Chapter 11
T ired but relieved, Elizabeth fell into a dreamless sleep that left her fully rested in the morning. She dressed, helped by Alice, the young maid she would likely choose to be her lady’s maid. A playful spirit, Alice had a unique talent for styling hair, a quality Elizabeth secretly appreciated more than anything else—her hair had never been wholly tamed.
The knock at the door was urgent, matched by the tone of Darcy's voice. “Hurry,” he said, “we are waiting for you. Lady Edwina is here.”
“I am almost ready. I shall be down in five minutes,” she responded, hoping he would force the entrance and come in to kiss her, but Darcy was nervous, as she could tell by his tone.
She smiled at Alice, admiring the curls and the exquisite chignon tied up with golden ribbons; it was simple, yet it made her look sophisticated.
Before her mirror, Elizabeth felt a pang of unease, for those within Darcy’s circle often regarded her with disdain—an aspect of her new life she found utterly distasteful. The duke’s assistance was essential, yet his influence would alter only the topics of conversation, not the true thoughts of those around them. To change their intimate opinions, Elizabeth felt she must first bring about a transformation within herself. Taking care of her appearance was one of those changes that she needed.
The girl from Longbourn, with a mud-stained hem, was evolving into Elizabeth Darcy, the wife and mistress of Fitzwilliam Darcy’s house. She was beginning to understand that elegance and style were becoming an inherent part of her life. This was the thought she clung to each time she stepped into a room, whether in London or beyond.
“You look amazing, madam,” murmured Alice as if she knew her torment.
Elizabeth thanked her with a smile and descended, regretting when she could run down the stairs or glide along the railing.
However, that morning, she could be just Elizabeth Bennet as, at breakfast, she was greeted by a lady who already liked her and approved of Darcy’s choice. Their meeting at the opera had been too brief for Elizabeth to remember much about Lady Edwina. But in the bright breakfast room, she looked in amazement across the room; she could not imagine that the red-haired woman full of spirit and goodwill was the same age as her parents. She began to curtsey, but Lady Edwina hugged her in a spontaneous gesture of acceptance. Then she took Elizabeth’s chin in her palm and smilingly gazed at her with great attention.
“My dear boy,” she said, “I liked your future wife at first sight.”
Elizabeth wanted to sit beside Georgiana, but then she saw Parker inviting her to sit at the other end of the table in the mistress’s chair, facing Darcy. Confident in her new coiffure and the pearl-coloured gown she was wearing for the first time, she sat.
“I am sorry to be late,” she said, smiling.
But Georgiana chased away her words with a broad wave of her hand, pointing towards Lady Edwina. “Do not be, my dear. Lady Edwina arrived when all of us were still asleep.”
“Where is Jane?” Elizabeth asked, looking around.
“Well, that splendid young woman was taken away by a noisy group,” Lady Edwina said. “She was up and ready to depart when I arrived. We had an early breakfast and forced your sister to tell me all the details about her wedding…and some secrets, too!” She laughed.
“Lady Edwina knows all the secrets of this house…”
“And many others, dear Georgie.” Her ladyship laughed merrily.
“As a matter of fact, Lady Edwina knows secrets of this house that we do not know,” Darcy said, looking at her with a surprisingly mischievous expression on his face.
“He is as naughty as he has always been.” Lady Edwina smiled, not offended, and then she continued, looking at Elizabeth. “Take care, my dear. He can be a rather spoiled boy.”
In no more than half an hour, Elizabeth was charmed by this friend and godmother with the vitality of a young woman.
By the time breakfast was over, the informal atmosphere around the table had begun to change into agitation, particularly visible in Darcy. Abruptly, he helped Lady Edwina from her chair, inviting the party to the parlour. Once seated on the sofa and chairs around the elegant low table, they had to face the real motive for their meeting: the two letters and the key, all displayed as an invitation. Edwina read the papers one by one, first the codicil, nodding in a clear sign of approval and then the letter Lady Anne Darcy wrote to her son. As she took off her pince-nez, they could see the tears she did not try to hide.
Lost in her thoughts, she took the key from the table and began playing with it, gaining time to order her feelings and ideas, but nobody was in a hurry. Darcy and Georgiana wanted to know their mother’s secret but still thought they were entering forbidden territory. They needed a parental figure to assure them they did not lack reverence towards their mother. More than ever, the sister and brother seemed to be two children caught in an awkward situation.
