Darcy & Elizabeth (39 page)

A Momentous Event at Rosings

Sitting quite erect, Lady Catherine occupied a well-used wing chair that rested in the precise centre of a long corridor. The chair was upholstered in crimson caffoy and amongst the other rather splendid furnishings, it alone looked a bit worn. Although it sagged, it did so with a kind of withered majesty—one of the same sort that graced the countenance of its distinguished occupant. But as the chair appeared quite comfortable, there the similarity ended. For so forbidding was the lady's figure, the opulence of the room strewn with statuary and ormolu struggled to maintain its impact.

Her finger drummed with great determination. And if the drumming did not, the look of unamused apprehension Lady Catherine bore betrayed her usual hauteur. Clearly, her ladyship awaited an event of some import. But one of a particular nature. Hence, curious of the outcome though they may have been, every soul within the walls of Rosings was of the discipline to make no acknowledgement of the event. This was no small tenacity, for the portentous proceedings unfolded just beyond the enormous oak double doors directly in front of Lady Catherine's chair. A tall clock stood in an alcove, chimes silenced. Even mice cowered in the crevices, none having the brass to dart across the edge of her carpet. It was as if the house itself was as transfixed as was her ladyship. Indeed, the shadowed niches of the cavernous hall revealed several servants practicing the art of unobtrusiveness with meticulous care.

Henry the parrot sat on his perch in the corner maliciously eyeing the gathering—but even he was silent. The single exception was an otherwise undistinguished footman who cleared his throat of an annoying tickle. When he did, Lady Catherine did not turn in his direction, but her drumming finger stopt. Then it recommenced, giving the footman leave to understand such insubordination would not be tolerated. His rasping throat, however, threatened to erupt into a cough; he subtly began pulling a pocket-square from his sleeve. With even greater delicacy, he stuffed the whole of it into his mouth.

All quiet once again, shadows slowly marched across the floor. So deeply did they intrude, a skulking figure broke rank. Yewdell drew his resin torch like a sword, pranced the length of the room as if a Lancer of the 17th addressing each candelabra as he went. Grand as Rosings was, its mistress bore a parsimonious streak. Hence, the renewing of light that was burdened by the candle tax was not a good sign to those servants who had begun to admire the thought of their beds. Returned to his station, Yewdell stifled a yawn. There may have been an inward sigh from the others, but little more. Although the night looked to be long, nary a head dared droop as long as her ladyship was still at her post.

Lady Catherine had no company upon this watch, nor did she expect any. Irritably, she looked about and saw amongst the statuary another one of Beecher's ornately framed (and altogether abysmal) water-colours.

“Anne's doing, no doubt,” she sniffed (making a mental note to have it removed and burnt).

As Lord Beecher held little interest in what jewels of wisdom his mother-in-law had to offer, she saw little worth in Beecher. Other than a fourth at cards in those long evenings at home with Anne and Mrs. Jenkinson, she would have seen him as she did most every other man of her acquaintance—a compleat waste of manhood. He was, however, a fast worker. That conclusion came by way of Lady Anne not only sporting a fiancé, but a womb half-gone with child by the time they left Bath. In light of Lady Catherine's attentiveness to all that was decorous, it might have been expected that she would have been most unhappy to learn that her daughter had leapt the nuptial broomstick prior to her wedding day.

However, upon this specific occasion, she was not.

Indeed, she was pleased as punch to confirm that the breeding stock of a lord that she had purchased was not merely fertile, but motile as well. It would have been untidy to have to rid Anne of Beecher after the wedding—not to mention the time that would be lost upon obtaining a pregnancy. But that had not come to pass. She congratulated herself upon the thoroughness of her investigations of Beecher's prolificacy. He had serviced her daughter with unrivalled efficiency. Indeed, from what the servants reported to her, her daughter's solemn demeanour hid a libido of some magnitude. Lady Catherine had been more bemused than offended to learn of it.

“Well, just when one thought there were no more surprises to be found in this world,” Lady Catherine had reflected in the darkness of her bedchamber, “one learns that little Anne is just as cock-smitten as any scullery maid.”

