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Chapter 22
Elizabeth stared at William dumbfounded, unable to say a thing. She stared, coloured, doubted, and was silent, to be precise. And as if his blurting out those astonishing feelings wasn't quite enough, he seemingly found her staring at him as if he had grown a second head to be encouragement enough for him to go on.
"It has been some time now since I have been prone to feelings akin to admiration and love regarding you, in spite of my better judgement. I once thought you spoiled and over indulged by the entire family. They have seemed to see your lack of discipline and proper traits in someone of your breeding as something acceptable and I dare say charming. However different my view is from theirs, I cannot help the way I feel towards you, so I must ask you to relieve my suffering and consent to be my wife."
Elizabeth gaped at him open-mouthed. It did not matter that she disliked him so much anymore - this was atrocious! Checking his demeanour, she realised that he was expecting her to accept him as if he were worthy of such! Not only as if he had not wronged people she loved, but also as if his proposal had been indeed appealing.
"You expect me to accept you, cousin?" She asked calmly, in spite of her heightened colour.
He did not move.
"You do, do you not? Well, I would have felt grateful and flattered, but I cannot."
William remained looking at her and when the realisation of her rejection finally hit him, he walked all the way to the mantle piece and leaned his arm against it, taking a deep breath.
"May I ask why are you rejecting me with so little effort to be civil?"
Elizabeth snorted.
"You mean to tell me that you find it acceptable and civil that you should insult me while telling me you like me in the first place?" She asked.
William was pale with anger, but could not say anything because she was not done yet. Looking down at her hands, bordering on angry tears, Elizabeth went on.
"I have every right to think ill of you. Ever since we were children you have done absolutely nothing to recommend yourself. True you were not always around, but when you were, you treated me with disdain and indifference, often insulting me. If you wonder how the family has accepted my lack of proper upbringing, I wonder how you have become such a conceited fool!"
His eyes were wide and the blood had drained from his face.
"H-how-"
But Elizabeth would not let him go on. "And speaking of morals, you are indeed one to talk, are you not? Or should I perhaps remind you of your dealings with Mrs. Pratt? The way you abused her extremely ill?"
He turned to her sharply. "Oh, yes! Mrs. Pratt! She has been misled indeed!"
Elizabeth glared at him. "And it seems that it does not stop there, does it? Or you mean you will approach sarcasm when I tell you that I am well aware of you destroying the happiness of my most beloved friend - and another cousin of yours, I may add."
Silence.
"Can you deny you have done it? Can you deny that you took Bennet to London under false pretences to be away from Meg, thus hurting her deeply?"
"I will not even attempt to deny it. I had my reasons."
Elizabeth watched him as he blinked in a rather astonished way and suddenly walked from the fireplace to the other side of the library and from the main shelf back to the fireplace. He frowned and then paled, but just as soon turned his attention back to her.
"Dare I think that we would not be having this discussion had I flattered you instead?" He demanded suddenly. "Saying perhaps that I rejoice in the misled way your parents have raised you and the way the entire family overlooked this? Well, Cousin, I think you should know that I am not a man predisposed to falsehood."
"No, Cousin Darcy, in that aspect you are wrong. If you think that my response would have been affected by the mode of your declaration, you are indeed mistaken. As it was, it merely spared me the concern which I might have felt in refusing you, had you behaved in a more gentleman-like manner - or rather - had you not hurled insults at my face while asking me to marry you!"
It was William's turn to snort at what she said. "As if you did not insult me at all..."
She gaped at this childishness of his remark, but soon recollected herself enough to retort it.
"I did. Anyone in my position would have, were them in their right minds and not named Louisa Filmont."
William was silent then. And if Elizabeth had not been so enraged, she would have realised that she had hit a nerve and it did not regard her allusion to Miss Filmont. He coloured slightly and looked positively mortified. Unable to say a thing, he only stared at her - an action that she took advantage of because she continued on speaking.
"I have long been holding all of this back for our family's sake. And before you think up any more ways in which I could have been tempted to accept you, I tell you that there would be none."
He swallowed. "Oh, that is comforting!"
She ignored him. "I do not need any sarcasm. In fact, I will use none. I will be quite blunt with you...Even if I had been tied up and been held at gun point, I would still find you the last man in the world I could ever marry!"
William's expression changed from mortification to coldness in a second. He bowed curtly while saying.
"You have said quite enough, cousin. I understand how you feel. I'll leave you to yourself now."
And with this he left, not even slamming the door after him. Elizabeth sunk to the armchair she had been sitting on previously, sobbing already in a mixture of anger and confusion. She got up and started pacing, but fearing that her mother might come inquire after her and see her in this state, she left the library and immediately went to her room.
William walked out of the library and stormed out of the manor. It was not until he saw the celebrating people gathering outside that he remembered what had been going on whilst his proposal to Elizabeth. He ran a hand through his hair and sighed, feeling his stomach turn in agony and despair. Not only had he thrown every chance she might have him out of the window, he had left with the knowledge that she hated him. What more, he had hurt her and somehow in the pit of darkness he had been thrown, he could distinguish what real mortification and shame tasted like.
He realised that in the accusations towards his character she had been correct. While she had been talking to him, flushed with anger and more beautiful than ever, he had realised that indeed he had mistreated her and other people of their acquaintance, and that he did not deserve her at all. What was more astonishing (although seemingly only to him) was that, deep inside, he had always known that. Her refusing him made him love her even more.
"Will!"
He was shaken out of his thoughts by Richard Curwood's voice. He turned and gazed at his cousin as if in a daze. Richard's brow creased under his sand-coloured curls as he apparently searched his face.
"William, are you all right?"
He nodded. "I am well, thank you. But there is a pressing matter of business I need to attend to, Richard. Pray, ask my parents to offer the Filmonts my excuses."
The words left his mouth as if by themselves and William could not even recognise his own voice.
"You're leaving Linton!?"
Leave. I wish I could.
"Not yet." He mumbled and walked back to the house.
He did not fear meeting Elizabeth again. He knew she was determined not to attend the luncheon and that her room was away from his anyway, thank the Lord. He reached and closed the door behind himself with some relief. He needed solitude to think on what had recently transpired. When he sat down on the bed, however, it was too late. The realisation that he could not love another woman save Elizabeth Bingley was nagging at his brain constantly no matter how many times he repeated to himself that she would not be his.
And it was so that he wept in earnest for the first time ever since his Grandfather Bennet had died.
Meanwhile Elizabeth was sleeping in her room, having cried herself to that position. In her desk lay an opened letter from Margaret, which a servant had placed in her hands little after she had run from the library to her room.
"Bennet wrote to me. He said that he is enjoying the company of our cousins exceedingly and that they are all very charming ladies, Georgia specially. He even said he is inclined to stay there when Aunt Lizzy comes back, Beth. From that I must only conclude that if he ever cared for me, his regard is now indifferent than the one of the average cousin..."
Chapter 23
"Beth? Beth, are you unwell?"
Elizabeth's eyelids fluttered open and she saw her mother hovering over her, framed by the beautiful patterns of the ceiling. She blinked twice before remembering why she was still in her clothes and her cheeks seemed sticky. When that finally happened, she felt her eyes filling up with tears again.
"Dearest! Why are you crying!?" Mrs. Bingley exclaimed, sitting down and gathering her in her arms.
Upon finding herself involved into that familiarly scented embrace, Elizabeth wept instead of the mere sniffling she had settled for previously. William's sketch of her character had finally got to her and visions of the impropriety of her behaviour swam in her head one after another. From the way she always found herself surrounded by Bennet and his friends, to the manner in which her father had always indulged her.
She found that she should probably start humbling herself before more harm could be done. William was probably just another person in this world who also thought her spoiled and irresponsible.
She sobbed until she tired herself and nearly fell asleep again. However, instead of laying back and letting unconsciousness do its role in making her forget the horrible happenings of that morning, Elizabeth raised her head slightly to face her mother.
"What time is it?"
