Chapter 8 #3
“You are both correct,” Lady Amelia admitted after drying her very moist eyes.
“Francis would be disgusted at the way I have behaved since he went to his final reward. He would not forgive me for giving up hope of ever seeing Bethie again. I must, I will, do better,” she vowed more to herself than her friends.
“Will one of you ring for my maid, please? I need to dress and begin to live again.”
The sisters-in-law had been sure that their decision not to travel to London with their husbands to be at the opening session of the Lords had been a good one.
Who knew whether Amelia would have been alive had they waited to visit her after the season?
Their next task was to convince Amelia to accompany them and their daughters to London.
Anne Fitzwilliam would be twelve in June upcoming, and Giana, as Georgiana was called among family, would be four in two days.
Richard and William were at Eton. The former was fifteen and soon to be sixteen, and the latter would be fifteen in April.
Andrew, who was nineteen, was in his final year at Cambridge.
It did not take Ladies Elaine and Anne much to convince Lady Amelia to travel with them, first to Pemberley for Giana’s fourth birthday celebration and then on to London.
It was as if the whole of Hornby Castle seemed to breathe again once Her Grace decided to continue on with her life and not sit and waste away in her bedchamber.
As for Amelia, she felt a new sense of purpose and swore to herself and her late husband that she would live to find Bethie.
No trace of a body had been found in almost eight years, which she would take as a positive sign that her daughter was alive, and she would be reunited with her one day.
Bethie would reach the age of eight on the day after Giana’s birthday.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
Elizabeth Bennet felt very old now that she was eight. She was pouting a little because, as much as Mamma and Papa would grant any of her or her siblings’ requests, there were some things on which they would not be moved.
The thing Elizabeth was lamenting was that her request to walk or ride out on her own had been rejected by both of her parents, and no amount of pleading to Grandmama Beth or Aunt Penelope to intercede had changed their minds.
In fact, rather than being allowed to go ramble or ride on her own, or even with her brother or sisters, Papa had employed several men to act as what he had called ‘footmen-guards’.
Papa had contacted Uncle Edward in London and asked him to find eight men who could fill the roles of protectors of the five Bennet children.
Uncle Edward had found men who were about to join the Royal Marines.
They had told him it was the only employment they could find.
Instead, Uncle Edward had offered them positions on behalf of Papa for a lot more pay and far less danger than they would have had in the Royal Marines.
What Elizabeth did not know was that her parents had employed men to protect their children from harm in case anyone learnt of their true financial positions.
They wanted to make sure that none of their children were ever targets for kidnappers or, in later years, fortune hunters.
With the growth of the dowry accounts for Elizabeth and her sisters, there was a rather significant amount in the account.
The increases were thanks to Uncle Edward’s skill at investing and Aunt Penelope adding a significant portion of her fortune to the account for the dowries.
All eight men were large and strong, but two of them made the others look small.
Their names were John Biggs and Brian Johns.
As much as Elizabeth chafed at the restrictions of never leaving the house to walk or ride without one of the men escorting her, she had come to like the two huge men quite a lot. She called them the ‘gentle giants’.
Even when she and Mamma went for their walks in the wooded areas, one of the men trailed behind them. As her mamma did not seem to object to the escorts, Elizabeth supposed it was not so very bad. Mamma was the only Bennet who did not ride.
When each Bennet child turned five, she, or in James’s case, he, was presented with a pony.
At eight, they graduated to cobs, and next year when Janey turned twelve, she would be given a gelding or a mare.
Elizabeth was very excited, as she had been presented with a cob on her birthday in February.
Now she and James could race their cobs.
He had received his in May the previous year.
Elizabeth loved winning, but only if it was fairly done; she refused to cheat to gain what she wanted.
The last one to receive a pony would be Kitty in August of the current year.
The older three Bennet sisters were training to ride side-saddle; however, on Longbourn’s land they were all permitted to ride astride.
For that purpose, they had special split-skirt riding habits made for them to preserve their modesty.
Riding that way enabled the three eldest Bennet children to have their races. Mary had been riding a pony since April of the previous year, so she did not partake in the races…yet.