Chapter 43
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
A TOUCHING VISIT
S everal weeks after Colonel Fitzwilliam’s brief visit, I stepped out to the drive where stood my little Swift at the ready with a liveried boy, freshly scrubbed and neatly dressed, holding back my restive ponies.
“Good morning,” I said to my young groom. He tipped his hat and stood aside as I went to greet April and May, approaching them with the stately serenity Georgiana had taught me, yet also bribing them with nibbles of an apple I had cut up at breakfast for the purpose.
“We are off on a little errand, ladies,” I said. “Let us show our neighbours how beautifully groomed Harry keeps you, shall we?”
The boy beamed with pride, and in under a moment, we were sailing down Pemberley’s drive. It was a beautifully still day with dotted clouds in a faint, cerulean sky, and as I filled my lungs with fresh, cold air, I realised I no longer thought of Hertfordshire as home. This surprised me a little, for when I had left Longhorn, I expected several years would pass before I no longer missed it.
But Derbyshire was truly home. I belonged here. The terrain, full of contrasts and wilder in wild places, suited me to my soul. Upon my saying so, Mr Darcy had blandly remarked that he was unsurprised that a conspicuous landscape appealed to me, to which I had glibly replied that I hardly knew how he had grown up to become so rigid with such a broad variety of vistas upon which to feast.
We had teased one another thus over breakfast, causing Mary and Georgiana to look ruefully into their teacups, no doubt wishing to be excused. But Mr Darcy was a punctilious man, and if he promised we would flirt over breakfast for the rest of our lives, I believed we would. Anyone who joined us would simply have to endure it or go hungry.
I chuckled aloud at the recollection, an occurrence so regular Harry had ceased to glance at me with concern. The poor boy had most likely been given to understand the enormity of his responsibility—that of keeping his mistress both safe and in good working order—in an age when solitary laughter must be considered a symptom of hysteria.
A few more random and silly thoughts breezed in and out of my head as I sailed down a rise towards the village of Lambton. As we approached the church, I turned my attention away from my inner amusements in order to go about my errands in a suitably proper state of mind.
First, I stopped at the rectory where for five minutes I visited with the vicar and invited him to dinner on Sunday next. Then I stopped at the sundries shop where I browsed its humble shelves and came away with yarn, needles, thread and buttons—simple necessities that I took with me on my visits to the cottagers of Pemberley .
At last, the real errand for which I had driven to Lambton was then at hand. I hoped I had deferred attention sufficiently by being seen out and about so that a particular visit to a nodding acquaintance would not be marked as overtly strange.
Mrs Martin, the housekeeper engaged by my husband, received me warmly, and soon I stood in Mary King’s— Maria Kingston’s —neat little parlour.
By necessity, our reacquaintance had been severely restrained since her flight from Longbourn. I saw her at church from time to time, and when I corresponded with her, it was only by letters sent to Mr Darcy’s banker, who included my notes with her quarterly allowance. This was perhaps undue caution, since Mr Wickham had been gone from Derbyshire for far too long to come to anyone’s mind. Moreover, I had never once heard any gossip that he had married or was seen lurking about. Even so, I did not wish to bring any attention to her so that she could enjoy the safety of her anonymity. It was unfortunate, but anyone noted to be Mrs Darcy ’ s friend would be a target for scrutiny and talk.
This visit, then, was out of the ordinary, and my friend, though she had warmly clasped both of my hands in hers, had looked at me with large, questioning eyes. She was pale as ever, her bright red hair and freckles standing out in striking contrast against her pallor, and the deep charcoal tone of the woollen gown she always wore only added to the effect by casting shadows under her eyes. My friend, I thought sadly, was still a ghost.
Mrs Martin went for tea, and as I sat down, I spoke in a low voice.
“I do not mean to startle you by coming. I assure you, Mary, you shall not be exposed by my gesture. Only I have news to share which I wished to impart in person. I have so often regretted we could not visit one another often since I came to Pemberley.”
“And I longed to tell you in person how happy I was to hear you had married Mr Darcy, Elizabeth,” she said. “He has been terribly kind to me.”
We sipped tea and murmured our way through commonplace topics for five more minutes before I briskly set my cup on its saucer.
