Chapter 38 A Father’s Blessing
A FATHER’S BLESSING
In Mamma’s room, I read aloud from my father’s letter:
“I have, in remarkably expedited fashion, completed my business in Derbyshire. Your sister Lydia is found, and with her Mr. Wickham, who admirably fulfills all my recollections of his superficiality and arrogance, and whom I will be obligated henceforth to refer to as my son.”
“Oh! Oh! They will marry!” cried Mamma, bouncing in her bed while Kitty stared at me with a stunned expression.
Mary listened also but had already read the letter. I gave it to her after I read it, and we had both rejoiced. But on this second hearing, Mary was impassive, her brown eyes, framed by her long, straight hair, narrowing with each sentence.
My mother clapped her hands. “Married at sixteen! What a clever girl! Have my clothes set out at once! I will go to town and share the news. And I shall certainly call on the Lucases. Oh, your father must raise marriage gold! He foolishly insists we can afford only ten guineas for the lot of you, but with Lydia marrying such a handsome officer we must do more. I am sure he can raise five guineas for her while the banns are called.”
“Mamma,” I interrupted. “They are already wed.”
“Already?” Her face puckered. “But she was not at home. Without her marriage gold…”
“You should be thankful they are married at all,” I said. “Listen.” I resumed reading, trying not to worry at the shakiness of Papa’s hand:
“Prior even to my or Colonel Forster’s arrival, Lydia and Wickham were discovered, and through reliable authority I know that Wickham had no intent to marry.
We have been beneficiaries of a most galling negotiation, which has left me with an unpayable debt and no merit.
If it were not for some sacrifice of health, I would call the entire trip a deplorable bargain, for it has cost no more than an outing to London. ”
“How can it be deplorable when I have a daughter married!” exclaimed Mamma.
“I dislike his mention of health,” Mary said. “And what is an unpayable debt?” I shook my head, although I had a wild suspicion. I read on:
“As they have bound a ferretworm—”
“Bound!” my mother shrieked. She jumped from her bed in her crumpled nightgown. “Bound! Oh, my darling Lydia!”
She subsided into excited peeping noises, so I resumed:
“As they have bound a ferretworm, Wickham has secured a married officer’s commission in Newcastle, where they will travel directly. They will not be received at Longbourn. Although further affairs remain to be settled, I am forced to return. Expect me a day after this letter.
“Your loving father, James Bennet.”
My mother’s expression had collapsed like a fallen loaf. “Not received here? Why ever not?”
“Papa is angry with Lydia, Mamma,” I said.
“Angry? Whatever for?”
I exchanged incredulous expressions with Mary while mother enlisted Kitty and a maid to prepare her clothes.
Papa’s coach arrived the next morning, but he was not alone. A doctor traveled with him.
“Doctor Culpepper,” he introduced himself as I helped Papa from the coach. “I hoped to speak with Mrs. Bennet?”
“She is away until luncheon,” I said. Mamma was making an extensive series of social calls.
My father’s weight fell on my arm. In a windy voice, he said to the doctor, “You should speak to Lizzy.” Then he nodded toward his library, and we settled him in his chair with a blanket and a cup of tea.
In the hall outside the library, the doctor addressed me. I listened with my arms wound around myself, as if our house had chilled.
“Your father’s health took a sudden and severe turn,” the doctor said. “His circulation remains poor, which will shorten his breath and greatly limit his activity.”
“For how long? What is the cause?”
“The cause is disease of the heart, which is prone to sudden attacks. Your father has had a long and productive life. The best care is quiet rest and love from his family.”
My chill was growing. I had been steeling myself since reading the letter, but not this much. “You are considerate, but our circumstances require forthright advice. You said nothing of recovery.”
“Improvement is always to be hoped for.” He chose his next words slowly, and every hesitation drove my chill deeper into my chest like a knife of ice. “However, it would be prudent to prepare for a worsening, which may be abrupt. Have you a local physician?”
“Mr. Jones. A surgeon and apothecary.” Meryton was too small for a physician.
He nodded. “I should like to consult with him before I depart.”
I asked Mrs. Hill to send for Mr. Jones. Then I stared at my father’s open library door for a minute, straightened my shoulders, and went in.
Papa was shrunken in his chair. A sheet of written paper rested on his desk.
He nodded for me to sit. “Has the illustrious doctor befuddled you with his niceties?”
“No.” I was proud my voice was steady.