"It is past five in the afternoon. I went to look for you in the library to call you for dinner, and when I could not find you, William told me you were probably in your room."
"William?" Elizabeth croaked.
Mrs. Bingley pursed her lips in apprehension. "I met him on my way to the library. He did not look very well, either. Fitzwilliam said he has been over exerting himself with business and a whole lot of reading lately and that he never stops working. He was hoping that this trip would do Will some good, but apparently he was locked away in his room all afternoon! He looked so exhausted when I met him."
Elizabeth just tried very hard not to sob out loud.
"Beth, is something the matter?"
"My head hurts, mama."
"All right," said Mrs. Bingley, amused by the childish tone of her daughter's voice, "I'll leave you be for tonight and convey your excuses to your aunt. The General and your Uncle Darcy were expecting a performance from you, but I guess they will have to settle for Louisa tonight."
"Would you send the maid in?" Elizabeth asked while sitting up. "I want to get changed into my nightclothes."
"Of course, dearest."
Elizabeth shut her eyes and waited until she heard the soft thud of the door before she lied back in bed and began thinking about it all again.
It was with dread that she went down for breakfast the next morning. She asked her maid for a simple and comfortable old dress and to do her hair in the simplest manner possible. In her mind, the only wish she could make out for that morning was that she could walk herself to death. She was craving for the solitude and peace of the groves and gardens of glorious Linton Park and so she went down looking like a country wench. Elizabeth was aware of the damage her gowns were often subjected to when she spent her mornings in such fashion.
"Why, Bessie, you forgot your riding gloves."
Good morning to you, too, Aunt Caroline.
She faced the presents at the table and fell into silently thanking the heavens for William's absence.
"I am not going riding, Aunt." She replied sweetly.
"If this is not one of your riding habits, I do not know what is."
She ignored Lady Caroline and smiled at the eight other people there while dropping a curtsy. "Good day all."
"I am talking to you, Elizabeth! Charles, do you ever teach this girl manners regarding respect for her elders?"
Elizabeth smiled while arching an innocent eyebrow at the irate woman. "I apologise, Aunt. I meant no disrespect. I was merely doing as my parents tell me. Once you meet someone for the first time in the day, you curtsy and wish them a good day."
If you are to treat me like a child, I am going to behave like one for your exclusive mortification.
"Well, it could have waited. I was asking you why you are dressed in such ludicrous manner."
Elizabeth looked down at her garments. "I am going out on a walk. You see, Lady Caroline, had you asked me to please, sit down and join all of you for breakfast, I would have declined and said that I needed exercise instead of food."
Lady Caroline was quite riled up as she glared at her niece. Elizabeth was well aware of her aunt's pride in her being a good hostess. She turned her eyes from the woman's face and looked at Louisa, who was quietly seething at her. In regarding her cousin, Elizabeth quite missed Mr. Darcy smiling from behind his morning tea.
"Now pray excuse me." She said with a smile for the gentleman.
She curtsied and left.
"...You see, Lady Caroline, had you asked me to please, sit down and join all of you for breakfast, I would have declined and said that I needed exercise instead of food."
William heard the voice coming from the breakfast room and its arch tone made his inside quake. If the mere sound of her voice was enough to send his stomach in a sharp lurch, what was one to say about her presence! He froze in his tracks to the room and stood at the doorway absolutely struck. His eyes darted to the mirror he could see from his position and caught the image of her as she stood instead of taking a seat and smiled at someone at the table. She was simply dressed, as if she were to spend the day indoors with her parents, and William felt slightly amused when he realised the pestering from her aunt that she was probably putting up with.
You are one to know that she only uses such flippant tones when insulted. He thought.
He heard a bustle and started. She was suddenly gone from the mirror and before he knew it, she was tearing out of the room in a hurry. She never saw him. Otherwise, he felt he would have died and so he nearly ran into the breakfast room, praying that she would not change her mind and come back.
"Dear William! How delightful that you should join us!" Said Lady Caroline in what he assumed she thought the sweetest tone.
"Good morning." He mumbled, still under the effect of the whiff of perfume that had attached itself to his nostrils when Elizabeth had stormed by.
He automatically sat down at the only seat available - one dangerously close to Louisa. He could not even think about the sickening effect this lady had on him, though, as he perceived that every eye in the room was on him. So to make things look a little more natural, he turned amiably to his Uncle Bingley.
"I did not have the chance to speak to my cousin this morning. Pray, has her health improved any?"
Mr. Bingley chuckled, as if his daughter's display in the room had been considered an awfully charming one by their hostess.
"Why, son, did you not see her just now? She is as fit as ever! I dare say she will spend the entire day outside, walking and riding and doing all those things that she enjoys so much."
William could only grimace. However, another voice shook him from this state.
"I dare say you were not spectacular yourself yesterday, Will." Said General Fitzwilliam. "How are you feeling?"
"I-I...I am well. Thank you, General."
You have to talk to her, you idiot, and explain yourself to her. Tell her everything about Fanny and how stupid you were to think that Bennet was in love with her and not with Margaret.
He was glued to the chair, however, and to feel the pain of having to face her wrath again was too much. He ate quite as if his body had taken control of the situation and he made conversation with Louisa just as naturally. What he did not see was that the General was looking at him with his eyes narrowed and when the older man got up to leave, he did not find anything unusual about it.
"Tell me Bingley, what groves divert your daughter so much around here?"
William was too engrossed in his own pity to find anything suspicious about his father's cousin's sudden craving for a walk.
Chapter 24
General Richard Fitzwilliam was a very observant man. Something he would not say about the cousin who was closest to him in acquaintance, though; he had been astonished with Mr. Darcy's lack of awareness regarding his son and his relationship with Elizabeth Bingley.
"Have you ever noticed how Will and Bingley's daughter get on together?" He demanded of Darcy the night the Bingleys had arrived at Linton. "I had never seen a battle of wits like that since before you and Lizzy were married."
Mr. Darcy had smiled fondly at this. "Beth is remarkably deserving of her name. She is a charming creature, is she not?"
"And William is not surprisingly unlike yourself." He had remarked, hoping that his cousin would get the hint.
"I am afraid that sometimes they carry it on too far, but Bennet says that Beth teases involuntarily, almost as if it were a bad habit. She has always been like that."
"You mean to tell me that you do not think that they are partial to each other in the matters of the heart?" He asked, almost desperate.
Mr. Darcy seemed pensive, but then shook his head. "They are cousins and she is far too young for Will."
"Lizzy is eight years younger than you herself."
"That is nonsense, Fitzwilliam. William may be like me, but he has always looked upon Beth as a child." He chuckled. "And she would rather have his head on a plate than marry him. True they are similar to Lizzy and I, but they are cousins and have known each other since the time Beth was born. I find it impossible...Personally, I think that she would rather favour Bennet. They are inseparable."
The General quite gave up by then, refraining from taking his cousin by his shoulders and shaking him up until he observed his son a little closer when in Elizabeth's company. It was obvious to him that the boy was in love; much like his father had been when in Kent, visiting their Aunt Lady Catherine and ended up meeting with the charming twenty-year-old Miss Bennet.
The General had perceived there was something amiss regarding the two young people since the day his son James had narrated to him Elizabeth and William's encounter at the Filmont ball in London all those months ago. When he arrived at Linton, he had observed that the heir of Pemberley was unusually quiet and more taciturn than ever and then when the Bingleys had arrived, he had gathered all the proof he needed: Long stares, bickering, glaring, and Elizabeth doing her job well in putting William on edge.
Edge of madness, that is. The poor boy looked like he was going to go insane.
So now the General was walking the gardens of Linton Park, looking for his cousin's niece. He knew that something was very wrong, for he had seen the look on William's face the night before and then this morning, as he had entered the breakfast room not a minute after the lady had exited it. William was his godson, named after him in the most subtle way (the lad bore the name Fitzwilliam, twice: once as his first name - though everyone shortened it - and then a second time as a last name), and he had always been close to him. The General needed to find the Bingley heiress to straighten out whatever the hard-headed William had messed up before anything more happened. That was how much he cared about the lad.
