Chapter Twenty Two
As the carriage approached Pemberley, Darcy watched Elizabeth with rapt attention.
It was so beautiful to watch her expressions as the carriage travelled up the tree-lined grand avenue into the park. There in a clearing the deer tended to congregate, due to the judicious use of fine deer treats by Darcy’s gamekeeper.
Upon seeing the herd of deer Elizabeth looked at him with her shining eyes. “How beautiful!”
Her breath caught as they came over the slight ridge, and the view extending out to the great house opened before them. Lips slightly open, the lovely curls floating around her hair, the silk fringe around her bonnet, a studied look of concentration as she admired Darcy’s beloved house.
His heart beat faster.
George immediately demanded to have a better view, and he climbed onto his mother’s lap to stretch his head out the window to see everything. Darcy held Emily up to another window so that she could clearly see as well. “That’s Pemberley,” Darcy told the little girl. “It is your new house.”
“Pebely,” she repeated back, seriously.
“Close enough,” Darcy agreed.
Elizabeth exclaimed, with some emotion in her eyes, “It is as lovely as you said!”
Darcy tried to perfectly memorize the moment, and how he felt.
“Welcome home,” Darcy told her.
She wiped at the edge of her eyes, “I love it. I do.”
That was nearly as good to Darcy as it would have been if she loudly declared that she loved him.
Darcy had given instructions to the coachman to pause at this point for as long as they wished to observe the house from its best perspective, so he now stuck his hand out of the window and struck the roof.
They set off.
There was now only a little pain in his chest, though he could feel the stretch, when he extended his arms out to their full length.
While nothing next to the joy of caring for Elizabeth and the children and seeing Elizabeth happy—Elizabeth had been happy since they married, that showed in her every expression—Darcy was deeply, deeply grateful to the Almighty, who had showed him far, far more kindness than he deserved in allowing him to recover so well and so quickly.
The surgeon had said that he would likely experience pain from the wound for the whole of his life, and it would always be more difficult to make certain wide stretching motions.
The bullet that sat in him, likely on the edge of his lungs, might also cause problems. He’d found that if he breathed deeply there was a peculiar and painful sensation on one side that the doctor thought was likely caused by the bullet.
Darcy’s stamina grew day by day, he no longer found difficulty in most daily tasks, and he had even ridden his horse for fifteen minutes the previous day. The ribs themselves barely twinged; it was the scar that gave him pain.
It was good that he would always feel some pain due to his duel.
Darcy would not have liked it for his body to have come away unscathed.
His current happiness was such that any reminder of the wrongness of what he had done would need to come from his body—there was no good moral in this, except that sometimes the Lord was kind to those who did their duty.
When the carriage came to a stop, there was a line of servants who had come out to greet them, with old, dear Mrs. Reynolds at the front.
Georgiana did not wait for Darcy: She leaped out of the carriage and ran over to the beloved housekeeper and embraced her. Mrs. Reynolds smiled at Georgiana and embraced her back, though this clearly violated Mrs. Reynold’s firm sense of how matters were supposed to be done.
The dear old woman had been nearly a mother to them for many years—Darcy and Georgiana had especially looked towards her ever since their mother died.
Darcy climbed out of the carriage cautiously. He did not need help, and then with some difficulty, but not too much, he lifted George and then Emily down. Then grinning like a loon, Darcy helped Elizabeth down.
Georgiana, with an air both of embarrassment, but also something like Elizabeth’s thrown back shoulders when challenged, glanced down the line of servants before going over to George and Emily.
Elizabeth’s eyes were warm on Darcy’s, and he kept her arm as he led her to Mrs. Reynolds. “My dear, dear Mrs. Reynolds. It is my great delight to introduce my wife to you. Elizabeth, Mrs. Reynolds, our housekeeper.”
The two women curtsied to each other.
Elizabeth smiled and warmly said, “Mr. Darcy has told me many tales of your devoted service. We shall be the best of friends in time.”
“Thank you, ma’am.” While Mrs. Reynolds was rather more reserved and formal in her reply to Elizabeth than Darcy would have liked, he knew that Elizabeth would charm the old servant in quick order.
Darcy shook hands with the butler, with his steward, and with all the chief servants.
They went up to the house, and every step made Elizabeth seem more lovely. Darcy felt completely happy. “The stairs are marble as you see—” They entered the estate, and Darcy pointed for Elizabeth, “I told you about that painting.”
“It is delightful,” she replied, craning her head and eagerly looking around to see everything. She pulled off her bonnet, and Darcy had a free view of her ears, the lovely curve of her neck, and her dark hair.
He was so proud of her, and he felt as though the servants must see, simply from the way that she looked about, how he had provided them with a superior mistress.
“Shall we do a tour first,” Mrs. Reynolds asked, “or do you all wish to settle into your rooms?”
“Papa Darcy, Papa Darcy,” George said. “Can we go to the nursery! I want to see those toys you said would be there, from when you were a child.”
“Of course,” Darcy smiled at the boy. “Come, come.”
He picked George up and climbed the great staircase, enjoying the difficulty of the exercise, and glorying in how he was able to manage, though he was breathing hard and had to put George down a few steps before the top.
The others followed, Elizabeth carrying Emily.
When they reached the nursery, they found that Sally had already settled in and arranged a selection of the toys for the children to play with.
After ten minutes of watching George and Emily run about screaming in delight, Elizabeth suggested that they look over more of the house, as she thought the two children would be happy there for a long time.
Pulled by an impulse that Darcy understood perfectly well, though he refused to explain it to himself in words, he said, “Elizabeth, you must want to look at the master suite first—you must wish to see your rooms beyond everything else.”