Although Beecher had been secured for Anne by the time Lady Catherine had learnt the extent of his gambling debts, she was not prepared to call foul in the matrimonial sweepstakes. As she saw it, holding that information gave her the whip-hand over her son-in-law. She secretly paid off his creditors, thereby becoming his true obligator. She could sic the dogs of the bailiff upon him at her own will—
that
was a handsome thought, indeed. There would be little meddling from him when she put her plan into play for her grandchild. So long as she held the financial reins, he would back her every move. Moreover, money properly applied would cinch his compleat compliance—perhaps even his assistance. If there was one thing she had learnt in her life, it was that there were few sorrows in which a good income is of no avail.

Lord Winton Beecher was not about this evening. Everyone in the house knew he was in London—but only Lady Catherine knew he was gambling at Boodle's. She cared little. The proprietor would only allow his losses to reach a level of her determination before his credit was halted. She looked in the direction of the clock once again. Only on the half-hour did she allow herself a glance to reckon the time. Yewdell noted that thrift and was not surprised. It was with compleat dispassion that he observed the hands of the clock as they slowly circled. And it was with no little irony that he realised that the swinging of the clock's pendulum acquiesced to the mistress's will, keeping time to the beat of Lady Catherine's drumming finger, rather than the reverse.

When at last all thought they would run mad from the interminable wait, the drumming ceased. The silence was broken with such force, everyone, to a person, leapt in their skins. Lady Catherine had struck her stick but once, but it landed with a resounding thud upon the floor. At the cracking blow of her stick, all who had uniformly given a start punctuated it with a great gasp. As for Henry the parrot, he went into such a flapping frenzy that it alone would have startled everyone out of their stupor. All this came about because even Lady Catherine's perversely persistent patience had had enough. (When the silence was finally ruptured, that it was pertinacious Lady Catherine who finally broke it was more startling than the act itself.) Unfortunately, the footman who had the whole of the pocket-square stuffed in his mouth gasped too. He began to turn the colour of a boiled beet, further distraught as to whether to break his stand and extract that which was choking the life from him, thus enduring his lady's displeasure or dying on the spot—in Rosings, 'twas no quick decision. Yewdell cut his eyes in the footman's direction daring him to suffocate.

The strangled footman let out a small, gurgling cough, all others gulped in anticipation, but still the doors before them did not open. This a unique occurrence, for few things did not yield to Lady Catherine de Bourgh's wrath.

Lady Catherine's finger paused atop her stick, her eyes fluttering in exasperation. Just then, as if bidden by the huge Javanese gong sitting quietly in the corner, the doors were thrown back and Dr. Brumfitt strode momentously into the corridor. Whilst still wiping his hands, he initiated a small ceremony. Stepping back, he hid the bloody rag behind his back and swept his freshly wiped hand in the direction of an equally be-stained nurse who had followed in his wake. Now the centre of all notice, Nurse made an awkward, off-balance curtsy. In her arms lay a squirming, swaddled bundle. She raised the child before her ladyship as if a gift from the Magi.

With a self-conscious flourish, Dr. Brumfitt bowed, saying, “Lady Catherine, I present your grandchild!”

For one whose arthritic hip had been the subject of a great deal of complaint, Lady Catherine came to her feet most expeditiously. She nodded once, abruptly turned, and with great purpose, carried herself down the corridor. She neither peered at the infant nor took notice of the silence from the room from whence the surgeon had emerged.

Simultaneous to her leave, the enormous beads of perspiration that had formed at his hairline began to seep down his face.

Standing quite still, Dr. Brumfitt closed his eyes and drew a deep, heartfelt breath of stagnant air and mopped his brow. It was not his place to prophesy. He could only praise God above that Lady Catherine believed he had done well seeing that her grandchild survived such a troubled birth. If Lady Catherine spoke no question of it, he was beyond caring the fate of Lady Anne.

