Chapter Nine
Apples and Tigers
Jane found her in the sunken garden, whose walls, remnants of an earlier Pemberley, enclosed a small space built around a fountain.
The garden was thick with flowers: graceful white lilies, rose campion seeding in all directions, and tall helianthus cheering the day with their small yellow faces.
Usually the fountain soothed, but Elizabeth barely noticed its watery music, though she stood beside it beating softly at the marble basin with a campion broken from its slender stalk.
“Mary has gone to bespeak the gig to return Mamma home.” Jane kissed Elizabeth’s cheek. “I am sorry I could not turn Mamma from her purpose today. She was determined not to be the last to visit our landlord. She… well, you understand.”
Elizabeth allowed the campion to drop to the ground.
“Perhaps we expected too much of her nerves, despite our assurances. I did not want us to intrude, to appear too eager or over-officious in our attentions to Mr Darcy. It is difficult to be sure of the note to strike, since, of course, we must be cordial without toad-eating. Ah, well. It is done now. I am sorry I fled the scene. Did all go well, in the end?”
“The Darcys were all that is kind, and Mamma’s concerns were, I believe, allayed. Of course, with other visitors present, the lease could not be spoken of directly, but Mr Darcy did say he had no intention of overturning any of the arrangements made by his father.”
Jane was too good. Elizabeth could only imagine how such an assurance came to be given, and what unsubtle promptings and hints her mother had made to provoke it. “I am grateful to be spared that particular humiliation. Are the Standleys gone?”
“A few moments ago. Harriet seemed out of spirits.”
“You cast her in the shade with Mr Darcy. She admires Hugh, too. She must be galled to see you have the attention of both.”
“Lizzy. That is ungenerous.”
Elizabeth bit back a smile. Jane’s ability to see the best in everyone was admirable, she supposed. “Mr Darcy admired you, Jane.”
“I am sure he did not. He is neighbourly, nothing more.”
“If you say so. Hugh seemed to be as far out of spirits as Harriet.”
Jane’s forehead did not seem to be made for frowns, but she attempted it. “Please do not tease me about Hugh. He is young yet, and will grow out his silly fancy.”
“He is your age exactly.”
“We are the same in years but he is too young for me, fond as I am of him.”
Women aged more rapidly than men. Elizabeth, though she were but twenty, felt a full forty years older some days. Today was such a day. “Hugh has no great love for his brother, and if Mr Darcy admires you, it will worsen the tension in this house.”
The minute crease on Jane’s brow deepened. “I will take care not to encourage either.”
“Oh, I did not mean that. If you are drawn to Mr Darcy and he to you, then by all means consider if it might come to something.”
“We shall see. Is it very difficult here, Lizzy?”
“Not entirely comfortable. We live in… well, I shall call it dissonance. You must understand the reason for it.”
“It must be difficult for Aunt Darcy’s family. They must feel …” Jane paused.
“Disappointed. Yes.”
“Hugh loves Pemberley so much, Lizzy. It is understandable that he is less contented with his changed position. He will grow accustomed to it in time, I am sure, and he must love and respect his brother.”
Jane’s ability to see only goodness was a kind of blindness.
“I hope your assertion to be true. In the meantime, we are not a harmonious house. I do not have your talent for promoting peace, and while I have some small influence over Hugh, Mr Darcy disregards me. Consequently, my efforts to prevent discord are not as successful as I would like.”
“Disregards you?”
“We do not speak outside of necessary conversations over dinner and in the drawing room. It is easier if George is present—you know his easy manners—but he does not often stay for dinner, unfortunately. His father, you know.”
“Yes. Poor George. And poor Mr Wickham.”
“Well, it does not make for scintillating evenings en famille. Mr Darcy rarely initiates a conversation, although he has begun to stare a great deal. Considering the expression on his face, I must assume he does not approve of me. Meals are uncomfortable, sometimes!”
“I am sure he cannot mean anything by it, Lizzy.”
“Pure absence of mind, you mean? I think he is cataloguing my faults and deficiencies.”
“Whatever do you mean?”
“Mr Darcy has no liking for impertinent dowdies such as me. He said so.”
“Surely not!”
“The night he arrived, I overheard him speaking with George.”
