Chapter Five
The Master Requests
The summons arrived with the morning chocolate. Hill did not look at Elizabeth as she set the tray down, her expression pinched and unhappy.
“The master requests the attendance of all the young ladies in his study,” Hill announced, her voice flat. “Immediately. Before breakfast.”
A hush fell over the room. Lydia, who had been loudly recounting a dream about a new bonnet, stopped mid-sentence. Mary looked up from her sermon book, blinking behind her spectacles. Jane set her cup down with a rattle that seemed deafening in the sudden silence.
A cold knot formed in Elizabeth’s stomach.
Her father never summoned them all. He avoided collective gatherings of his offspring as a general rule, preferring to take them in small, manageable doses.
To call for them before he had even taken his coffee spoke of a disruption to his peace that he intended to rectify with speed.
“What have you done now, Lydia?” Kitty whispered, her face already blotchy with panic.
“I have done nothing,” Lydia retorted, though she looked uneasy. “It is probably you.”
“Come,” Elizabeth said, rising. She caught Jane’s eye and saw her own apprehension mirrored there. “It does no good to keep him waiting.”
They filed out of the breakfast parlour and down the corridor in a sombre procession. The house seemed heavy, the very air charged with the pressure of the secret upstairs. When they reached the heavy oak door of the study, Elizabeth took the lead and turned the handle.
Mr. Bennet was not sitting at his desk. He stood by the hearth, his back to the room, warming his hands. The study smelt of old leather, dust, and the sharp tang of ink. He waited until all five of them had entered and the door was firmly shut before he turned.
His gaze swept over them, resting for a moment on each face. He did not look angry. Nor did he look like the detached observer who usually mocked his daughters. He looked curiously, dangerously attentive.
“I find myself,” Mr. Bennet began, his voice conversational, “in a position of some perplexity. I am accustomed to the general disruptions of this household—missing bonnets, arguments over nothing, the occasional screeching from the music-room.” He nodded vaguely at Mary.
“I am not accustomed to my house behaving like a besieged fortress.”
Elizabeth exchanged a glance with Jane. Jane’s hands were trembling, her fingers picked at the seam of her gown.
He moved to his desk, picking up a slip of paper.
“Hill tells me the nursery chimney has been smoking for three days. She also informs me that a scuttle of coal—coal that costs a pretty penny, I might add—disappears up those back stairs every morning. We are consuming coal at a rate that suggests we are operating a foundry, and that chimney has been cold for four years until now.”
Lydia opened her mouth, but Mr. Bennet held up a hand.
“Furthermore,” he continued, “Cook is distraught. Breakfast trays are vanishing from the kitchen, carried up the back stairs by my daughters, only to return empty. Yet none of you seems to have gained an ounce of weight.”
He dropped the paper and leant back against the desk, crossing his ankles.
“Last night, Sir William Lucas entertained us with a tale of a missing girl, and my daughter Catherine,”—he fixed his eyes on Kitty — “reacted as though the bailiff had come for her soul.”
Kitty let out a whimper and shrank behind Jane.
Elizabeth drew a breath. The air in the room was too thin. To lie was impossible. He was too clever for that. To speak was to expose Georgiana to the very judgement she feared.
“Kitty was frightened, Papa,” Elizabeth said, choosing her words. “The story struck a chord. She is young and easily alarmed.”
“She was not alarmed. She was guilty.” Mr. Bennet placed his knuckles on the desk and leant forward.
“It creates a picture, my children. A picture of a house with a ghost, or a secret. I do not like secrets in my domain. They interfere with my reading.” He straightened.
“Do not insult my understanding. You are hiding something. Or someone. Who is in the nursery?”
The trap snapped shut. There was no manoeuvring left.
Jane let out a soft gasp. Mr. Bennet did not blink.
“Well, Lizzy? You are as a rule, the most articulate of the set. Explain to me why I am paying for coal to warm a ghost.”
“It is not a ghost, Papa,” she said.
“Clearly. Ghosts do not eat toast and marmalade. Who is it?”
“A young lady.”
“A young lady,” Mr. Bennet repeated. “In my nursery. How did she arrive? Did she fall down the chimney?”
“We are sheltering a young lady,” Elizabeth said, the words tasting like ash.
“She was in distress. She had nowhere else to turn. Lydia found her in the barn loft, half-frozen.” Elizabeth continued, her voice steady despite the rapid beating of her heart.