He found her in a secluded grove, sitting on a concrete bench in the clothes she had shocked her aunt in. She looked like a country gentlewoman in the dress of pastel tones and no flattering elements at all. Her hair was held up with as little intricacies as possible and it glinted reddish in the morning sun. Her boots were worn and dirty and she was holding onto an old bonnet. No wonder Lady Caroline had been "quite put out", the General thought with a chuckle. But it was this propensity to impertinence that had always made him fond of the former Miss Elizabeth Bennet. If her niece were anything like her, he would not take great pains to like her at all.
I would almost wish her for a daughter-in-law like I had half-wished her aunt for a wife.
"Miss Bingley." He said, quietly approaching her.
She turned slowly and seemed to dab at her eyes. She got up from the bench and curtsied while wearing a pathetic smile.
"General Fitzwilliam, I have long asked you to call me something else."
He smiled at her attempt at humour. "I apologise, Beth."
"Pitiful morning, is it not?" She asked, regarding the heavy clouds that dampened the sunlight.
"Quite." He agreed.
They sat there in that comfortable silence until Elizabeth's face contorted a little in a forlorn expression.
"Is something the matter, Beth?"
She did not reply.
"You know, I have been a friend of your father's for the longest of time and I am your uncle's cousin. I have always gathered that their children can count on me as much as they have done themselves."
She still sat there and ran a hand over her creased brow.
"Beth, William probably had a reason for whatever he has done that you did not approve of."
"Wh- H- Did you hear us?"
"No, Beth."
"Then how...?"
"I am very close to my godson. He tells me everything. Even facts that he would not tell his own father."
"If he told you anything about his proposal, then you have no business coming here to explain his actions to me nor to beg me to accept him - if you are that devoid of judgement, sir"
"He proposed!?"
Elizabeth sniffled. "He did not tell you then?"
"No, Beth. I have not spoken to him since yesterday."
Elizabeth seemed pensive for a moment. "Well then, sir, whatever have you come here for?"
"To ask you what has got you avoiding my godson and why he is so miserable."
Elizabeth huffed. "That is his own doing."
"I am sorry, but you do not seem a ball of joy yourself."
"He insulted me! Not only me, but he also conveyed his own partiality for the way my parents raised me and the way the rest of the family treats me. And then he told me he loved me in spite of it."
The General, amazingly enough, was laughing.
"I do not find it funny, sir."
Apparently, neither the Bingleys nor the Darcys made a tale out of the trial that had been their acquaintance before their courtship. Well, he was not the one who was going to acquaint their children with the story.
"Neither do I." He said, sobering up.
Elizabeth was silent until anger seemed to compel her to speak.
"He separated Meg and Ben, you know. Your son was the one to tell me. Do you not find it abominable that a person is capable to do this to his own brother?"
"Beth, he thought that Ben was in love with you."
"What!?
Elizabeth stared at the General open-mouthed. She could not believe what he was saying. After being over that one shock, she settled for not believing that William would have come to that conclusion in the first place. Where had he found any indication that Bennet was partial to her, when it seemed so clear that...
No, Beth. It was not clear at all. He treated you both equal - Meg said that herself and you only mistook that for foolish humbleness. Yes, he did indicate that he enjoyed her company very much, but he did not make any declarations at all.
Then something else hit her and as a consequence, she got up and began to pace.
"Then how on Earth could he gather the nerve to propose to me!?"
The General did not have the time to answer that, for as soon as the words left her mouth, Elizabeth turned on the heel of her boot and marched back to the manor at the speed of a whirlwind. And William would, no doubt, be its target.
"I just hope he will be able to withstand it." The General mumbled.
Chapter 25
"What do you mean by 'he has left'!?"
The valet stared at Elizabeth in astonishment as both stood in front of William's chambers; him quite startled by the amount of anger that fit such a small person and Elizabeth, obviously frustrated.
She was glaring up at the older man with her hands on her hips like a little girl whose doll had been stolen by an impetuous older brother, but the valet's response was not affected by her posture.
"Master William has left Linton Park this morning, Miss Bingley. It is as simple as that."
Elizabeth indignantly regarded the poor man for another thirty seconds, thinking of the lost opportunity to confront William Darcy. What had he been thinking!? Proposing to her whilst thinking his own brother was in love with her! The nerve! And he expected her to accept him almost as if she were doing him a favour. Or maybe those ridiculous and pompous De Bourgh fools had been talking him into family honour and fortune combining.
She almost laughed out loud at the angry insane thoughts that were darting through her head because of that foolish, conceited man!
He is absolutely insufferable!
She blinked then in half recollection of her composure and smiled mildly.
"I apologise. Thank you...ah..."
"Lewis, ma'am."
"Thank you, Lewis."
Elizabeth stared mutely at the opened letter at the coffee table in her sitting room after she was done reading it. She had never been so mortified in her life and yet she could not bring herself to react. Forget the whole deal about Bennet and Margaret being separated - There was only one question that reverberated in her head after she had read and reread the long missive left behind by William, under her bedroom door of all places.
She had stalked to her chambers, huffing and mumbling all kinds of insults towards him and stumbled upon the sealed letter with her name neatly written across its smooth surface.
Why has Bennet never told me all this?
Her eyes travelled the neatly hand-written words and found the ones that were haunting her now.
"(...)I suppose I showed myself far too friendly towards Miss Wickham. She was, after all, the fiancée of one of my closest friends from Eton. However, she interpreted this as an open invitation to offer herself to me in the most inappropriate way. I promptly told her that I despised women who behaved in such a low manner while thoroughly betraying and dishonouring her promises to a man, moreover when this man was a friend of mine. She did not take my rejection well and pursued her mother to leave us.
As much as I was relieved to see her go, I would not dare to partake my mother in the subject. I knew how displeased she would be, for I quite realise (as we all do so bitterly) the view of our parents towards the late Mr. Wickham. But that was not the end of it. Apparently, Mrs. Hughes and her daughters decided to go to London, where they met with my brother. Bennet had by then left the Curwoods and gone to town to spend a few days with a friend.
Bennet was very charmed by Miss Wickham, but he did not write to us telling that he had made her acquaintance until the damage was done. In a separate letter to me, he informed me that he was besotted by Fanny and that he was considering defying our father and making her an offer of marriage. I suppose you know how my brother can be.
Anyone would probably assume that upon my warning him through a letter of Miss Wickham's character, Bennet would have broken his attachment with her and returned to Pemberley. But I know how close you are to my impetuous brother and so you must already have guessed that he wrote me back, not only saying that he knew about her engagement, but that it was being called off as he wrote. He said that they would come to Pemberley to ask Father's permission within a week.
I hastened to London as soon as I could, only to find Bennet heartbroken. Miss Wickham had called the whole scheme off because some young Baronet had laid eyes on her and of course, a Baronet is a lot wealthier than a younger son of a country gentleman. Last I heard, she was still having an affair with this poor man."
Elizabeth darted her eyes to the end of the letter.
"Bennet has written to me saying that he is very much relieved that Mrs. Pratt is not in Scotland. She has recently found out that she is expecting and found travelling so far not a good idea in her condition. The Hughes and the other Wickham children are not aware of their relation's dealing with Bennet nor with myself and neither do no one else in our family but General Fitzwilliam and you, madam. He has all my avowal to rectify to you any doubt regarding the events related by this letter.
I will only add, God bless you.
FITZWILLIAM GEORGE BENNET FITZWILLIAM DARCY"
Elizabeth let out a choking sob. It was all of a sudden too much.
