Nine
“Mr Carruthers. We are about to make someone disgustingly wealthy.”
Carruthers, who had managed the Darcy financial affairs for seventeen years and had survived every crisis from failed harvests to French wars without so much as loosening his cravat, merely inclined his head.
He was a small, precise man with spectacles perched on the bridge of a nose that had been calculating compound interest since the age of twelve.
Nothing Darcy said surprised him anymore.
Or if it did, he had the professional courtesy to conceal it.
Darcy slid a folded paper across the desk. “This is a property in Somers Town. Number fourteen, The Polygon. A narrow house, leasehold, currently tenanted. I wish to acquire it.”
Carruthers opened the paper, glanced at the address, and returned his gaze to Darcy without blinking.
“You shall offer double the market price. If you find resistance from the current owner, you shall double it again. I do not care what it costs, and I do not care how quickly you spend it. What I care about is this.” He held the man’s gaze.
“My name is never to appear in any document, any correspondence, any conversation related to this transaction. Not now, not ever. No one must know of my involvement. You shall conduct the purchase through a third party of your choosing, and that third party shall be ignorant of the true buyer. Is that clear?”
“Perfectly, sir.”
“Once the purchase is complete, the rent is to be reduced to the minimum you can justify without raising suspicion. Inspect the property. Make improvements where necessary—the roof, the windows, the fireplaces, whatever requires attention. The tenants are to live in comfort. Not luxury, but comfort. The distinction matters.”
Carruthers made a note, a single line of shorthand that probably represented several hundred pounds.
“And I want this done with all possible despatch, Mr Carruthers. With the utmost discretion.”
“Naturally, sir. Might I ask the nature of your interest in the property?”
“No.”
Carruthers nodded. He had been told no before. He gathered his papers, rose, bowed, and departed. He understood that some questions were above his station and all answers were below his curiosity.
Darcy sat for a moment after the door closed.
He pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose and breathed.
He was doing this for the right reasons.
He was not buying Elizabeth’s family a house because he was in love with her.
He was buying them a house because they were living in conditions that no gentlewoman should endure.
Their rent was precarious and their uncle’s charity was finite.
He had the means to help and the ability to do so without detection.
He was also, without question, doing this because he was in love with her.
He rang the bell and Barton appeared promptly.
“Ask Mrs Hatfield to attend me, if you please.”
Mrs Hatfield arrived within minutes, her hands folded, her expression attentive. She had run the London household for many years and had mastered the art of anticipating her master’s needs before he articulated them. This, however, was not a need she could have anticipated.
“Mrs Hatfield, what I am about to discuss requires your absolute discretion. You will speak of it to no one in this household or outside it. Is that understood?”
“Of course, sir.”
“It has come to my attention that Miss Bennet’s family is in difficult financial circumstances.
They reside in Somers Town with limited means.
I wish to assist them, but the ladies are proud and would not accept charity openly.
Any hint that the assistance originated from this household would cause Miss Bennet considerable distress and would compromise her position here. ”
Mrs Hatfield’s expression did not change, but something shifted behind her eyes—a warmth, a recognition, an understanding that went beyond the words.
“I wish you to arrange regular deliveries of provisions to the family’s address.
Groceries, household supplies, coal—whatever is necessary.
You shall present yourself, or a trusted proxy, as the representative of a charitable foundation.
One that assists families of reduced gentlewomen.
The name and details I leave to your invention, but they must be convincing. Mrs Bennet is not a fool.”
Mrs Hatfield’s mouth opened. She had something to say—he could see it forming behind her careful composure, a question or perhaps a comment that skirted the boundaries of what a housekeeper could properly observe to her master.
He gave her the look. The one that had ended debates in clubs, silenced impertinent cousins, and once, memorably, stopped a horse mid-bolt. It was the Darcy stare, inherited from generations of men who had brooked no nonsense, and it worked on Mrs Hatfield exactly as it worked on everyone else.
She closed her mouth.
“Yes, sir. I shall see to it directly.”