Lady Millhouse Interjects

Lord Millhouse was a genial soul, but Lady Millhouse was a long-time Darcy family friend and was, in all ways, quite formidable. Lady Millhouse's true occupation was that of horsewoman, but she was a devoted wife and excellent friend to the few amongst her peers whom she respected. Bombastic as she was kind, her cheerful exuberance belied her sad history of enduring thirteen pregnancies with not a single child surviving beyond a fortnight. Successive blows of such strength and number would have felled a lesser being. Yet so little did that burden trouble her bearing, those unacquainted with her tragedies would never have guessed that she had suffered as grievously as she had. Indeed, quite the opposite. For the entire of her life she had presented herself as nothing if not indomitable. Belying those blows of unendurable loss, Lady Millhouse did not begrudge the happiness others found in their own children. Indeed, she heartily joined in, bestrewing not a few of her nieces, nephews, and the offspring of close friends with motherly love and unswerving attachment. Although she was of no blood kinship with the Darcys, she was in deportment and affection as much an aunt to Darcy and Georgiana as Lady Catherine could ever have wished to be. Whether her dauntlessness was inborn or learnt in trial by fire, Elizabeth was wholly unacquainted. She did know, however, that in her own darkest hours, Lady Millhouse had come with words of uncommonly good judgement—horse sense, Lady Millhouse called it.

Her bond with the Darcys had fastened ever more tightly subsequent of the ill-fate of her adored nephew, Newton Hinchcliffe. When told that young Hinchcliffe was felled on that vast graveyard known as Waterloo, Lady Millhouse took the news with unyielding stoicism. However, she had been determined to have Lord Millhouse accompany her to Belgium to find the exact location of Newton's final resting place. As any notion upon which Lady Millhouse became attached was as good as done, they sailed within the week. After hours of searching the graves he was at last found, but Lady Millhouse was not happy to leave him there. It was her wish for him to take his last rest not in some foreign soil, but within the earth of her beloved Pennyswope, to lie forever amongst those graves of her many departed infants. Although Lord Millhouse insisted on the folly of doing so, she was adamant on this point.

“I shall take him home if I have to swim the Channel with his corpse on my back!” she said defiantly.

Hence even a phalanx of gendarmes and her husband's disapproval could not sway her from disinterring his body and carting it back to England.

Her time had not been misspent, for Newton's reports from that battle had won him great, if posthumous, acclaim and there were those who clamoured to pay him respect.

“Would he not have been pleased?” said Lady Millhouse upon hearing of it, bringing a linen handkerchief to wipe a tear from the corner of her eye. Proudly she said, “And to think that he might not have been here to know of it.”

As no one was of a mind to question whether in having shuffled off the mortal coil, Newton would have been less cognizant of his acclaim had he been dead in the ground of France rather than England, that determination remained Lady Millhouse's to pronounce. Her friends merely shook their heads in perplexity, far too troubled by the sight of one who was so seldom discomposed falling victim to a weep. All stood ready with limitless sympathy, but most stood helplessly about and said, “There, there.”

Amongst those dear friends stood the Darcys. They too were a bit discomposed by her weep. Perhaps that affection is why Darcy allowed certain familiarities from Lady Millhouse that would have otherwise driven him to distraction. Although his dignity was occasionally battered, he could never bring himself to be truly vexed by her earthiness. In consequence of her sorrow, the Darcys encouraged her to visit Pemberley at every opportunity. Their object for such generosity was the two-fold kindness of cheering Lady Millhouse and relieving Lord Millhouse of the office of sole consoler.

When her ladyship did occasion Pemberley, the directness of her address was weathered by the master of the house with even more forbearance than ever known of him. Although it remained unspoken, her visits were encouraged for a consideration other than simple kindness. Whatever their friendship offered Lady Millhouse, hers recompensed them several times over. For rich as the Darcys were in family, love, and property, there was but a single commodity in which they were poor. Their children had no grandparents to bestow those particular indulgences that are peculiar to that race of second-season parents. Both Darcy's mother and father were long in their graves, Mr. Bennet more recently so. As for Mrs. Bennet, as a grandmother she was even less devoted to her grandchildren than she was to her daughters. From a woman whose regard for riches and those who were rich was unparalleled, this lack of devotion for children in so coveted a pecuniary position appeared quite extraordinary.