It must not be considered a surprise the fact that Elizabeth read more than twice the letter William had left for her upon his leaving Sussex. And while one would think her incensed with Bennet for not having ever told her about his dealings with Fanny, she was not. The time she spent reflecting on the subject made her realise that Bennet had not been ready to share it with her, either out of pain or out of fear. She completely understood him. And as for William's proposing to her while he thought his brother in love with her, she could only forgive him. Had not Margaret told her that he was intending on staying in Scotland, enjoying the smiles of Georgia Wickham? Then William must have felt compelled to propose to her based on that fact.
Or maybe William had been wrong after all and Bennet had indeed had some regard for Margaret while at Netherfield. He was not to blame for wanting to watch out for his own brother, because had he not realised that she did not return the feelings that Bennet supposedly had for her?
"From my own observations, I gathered that that Cousin Margaret looked upon my brother with longing and admiration. But at the same time, it was also revealed to me that you did not look at him in this light at all, whilst he did towards you. I perceived that if you loved him, it was in the affectionate way of a sister and not the one of a lover. And to me, this would only lead to the estrangement of all parties concerned, including yourself."
So Bennet was not the only person she began to understand. William was constant in her thoughts, even if his behaviour towards her had not been corrected or justified. What changed now was the existence of any blame that she had put on him before and the conscience of her own blindness towards him. Should he be blamed for interfering in what, in his erroneous prospective, would have left three broken hearts and a whole deal of awkwardness in the family? Should he be blamed for looking after his own brother?
Elizabeth acutely recognised that she had been moved by her own prejudice towards his past behaviour regarding her, when believing Fanny Pratt, a woman she hardly knew, and could not help but smirk at her own self.
What a great student of character I am indeed!
Chapter 26
The tea was poured, but Margaret Fawley didn't notice it. Not out of aloofness, but because of pure surprise. Astonishment would be too a strong word to describe the way the young lady stared at her dearest cousin as they both conferred at this lady's family's townhouse, in London, a mere day after the Bingleys had arrived from Sussex on their way to Yorkshire.
Elizabeth eyed Margaret carefully, trying to read the expression in the lady's green eyes as they set themselves in hers.
"You do not blame me for refusing him, do you?"
Margaret seemed to shake out of her reverie. "Blame you? Oh, no, Beth. I could not."
Miss Bingley seemed relieved and exhaled as she drank from her tea carefully.
"Then why are you so stunned?" She asked after placing the cup back onto the saucer.
"I am merely thinking of our cousin. He seemed so cold, so reserved...And all the while, he loved you! Poor Cousin Darcy!"
"Poor Cousin Darcy indeed - to have to stand there and hear all the horrible things I said to him! But then, Meg, how could I have known! He obviously has never told anyone...Except for the General."
"I am surprised that he did not tell Ben anything."
Elizabeth bit the inside of her cheek. She felt awful lying to Margaret. Elizabeth loved her cousin dearly - after all, they had been as close as sisters from ever since Elizabeth could remember. But, she concluded, it was better to omit certain details from Margaret, than to have her suffer with the knowledge of Bennet's previous attachment to Mrs. Pratt.
"And to think that Mrs. Pratt seemed so kind and open and good!" Margaret was saying.
Elizabeth smiled. "I am afraid that what one lacks in appearance, the other lacks in character."
"Could there not be a mistake?"
Elizabeth laughed openly at this. "No, dear Meg. I am afraid not."
"Harry!"
"Well! When you think you get rid of a person!"
Henry Curwood smiled widely at her as he took off his hat and bowed to her. Elizabeth, atop her own horse, nodded graciously at her friend, an amused expression etched on her face as the park bustled with the crowd that usually filled its lanes and paths in the spring afternoons. Henry was a welcome relief, even if he could not offer the same kind of comfort Margaret or her mother could. He had the precise dose of good nature in his character to make her momentarily forget about all that was going on.
"I though you were gone to Yorkshire." He said after recovering from his turn at humour.
She faked indignation. "You were hoping you would be rid of me!"
"No, that was my way of asking you what you are doing in London."
"I am here with my parents on my way to the North, as a matter of fact. Mama wanted to spend a few days here so she visit with my Aunt Kitty."
"And you would not miss a chance to be with Margaret, so you did not plead with your parents to move on to the country."
Elizabeth cringed at the comment and looked down at the pale riding gloves that matched the pastel tones of her afternoon dress.
Do my parents really indulge me in this manner? Did I have to be told harshly to my face of that fact so that I could recognise its very existence?
"How is she, by the way? I have been to call on the Fawleys, but only John was there. Meg was out, presumably at some other lady's house." Henry finished teasingly, but then saw the unsettled look on her face. "Are you unwell, Beth?"
She raised her eyes and considered her friend's pale blue ones for a moment before shaking her head and smiling.
"No, I am not. I was thinking about mama, 'tis all."
"Mrs. Bingley is not ill, is she?" Henry asked in alarm.
"Oh, no."
Henry just frowned and then raised a curious eyebrow at her. "Heard from Ben?"
"Not in two weeks. You?"
"Same thing."
They were both silent, until Henry's countenance suddenly changed. His eyes brimmed with delight and his smile was as wide as Elizabeth had ever seen it being. Upon turning to see at whom such joy was directed, Elizabeth felt her breath catch. In the same delicacy and elegance - one that Elizabeth never would possess - with the caramel-coloured hair neatly arranged under a beautiful cream-coloured hat and eyes filled with astute merriment as they were set in hers - came a reason for her to distress herself further
"My dear Mrs. Pratt!" Cried Henry.
"Mr. Curwood! Beth! What a delight seeing you again! This is my good friend Miss Evans. Angela, this my cousin Miss Bingley and my Uncle Darcy's nephew, Mr. Curwood."
"Fanny." The word came out from Elizabeth's mouth tersely.
"Oh, dearest friends! How I have missed you! Get down from that horse, cousin, and let me look at you! That is surely a new dress, for I had not seen before. It becomes you!"
It was one of those dresses Elizabeth had been given upon the Bingleys' leaving for Sussex and it was made of the finest material. Fanny caught the exceedingly puffed sleeves in her hands and rubbed the fabric with her fingers while murmuring "lovely indeed."
Is that what you would have hoped having by luring one of my cousins into wedlock? Fine fabric and a name? People are worse than I thought!
"Pray, how was Sussex?"
"It was...Enlightening!" Elizabeth said lightly, perceiving that Henry was busy talking to Fanny's friend.
"Cousin William was there, was he not?"
"Yes, he was. And you know something...I found that Cousin Darcy improves on acquaintance, even if it may sound ridiculous - for we are, after all, cousins - but it is the truth."
Fanny gave her an uncertain glance. "Indeed? Could his manners have improved?"
"No, I do not think there was anything to improve...Other than his being rather taciturn, something I cannot really blame him for - His father is just the same."
Where did that come from, Beth?
And then Elizabeth suddenly remembered something. "I believe I owe you my congratulations. I heard that you are expecting."
Fanny shot her a brilliant smile. "Yes, I am! Robert and I are so happy!"
"You must be. Any wife completely devoted and passionately in love with her husband as I am sure you are with your Mr. Pratt would be effusive with joy."
Mrs. Pratt merely looked away in a discomfited manner. "Yes, indeed."
Once more were Miss Bingley and Miss Fawley in each other's company. To any casual observer, the scene merely reflected one of pure love and affection in a friendship. But those who knew exactly who the young ladies were, and "where" they both came from, would no doubt smile and nod at the rightness in how Margaret was quietly pacing the room, with an expression of pure luminous modesty while Elizabeth seemed restlessly frustrated.
"Well, I shall miss you once again and you shall write me to tell me of how you are doing." Said Elizabeth as she fingered a few keys on the Fawley's pianoforte.
"You speak of my sadness as if I were ill, Beth."
Elizabeth looked at her cousin, as she stood framed by the spring sunlight that came through the music room window. She could have been deemed the loveliest and most serene of creatures in the yellow afternoon dress that turned her green eyes into a rustic shade of olive green and paled her thick and coppery hair into a shade of old bronzed metal. But Elizabeth was much more perceptive than that. She had seen the sadness that was attached to those beautiful green orbs and how it had clung there for the days they had spent together in town.