“Thank you, Mrs Hatfield. That will be all.”
She curtsied and withdrew. Darcy waited until the door was fully closed, then dropped his head into his hands. This was not the behaviour of a rational man. This was not the behaviour of a responsible employer maintaining professional boundaries.
This was the behaviour of a man who had held Elizabeth Bennet in his arms while she wept, and who had felt the shape of her grief press against his chest. He had understood, in that moment, that there was nothing he would not do for her.
Nothing. The house was the beginning. The provisions were the beginning.
He would have bought every house on The Polygon and endowed every charitable foundation in London if it would have taken the shadows from beneath her eyes.
He could not tell her he loved her. He could not court her, and he could not cross the distance between employer and suitor without becoming the sort of man he despised.
But he could do this.
He rose from his desk and straightened his coat, striving for perfect command of himself.
He found Georgiana in the drawing room, which was not unusual. She was surrounded by fabric, which was also not unusual. She was accompanied by a small, sharp-eyed Frenchwoman wielding a measuring tape and an expression of supreme artistic authority, and this was new.
“Brother!” Georgiana emerged from behind a wall of silk. “You remember Madame Delacroix?”
He did not remember Madame Delacroix, because he had never met her before. He bowed anyway.
“Madame is fitting my trousseau,” Georgiana explained. She was flushed with excitement. She had been choosing between ivory and cream for the past two hours and considered both options life-altering. “We are selecting gowns for the honeymoon in Bath, Brother. I shall need muslins.”
“You shall get whatever you wish.” He said it absently, because his mind had already moved from Georgiana’s trousseau to a different wardrobe entirely, and the thought had arrived fully formed, which meant it had been forming for days without his permission.
“Georgiana, since Madame Delacroix is already here—” He paused and arranged his face to convey that he had just had a perfectly spontaneous idea that had not been keeping him awake for the better part of a week. “I wonder whether she might also take measurements for Miss Bennet.”
Georgiana’s hands stilled on the silk.
“Miss Bennet will be required to escort Anne to church on Sundays and to your wedding in June. She represents the Darcy household, and she cannot be seen in—” He stopped himself.
He had been about to say the same grey dress she has worn every day since she arrived.
The specificity of that observation would have betrayed a degree of attention that no employer should possess regarding his governess’s wardrobe. “She will need appropriate attire.”
Georgiana regarded him, her expression carefully neutral, but clearly trying very hard not to smile.
“I was thinking the same thing, actually. I simply did not wish to overstep.” She tilted her head. “How many gowns were you envisioning?”
“I leave the particulars to your judgement. A day dress. An evening dress. Something suitable for the wedding. Whatever is appropriate.”
“And you would like me to present this to Miss Bennet as—?”
“A requirement. For the proper representation of the household. She is to understand that the gowns are provided as part of her position, not as—” He searched for the word. “Charity.”
“A uniform, essentially.”
“If you wish to call it that.”
Georgiana nodded slowly. Madame Delacroix had been following this exchange with shrewd attention. She had dressed half the ladies of the ton and she understood the subtext of every fitting, but said nothing.
Darcy turned to leave. He made it three steps towards the door. Then he stopped.
He should not say what he was about to say.
There was absolutely no reason for him to say it.
Elizabeth needed gowns for public appearances.
That was the scope of the commission. Gowns.
Outer garments. The parts of a woman’s wardrobe that were visible to the world and entirely within the purview of an employer’s concern.
He turned back.
His ears were already burning. He could feel the heat spreading from his collar to his jaw, the same traitorous flush that had betrayed him at every moment when his body decided to announce what his mouth would not.
“Georgiana.”
She raised an eyebrow.
“You should also ensure that Miss Bennet has—” He cleared his throat, glancing at Madame Delacroix. “Everything else she might need.”
“Everything else,” Georgiana repeated.
“Yes. Shoes. Stockings.” He was going to stop there. He was absolutely going to stop there. His mouth, which had apparently seceded from the union of his better judgement, continued. “Underthings.”