“Oh, yes,” Elizabeth replied. She looked at him with dear eyes. “I do wish to see them.”
When they went to the hallway Darcy pointed to Georgiana’s rooms, “Georgie, I imagine you might want to rest and see your own rooms again after such a long time?”
Georgiana looked between Darcy and Elizabeth briefly.
Then Elizabeth cheerfully said to Georgiana, “I dare say your brother can manage to show me our rooms alone.”
Darcy’s sister blinked several times then she smiled at Elizabeth. “But do fetch me before you go to the library, so that I can see how you like it.”
“I would not dream of admiring your library for the first time without you being able to watch,” Elizabeth replied.
Mrs. Reynolds made a curtsey, seeming to divine Darcy’s preference, and said that she was sure they would wish to refresh themselves in their rooms together, and that whenever Mrs. Darcy wished to resume the tour, they ought to call for a servant, but no one would bother them until then.
“Thank you,” Elizabeth said clearly. “I look forward to it.”
Darcy took Elizabeth’s arm again, and she shuffled close to him as he opened the door to the suite. His hand oddly fumbled with the door handle, finding it difficult to open.
His nose was filled with the scent of her hair and her neck. His stomach felt light.
When they stepped into the room Elizabeth looked around, “Oh, my, how lovely!—I keep saying that, do I not?”
“It is not half so lovely as you.” They looked at each other, and Darcy flushed and looked down.
Elizabeth smiled to herself.
She stepped up to the windows with the curtains kept wide open that allowed a view of the whole park below, the stream running through the trees, the whole of everything.
It was as he’d imagined, seeing her here in his home, looking down from these windows.
He walked up next to her. “The whole of the park was designed so that the perspective would come together at this point.”
“It is almost too much.”
Darcy took her hand again, “What is?”
She turned to look at him, her eyes wide on his, “I pretend as though I belong, but it is so much beyond anything I have seen before. So—”
“You belong.”
Her eyes clung to his in such a way.
Darcy kissed her softly on the mouth.
Elizabeth let out a soft moan, and her arm snaked around his neck, and she pulled herself higher on her toes and desperately deepened the kiss.
After what seemed like several minutes their mouths separated and Elizabeth smiled at him in such a happy way.
“You truly belong here,” Darcy said.
“You shall need to kiss me often to convince me,” she replied. Then she blushed and looked down.
He kissed her again.
The following time involved a glow of sensation where many of the details could be recalled as clear as a painting in Darcy’s mind more than fifty years later.
Afterwards, they laid together entangled and naked on the bed in Darcy’s room. Elizabeth’s head was on his chest, strands of her hair bothering Darcy’s nose, though he would not dream of pushing it away.
“Why did it take you so long,” Elizabeth murmured as her finger lightly ran around the edge of the scar from the bullet wound.
“I…I did not…I feared I might make you do something you did not wish to. And…”
Elizabeth laughed a little. “My sweet, silly dear. Had I not made it clear enough that I was eager?”
At this consideration, Darcy felt a little a silly himself.
But he did not mind if Elizabeth thought he was, at least so long as she was happy.
“I suspected, but…I do not have any great experience with women. And I…when I saw you here, in my rooms, how well you belong in my house. Then I knew, and I…”
He was silenced with a passionate kiss.
At least an hour after that, Elizabeth giggled and said, “Dear Georgiana, I wonder what she thinks. I am quite sure everyone knows precisely what we are doing.”
That made Darcy flush. “No, they simply think we are resting after the carriage trip.”
“After a stage that did not last much more than three hours?” Elizabeth asked. “But my dear, sweet, silly husband, you may feel free to think that it was merely by chance that everyone happily left us alone.”
Darcy laughed. He really did not mind if Elizabeth called him silly. “Was I particularly obvious when I suggested to Georgiana that she might wish to look at her own rooms?”
“Obvious to me, yes—though after your abominable failure to exercise your husbandly duties for the first weeks of our marriage, I was not at all confident. I think it was only my strong encouragement to leave us alone that made Georgiana suspect.”
“Abominable failure,” Darcy smiled and kissed her again. He wanted to do it again, though they had already been in their suite alone for at least two hours. “I shall have to make a strong effort to improve myself after such failures.”
“I agree wholly,” Elizabeth said.
When they finally did leave the bed to dress, having become hungry, Darcy watched Elizabeth moving across the room, her naked legs and back, the way that she looked when she wrapped one of his oversized dressing robes around herself before she called for the maid to help her dress again, and to fix her hair.
The lovely light in her eyes, the way that her bosom appeared, the glowing skin.
Darcy hurried over to her and kissed her again, and he held her in a tight, squeezing hug.
She giggled then, “My dear, we really must attend on everyone. Especially the children—tonight.”
“I love you.”
Her mouth fell open.
“Elizabeth Darcy, I admire and love you.”
“B-b-but. You said. But…” she took in a deep breath. “But…”
And then she turned away. She started crying.
He held her. “My dear, dear Elizabeth.”
She was soft and vulnerable.
He understood her. She was frightened, not of happiness but of completely trusting herself to another person or believing that that person trusted her and would remain present with her.
After a while she wiped her eyes off against his naked chest, looked at him, fiercely kissed him and rang for her maid.
Darcy felt a slight disappointment at not hearing her say the same to him, but he did not really mind.
He was too completely and wholly happy, and too delighted to have such a woman in his life, and in his arms, and too delighted to know with certainty that she was happy with his touch, and that she was his to care for.
Besides, he knew that it would take her time, perhaps even a great deal of time, to admit to herself what was clear to Darcy: She loved him in return.