"I am determined to forget I ever liked Bennet in a manner different from the one that I was supposed to like him."
That was like a knife in Elizabeth's heart.
"Oh, Meg..."
"Stop feeling sorry for me, Beth. I know you worry and care, but I do not want to estrange you from Bennet ever. You both have been close since we were small children."
"No one shall be as close to me as you are."
"You also have to stop being so stubborn. I know you care about Ben."
"I do. Deeply. He is the brother I never had, but I do not think it right that he should make you suffer. He is behaving very foolishly in staying there with the Hughes and running away from us all!"
Margaret sighed as she crossed the room and stood behind Elizabeth as the latter began to poke the piano keys again.
"Betsy, Betsy...I am the one to blame for my own suffering. It is I that think about him and wish he could return to London and say that it was all a horrid mistake. But he is not likely to. I know you will not stop loving him for not loving me in the way that I hoped he would, but you need not turn your guilt over it into anger against him."
"What?"
"I know you more than you think, Beth."
Elizabeth blushed as she looked down onto the carpet. Margaret embraced her warmly and both girls leaned their heads on the other's shoulder.
"Now play a merry tune." Mumbled Margaret. "I am sick of all the sadness."
Chapter 27
The gates opened slowly, admitting the carriage as it rolled smoothly into the grounds through the sudden afternoon downpour. The exquisite brick house stood imposingly as it shadowed them through what was left of sunlight behind the grey clouds. And even though the scene seemed out of those morbid novels that she enjoyed reading during chilly winter nights, she was instead entertained in watching the beautifully manicured lawn as drops of water bounced off grass and concrete likewise. She could almost see the earth drinking from the starching rain as the vehicle tediously moved along the path and on towards the manor.
To Elizabeth Bingley it was all about relief. Here she could be herself again.
Wragby had been bought by Mr. Bingley, a year and a half after he had been married to the eldest of the Miss Bennets from Hertfordshire, when he was barely twenty-eight years old. Although he managed to keep Netherfield as an entail for his brother-in-law's newly born second son, time spent just three miles away from his mother-in-law had proved to be a tad too much. He relocated to Yorkshire with his wife and there he started hoping for a house full of heirs. And even if they did not come to the young couple, the Bingleys seemingly found comfort in the sure company of their dearest brother and sister, who were but thirty miles away in the neighbouring county. Such comfort was so highly offered that not more than a year after the loss of their first born son, Mrs. Bingley gave birth to healthy baby girl.
Elizabeth had missed her home greatly, but only when the carriage finally stopped in front of the manor and she could finally get out to consider it, was that she realised how much. She ran her eyes along the stone doorsteps and the great wooden doors and just as soon as she was stepping forward to enter, she found herself running into the arms of a plump woman who looked very much the housekeepers children loved.
"Mrs. Temple!" She cried as she threw herself into the cloud of grey linen and impeccable aprons.
"Miss Beth!" The woman replied, disengaging the smaller arms from around her shoulders. "I missed your company as much as you seem to have missed mine, but you are a lady now. Do not forget your manners."
Elizabeth was ready to cry out nonsense, but she instead nodded firmly and sadly - words said in an altogether too familiar deep voice echoed emphatically in her head.
"I once thought you spoiled and over indulged by the entire family. They have seemed to see your lack of discipline and proper traits in someone of your breeding as something acceptable and I dare say charming."
She shivered at the memory and shook her head.
"Come now, child. Let me look at you."
Elizabeth stepped backwards, letting the hazel eyes roam over her travelling clothes, her hair, and her posture.
"You are terribly pale, but otherwise you look beautiful. I can just picture you dancing and shining away in town." The woman sighed. "Come. I've sent for a bath upstairs and for a hot meal. You must be tired and I must see to your parents before they fire me for neglecting them."
Mr. Bingley heard the comment and shook his head, grinning. "We could never fire you, Mrs. Temple. You are too good to Beth and you would never be blamed of neglecting anyone, least of all Mrs. Bingley and I."
This was the last thing Elizabeth heard before she entered the house straight for her chambers.
Elizabeth raised her head from her book and found herself looking into her mother's tired and impatient semblance. She had been merely staring at the page, unable to concentrate at all.
"Beth, have you heard a word I have said?"
She raised her eyebrows and blinked twice before offering a pathetic attempt at an apologetic smile.
"I am sorry, mama."
Mrs. Bingley sighed. "You are Lizzy from head to toe! She always did that to me."
Elizabeth's lips twitched into a teasing smile. "I thought you were the romantic, dreamy sister."
Her mother blushed as though she were twenty-three again. "Yes, but Lizzy was the one with the flighty imagination and the scheming mind."
"You mean to tell me that my inattention to the reading that I, myself, find pleasurable, and to my own precious mama was not something I inherited from the romantic mama herself?"
The older woman giggled softly. "No. Like every aspect in your dreadful personality, this was something you have taken after that aunt of yours."
"Mama! How would Aunt Lizzy react if I told her you called her personality dreadful?"
Elizabeth was rewarded with an unbecoming (and shocking, too!) snort. "She is probably already used to it. I used to blame her for every turn you cried at night in your nursery and woke me and your father up, no matter how many maids we had in for you. And I did not call her personality dreadful, I called yours."
Elizabeth was by this point, laughing delightedly. "What is it that you have come talk to me about?"
Mrs. Bingley quite ignored her daughter for a moment and derisively sighed. "It is no use. I try scolding and teasing, but only to be laughed at."
"Oh, mama...It is only because you are too sweet and it is all quite unexpected!"
"I came here to give you this. It came in along with a letter from Lizzy."
Elizabeth took the parcel her mother was offering her and opened it only to find it a letter from Bennet. It was with a helpless sigh that she put it down after reading its contents.
"What is it, dearest? Something wrong?"
"No, no. Nothing too entirely dreadful. It is just that Ben has decided to stay in Scotland with the Hughes."
The situation proved hopeless indeed. Elizabeth eventually became lonely in Wragby, having to content herself with letters from those she cared. Bennet seldom wrote and when he did, it sounded quite like a chore. Apparently, his brother was still resolved to keep him away from her and Margaret or no doubt she would have heard from him. And Margaret's letters were morose and dull, merely depicting events of London life. Henry was in London, too, now but was too absorbed in going about his own business to write the long and delightful letters he wrote her when he was bored. Elizabeth had never ill-wished the people she cared for, but now she found herself hoping that at least one of her friends would lapse into dullness and either come to Yorkshire or invite her to join them somewhere.
She knew that inviting Bennet would come to naught, so she wrote to London, to Margaret. Unfortunately, Miss Fawley was to go straight to Somerset. Mrs. Fawley wanted her there and Margaret was too good not to comply with her mother's wishes.
"Do you think Beth is unhappy in the country?" Asked Mr. Bingley of his wife as he joined her for tea one afternoon.
"Whatever do you mean, Charles?"
"She has been very quiet lately. I would not want to relocate to town so soon, but if she is not happy with the situation, we must surely be able to rectify that."
"Charles!" Mrs. Bingley protested. "I admit I know that our daughter is feeling rather lonely, but she loves it here. Besides, I think you spoil her too much. This is our home and we are to decide when we leave it."
Mr. Bingley seemed pensive. "Lonely, eh?"
"Yes! After all that time with hoards of people around all the time! First London, then Netherfield, then Linton, then London again! All the while going about with her friends...No wonder she spends so much time with the horses!"
Mr. Bingley laughed. "Indeed?"
"Precisely. And I rather think she needs the peace and quiet for a while. I told you about the state she was in on Marianne's wedding day."
"Oh, she was just envious."
"No. She would not envy the Filmonts for anything as marriage. I do not know what it was precisely, but something tells me that it involves matters of the heart..."
"Do you not think we would have known that, Jane?" Mr. Bingley asked, probably having a thousand and one thoughts nagging at his brain about whatever rascal that hurt his daughter
"I cannot tell, dearest. If Beth is anything like my sister, a lot could go on right under our noses and we would not know a thing about it!"