“She was frightened and alone. We could not turn her away.”
“Who is she? Is she a servant? A local girl in trouble?”
“No, Papa.” Elizabeth took a step forward. “She is a gentleman’s daughter. She has been pursued. She is terrified.”
“Pursued,” Mr. Bennet repeated, his eyes narrowing. “By whom? The law?”
“By a man,” Elizabeth said. “A man who seeks to ruin her.”
“Does this paragon of prudence have a name?”
Elizabeth hesitated. “She gave us a name. Anne.”
“Anne,” Mr. Bennet said dryly. “Does this ‘Anne’ have a surname? Or perhaps some connexion to one of the gentlemen Sir William was so eager to discuss?”
At the mention of the gentlemen, Kitty began to sniffle.
“We are protecting her, Papa,” Jane said. “Mr. Wickham—the man at the inn—has been hunting her. He took her from her home in London and pretended to marry her, but he means to ruin her to secure her fortune. She is terrified of him.”
“Wickham,” Mr. Bennet mused. “The fellow with the smooth manners and the shifting eyes. I never liked him.” He turned back to the fire and nudged a log with his boot.
“I knew he was a scoundrel the moment he bowed. So we are harbouring a girl from a fortune-hunter. That is foolish, Lizzy, but perhaps forgivable. We shall send her back to her family and have done with it. Why the secrecy from your own father?”
“Because of the other one,” Elizabeth said quietly. “The man from Derbyshire.”
Mr. Bennet stilled. The amusement vanished from his face.
“Excellent. You have taken in a young lady whose whereabouts concern a man of fortune and influence. He will think we stole her.” He looked up sharply.
“Do you have any conception of the fire you are playing with? If he finds her here—concealed, lied about—he will not thank you for your charity. He will think us in league with her kidnapper.”
“We could not give her to Mr. Wickham,” Elizabeth insisted.
“No,” Mr. Bennet conceded grimly. “You should have given her to me.” He ran a hand over his face. “Who is she, Lizzy?”
Elizabeth looked at Jane, then back to her father. The truth was the only shield left.
“Her name is Georgiana Darcy,” Elizabeth said clearly. “The man seeking her is Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy of Pemberley in Derbyshire.”
Mr. Bennet stared at her. For a long moment, the only sound was the ticking of the clock on the mantel. The cynicism, the amusement, the detachment—none of it remained.
“You have placed this family between a man of immense power and the young relation he is searching for,” he said at last.
“We kept her safe,” Elizabeth cried, her composure cracking.
“When Mr. Darcy arrives,” Mr. Bennet said, “and he will arrive, I must be in possession of every fact. I will not face a man who can ruin us with a word whilst half blind.” He straightened. “Bring the girl to me.”
The Ware Plan
Darcy rode into Ware with the low winter sun at his back, his coat stiff with cold and his temper not much softer. The great North Road was rutted and half-frozen. A passing post-chaise threw up clods of dirty snow that spattered his boots as he swung down from his horse.
He had spent the day riding from posting house to posting house along the road between Ware and the next market towns, speaking with landlords, ostlers, and postboys until his throat was raw from cold air and repeated questions.
There were vague recollections—a chaise that had changed horses in haste, a gentleman with a bandaged hand, a lady and a much younger girl—but nothing that could be held as certain.
It was growing dark when he turned his horse back towards Ware. The lanterns before the inn swung in the wind, the sign of the Red Lion creaking faintly on its chain. They had agreed to meet there or send word if they had found any information of consequence.
Darcy had taken a small table in the common room at the Red Lion and worn a narrow path in the threadbare carpet.
The inn clock had struck the half-hour some time ago.
The candles had guttered lower in their sconces, and the fire had sunk to a bed of glowing coals.
The landlord had ventured twice to enquire whether he required supper.
Darcy had refused both times. He could not have swallowed a mouthful.
At last the sound of hoofbeats in the yard penetrated his abstraction.
A man’s voice called for a groom. A harness jingled.
A door banged. Darcy crossed to the window in three strides and drew back the curtain.
A familiar figure was swinging down from a lathered horse in the lantern light, cloak flung back, hat in hand.
Darcy strode out into the passage and through the taproom, the smell of ale and wood smoke crowding about him. He stepped into the yard just as the newcomer turned from giving his reins to a stable boy.
“You are late,” Darcy said, the words sharper than he intended.