“Good. I knew I could rely on your sense.” He drew a labored breath. “It is a dark day when a rogue like Wickham joins our family. I would have refused their marriage and condemned Lydia to her fate were it not for the damage to you and your sisters.”
“You would not do that.” For all I was furious with Lydia, she was family.
He smiled through gray lips. “No. I admit you are right. But I did give Wickham a firm account of my mind. I bested him well in our argument, but I paid the price after. How pathetic that passion and moral outrage—emotions that spiced my life and drove my work in my youth—are now a poison.”
He placed his forefinger on the sheet of paper on his desk.
“I have written a power of attorney that authorizes you to administer Longbourn. Legally it is little protection, as the entailment declares a bound male is heir, and the law gives women no right to conduct business. However, our estate has longstanding and mutually profitable relationships, so you will find our partners eager to proceed as usual. Has Mr. Jones been summoned?” I nodded.
“When he arrives, he and Doctor Culpepper will witness it. Then you may continue. Until someone chooses to challenge you.”
“Continue?” I said, and finally my voice was uneven.
“Until Longbourn is claimed, I consider it yours. It is an unfair burden, Lizzy, as you assume responsibility without reaping reward, but I know you will shine. You must care for our family, household, and tenants as long as you can. You are mistress of Longbourn.”
Doctor Culpepper found me in our garden, embedded in incongruous calm. The scent of hyacinths and lilac. The hum of bees.
“Miss Bennet. I have consulted with Mr. Jones, and we have assisted your father with his legal preparations. I regret that I must depart to return to my own practice.”
“Thank you for attending him,” I said. “Has my father arranged payment of your fees?”
“I am physician to the Pemberley estate, present at Mr. Darcy’s request.” He gave a slight bow.
That name was no surprise. Since reading Papa’s letter, my wild suspicion had become certainty. Who else had the resources to find Wickham in the vastness of Derbyshire, and the power to bribe and threaten him to marry?
I suppose the physician to Pemberley did not bother with trivialities like fees.
“Was there any message?” I asked.
“Message?”
“For me. From Mr. Darcy.”
“No, Miss Bennet.”
After the doctor left, my mother bubbled through the front door, chattering and happy, then ecstatic that Papa was home. Mr. Jones took her upstairs to visit my father.
Mr. Jones came down after ten minutes, upset beneath his professional manner. We took a wordless cup of tea together. I watched the tea tremble in my shell-thin cup until he departed, telling me to send for him if there was any change.
It was an hour before my mother emerged, her face wretched.
I held her, and she moaned. “I am so frightened, Lizzy.”
“Hush,” I said, stroking her hair like a child.
I went outside and walked circuits around the manor, reviewing what business required attention. April was rather a lull with the main crop of peas sown, but there were potatoes to plant and lambs to protect.
My feet stopped at our draca house. Our firedrake watched me, silent and waiting, an icon of our gentry status and our sole inviolable claim to Longbourn.
“I understand now,” I whispered. “You know the end approaches.”
The sky turned fiery with sunset and faded to silver dusk. I went up to my parents’ room.
Papa rubbed the bed beside him with a shaky hand, and I sat close to him.
“I wish to understand what happened in Derbyshire,” I said.
“Perhaps we can explain it to each other,” he said, his dry humor sharp even with a weak voice.
“I shall tell my side first. Colonel Forster arrived the day before me and made inquiries about certain friends of Wickham. Gambling acquaintances, to be blunt. Within an hour, he received a remarkable visit from a gentleman.”
“Mr. Darcy,” I said. This much I had guessed.
“Yes. Mr. Darcy spent some time ascertaining the colonel’s purpose and credentials, then revealed he knew the whereabouts of Wickham and Lydia. He had, in fact, already confronted Wickham in very strong terms.”
“Why?” I asked. This was my real question.
My father pondered me for a good half minute, as if the answer hung in my eyes, then continued, “I arrived the next morning and met both Wickham and Mr. Darcy. Mr. Darcy and I spent a day and a half together, including a late night where we spoke at length between bouts of negotiation with Wickham. And between my arguments with Lydia, whom I found greatly changed, and not for the better.”
Papa took my hand. “Mr. Darcy, to my surprise, is a man who draws confidences. We spoke earnestly, and I found him principled and of remarkable consequence. Wickham, of course, is his opposite. Wickham had thought up a variety of selfish demands before he would marry Lydia, mostly escaping debts which added to a formidable sum. But the great challenge was his obsession with binding. This, even though it was grotesquely evident that he and Lydia traveled with unfettered intimacy.”