Page 24

“Mrs Hawthorne!” Mrs Philips cried, hurrying out of the room. “We will require tea! And refreshments! Oh, my stars and garters!”

The party entered, Mr Darcy performing introductions to his sister and to Colonel Fitzwilliam’s new wife. Mrs Fitzwilliam was so engaging a person that Elizabeth felt comfortable almost instantly. Miss Darcy was very shy, but she was plainly putting herself forward. After a very friendly visit, Mrs Fitzwilliam suggested that perhaps Elizabeth might take them to call upon one or two of her friends.

Before she knew it, she and Mrs Philips were ensconced in the ornate carriage with Miss Darcy and Mrs Fitzwilliam; Mr Darcy and Colonel Fitzwilliam rode alongside. They visited Mrs Treadwell and Mrs Davies. Mrs Treadwell was mostly tongue-tied; Mrs Davies was not.

“Oh, but aren’t you a fine-feathered flock,” she cackled, while serving them the most delicious pound cake Elizabeth had ever tasted. “Won’t those stiff-rumped tabbies be sorry they’ve been ignoring you, Miss Bennet!”

Elizabeth had been pleased, highly gratified, and even excited by this visit. It was not, truly, until Mrs Davies’s remark, however, that Elizabeth realised what else it was: a kindness.

Mr Darcy had somehow heard of her situation, and set about remedying it. She looked towards him, standing tall and sober in Mrs Davies’s spotless parlour; he met her gaze and smiled. Something within her chest clutched at the sight.

Bound by his father’s will, he was required to give me the property, and all the monies to support it. He was not required to do this—to spend several hours in a carriage, compelling his relations to attend me as well, and to spread his consequence around on my behalf.

She smiled back helplessly, and a part of her heart began to dream.

In the month that followed, Sheffield began to throw out its welcome. Not every one of the ‘stiff-rumped tabbies’ beat a hasty path to her door, but quite a few did, more than enough for frequent callers. Elizabeth forgave them their initial hesitance; they had not known her, and had believed the gossip of those they did. While she did not immediately meet any bosom companions, life became more interesting as her world grew wider. In the company of some of the other matrons, Mrs Philips felt able to resume their shopping expeditions. As the house grew better furnished and her niece better accepted, she finally began making noises about going home to Meryton.

Elizabeth did not realise how much she hoped that Mr Darcy would return until Michael again called excitedly to inform the household of an unexpected arrival. Elizabeth hurried down the stairs, but it was not Mr Darcy who entered through the front door. Instead, it was her sister.

“Jane!” she cried, and then they were embracing, both sisters breaking into happy tears.

Behind her followed Mary, Kitty, Lydia, and Mrs Bennet, with Mr Bennet bringing up the rear. Then Mrs Philips joined them in the drawing room; the house was suddenly full of shrieks of mirth and joy.

“What is happening? I can hardly believe this!” Elizabeth exclaimed, amidst laughter and tears.

“Mr Darcy brought us to Pemberley!” Jane said, once speech was possible. “Bingley and I will be married in the chapel at nearby Lambton in a week’s time. Mr Bingley has been in the parish for weeks already, and Lizzy, Mr Darcy has found an estate for sale, not twenty miles away, and Bingley shall soon be its new owner! Oh my, I have never seen such an extraordinary place as Pemberley in my life.”

“I may never leave its library. You may take it as a sign of my affection for you that I left it for the tedious drive to Sheffield,” Mr Bennet said.

“It is so dreary since the militia left town, and Mama would not allow me to go to Brighton with Harriet Forster because of Jane’s wedding, and everything was terrible, but then Mr Darcy invited us to the country, so at least we did not have to remain in deadly dull Hertfordshire. Riots, Lizzy? Will you tell us all about them? Have you met anyone handsome and charming?” Lydia asked, with hardly a breath between her sentences.

“Lizzy, your house! I never imagined anything so fine,” Mrs Bennet said, beginning a closer examination of the new draperies, soon joined by her now animated sister pointing out the superior results of their shopping expeditions.