Mr. Bingley was silent and his wife burst out laughing.
"I shouldn't have said that! Now you are all worried! She may be just eighteen, Charles, but Beth can take care of herself. She is as sensible as they come!"
More silence.
"If it is any comfort for you, though, I will write to Lizzy hinting it that I want Beth to take a few swims at that pond of theirs. That ought to cheer her up."
Chapter 28
"No, no, and no." Said Elizabeth, shaking her head vehemently at her parents two days later during dinner.
The couple was, needless to say, surprised.
"Why ever is the idea so repulsive to you, Beth?" Said Mr. Bingley. "I thought you would like to go to Pemberley. You always did enjoy it there."
Suddenly realizing what her rejection would probably sound like and not wishing her parents to become suspicious, Elizabeth immediately calmed herself by plastering a small smile on her face.
"It is not that I find it repulsive. You know how I love it there! It is just that I do not wish to disturb my aunt and my uncle further than I have."
You are a very bad liar, Elizabeth Bingley. A very bad one indeed.
Praying that her parents had not caught on to the pathetic excuse that had come forth from her mouth, Elizabeth pictured what an incredibly embarrassing experience would be a trip to Derbyshire at this point. Bennet she could not face, for she would be rather tempted to bring up the subject of Margaret instead of watching what she said. As much as she missed her cousin, she could not indulge in his company when she felt like she was about to explode with all the frustration and her own lack of understanding of what was happening.
William cannot possibly have already explained it all to him. It is too obvious that he is enjoying himself in Scotland with Georgia, and William probably does not have the heart to open up old wounds.
When had "Hateful Cousin Darcy" become "Sympathetic William", by the way?
William himself was the main issue, though, and Elizabeth had to admit that to herself. She simply would not withstand meeting with any kind of connection to him without feeling like he would think she had thrown herself in his path.
"What could possibly compel you to think that you have disturbed the Darcys, dearest?" Asked her mother, shaking her out of reverie.
"Oh...I don't know! It could be anything! I feel that I have taken leave of their hospitality far too much...I was actually thinking of inviting Ben to come to Wragby this summer, but he decided to stay in Scotland so let us just leave it be."
"But, Beth! I have already written to your aunt!"
"Oh, mama! Why?" She found herself rudely demanding.
Mrs. Bingley was somehow stricken by her daughter's attitude, but sighed. "I was afraid you were lonely and there are more delights in Pemberley than Wragby could offer. Bennet might arrive by the end of August, so you would still be there."
"I appreciate your concern, mama, I really do. But I have just arrived at Yorkshire and I have no wish to leave it whatsoever. The day I decide to visit Aunt Lizzy I will just ride Flowers myself."
"Oh, no." Her father countered. "That you will not do."
"But, papa..." She sighed.
Mrs. Bingley sighed one more time before ringing to the maid for the next course.
"Very well. I shall write to Lizzy again."
"Just answer me once. How could you come from Linton unattached?" Screeched Mrs. Bennet, recently arrived at Yorkshire through the service of her sister-in-law's carriage.
"Grandmama," Elizabeth sighed while focusing on her needlework. "I was not about to hurl myself at every single gentleman present."
The older woman had suddenly arrived, taking the Bingleys by complete surprise. Whereas Elizabeth wanted a distraction from her lonely afternoons, she could not help but wish herself to disappear so that she could have a little peace. Ever since her grandmother had arrived, she had not spent five minutes without listening to extensive berating about her every step.
"At least you seem to be giving a mind to your hope chest and not wasting time with your books. Lord knows I tired of trying to persuade your aunts Lizzy and Mary to do that. It ought to be Jane's work. At least in something her temper has not been forgiving!"
"Mama, Beth has been doing needlework ever since she was small."
"And this is not for my hope chest. This is a handkerchief for my father." Said Elizabeth with a teasing smile tugging at her lips.
"Oh, how you vex me, Elizabeth! Jane, have you been feeding this girl right? She is thinner than she was during the season. If she becomes scrawny and sickly, it will be another thing to worry about!"
"Grandmama!"
"You know, Beth, time is something that does not stop, specially when you are a young woman such as yourself, with a frail mother and heiress to estate which needs proper taking care of."
Elizabeth fought the temptation to mouth her grandmother's words along with he. How many times had it been that she had sat listening to the same speech over and over?
Good thing she does not know I refused Cousin Darcy's offer. We would be in mourning if she had.
"What are you doing this summer?" Inquired the old widow suddenly.
"I am staying in Wragby with mama and papa."
"I heard Lizzy invited you to go to Pemberley and you refused. Why? Bennet and William might bring friends home from town and then where will you be when sons of Earls and Dukes are in your aunt's home? Stuck here with your horses and your books!? Oh, you will be the death of me, Elizabeth Bingley!"
"I am considering going to Pemberley by the end of August." Elizabeth lied, much to the surprise of her mother. She had always been blunt with her Grandmother Bennet.
"The end of August? By then all they will be gone for sure!"
"Grandmama, you do not even know if Cousin Darcy and Ben will be there in the first place."
"Your cousins are very fond of Pemberley. They would not be far away from it in the summer for the world. Beside, James Fitzwilliam will probably be there, too." Mrs. Bennet said James's name in a sing-song tone.
"I dare say James cares for me as little more than a friend, Grandmama. You will not live to mention your granddaughter, the future Countess of Matlock, I am afraid."
"I wonder why! You probably rode astride in front of him and played cricket!"
"No. I rather took long walks and read Greek plays. Good thing I did not smoke."
There was a loud wail. "You will indeed be the death of me!"
Elizabeth shared with her mother a little pain-torn smile.
"How long will you stay with us, Grandmama?"
"Oh, the whole summer if your mother will have me!"
The letter was short and simple.
"Dearest Beth,
If you are not to come here by mid-July, Fitzwilliam and I will come on a chaise to drag you all the thirty miles to Pemberley. We will be quite lonely, the two of us in this huge empty for this summer (even if we will not be wishing for company all the time) and I am in need of some lively female company. Your mother wants you out of the house and I totally sympathize with her. Our dreadful personalities must be quite tiring!
Oh! And I do not mean that we will drag you into the chaise - we will tie you directly to the horse.
Yours, & etc.
Elizabeth Darcy.
Chapter 29
Elizabeth always awoke at the precise moment the carriage rounded the route and came to stand into view of the house. There had been so many times in her childhood when she would anticipate the prospect, that she now automatically bolted up in her seat to open the curtain and take a glimpse at the huge manor reflected on the shimmering waters of the pond.
Pemberley had never seemed so beautiful, for some reason.
"Should we ask for the coach to stop, Miss?"
Elizabeth smiled at Joan as she nodded in affirmative, and the carriage halted. She peered outside and felt invaded with every feeling of love she had for that magical place.
I should enjoy it now. There will be a day when I am not going to be allowed to come to Pemberley whenever either me or its mistress have a whim.
A strange feeling settled itself in her stomach at that thought and Elizabeth was left in wonder of her own feelings for her aunt's home. She felt as though she was made of the same fibres those trees were, in an incredible sense of belonging. Why had she never felt that way about Wragby? Was it because she had been born here? And the oddest thing was that her memories of running through those very woods with Bennet, Margaret, and Henry seemed distant now. It was almost as if the little girl who used to tear her summer dresses in those long explorations had been another person other than the prim lady she had suddenly become. It was quite a stifling notion.
We are suddenly very grown up somehow. We were not who were last summer, much less the children we were so long ago. Is growing into an adult supposed to be so depressing? And why is it only now that I feel like a grown woman? Oh, it will not do to have such thoughts while here, of all places!
She sighed slowly and told Joan that the carriage could go on.
As the sounds of trunks being shuffled around began, Elizabeth quietly stole away from the carriage she had boarded and looked around herself as she always did. There was no one to receive her at the manor's doorsteps - something she frowned upon. It was only a minute later, when she was already asking from the housekeeper where the mistress was, that Elizabeth was caught into an effusive embrace.
