Chapter Fifteen The Dawn Chorus #2
The room was vast, dim, and smelled aggressively of laudanum.
In the centre, a four-poster bed rose like a ship upon a sea of carpet.
Mr Bennet lay ensconced in pillows, a glass of port in one hand, his splinted leg elevated on a stack of cushions so high it nearly touched the canopy.
He appeared not in pain, but in the throes of supreme entertainment, and well into his cups.
But the true spectacle was the performance.
Tepper, the valet, walked slowly back and forth along the bedside rug. He held a massive, leather-bound volume open in his hands, his arms rigid, functioning as a mobile, human lectern.
Beside him, Charles Bingley paced. He wore kersey thick enough to thatch a roof. He did not read the book. He recited from it, glancing at the pages Tepper held only for confirmation, waving a hand in the air with the fervour of a radical politician.
"—and thus, the rotation of the turnip allows the vital salts to return!" Bingley shouted, spinning on his heel. " A beautiful, eternal cycle of vegetable decay and rebirth! The soil forgives, Mr Bennet! The soil forgives!"
"Fascinating," Mr Bennet drawled, sipping his port. "And the manure? Do not spare me the details of the manure, Charles."
"The manure is the catalyst!" Bingley roared.
"What," Robert's voice boomed, shattering the agrarian sermon, "in the name of all that is holy, is happening in here?"
Bingley jumped. Tepper snapped the book shut with a dust-raising thud. Mr Bennet merely tipped his glass.
"Ah," Mr Bennet smiled. "My wife's Son. And just as we were getting to the dung spreading."
"Keathley!" Bingley smoothed his kersey coat, breathless. "Lady Keathley! You are here!"
"We are." Jane rushed to the bedside, bypassing the confused agriculturalists to kiss her father's forehead. "Papa, are you in agony?"
"I am in luxury, my dear," Mr Bennet patted her hand. "Charles has been reading to me about crop rotation for three hours. I have never slept so soundly in between paragraphs. It is better than laudanum."
Robert advanced into the room, poking Bingley in the chest with the head of his cane. "You. Man of Mud. Why is your valet functioning as furniture?"
"Tepper is assisting," Bingley said, dignity radiating from his kersey coat. "My hands were gesturing. I needed them free to convey the passion of the harvest."
"Passion of the harvest?" Robert stared at him. "Bingley, you are talking about vegetables. Subterranean lumps. You sound like you are inciting a revolution."
"It is a revolution!" Bingley insisted. "Of the soil!"
"It is a tragedy," Kitty sighed from the doorway. She leaned against the frame, gazing at Mr Bennet's elevated limb with morbid fascination. "To think. One moment, a man walks the earth. The next, his bones snap like dry twigs. We are but porcelain dolls waiting to be shattered."
"Hello, Kitty," Mr Bennet waved his glass. "Cheer up. Mr Jones says the bone is set beautifully. I shall be dancing the jig by Christmas."
"A jig of death," Kitty whispered.
"Right," Robert announced, clapping his hands. "That is enough. Tepper, put down the book before you develop a cramp and sue us. Bingley, stop shouting about salts. You are frightening me. Mr Bennet, stop enjoying this."
"I cannot help it," Mr Bennet chuckled. "It is the finest farce I have attended in years."
"Where is Miss Bennet?" Bingley asked, his eyes darting behind Jane. "Is she... did she leave?"
"She sleeps," Jane soothed, turning back to the group. "Colonel Lindon says she is resting. I must go to her. She will want to know we are here."
"Make her rest, Jane. My dear girl deserves it." Mr Bennet averted his eyes.
"I will try," Jane kissed her father again, suppressing a sigh. "And you, try not to break the other leg while I am gone, Papa. Robert, keep them sane."
"A task for Sisyphus," Robert muttered as his wife slipped out the door. He turned his predatory gaze back to Bingley. "Now. Explain this rough kersey. Did you skin a sofa?"
Jane slipped through the door of the guest chamber, closing it softly against the distant, booming laughter echoing from the infirmary. The room was dim, the curtains drawn against the afternoon light, but Mary was not asleep.
She perched on the edge of the bed, her knees drawn up to her chest, wearing a borrowed gown that was two sizes too large. Her spectacles lay on the nightstand. Without them, her eyes seemed vulnerable, stripped of their usual analytical shield.
"Is the shouting finished?" Mary's voice came raspy.