It was of no surprise that she did not hie to Derbyshire to gaze upon her newest grandchildren. For after betaking herself to the first several of her daughters' childbirths, weathering their ordeals to bask in the joy of grandmotherhood grew steadily more tiresome. Before long, her nerves had suffered quite enough.

When time came for Jane's most recent lying-in, she had said, “I am well content to abide here and look upon the wee one once uncertainty has passed.”

Her meaning was not ambiguous. Nor was it challenged. For the single pragmatic quality Mrs. Bennet owned was that of affection. She was not without feeling; hers was simply finite in nature. One child in four would not see their first birthday, the odds were not good and she had not excess to invest in those tiny souls not long for the world.

Elizabeth had her own answer for this seemingly paradoxical behaviour.

She said cryptically, “One of my mother's greatest wisdoms is to know when the pot no longer needs stirring.”

Indeed, Mrs. Bennet's interest in her daughters' well-being had waned precipitously once they were advantageously married. As it would be fully a year before mourning would allow her to enjoy the benefits of society, was it not for her exceptional regard for Lydia, the woman would have had little interest in her daughters whatsoever. She found her time better employed at Longbourn concentrating on the thing that most caught her fancy—herself. Now that she was a widow, it took every hour of every day to adequately see to her own needs. As much as she enjoyed her own nerves and fits, she could little weather the cries and unseemly discharges inherent to her offspring's offspring.

“There is ample time to be in their company when they are proper young ladies and gentlemen,” she had announced.

Jane had long since ceased to cajole her into grandmotherly affection. The only children she would tolerate to visit Longbourn were Lydia's, and only then when Hill kept them out of her sight. Although there was no grandmother who warbled on with more enthusiasm of the advantageous situations of her grandchildren, her affection for them was of a particular kind—that which was displayed best at a distance.

Therefore, it was by absences either in spirit or in the flesh that Geoff and Janie suffered a dearth of grandparental attention. Hence, it was to the Darcys' additional fortune that Lady Millhouse was particularly happy to undertake the office of Provider of Grandmotherly Effusion. Yet, as with every silver lining, there comes a cloud—and, insofar as Darcy was concerned, even this one.

The Lady of Pennyswope Manor had been a most cherished friend of Darcy's parents and therefore privy to their most closely guarded secrets. Although her connection with her Aunt Gardiner was very dear to her, Lady Millhouse was the single visitor with whom Elizabeth could be compleatly unguarded. Although her trustworthiness was unquestioned, this intimacy and her lack of discretion could occasionally exasperate Darcy, particularly when she was sent to rhapsodising whilst recollecting his childhood. Unfortunately, every achievement celebrated by the twins provoked her remembrances of the young Master Darcy which were not necessarily those that he enjoyed in recapitulation.

“Yours is a strapping boy, Elizabeth,” Lady Millhouse said admiringly—and repeatedly; “if only your mother were here, Darcy. There would be no end to her delight!”

Darcy's mother had died whilst giving birth to Georgiana; he then was but ten years old. Although Darcy thought of his father with nothing but the highest of esteem, he was his mother's son, inheriting both her aspect and temperament. He admired his father, but it was his mother he had adored. Lady Millhouse had been her lone confidante. Because of that, Elizabeth was pleased beyond measure to hear her applaud young Geoff. Darcy's countenance remained passive whilst she laid out her compliments, but even Elizabeth could detect a small swell of pride in his attitude.

With goodwill and happy thoughts flooding their bosoms, Elizabeth and Darcy nodded and smiled with approval. Although he always steeled himself for Lady Millhouse's occasional inexplicability of discourse (as his dignity often bore its brunt), her conversation that day in the sitting room at Brighton had been so benign he had been lulled into a truly genial mood. Lady Millhouse, however, made an addendum.

“But wee Geoff is not half so enormous as was our Darcy here. Now there was a child of goodly bulk!”