"Aunt Lizzy!" She cried as the older woman made her turn around so she could take a look at her. "Where did you come from?"
Mrs. Darcy laughed. "I suppose your mother never let you into what a terrible hostess I am. Would you believe I was seeing dinner arrangements and completely forgot you were due to arrive soon?"
"You cannot be a terrible hostess, otherwise you would not be the envy of every woman in the Kingdom." Said Elizabeth teasingly.
"I am the envy of every woman in the kingdom for reasons different than whether I am a good hostess or not." Replied Mrs. Darcy.
Elizabeth perceived her uncle's presence behind his wife and blinked her eyes in an innocent fashion.
"Could that be my uncle's money?"
"Maybe it is your uncle himself..." Said Mr. Darcy as he placed his arms around his wife's waist and grinned at his niece.
Both Elizabeth and Mrs. Darcy turned an eye to the gentleman's face and shared a grin.
"Nah..." They said in unison.
Mr. Darcy pretended to be angry, but then shook his head and rolled his eyes.
"What is that all about, dear?" Asked his wife.
"I just realised I am to spend two months in the company of two Elizabeths, none of which are particular keen on controlling their tongues."
"How could I ever have dreaded coming here?" Murmured Elizabeth the next morning, when she was being pulled into her corset.
She could not help it. The view she had of the pond was too stunning for her not to be overcome with joy to be there. Shallow emerald green waters and marsh plants moved with the quiet morning breeze. It was not sunny outside, but it was hot enough so that one could go about without bothering to wear coats and other impediments. It was just the kind of weather Elizabeth loved, filled with the electricity that elicited from impending rain, but enough life outside to cheer whatever time there was before the downpour began.
"You can go, Joan. I will do Miss Beth's hair."
Elizabeth turned around to meet the sigh of her smiling aunt as the maid scurried off with a curtsy.
"Is this a Bennet women thing?" She asked. "Mama always asks Joan if she can do my hair and Margaret and I always do so, either, so that we can talk."
"I always did Jane's hair when I wanted to tell her something or to ask her advice. I learned it from watching Hill do it and then taught Jane so she could return the favour. It is no wonder you two behave the same way. Hand me that pin, would you?"
"You are not going to do my hair like you used to do Mama's, are you?"
"Why?"
"I think it frightfully odd."
"It was the fashion then. People always follow the fashion, no matter how odd they might look."
"That we can safely learn from watching the women in my father's side of the family."
Mrs. Darcy laughed in a manner altogether too delightful, which amused and shocked her niece at the same time. Elizabeth knew her aunt to be a frank person - always open when regarded her personal opinions - but not that much.
"Why are you so shocked?" Asked the older woman.
"I thought you would have scolded me for speaking ill of my family."
"Well, you should know better."
"I figured as much."
Both women giggled.
"What are you doing today?" Asked Elizabeth after her aunt was done pushing the last pin into her hair.
"I have to visit some tenants. Will you be all right if I leave you to reading and pianoforte practising this afternoon?"
"One could never die from those."
"No indeed."
Chapter 30
If there was something that had always lured her to Pemberley was the thought of becoming lost in its immense gallery. To a child that had always been easily entertained with History and its characters, being able to stare at each semblance that made part of the noble Darcys and study their every feature was something that delighted Elizabeth and made her lose herself for hours in the immense quarter that stored generations of faces, both old and new.
She had been trailing after a servant so that she could have access to a particular book in the library, which had been stored in a too exclusive shelf, when she stopped dead in her tracks. By some distasteful joke of mother nature, the sun hit the pastel-coloured linen curtains and shed light on a section of the gallery she had long ago helped her uncle organise. It was there, all in a row, that all of Pemberley's mistresses were in their younger selves. Stelle, Beatrice, Lady Anne, and the former Miss Bennet all stared down at her with either smiling or affable eyes. The only one who seemed slightly brooding was old Mrs. Beatrice Darcy, her uncle's grandmother, whose dark eyes he had obviously inherited. Elizabeth had always thought the woman's eyes disconcerted her, for some odd reason, as they seemed to gaze right back at her in a very intense manner.
She shivered when a sudden thought crossed her mind.
And to think that my portrait could have been on its way next to Aunt Lizzy's.
What would one feel upon having Pemberley placed on her care? What would it feel like to slumber every night at the library and wake up to the birds outside and the wind that roamed the peaks early at dawn? Elizabeth had never encountered the possibility of being one day its mistress. Of having that place at her disposal. Of it being hers.
She gazed down at the long gallery and remembered an occasion in which she had stumbled on one of Bennet's many carelessly discarded toys and fallen on the hard ground. With the fall, she had somehow hit her chin on her knee and cut it. Someone had picked her up in her stupor and had her sat on a chair. William had been very careful as he placed his handkerchief against her bleeding mouth in order to stop the blood from coming.
"Are you feeling all right?" He had asked, his brown eyes definitely betraying his fear as they blinked at her in concern.
She had nodded, scared because she had never seen him pay any such attention to her before. Fifteen-year-old boys on their summer vacations rarely paid any heed to stray little eight-year-old cousins.
Elizabeth blinked out of her reverie when she caught the image of the subject of her thoughts. William was portrayed along with the Curwoods, looking his usual distinguished self but wearing a small smile. She had never seen anything so eerie in her life, but then had never really realised how handsome her cousin could be if he put a more tranquil demeanour on his face. She sighed. In the last few days, she seemed to only to think of him through the good things that she had witnessed him doing, as scarce as they were.
She turned her eyes and caught the sight of another painting. It was one of two little girls, both of twelve years, one dark-haired with large blue eyes and the other a red-haired beautiful freckled little thing with romantic emerald orbs. Margaret and her, at the music room at Pemberley. Herself sitting at the pianoforte that had belonged to the former Miss Darcy and Margaret behind her, turning the pages with a hand on her shoulder.
"Mother had a huge row with Aunt Kitty over that painting. Both wanted it so bad. I guess Mother ended up with it because she is older."
Elizabeth nearly screamed with fright upon hearing the deep, familiar voice behind her. She turned and met the sight of the subject of her previous musings with his hair tousled and his cheeks bright pink, holding placidly onto his hat, jacket, and waistcoat. His shirt was undone and visibly moist, clinging to him rather lopsidedly and ending over a pair of dirty trousers. It hung with its top buttons open, sagging around his neck. Elizabeth looked down and perceived there was a puddle underneath his feet, which indicated he had been standing there for sometime and when she raised her eyes, letting them roam about the broad shoulders which were visible underneath the soaked shirt, she blushed a fierce shade of pink. She glued them on the floor and then timidly raised them to meet his, which were hidden behind dark dripping curls. He pushed them from his face, wrinkling his nose upwards.
"One usually greets a family member when he sees one, Cousin Elizabeth." William Darcy said with a nervous smirk.
Her eyes must have been the size of saucers, for he cocked an eyebrow in anticipation.
She blinked, feeling her cheeks grow in their temperature little by little. "Cousin Darcy. I didn't - I didn't know you were here."
"Otherwise you would have been acting like your usual pert self and would not have been staring at me as if I had grown a second head?" He asked.
Who are you?
She recomposed herself quite quickly for one left so stricken as she was.
"No, sir. I was merely startled that you should be here. After all, your mother informed me you were not due to arrive in a another month."
"Ah! It so happens that my mother does not know I am here. She could not have informed you of my coming if she was not aware of it, now could she?"
And he walked away hurriedly, carelessly spraying water on the fine carpeting as he did so, much to her further shock. She stared after him and then at the glass pane of the window, in which she could clearly see her flaming cheeks, all the while quite unable to convey that this was the same cousin whose company she had always loathed.
Mother will kill me for ruining the carpeting, but perhaps when she learns of why I could not avoid getting in there, she will forgive me.
