantageous match in Sir Lewis de Bourgh. That union was not without its grief, but because the single occasion upon which that gentleman exhibited unerring good sense was to, quite expeditiously, drop dead, it was ultimately one of great success. Marrying, bearing a single offspring, and ridding oneself of the encumbrance of a husband all within one and ten years had been a comfort indeed for a woman who prided herself upon efficiency in all matters. Therefore, Christian charity compels one to assume that it was this aspect of her nature, not a lack of affection for her husband, which directed her to oversee the digging of his grave and the setting of his stone whilst his deathbed vigil was still in progress.

'Tis always sadness for a soul to be wrested from the breast of his family and taken in wing'd flight. This was particularly true of Sir Lewis, who was still in the robustness of manhood (figuratively, for in truth only his pigment suggested him robust, and no one accused him of actual manliness) as he was but two and forty. The corpulence of his neck announced his dutiful enjoyment of the feasts of life. Indeed, it and several chins billowed over and about all sides of his neck-cloth no matter how carefully it was arranged. Ergo, even the most optimistic of observers had to admit to no astonishment when he was struck by an inevitable attack of apoplexy.

Lady Catherine, good wife, never tired of telling each guest (both individually and in groups, so as not to miss an ear) who attended her in subsequent years that she saw the event coming and had counselled him most vehemently, “Eat low on the hog and spare not the beans.”

Those more speculative in nature whispered behind the backs of their hands that it was the gas, not the fit, that did Sir Lewis in. Whether seized by wind or stroke was unimportant. Dead
was
dead. For regardless of the manner of his departure, his being church triumphant left Lady Catherine a dual office. She was from that day forward not only the heir to his estate of Rosings Park, which was much admired by all, but sole parent to their daughter, Anne, who was not.

Used to obedience, Lady Catherine brooked disappointment no better from God above than man below. Hence she was much put out about her own daughter's lack of comeliness. As it was, Lady Catherine's own strong features had lent her some handsomeness in her youth. But those same features when exhibited in Lady Anne's narrow face had not the same success. It might have been inferred that a bit of self-recrimination for her daughter's lack of pulchritude may have fuelled Lady Catherine's vexation in this matter, but no one was actually willing to make that observation. In truth, the blame did lie squarely at her feet (or upon Anne's face, in this particular instance). Indeed, a strong Roman nose, exceedingly long upper lip, and almost compleat absence of a chin grieved Anne's aspect most unkindly. This equine quality of her countenance might have been overlooked had not any small excitement effloresced the nasality of her voice into an outright whinny.

If her neighbours shared Lady Catherine's disappointment in her daughter's want of allurement, their commiseration also remained unspoken.

Lady Anne's lacking may have been disadvantageous, but it was not disastrous. Her connections were such that a good match was inevitable. What was potentially disastrous was that Anne had inherited a sickly constitution from her father. Yet, unlike her father, Lady Anne did not harbour a prodigious appetite and, consequently, was thin rather than slim. With no padding with which to ward off the cold, she took chill easily and was often plagued by coughs and fevers. Her indifferent health was a great worry to her mother. Lady Catherine refused to entertain the possibility of losing her daughter, not entirely out of unconditional maternal attachment. If Lady Catherine looked meanly upon disobedience, interference fared no better. Her husband's untimely death was of little inconvenience, the forward progress of her life's design was not altered. Losing the trail of issue through a lack of grandchildren, however, was another kettle of fish entirely.

Although not a particularly contemplative girl, Anne was not compleatly dull-witted. Still, she might have passed blissfully unawares of the full extent of her own lacking had not her mother dutifully pinched her pallid cheekbones so fiercely, demanding them to rouge. Hence, Lady Anne passed her days in neither a dolorous funk nor effervescent bliss. She settled into a somewhat amiable melancholy. (Whether poor constitution induced this spiritlessness or it fell to the consistent abuse of her sensibilities by an exceedingly dictatorial mother can but be speculated upon.) The insult of a morose disposition, uninspired mind, pale complexion, and, if one were perfectly frank, a bit of a horse-face, was a heavy burden on such thin shoulders. Much to her credit, however, Anne suffered the slings and arrows of Mother Nature's petulance altogether complacently. Those injuries notwithstanding, living under her mother's unsparing criticism in and of itself might have persuaded acquaintances to pity Anne. However, they did not.

Although she only had a single virtue, it was one valued above all others. For her father's immense estate was not entailed away from the female line.

Lady Anne de Bourgh was to inherit it all.