“I must confess to you, my dears,” Lady Edwina began, her voice tinged with a slight hesitation, “that I disagreed with your dear mother when she decided to reveal her secret. First, it was not entirely her secret as Fitzroy was also involved.”
And as all three were looking at her with questioning faces, she smiled. “I call the duke ‘Fitzroy’ as we have been friends since childhood.”
She was silent for a moment, alone with memories from a past she was unsure if it was wise to unveil.
“It is a secret that could ruin their reputations even now,” she said.
They started to protest, but Lady Edwina stopped them with a vigorous wave. “Let me finish, please! Just months before her death, Anne decided that Darcy must know the truth. Nothing was said about Georgiana. She was a little girl at the time. I think Anne scarcely imagined her daughter as the splendid young woman Georgie is now.”
“I understand,” Georgiana said, “but my brother has decided that I am mature enough to be part of this secret, and in the present, the decision is only his.”
“I know, dear, and I admire your brother for his role in your education and, now, for his trust in you.”
They kept silent, not exactly knowing how to go on. They did not want to rush, but at the same time, all of them were alert and curious.
“Do you know what this key unlocks?” Darcy asked finally.
“Yes, I do. Your mother told me the time would come when I would have to show you the secret cabinet. But I do not know what you will find inside.”
“I must tell you, Edwina,” Darcy said, “that we…suspect the secret.”
Elizabeth was astonished by their relationship. Lady Edwina seemed so close to them, and Darcy calling her ‘Edwina’ was a sign of intimacy accepted only in the family. It was so lovely to see them together, and she was convinced Lady Edwina had an essential role in comforting them when their dear mother died.
“Was it Fitzroy, I mean the duke, who told you…there was a secret? Jane related your encounter with him.”
“No!” Darcy was still hesitating, yet he continued, “But meeting the duke offered me a clue about an old story. I think it is better to go into my mother’s apartment.”
“Yes,” Edwina agreed, “after all, the secret cabinet is in your mother’s bedroom.”
They left the room, Darcy leading Lady Edwina. At the same time, Elizabeth and Georgiana closely followed arm in arm, hearing every word said. Darcy explained to his godmother that Elizabeth was staying in his mother’s rooms. Although Elizabeth liked the apartment, she wished, at that moment, that she stayed in another part of the house. Her gowns were in Lady Anne’s cabinet, and with all her personal belongings scattered around the dressing room and bedchamber, it might seem that she was being disrespectful. However, Lady Edwina turned to her with a broad smile in total accord with her staying in those rooms.
Lady Edwina, the first to enter Lady Anne’s parlour, considered herself a strong woman. Still, the sight of the dear décor that seemed unchanged made her stop. She turned to Darcy, who took her into his arms, a touching scene.
“It is unchanged!” Lady Edwina said. As often as she had visited Darcy and Georgiana in the past, she had never dared to see that apartment again. By George Darcy’s order, the rooms were locked at Lady Anne’s death, and the interdiction remained until Georgiana decided to open the apartment for Elizabeth.
“You opened the rooms for me?” Elizabeth whispered to Georgiana in disbelief.
“Yes, I thought it was time to unlock them to life. If Mama had ever returned from heaven, I am sure she would have been sad to see her rooms with no flowers and the curtains obscuring the daylight or the night sky. Mama adored reading in the bow window; it was her preferred place.”
The shock of seeing the two portraits facing one another was a day old. Lady Edwina placed herself between the images but looked at Darcy, Georgiana, and the beautiful young woman who was her godson's promise.
Lady Edwina was not shocked by the portraits; she knew the secret very well. But she let the past overwhelm her and spoke in a mild and tender voice. “It was the greatest love I had ever seen.
“Do you know the ballroom in the duke’s palace?” she asked without waiting for an answer, already plunging into history, her eyes seeing other times. “Fitzroy’s ancestor Louis Fitzroy, first Duke of Blandford, was an illegitimate son of James I by his mistress Mary, Duchess of Grafton. Fitzroy means “son of the king.” It is said that he rebuilt that palace, especially for Mary, with an impressive staircase in greenish marble that descends directly into the ballroom. The king liked to see his mistress descending the stairs like a queen.