William's quick steps resounded on the marble staircase that led to the family quarters, but felt that his heart rather drowned it all with its hammering against his ribs. All the while he had been cursing his luck. His luck and the rightness of his guess, or rather, the accuracy of those silly little details one remembers when in love with someone.
He had galloped from London to Pemberley because he needed the exercise. If he were to stay cooped up in a carriage, it would only add to what he felt was becoming his madness. And even then, when he had reached Pemberley, he did not see himself rid of it. The very spot he first found close to the manor was the quiet grove in the margins of the pond that he had found her reading once, as quiet as mouse, as not to be discovered by those who were in potential to disturb her. She had been mere eleven years old then, and the memory had been strewn in his subconscious until the need to think of her had made him search for recollections. The image was vivid in his head now, though, because he often dreamed that one day he would arrive there and find her just as he had once: lying on her stomach, probably ruining the peach-coloured fabric of her dress. She had blinked at him those huge blue grey orbs at him, her white face framed with the two braids her hair was in, and then bent her legs upwards. He caught a glimpse at the dirty white stockings she was wearing and felt insolence being shot at him through those pools of mockery her eyes were. How he had despised her then!
He tied his horse and then unwaveringly discarded his hat, coat, boots, and waistcoat about the damp grass of the margins. The water shimmered welcoming at him and he recalled the many afternoons he had ridden up there for a swim. It was a common habit in the family he never failed to endeavour in.
It was when he was busy with such doings that he caught a glimpse of lavender linen flashing in contrast with the greenery. He picked it up to find that it was a bonnet, edged in very familiar purple lace. His breath sharply caught in his throat and his heart immediately throbbed at the significance of such finding. Next to the bonnet, cast as astray as any object, there was a book, a Walter Scott novel. He frowned and then opened the volume with his hands. How on earth could she be at Pemberley!? Inside he found a simple dedication etched in black faded ink in his father's handwriting.
"I hope to find this in your library one day, in a special place, for I know it is the first volume you are acquiring that you can call your own. And as I have such honour, I could not go without claiming it an achievement of mine. So, Elizabeth Jane, enjoy your Walter Scott and remember your old uncle by it. - Fitzwilliam Darcy. Yorkshire, 1830."
His grip on the bonnet had tightened. She was there. And if she was not at the pond, he knew that there were two other places she could obviously be. After he had retrieved himself out of the cold waters of the pond, he gathered his (and hers) belonging in his hands and marched to the manor, deciding that he knew where she was.
So the image of Elizabeth Jane Catherine Bingley, quite mingled with the furniture in the brown and cherry tones of her dress, sitting in the gallery in a pensive manner with the curtains rustling about her was almost surreal to him, in the way that she was the personification of his early discovering. Knowing that she was there was one thing, seeing it was quite another.
She had been the subject of his every thought for the past two months, and now there she was before him like a godsend.
He had learned to live with her in his head and to be reminded of her by anything he saw. He had lost all hope, until he took a deep breath and walked into the gallery. He knew she wouldn't be at the library, because she never read in there if the weather was as fine as it was. The gallery was where he knew she would be because the sun poured in there enough to light it in a serene way, most agreeable for someone who wanted to spend their afternoons in leisure. And he knew that she favoured it over any sitting room for doing her needlework or any such things. But when he found her, she had been gazing at the same portrait that had entertained him while he had spent his weeks in Pemberley. The one of her and Margaret with the Spanish frame, that showed her blue eyes in that very familiar eerie shade that they gained when she was happy. William knew every line of that portrait by heart when it concerned the way she was seated on the pianoforte bench or how her fingers were lightly touching the black and white keys. He was familiar with the blue lace on her white dress and how her dark elf locks tumbled down her back while caught with a simple satin ribbon. Seeing her looking at it with the same degree of interest as he had done all those days was most strange.
And then, when he had thought that all was lost, she had blushed, blinked those beautiful eyes at him in astonishment, and been embarrassed. It became her to the point of making his throat tighten, but it now left him with determination enough in his heart to make him choke for different reasons. He wanted her, he needed her, and she wasn't the one his brother loved anymore. She was in Pemberley and was his to be won.
He would at least be able to say later that he tried.
Mortification. Elizabeth had tasted that word few times in her life, the last one of them being when she was eleven and had knocked a bowl of soup over Countess Matlock. Now she all but felt herself running out of air to breathe, because everything seemed to stifle her into agony. She wanted the next coach to Wragby. She wanted her mother. She wanted the cold waters of the pond to drown her. She wanted to simply disappear.
"Beth?" She heard someone call from behind her.
She was half started into thinking that it was him again, for the depth of the voice behind her was quite the same, but she turned to see her uncle there. He raised his eyebrows at her and then frowned.
"Why, are you quite well? You seem flushed."
That only made her blush more.
"Yes - I - no, but it's nothing really, I just need to get some fresh air."
He smiled at her. "You should. I myself was wondering what you were doing indoors. It has been such a fine day, I would rather have thought you had gone riding or for a walk. Your aunt has not set foot in the house since after lunch and that cousin of yours quite tore into the house all wet after a splash in the pond. I meant to ask if you've seen him...Lizzy was quite adamant in sending me after him to tell him to keep off the furniture."
"I...That is, yes. He went through the gallery on his way to his room and I was in here while he did so."
"He went through the gallery!?" Mr. Darcy said. "Why on Earth would he do that?"
Elizabeth just shrugged and then walked out of the room. She was very much in need of some fresh air indeed.
"First of all...I want to know what you are doing here in mid-July and then I want to know why on earth you had to walk in here all wet like that."
William shrugged into a clean shirt as his valet helped him with his breeches. His hair was still wet and dripping over his face, so he kept pushing the errand locks out of his eyes and drying his features. To his father, he seemed to have turned eight all over again.
"I had nothing more to do in London and could hardly take any more of Curwood and Fitzwilliam dragging me to places, sir. And you know very well what I am talking about."
Mr. Darcy rolled his eyes. Yes...He knew...
"And then...You are one to talk!" William cried over his waistcoat being put on. "You used to come in here along with my mother, both wet and dripping from the pond."
"We never went through the gallery, though."
"I had to pay my respects to my cousin!"
"Dripping wet?"
"Why not? She greeted us in a manner not very different from that when we arrived at Netherfield. Plus, I found a bonnet and a book of hers by the pond margin."
Darcy had to admit that his son had a point. How he had laughed at the vision of Elizabeth Bingley all bedraggled in front of them, being chased by her little cousins!
"Well, your mother is upset."
"I thought she would be happily surprised that I joined you after all."
"She is, but she would be a lot more so had you not left puddles all over the house."
"Fitzwilliam Darcy!"
Both men turned surprised at the sound of the voice of the subject of their conversation as she tore into the quarters. William acquired an amused smile as he waved the valet off with a thank-you and took to putting on his own boots.
"Which one do you mean, Mama?" He asked loud enough for her to hear from the hallway.
"I do not care if you are dressed, Will. I am coming in." And in Mrs. Darcy barged, turning a second later to glare at her husband.
"I am most decidedly not 'very upset' with my son. If you, sir, are angry with him for entering the house in such fashion, you must own to it." She flung her small arms around her son's neck and kissed him on the cheeks. "I am very happy to see you, dearest, although I must reproach you for preferring the company of your beautiful young cousin over kissing your old mother."
"I would much rather have kissed my beautiful young mother, had she not been traipsing about the grounds in a manner that turns my cousins into old ones no matter how pretty they might be."
"Flatterer." Deadpanned Mr. Darcy.
William saw his mother turn a sly look towards him. "Beth has grown very beautifully, has she not?"
"She looks like you." He replied, feeling his cheeks burning up by the second.
Mrs. Darcy let go of him, something that he was very grateful for. "Well," she said, "dress up nicely for dinner tonight. We are having guests."
William raised his eyebrows, but his mother ignored his questioning.
"And pay attention to where you are going next time. The gallery is not the fastest way to your room."