Chapter Twenty-Four #2
George snorted. “If you can call it gambling, Fitzwilliam. At Cambridge, when I admit I was at my very worst, I once wagered two hundred guineas on which of two raindrops running down a windowpane would reach the bottom first. In comparison, a shilling or two at cassino does not rank as gaming.”
And yet he did not quite meet Darcy’s eyes.
“Did you win?”
George gave him a quizzical look.
“With the raindrops.”
“Oh. No. I lost. And the devil of it was, I did not have two hundred ha’pennies to my name, much less guineas.
” He grimaced, and again looked away to avoid Darcy’s gaze.
“My father came to my rescue then, but I regret I did not learn my lesson. Not until my uncle wagered the family estate on the turn of the cards, and lost everything. That brought me to my senses, when my father’s apoplexy struck.
Barrow said it was a miracle he lived. But it left him as he is, a shadow of the old James Wickham.
Your father showed me such faith and he was all that is good.
I have tried since then to be the man they both wished me to be. ”
“Perhaps I will go with you then, the next time you attend. It will satisfy old Standley, likely. Provided they do not play too high.”
“Sixpences and shillings. I have not regressed, I promise you that.”
Darcy nodded, and smiled faintly. And wondered.
Darcy was part of a group of men farewelling the general when Hugh approached him.
“There are still a few hours of daylight, Fitzwilliam, and some of the fellows thought we might go back up onto the moor. We had famous sport up there today, and we should like to enjoy it a while longer. With your agreement, of course.”
Darcy smiled. Throughout the meal, he had made a show of cordiality towards his young brother, for the benefit of the neighbours.
He would prefer that whatever whispers were circulating were shown to be false.
Or at least, exaggerated. “Have at it. I will tell your mother to expect you by dark, mind, so do not stay too long.”
“Pfft. I know every tree and lane on the estate. I will hardly get lost, even in the dark!”
“Taking my Tom back up with you, are you?” the general asked. At Tom’s enthusiastic nodding, the old man glanced at Darcy, who at once offered to host Tom until the following week, since the general would hardly wish his grandson to travel on a Sunday.
Satisfied, the old man went off with his groom as escort for the long ride home.
Standley left with him, their road lying together a few miles, after securing Darcy’s promise to come to the Standley estate to shoot in the next week or so.
Bingley, watching Hugh and Tom and a few of the other younger ones fairly stuffing themselves with the last of the feast—presumably to guard against any possibility of starvation on the moors—decided he and Hurst might join them for an hour to see if they could bag some grouse.
Hugh looked a trifle sour for a moment when this was broached, then nodded. “Bailey told me you are a very fair shot. Come if you like.”
Hardly the most gracious invitation, perhaps, but if it meant a cessation of hostilities, then Darcy would deem it the height of civility. Hugh and Bingley walked off. Hugh was a trifle stiff-backed, but at least he appeared to be responding to Bingley’s efforts at conversation.
“Shall I go with them, and keep an eye on things?” George glanced out of the open barn doors.
“Not unless you truly wish to. I think I will escort the Misses Bennet home, but I do not want to leave Tom Wilkinson with all the work of clearing up. Can you oversee it, George? The lads and the keepers can help, and you can disburse more of those thruppences you are hoarding.”
George turned and looked to where Miss Elizabeth, a teacup in one hand, was deep in conversation with Mrs Wilkinson.
“Lizzy looks tired. She has done enough, today. Leave it to me, Fitzwilliam. Lizzy will take her gig, but several of our home farm carts are behind the barn. We can pack all the belongings going back to Pemberley in those and bring them home later, along with all the guns.”
“Thank you, George.” And Darcy went to broach the notion with Miss Elizabeth.
Mrs Wilkinson urged her to agree. “You’ve done enough this morn, hinny, and braw as you are, it’s no’ so long since we were saying prayers for you on Sundays.”
“It was months ago, and I am fully recovered, I assure you!”
Mrs Wilkinson met this protest with a sniff.
“That’s as may be. Hie ye off to the big house now, and leave me and the girls to make all right and neat.
There’s little enough to do other than washing all them dishes, and I’ll no’ let you put your bonny hands to that task anyway.
T’wouldn’t be fitting.” Mrs Wilkinson looked Darcy up and down.
“You’ll tak’ care of our lass, will you not? ”
“The best I can.”
“Aye, then. Our Tom’ll harness up your wee carriage, and bring it round, Miss Lizzy. You tak’ another mouthful o’ tay and sit on your laurels ’til then.”
“I would not dare do anything else,” Miss Elizabeth murmured, as the older woman bustled off to give ‘our Tom’ his orders.
“She is quite fearsome,” Darcy agreed.