“We only arrived at Pemberley day before yesterday,” Kitty explained. “Mr Darcy asked us if we should like to come and bring you yesterday, but Mama and Papa were too tired of travelling, even though the rest of us wanted to leave immediately and Lydia cried when they refused. He brought us to Pemberley in his carriages—they are so very fine, Lizzy, and so much nicer than Papa’s. Papa was not very nice to him at first, but he was better once he saw the library, and Mr Darcy invited him to use it any time he wished.”

“We have missed you, Lizzy. You will come back to Pemberley with us, will you not?” Mary asked.

Elizabeth shook her head, overtaken with the familiar amusement and dismay at the sight and sounds of, in the words of Mr Darcy’s proposal, her ‘temperamental, bad-mannered, embarrassing’ family. “Of course I will. Oh, I have missed you all so much! Now, if I know Whitby, she has already begun preparing refreshments for you all. Come in, come in, and be comfortable.”

Mr Darcy had sent them in three—three!—carriages. In the first were Mr and Mrs Bennet with their two youngest daughters. Mary, Elizabeth, and Jane travelled in the next. Elizabeth recognised Mr Frost, Mr Darcy’s personal coachman, driving the carriage in which she rode. Stretton, along with Elizabeth’s trunks, rode in the third. Michael—Elizabeth insisted that he come along—started out with his mother, but she noticed it was not long into the journey before he was up on the box with Mr Frost.

For the first part of the drive, a radiantly happy Jane spoke of little besides her plans for the future with Mr Bingley.

“When did Mr Bingley begin looking for an estate near Mr Darcy?” Elizabeth asked casually, and not as if she was dying for more details.

“Oh, Mr Darcy discovered the place before it was even for sale,” Jane replied. “The owner was only making noises about it, but Mr Darcy convinced him to move forward, and sent for Bingley. It needs some work, but it will be lovely once renovated, and Mr Darcy said we must stay with him until the house is more habitable. Oh, Lizzy, Pemberley is a dream! There is something about its placement within the surrounding country of wood and meadow that gives one a feeling of…oh, I do not know how to describe it!”

“I would call it a glimpse of heaven,” Mary offered.

“Oh, my,” Elizabeth said, much astonished. She had never heard either of her sisters wax so poetic regarding a house. After all, Netherfield Park was hardly a hovel on a tiny plot of land. “Are its passages paved in gold?” she asked, trying to lighten what surely was exaggeration.

To her further surprise, Jane took her question seriously. “I suppose we made it sound like a palace, but that is not it at all. Palaces are all gilt and glamour—one cannot truly think of them as someone’s home. Do you recall Charlotte’s letter written after the first time she dined at Lady Catherine de Bourgh’s home in Kent?”

“Yes. She was quite in awe, as I recall. I did have an opportunity to see Rosings…it was very…” Elizabeth hesitated, not wishing to be openly critical. “Very fashionable, I suppose one might say.”

Jane nodded. “Charlotte was so impressed, she wrote, that she insisted it worth the ache in her back caused by the stiffness of the chairs; it made her feel very princess-like, as if sitting enthroned. She says her feelings of awe still return every time she is invited in, that she will never become accustomed to it. That is the very opposite of Pemberley, would not you say, Mary?”

Mary agreed with an enthusiasm unusual to her. “The library is full of comfortable, overstuffed leather sofas so that one can read in comfort. Yes, the floors gleam of Italian marble and priceless artwork adorns its walls. Yet, Mrs Reynolds—she is the housekeeper—will happily show you the stained place in the marble where James the First had spilt his wine. They have public days on the first Thursday of every month so that people can visit, and there are lovely rooms on display, of course—but Mr Darcy brought us into the family rooms after dinner, which are never shown but not because they are shabby—quite the reverse. One wishes to sit and talk all the evening long, for they are so perfectly arranged for exquisite art and good books and comfort and conversation.”