“It was Anne's second Season in London. She was perhaps eighteen years old. Was she beautiful? I really do not know, but she was resplendent. She exuded an energy that other girls and young women did not have then.
“Their meeting was one of those happenings that destiny knows how to match. The night of the Season’s grand ball preceded the presentation of young ladies at the Queen’s court.
The young ladies came one by one from the stairs. They descended in a magnificent display of their gowns and jewellery while the young gentlemen waited downstairs. It was 1783, and we still wore dresses with hoops, though the corset was no longer as rigid, while wigs had recently fallen out of fashion. We were free to feel comfortable at balls, in carriages, and on the streets. Anne had a magnificent pink gown with a very long train that followed the shape of the stairs like a living snake. As I told you, it was destiny: five minutes earlier or later, and nothing would have happened. Destiny wanted Fitzroy to be at the bottom of the stairs, and Anne was a dream. When she stepped onto the floor, they were in love. Forever.
“Her brother, the actual Earl of Matlock, was conducting her, but he was so impatient to arrive that he nearly abandoned her…to Fitzroy’s arms.”
“Were you there that night?” Georgiana asked.
“I was not, but Anne told this story so many times that now, even after all these years, I have the feeling I was.”
“What happened?” Elizabeth asked the question that was on everyone’s lips.
She heard Lady Anne’s story with an anxious ear because, strangely, she still feared that her marriage to Darcy was in danger. It was illogical because they could marry as soon as they wanted, yet she had decided to wait. Perhaps it was a mistake. Hearing that long-ago story, she realised that every marriage faced obstacles. The anguish overwhelmed her; she was frightened but also felt selfish because it was not her story, and Lady Anne had the right to be the heroine of the day. so she turned to Darcy, hoping he would tell her he loved her and nothing could separate them.
Darcy stood near the bow window, slightly leaning against a panel. Though he was conscious of the portraits and the story Lady Edwina was unfolding, his attention was directed to Elizabeth. He wondered what he was ready to do if any obstacles should appear to their love. What happened to Lady Anne and Blandford to prevent their future together?
He asked the question aloud in haste, but he knew the answer long before Lady Edwina responded.
“They prohibited Anne and Fitzroy from marrying.”
“They?” Darcy asked. “Who might ‘they’ be?”
But Lady Edwina did not respond. With the key still in her hand, she stood and, without a word, went into Lady Anne’s bedchamber.
The atmosphere in the chamber was thick with emotion, as dense and suffocating as the air on a fog-laden London morning. Georgiana felt as though she could not breathe; instinctively, she moved to open a window, but before she could, her brother’s hand came to rest upon her shoulder. Without another word, all three followed Lady Edwina.
It had been a decade since Edwina had last stepped into that room. She hesitated—not for lack of memory, for she had not forgotten the location of the secret drawer, but because she was no longer confident that opening it was the right course of action.
“Please,” Darcy said, “we have decided to know what Mama left us, regardless of what this drawer may contain.”
Edwina turned to them and spoke in a whisper. “I am only afraid the contents could change how you remember your mother…”
“Nothing can change our memories! I am utterly confident she did nothing wrong. If she was a victim of these circumstances, we would love her more and feel compassion for the love she lost. It is a disturbing revelation to think that she did not love our father. But in the end, she lived with him for nineteen years, and we never once suspected that she was not happy with him.”
His godmother smiled. “Anne was a generous person. If she did not love your father in the way she loved Fitzroy, she fully enjoyed the life they had as a couple, and she loved you. Motherhood was a gift she heartily embraced, and she never complained about not being content or fulfilled. She was kind and understanding with your father, and he was happy with the love she gave him.”
Lady Edwina opened a drawer in sight—yet well hidden within the cabinet was another drawer that opened with the key—and returned with a pile of letters and a box.
At first, they were all disappointed as their intense expectation was that they would have the secret as soon as the drawer was opened. But they all knew the secret, and the letters could only give them a greater understanding. It was a tale of love and separation, one of the oldest intrigues in human history.
Holding the letters, Darcy understood that the real secret could be hidden in the motives behind their separation. The letters likely would reveal why two worthy young people were denied the right to live their love together.