Miss Bennet, who was in riding dress and had obviously ridden to the farm, decided she would stay and help George oversee the cleaning up.
Her eyes were on Bingley as he and the others accompanied Hugh out of the barn, Darcy noted.
“If you do not mind, Lizzy, I will follow later with the rest of the gentlemen when they come back down from the moor.” She blushed a delicate shade that only enhanced her beauty.
“The Robertses will be travelling back to their farm and I will have Mrs Roberts’ company all the way to Pemberley. It cannot be improper.”
“Of course it is not, and I am sure all the ladies here will enjoy your company in the meantime. It will be very pleasant for you.” Miss Elizabeth’s sidelong glance was sly.
“Do keep Jack Hill with you, though, until everyone is ready to leave. I will not need a groom if Mr Darcy and Mr Reid are with me.”
Miss Bennet stooped to kiss her cheek—she was taller than her sister—and went off smiling. Perhaps Bingley’s happiness was not so precarious, after all, and his stepmother was right about Miss Bennet’s integrity and honesty.
Five minutes later, Reid brought Ramesses and his own horse.
Darcy handed Miss Elizabeth up into her light gig, pulled by a single, sturdy bay.
He had Ram fall in behind the gig, calming the big chestnut’s affront at following such a vehicle and walking in the dust. Reid took up position beside him.
With Miss Elizabeth leading the way, they went up the farm track to the narrow, stony lane.
Cut into the side of a steep hill, and lined on the open side with large boulders set as some sort of rudimentary protection against a vehicle going down the hillside, the lane led from the farm gate to Pemberley valley five miles to the east.
They rode a couple of miles, walking the horses behind the gig.
From this vantage point, Darcy could see the delicate line of Miss Elizabeth’s neck, and several tendrils of dark curls escaping the back of her bonnet.
She handled the ribbons with skill, and he should consider ordering a low phaeton for her.
That was a more appropriate carriage for a lady.
“Does ‘bonny lass’ mean the same as the Scots version?” Darcy asked, breaking a long silence that had been, from his perspective, a contented one.
“It does. And it’s fitting. All the Bennet girls are bonny ones.”
“Like their mother.” Cathedral choirs could not be more innocent, in Darcy’s view.
“Oh, aye,” was all Reid said, and amusement sounded in his deep-toned voice.
“Though, perhaps, not all equally interested in gardening, shall we say.”
“We might say that, lad, if we are determined to tread on dangerous ground.”
Darcy laughed aloud, just as something whip-cracked sharply in the air over his head from behind and above him, and his high-crowned hat went spinning away into the road ahead.
The sturdy horse pulling the gig screamed and reared, jerking hard on the harness, and an instant later it bolted down the road at a dead run, with Miss Elizabeth, her gasp of shock and fright perfectly audible, hauling back on the reins as she was bounced on the seat, as helpless as one of the wooden dolls Darcy had long ago bought for a small Georgiana.
“God!” He spurred Ram into a gallop, hearing loud cursing beside him as Reid matched him yard for yard. “She will be hurt!”
Their only hope was to get alongside the runaway, one each side, and haul it back before either one or both the poles or the harness broke. And this road! Stony, unpaved, a steep hillside drop on the right hand— She was jolted all over its narrow course.
Ride on! Ride, man. Ride!
She cast one terrified glance over her shoulder, as they chased after her. Face chalk-white, lips parted, showing her teeth. She pulled back hard on the reins. Not strong enough. Not enough. Not—
Ahead was a curve to the left. The horse, maddened, unmanageable, tore on. At the very last second, it turned sharply.
A crack louder than thunder. The right-hand pole snapped. Gone. She screamed. The wheel that side bounced against the edging boulders.
Too late! Too late! They could not reach her. Could not—
The gig teetered on the stones. Another thunder crack. The other pole snapped and was gone. She flung the reins aside. Good girl! Clever girl! Too late, though. Too late. The horse sped off, dragging harness and poles. The gig’s going. Going over— Going—
“Jump!” Darcy roared. “Jump!”
He never knew if she heard him, but she had no chance to obey.
She was thrown from the seat, landing on the thin strip of grass beyond the boulders—thank every god there ever was!
—and rolling out of sight. The gig crashed over onto its side splintering into flinders, with one wheel bouncing down the hillside and the other down the road after the racing horse.
He brought Ram to a rump-scraping stop and threw himself out of the saddle by the wreckage, racing to the edge of the road to find her. The hill was steep, and she had rolled several yards before being stopped by a stand of thin young trees. She lay there, limp and still.
“Elizabeth!”
He hurled himself down the slope to reach her. She could not be dead. She could not.
Dear God! She could not!
“Elizabeth!”