Epilogue #2
After Reggie Fitzwilliam passed away, the dowager countess split her year between Derbyshire and Hertfordshire, and when she passed ten years after her beloved husband, she was mourned greatly by all of the family.
Mary and Richard loved each other with a special kind of love that grew, rather than diminished, over time. They were always surrounded by an ever increasing, loving family that eventually included grandchildren and greatgrandchildren.
Once Tom and James Bennet outgrew their habit of demanding stories of his glory days in the army, they were replaced by his own sons asking him to spin yarns for them, along with the children of all his sisters and brothers.
Richard Fitzwilliam became the favourite story telling uncle in the family.
The Gardiners:
As there was more and more acknowledgement of the importance of men of business to the Kingdom, in 1828 Edward Gardiner was awarded a baronetcy in recognition of his contributions to the economy of the Kingdom, and especially the wealth of the royal family.
He was gifted the estate of Dovedale just a little south of Lambton where his beloved Maddie had grown up.
In 1830 he withdrew from active participation in the daily running of Gardiner and Associates.
With his advice and influence, his partners kept the business running and growing from strength to strength.
Other than his brother Bennet, his solicitor, and some trusted individuals, few knew the full extent of his wealth. When he retired, he had amassed well over a million pounds in assets and was able to give his daughters dowries of one hundred thousand pounds each.
George Gardiner would inherit his father’s title, the estate, a large fortune and like his brother and sisters, five and twenty percent of Gardiner’s stake in Gardiner and Associates.
Peter Gardiner went into the business and followed in his father’s footsteps, dubbed Prince Midas; Lilly Gardiner married the eldest son of Ian Ashby’s brother who was now the Earl of Ashbury, so she became the new Lady Amberleigh.
Their younger daughter, May, married a member of parliament and, like her cousin Lizzy was no shrinking violet, she helped her husband become the leader of the Whigs in the commons.
Peter fell in love with, and married, the daughter of the other major partner in Gardiner and Associates, Miss Rose Riverton. The four Gardiner children produced nineteen grandchildren and eleven great-grandchildren before the Gardiner patriarch passed away many years later.
Edward and Maddie Gardiner were beloved and revered by all the extended family.
They loved hosting family and friends at their estate and enjoyed being hosted by family just as much.
Until he was no longer physically able to, well into his eighth decade, Edward Gardiner loved to fish.
He could sometimes be found fishing in his favourite spot where he felt all of their destinies intertwined, just beyond the formal gardens at Pemberley.
The Bingleys:
Although his wife was serene, she had a backbone of steel and anyone who tried to take advantage of the Bingleys discovered this fact to their peril.
Almost two years after their first daughter, Jane Bingley delivered her second daughter, Elizabeth Louisa, who would be known as Beth and who took after her aunt for whom she was named, most especially in impertinence.
Beth was followed by Johanna, and then by Rosamond. After four daughters Charles Junior made his appearance and he was the last born to Jane and Charles Bingley.
Jane’s fortune was also left to grow under the expert stewardship of Uncle Gardiner, along with profits from the Meadows and the balance of Bingley’s fortune after he had purchased their estate so that all four Bingley daughters had dowries of fifty thousand pounds.
Charles junior would one day inherit the Meadows, and with it a fortune in excess of two hundred thousand pounds.
The four Bingley daughters all made very good love matches. Maureen married the son of Lady Sarah and Graham Allenton. Allenton was no longer parson at Hunsford, his uncle who had no children when he passed left him as his heir to a large and very prosperous estate in Wiltshire.
Her sisters all married men they loved, Beth to the son of a baronet whose family were neighbours to her Aunt Lizzy and Uncle William in Derbyshire. Jo and Rosa both married very well-off businessmen.
The Bingley heir, seven years younger than his sister Maureen, married the daughter of the late Anne Ashby.
Charlie Bingley met and fell in love with Anne Ashby one year when the family met at Rosings for Easter.
They were very happy together and unfortunately Charles Junior inherited the Meadows far too early.
Charles Bingley Senior had always loved to ride at great speed.
One day, just before Maureen Allenton was to enter her lying in, he had taken himself for a ride on his son-in-law’s family estate in Wiltshire.
He did not know the land as he did at the Meadows; his stallion, Blaze, returned to the stables without him.
After an extensive search his body was found in the woods.
Evidently, he had ridden through the woods at too high a speed and had not noticed a low hanging branch that had broken his neck.
Jane had been beside herself with grief over the loss of her beloved Charles.
It hit the whole family very hard, especially his best friend and brother William Darcy.
The only thing that kept Jane Bingley going was her family and her children. She started wearing half mourning after a full two years and would only come out of mourning after another full year.
Jane Bingley never married again, but she lived a very long and happy life surrounded by family and friends. She helped her daughter-in-law learn how to run the Meadows while Charlie learnt how to manage it with the help of the steward and his uncles.
Once she was sure that Anne Bingley was confident in running the manor on the estate, Jane accepted her sister Lizzy’s invitation and moved to Pemberley.
She spent a lot of her time either visiting or being visited by family, especially her children, grandchildren, and eventually great-grandchildren.
As much as she missed her beloved Charles, she knew that he would have wanted her to carry on and be strong. And it was true her very nature would allow no less of herself because she had those in her charge that needed her care and love.
He would have wanted her to remarry, but that was one thing that she would never do, and with all the warmth of family to envelop her, she never felt the need.
Tom Bennet and Georgiana Darcy:
Once Tom completed his studies at Cambridge, he went home to Longbourn to learn how to effectively run the estate from his father, Longbourn’s steward, and his brothers-in-law.
He had cared for Darcy’s sister above all others from the first time he met her when she had been a guest at Longbourn many years before.
Tom knew that he was irrevocably in love with her before he was halfway through his studies at Trinity College at Cambridge. He had spoken to his brother and Darcy had requested that he not declare himself until Georgie had completed her first full season.
As much as he had wanted to do so earlier himself, he accepted the logic behind Darcy’s decision, and then, later on, he had spoken to his parents and found they had agreed with their son William completely.
It had killed him to watch her dance with other men that first season, and some had tried to call on her, but none were accepted.
What he did not know was Georgie was as much in love with him as he was with her.
She went out into society only so she would get the chance to dance with him, which would be the opening or supper set, and if he had not been able to claim both, sometimes included the last as well.
She was not sure that he loved her as she loved him but was resolute that she would not settle for anyone else.
There were too many examples of love, respect, and felicity among the married couples in her family for her to ever agree to marry for anything less, as she and Kitty had declared even before their first season.
Georgiana had learnt to accept that the folly of her youth helped teach her the value of true love, but more importantly helped her learn the value of herself, which was as far as she would allow it to influence her life.
At the end of the final ball of her first season, a season she had enjoyed with her sister-in-law Kitty Bennet, Tom, at the end of the final set which had been a waltz, had requested he be granted a private interview the next day.
She was then just nineteen and Tom had just turned one and twenty.
She had agreed to the request with alacrity and immense pleasure.
The next day, just after ten o’clock in the morning, Tom Bennet had made the walk across Grosvenor Square from Bennet House to Darcy House opposite. Killion had opened the door and then announced him to the Darcys who were waiting for him in the family drawing room.
Lizzy and William left telling him that they would grant him ten minutes, and that the door would remain cracked open.
As soon as they were alone, he dropped to one knee, told her how long he had loved her, and asked for her hand in marriage.
She told him that she had loved him just as long and accepted him.