Jane crossed the room, the sapphire velvet of her pelisse rustling in the quiet. She sat on the mattress, reaching out to tuck a stray lock of hair behind Mary's ear.
"I suspect that Robert is currently interrogating Mr Bingley about the structural integrity of a parsnip," Jane smiled, though her eyes remained serious. "And Papa is encouraging them. It is a very loud peace."
Mary rested her chin on her knees. "Mr Bingley has been harping about vital salts for hours."
Jane laughed.
"It was..." Mary paused, searching for the word. "It was the most ridiculous thing I have ever witnessed."
"Mr Bingley has a talent for enthusiasm."
"I love him."
The words hung in the air, stark and unadorned. Mary did not flinch. She did not retract them. She stared at the pattern on the quilt, her fingers tracing a blue thread.
"I know," Jane whispered, covering Mary's hand with her own.
"I am a traitor." Mary's voice tightened.
"I kept a ledger, Jane. I listed the reasons.
The logic. But the logic failed. He carried Papa through the mud.
He held me in the hallway while I wept. He is a variable I cannot solve, and I love him.
" She turned, her gaze frantic. "But he hurt you.
Last year. He left without a word. He broke your heart, and now I.
.. I am stealing the man who abandoned my sister. "
Jane shifted, turning to face Mary fully. The gentle, placid Jane of Longbourn was gone. In her place was the Viscountess Keathley, a woman who had navigated London society, tamed a chaotic husband, and found her own strength.
"Mary. Look at me."
Mary obeyed, squinting slightly.
"Mr Bingley did not break my heart," Jane stated, her voice firm. "He bruised it. He left because he did not love me enough to refuse the guidance of others. He is a good man, but he was not the right man for me."
"You cried for a month straight."
"I did," Jane admitted. "I mourned a possibility. I mourned a future I thought I wanted. But consider the alternative." She squeezed Mary's hand. "If Mr Bingley had stayed... if he had married me... I would be Mrs Bingley. I would be mistress of Netherfield. I would be content."
She smiled, and it was a blinding, radiant expression.
"But I would not be Lady Keathley. I would not know Robert."
Jane laughed, a soft, amazed sound. "Robert is loud.
He is impossible. He brings home parrots and insults Dukes and steals my hand salve.
He is a hurricane, Mary. And he is my sun and stars.
If Mr Bingley had not left, I never would have gone to London.
I never would have met the man who adores me so much. "
Mary studied her sister's face. She saw no deception. She saw only the fierce, undeniable joy of a woman who had found her match.
"You truly do not mind?" Mary asked, the knot in her chest beginning to loosen.
"I mind only that you waited this long to tell me," Jane teased gently. "Mr Bingley needs someone who will tell him when his kersey is hideous and his drainage theories are sound. He needs you."
Mary let out a breath, a shuddering exhale that released three days of terror. "He does have terrible taste in coats."
"It is tragic," Jane agreed. "But we can fix his wardrobe. We cannot fix a heart that does not love." She hesitated. She glanced at the door, ensuring it was firmly shut, then turned back to Mary. Her expression shifted, the playful sister replacing the wise matron.
"I have a secret," Jane whispered, leaning closer. "Not even Mamma knows. Only Robert."
Mary sat up straighter, reaching for her spectacles. She shoved them onto her nose, bringing Jane into sharp focus. "A secret?"
Jane took Mary's hand and guided it to her waist, resting it against the soft fabric of her bodice.
"Robert says we shall name him Augustus if it is a boy," Jane murmured, her eyes shining with tears. "Because he will conquer the nursery. But if it is a girl... I think she should be a Mary. Someone strong. Someone who sees everything."
Mary froze. Her hand rested against the flat stomach of her sister. She felt the warmth of the velvet, the steady beat of Jane's life, and the promise of the new one growing beneath.
"A baby?" Mary breathed. "A tiny Viscount?"
"Or a tiny lady," Jane beamed, her tears spilling over. "Arriving in the spring."
The Ledger in Mary's mind vanished. There were no columns, no guilt. There was a man who loved the soil, and a sister beside her who carried the future.
Mary threw her arms around Jane. She buried her face in the sapphire velvet, and for the second time these last days, she wept. But this time, the tears were not for fear. They were for the sheer, overwhelming perfection of a world that had finally, finally balanced its books.
Jane held her tight, rocking her gently, while down the hallway, the laughter of the men rang out, loud and full of camaraderie.