That comment in and of itself was not alarming. But having heard this particular recollection many times before, Darcy's pleased expression evaporated. Elizabeth had not, hence her ears perked up.

“Indeed?” was Elizabeth only response, not daring to glance at her husband, for she could sense his glower.

“Yes, indeed! So fat was he that he could not walk until well into his second year,” she said, smiling at the memory—as if she could behold his plump little person even then. “He had rolls and rolls and
rolls
of fat—so fat that when at last he stood, his little legs bowed under the weight! His mother was beside herself in fear that they would never straighten out!”

The one truth Elizabeth knew was that Darcy did not suffer a pricking of his pride with any part of good humour. She knew it probable that even good Lady Millhouse could try his patience. This subject was of particular mortification in that of his many conceits, foremost was the well-proportioned muscularity of his figure. In a time when men did not scruple to wear a corset, even at five and thirty years he was justly proud of his trim physique and not of a mind to recollect himself otherwise. Elizabeth knew that likely. But what with Lady Millhouse's descriptive powers thoroughly employed (and possibly embellished), Elizabeth had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing whilst imagining that long-past roly-poly baby.

“Thank you, Lady Millhouse,” said Darcy, “for those reminiscences. I am certain you overstate my early robustness.” Then in a change of subject stunning in its facility, he said, “I understand your favourite hunter threw her first foal, does he look promising?”

“Yes, he is a fine one,” said the lady, not taking the bait, but rather immediately returning to her previous topic. “And what trouble Darcy's mother had getting him to make his water in the pot! His breeching was put off for an embarrassingly long time. Had his father not had the superior notion to tell him he could not sit a horse until he was out of petticoats, I fear he would be wearing them still!”

Darcy scowled that his attempt to reroute the conversation was in vain, but nonetheless gave another attempt. “Are you to see to his prospects at the Brighton race-course?”

Before Lady Millhouse could respond to Darcy's question, Elizabeth, who had been endeavouring greatly to keep her countenance, burst out with laughter, then quickly covered her offending mouth with both hands. Lady Millhouse looked at her, but Elizabeth did not dare look to Darcy. He had stood abruptly and strode to the window, his dignity clearly bruised. She was chagrined—but only by half.

Lady Millhouse continued to talk on in the same manner and Elizabeth was uncertain whether she was oblivious to, or insensitive of, Darcy's dislike of her subject matter. But Elizabeth did observe her give a momentary glance towards him before returning her attention to Geoff, whom she had been entertaining with an assortment of faces and noises.

“Yes, young man, you are your father's son. No doubt that will be your enticement for good behaviour for him. Just lay out the chance of a horse in front of him and he will do your bidding,” she poked him in the ribs and sent him to squirming and giggling.

“Darcy was on a horse by the time he was three. Did he tell you that, Elizabeth?” she continued, “I think not. That is the only accomplishment of his that exceeds his way with a horse—his reserve!”

Of her husband's many favourable attributes, his way with a horse and his taciturnity were not even in the top three, but on this point Elizabeth remained silent to her company. Initially she did not dare a peek in his direction, but after only a trice, did. He caught sight of her then and, for the briefest moment, returned her gaze. She made no response but to raise one eyebrow. That small expression had become a secret communication between them. When employed, it was a reminder of the intimacy of their connection and, upon this occasion, of those virtues he owned known only to her. He then turned an ever-deeper shade of crimson than the one that Lady Millhouse's reminiscences had provoked.

But as his horsemanship was the single conceit that Lady Millhouse could have invoked to return him to good humour, he lost his previous air of displeasure and did not quite smile, but made a small attempt at it.

“I am certain you exaggerate on that point as well as on all the others you have employed to-day, Lady Millhouse,” he said picking up Geoff.

To him, he said, “You shall out pace your father in all things. Will you not, my boy?”

“Yes,” said Elizabeth, “he will be repeating all the responses by the time he is three, a full year after he takes a four-foot fence. But what of Janie? She may well be the one who inherits your horsemanship. What then?”