Chapter 9 An agreement that would change his life. #2
“It says here that a very distant relative of Thomas Bennet recently passed away in England. He had an estate in Hertfordshire that was entailed through the male line, and it seems he and his issue passed with no male heirs. His solicitors have advised that Thomas Bennet…I…am next in line.” He looked up from the letter to his wife as she sat on the divan.
“The name Longbourn sounds familiar to me. Do you know of this uncle and his estate?”
“No, dear, I have not heard of it,” she said pensively. He sat beside her and handed her the letter. Thomas was quietly sorting his thoughts as his wife read through it.
“Oh, yes, I believe this would be my father’s uncle, Herbert Bennet. I never met him. As I recall, he was said to be an unkind man, and there was some kind of disagreement between the brothers.”
“Herbert Bennet…I wonder if this is part of the family history that Bennet related before he passed away.”
“It may be. You had commented that you also had distant relations in Hertfordshire, and you both had joked that may be the reason you looked similar to one another.”
“Yes, now I recall. Neither of us was intimate with the relations in Hertfordshire.”
“Because Hertfordshire is a long way from Gloucestershire,” Fanny said in a quiet voice, then looked up at her husband, “and Derbyshire.”
“Yes, my pretty wife, you drew the same conclusion as I.”
“Are you thinking of returning to England, Thomas?”
“Only if it pleases you, my dear,” he said, his diction slow and soft.
“I would like that. But would we not risk meeting someone who knew you or my cousin before?” She furrowed her brow.
“We would have to take a great deal of care about where we travel and who we acquaint with. Even though Hertfordshire is a long way from our home counties, I am afraid we would spend our lives concerned about every new acquaintance.” He ran his hand through his hair as he considered the concerns flowing through his brain.
“We have spoken of this before,” he said.
“We would have much to think about regarding the future of the girls, and the affect our need for privacy would have on them. Could we risk sending them away to school? What about their introduction to society? I could never consider taking such a risk as going to town. And what if one of them should meet someone who knows me? Would we eventually be required to tell them our history?”
Mr. Bennet had related only a few of his concerns to his wife.
However, these and many others were not a surprise to her, and rather than acquiesce to his arguments, she decided to remind him of the advantages the situation had to offer.
Due to her husband’s encouragement and support in helping her overcome the disturbances of mind from the horrible events in her past, she had begun to embrace some self-assurance and independence of thought, but she still was cautious in her manner and spoke her piece in a soft, tentative tone that sought his approbation.
“Thomas, we have talked about this. We both dearly want to return to England. You hate the heat here, almost as much as you hate the slave trade. Mary was so ill last winter with the breakbone fever, and I am worried that we could lose one of the girls to a tropical illness. I also fear for their futures as they grow into young ladies. The colonies are a rough society, and I do not wish to board my daughters away from us as so many of our acquaintance have done.”
Mrs. Bennet became more confident in pleading her case as her husband’s face revealed that he was of similar mind.
“You have told me that you miss living in the country, and neither you nor I fancy the noise and dirt of such busy towns as Hamilton or London. We have been lamenting all we miss, but before today, we had not sufficient foundation on which to establish ourselves again on an estate in England, nor prospects of a location unrelated to our pasts. Were you to claim the rights to this estate, we could surely release funds enough to pay our passage. We could live much as we each had done prior to our bereavements and relocation. We could also have children of our own without worry.”
Several minutes elapsed in silence as Bennet continued to peruse the details of the correspondence. He related the facts as he had read them:
“The documents indicate an income of ￡2,000 per annum from the landholdings. The estate is not very large but prosperous enough to support a family. With our investments and the business interests here, we could live quite comfortably. We could easily let this house or sell it at a good price since the demand for housing in Hamilton is strong. You are correct; we can easily release enough money for our passage. The trip was difficult with two small girls, and now we have three, but we are in a position to afford a more comfortable set of rooms than the small quarters of our last voyage, and perhaps we could convince the Akuetes to join us. If you are willing, my dear, we could return to England as soon as an appropriate place on a ship becomes available.”
“I worry that someone will recognise you and I shall lose you, my love, when we have only just found our felicity together.”
“Fan, you seem to be as convinced as I that we both would be much more content at Longbourn. Therefore, let us make a plan such as to avoid our greatest worries. Shelton and Bennet are not known in Hertfordshire, and even where Shelton was known, he is dead to them. If I live a quiet life as a country squire in Hertfordshire, our pasts should not cause us any undue hardship.”