“Might you care for a little drive into the countryside, Mary?”
When she was sitting beside me wrapped in her black shawl, I bade Harry to wait in the kitchen with Mrs Martin until we returned, for like the Zephyr, the Swift was not built to carry a crowd. I then directed April and May around a lane that led through a few fields before it turned back towards Pemberley.
At one of the seldom used roads on the edge of the estate, I pulled us to a stop near a sturdy wooden bridge that spanned a little cut for drainage. The view was not terribly grand there, but it was a passably pretty and private spot with a soft matting of grass where my horses could comfortably stand for a bit.
“I wished to be private with you, Mary, because I need to tell you that George Wickham has died.”
“Oh!” she said quickly, then more soberly, “Oh.”
After a moment in which our silence became increasingly profound, I broke it and spoke gently. “As to the circumstances, I only know what I was told and that was that he had been ill.”
She did not look at me, instead taking my hand and giving it a quick squeeze of reassurance. “If that is what we have been told, we must assume it to be so. I prefer not to imagine what may have actually become of him.”
“Nor I.” He might indeed have been ill, but he had been mauled by his creditors upon his removal from Meryton, and the likelihood was too great for even ladies to ignore that he could more believably have met with a violent end.
More silence passed, and I endured it patiently. I had had much more time to consider this development than had that villain’s poor wife.
She soon turned to me with a hollow smile. “I suppose I will have to wear black for the rest of my life. It is a pity, for no other colour is so unbecoming to me.”
It was my turn to squeeze her hand. “I thought you might think so. But I believe this news should free you of mourning clothes, not condemn you to more years of them.”
“How so?”
“You came here already bereaved, if you recall. Who knows your husband has only recently died? No one. You have played your part as a widow already, and now you must play your part as a genteel lady who enjoys a life of some independence. Mr Darcy has written to Mr King to ensure that the remainder of your grandfather’s properties become your inheritance. If you wish him to, he is willing to serve as your proxy in the matter and see to the management of this claim in order that you are secure for life.”
Her eyes watered, and she brushed away a few tears. “I would be greatly relieved not to have to take control of matters I do not understand. Please thank him for me, though my gratitude cannot possibly be expressed in words.”
“Pish! Mr Darcy gets an unholy satisfaction out of managing, you know. Why look at me! He has me so well tamed, I go everywhere with a groom and never step out for a walk without everyone marking which direction I went and at what time.”
“Does he care for you so much?”
“If you call it such, yes. I have found it a nuisance, particularly when he has interrupted his plans of a morning in order to ride out on a mission of rescue when I was merely sitting on a stone at the edge of some stream remembering our adventure.”
“You saved my life,” she murmured.
“I could just as honestly claim you saved mine,” I countered reasonably. “For if we had not been in so much trouble, I might not have written to Mr Darcy, and he may have forgotten how much he loved me. But come, enough of this dribbling talk. I hope you are not greatly disturbed or laid low by this news.”
“I hope I am not so pitiful, Elizabeth. In under an hour, I may feel a little giddy without the constant shadow of concern that has followed me for so many months.”
“Good! What shall you do now, do you think?”
“I have always fancied living near the seaside,” she said shyly.
“And so you should. I will mention it to Mr Darcy. And even if you do live elsewhere, you may count on Mary, Kitty, and me to write to you often.”
“Perhaps you might also visit,” she said wistfully.
“Well,” I said lightly, “if you are suggesting you would enjoy that, we will do so at every opportunity.”
I turned us around—neatly, I am pleased to report—pointing us back towards the village. As we cantered through willow brush and berry patches, we enjoyed a comfortable spell of contemplation. Perhaps she was picturing as many pleasures in her future as was I. I hoped she was not thinking of Wickham, for she had wasted a great deal of her youth doing so.
Whatever it was that had captured her attention released its grip, however, for when I finally turned onto the road and drove towards her front door, Mary suddenly said, “Am I truly free, Elizabeth?”
“We both are,” I said kindly. “I have the liberty of marriage to a man who adores me, and you have the freedom never to be subjected to ill treatment again. Might you now rejoice?”
Then, for the first time since I had known her, Mary King laughed aloud.