Jane could not look more shocked if Elizabeth had told her Mr Darcy had arrived festooned in an Indian Rajah’s diamonds and riding on the back of an elephant. “He mentioned his difficult journey that day. It is, perhaps, no great wonder his spirits were depressed as a result.”
“I do not see the necessity for him to depress mine to keep his company. He did attempt a clumsy apology the next day.”
“So he did apologise? He saw his error and attempted to address it, as a gentleman should.”
“He was uncertain whether or not I heard him, and I was content to leave his consternation on that head unanswered. A small punishment, but all I could achieve. I was a little hurt, you see. I am altered, but I did not think it so very bad.”
“You are too thin, that is all.”
“Thin?” Elizabeth raised a hand to her throat, and prodded at the hard outline of her collarbone pressing up through her skin. “Look! My bones stick out like fish fins.”
“Nonsense! You already look more your old self than you did last week. Please do not refine too much upon it, Lizzy.” Jane slipped her arm through the crook of Elizabeth’s elbow and pressed close.
“As to Mr Darcy’s character and demeanour, what you say of him surprises me.
He greeted us kindly, and was very obliging with Mamma. ”
“He had better repent, and become stern and unyielding. Kindness only encourages her. She is hurtful enough already.”
Jane pressed closer. “She does not consider what she says.”
“I know she does not, but still she says it. She puts all her hopes upon your shoulders and despairs over the rest of us. Except, perhaps, Lydia, and she is too young. Oh, do not look at me so reproachfully, I beg. I concede five unmarried girls are a burden, and our mother’s neck was never one to bend willingly to the yoke. ”
“We must have some sympathy for her. She wishes us to be safer than she was. She dreaded Papa’s death for years, and in the end it all came about as she feared. She is reduced in status and fortune, and she wants better for us.”
“Well, you are her great hope for the future, and you are wasted on a small society when all you may look forward to are a local assembly and the occasional dinner with neighbours who are mostly not of the standing a gentleman’s daughter deserves.
I do understand her fears, but her aspirations are too…
well, too unsubtle. Mr Darcy is the best prospect the district has seen in years, and she does not cavil at showing her ambitions. ”
“I hope she does not push me at him.” And the frown lines between Jane’s eyes would be noticeable even to a stranger. “I had better go and find Mary and Mamma in the stable yard. Do come and see us off.”
“I will, if only to assure myself Mamma has indeed left for home and I might breathe freely again.”
Jane ignored this unkindness, as she would deem it, and swept up the train of her riding dress over her left arm. She did not release her hold on Elizabeth, and they walked through the gardens arm-in-arm to the stables built a little distance from the back of the house.
By mutual consent, they eschewed the topic of the Darcy gentlemen.
Instead Jane talked of their doings at Frith House in the few days since Elizabeth had left it.
Elizabeth was content not to deepen the conversation; they were at the yard gates, and she had still not found the words to tell Jane of the revelation of George’s…
what should she call it? An implied inclination, perhaps.
Well, she could not speak of George’s inclination even with her dearest Jane.
Not yet. Not until she understood it herself.
Not until she was, in fact, certain she had not misunderstood him.
The stable yard was busy with people and animals. One of the grooms held old Nellie by the bridle, ready to help Jane mount. Mary was already in the gig, another groom at the pony’s head holding it steady. Mamma stood to one side, engaged in animated and cheerful conversation.
But not with any of the Darcys.
“Who is the gentleman with Mamma?” Jane asked.
“Mr Reid, who has been with Mr Darcy throughout his service with the government. A Scotsman. Mr Darcy has appointed him as house steward, responsible for Pemberley and its gardens.”
“Truly? What of George Wickham?”
What, indeed? Elizabeth had the answer to only one part of that particular riddle.
“He remains land steward as he was before, responsible for the estates, farms, and so on. I understand Mr Reid’s appointment does not affect that.
” She managed a smile, although it would likely look more sincere if she used her forefingers to force up each corner of her mouth.
They were close, now, to Mr Reid and Mamma, and she dropped her voice.
“I believe Mr Darcy reassured George on that point.” Elizabeth broadened her smile and raised her voice to its normal tones.
“Mamma! You have met Mr Reid, then. How are you, sir?”
“Very well, I thank you.” Mr Reid looked from Mamma to Jane and smiled broadly. “Well, I can see this must be another of your bonny lasses, ma’am. The resemblance is marked.”