Chapter Four
The door burst open before Elizabeth’s screams had fully died away.
Mrs. Jenkinson stood in the doorway, her grey dress severe against the dim corridor behind her, her expression fixed in lines of professional concern that didn’t quite reach her eyes.
She stepped inside and closed the door behind her with a soft but decisive click, and turned the key.
The sound of the lock clicking shut seemed unnaturally loud, and Elizabeth realised with creeping dread that the companion had shut them in together, had deliberately isolated them from anyone who might hear.
Elizabeth tried to push herself upright, her hands scrabbling against the heavy coverlet for purchase.
The simple act of sitting required coordination her borrowed body refused to provide.
Her arms shook violently, her elbows threatening to buckle beneath her weight.
She managed to prop herself on one trembling arm, her other hand clutching the bed frame as though it were the only solid thing in a tilting world.
Mrs. Jenkinson crossed the room with swift steps, her hands already reaching out in the gesture of someone accustomed to managing an invalid.
Her face remained composed, arranged in an expression of mild concern that might have been convincing if Elizabeth had not seen the calculation in her eyes as she assessed the situation.
“You’re overtaxing yourself,” Mrs. Jenkinson said, her voice carrying the brisk authority of long habit. She reached Elizabeth’s side and placed one hand firmly on her shoulder, the other moving to adjust the pillows behind her. “You need to rest. Back to bed, now.”
The casual assumption in those words, the way Mrs. Jenkinson spoke to her as though she were simply a recalcitrant patient, sent a spike of fury through Elizabeth’s confusion. She tried to pull away from the woman’s touch, but her muscles responded sluggishly, achieving only a weak twitch.
“What...” Elizabeth’s voice emerged as a rasp, her throat still raw from screaming. She swallowed hard, forcing the words past the constriction. “How... who...”
The sentences fragmented before she could complete them, her thoughts moving faster than her tongue could follow.
Too many questions crowded her mind at once.
What had Anne done? How had this impossible thing happened?
Who could help her? The words tangled together, emerging as incoherent stammering.
Mrs. Jenkinson’s hand on her shoulder pressed down with surprising strength, urging her back toward the pillows.
“You’re confused. It’s to be expected after such exertion, visiting the parsonage yesterday.
You’ve overtired yourself, and now you’re suffering the consequences. Let me help you lie down properly.”
The patronising tone ignited something fierce in Elizabeth’s chest. She had to make this woman understand. Had to make someone understand. She could not simply be tucked back into bed and dismissed as an invalid having a spell.
Elizabeth planted her feet against the mattress and pushed, using every scrap of strength she possessed to resist Mrs. Jenkinson’s pressure.
Her legs trembled with the effort, threatening to give way entirely, but she managed to remain partially upright.
She lifted her head, forcing herself to meet the companion’s gaze directly despite the way the room swayed around her.
“I’m not Anne!” The words burst from her with desperate force, her voice stronger now though it cracked on the final syllable. “I’m not Anne de Bourgh!”
She expected shock. Expected denial, or confusion, or some attempt to soothe what would appear to be delusions.
Instead, Mrs. Jenkinson went very still.
Her hand remained on Elizabeth’s shoulder, but the pressure ceased.
Her expression shifted subtly, the professional concern sliding away to reveal something harder and more assessing beneath.
Mrs. Jenkinson studied Elizabeth’s face for a long moment.
Elizabeth could see the thoughts turning behind that composed exterior, could see the companion calculating and concluding.
The silence stretched between them, broken only by Elizabeth’s laboured breathing and the crackling of the unnecessary fire.
Then Mrs. Jenkinson sighed. It was a sound of resignation rather than surprise, weary acceptance of an anticipated complication. She released Elizabeth’s shoulder and stepped back slightly, her arms folding across her chest in a gesture that was almost defensive.
“Elizabeth Bennet, I presume?” Mrs. Jenkinson’s voice remained steady, matter-of-fact, as though she were confirming a tea order rather than acknowledging an impossible violation of nature. “I suspected she might do something like this.”
The words struck Elizabeth like a physical blow. The room seemed to tilt more violently, though whether from her body’s weakness or the shock of that casual confirmation, she could not tell. Her grip on the bed frame tightened until her knuckles showed white beneath the translucent skin.
“You knew.” Elizabeth’s voice emerged hollow, scraped raw by more than just her earlier screaming. “You knew what she planned to do.”
It was not a question. Mrs. Jenkinson’s lack of surprise, her immediate recognition of the situation, her expression of weary resignation, all pointed to prior knowledge.
The companion had known Anne intended to steal Elizabeth’s body, and she had done nothing to prevent it. Had perhaps helped facilitate it.
Mrs. Jenkinson only shrugged. “I had suspicions. Miss Anne has been studying her father’s grimoire for years, obsessing over certain passages.
I’ve cared for her long enough to recognise when she’s planning something.
” She paused, her gaze drifting toward the window.
“But I didn’t know for certain until now. Not until you confirmed it.”
Elizabeth’s mind reeled, trying to process the implications. Anne had been planning this for years. Had been studying, preparing, waiting for the right opportunity and the right victim. And Mrs. Jenkinson had watched it all happening, had seen the signs, and had remained silent.
“Why?” The single word contained a universe of questions. Why had Mrs. Jenkinson allowed it? Why hadn’t she warned anyone? Why was she standing here now, speaking with such calm acceptance of an atrocity?
“Why?” Mrs. Jenkinson’s lips curved in something that wasn’t quite a smile.
“Because Miss Anne is my charge. Has been since she was just a little girl. I’ve watched her suffer for more than fifteen years, watched her body fail a little more each day, watched her hope drain away until nothing remained but bitterness.
” She shook her head slowly. “I pitied her.”
“Pity doesn’t excuse this.” Elizabeth’s voice shook, not with weakness now but with fury. “She stole my body. Trapped me in this...“ She gestured helplessly at herself, at Anne’s frail form. “You can’t believe pity justifies such wickedness.”
Mrs. Jenkinson’s expression hardened. “I don’t require your moral instruction, Miss Bennet.
You’ve had health and strength all your life.
You’ve never known what it is to be trapped in a body that betrays you daily, to watch others move freely while you can barely manage stairs.
Perhaps if you had, you might understand desperation. ”
“Desperation doesn’t give her the right to steal my life!” Elizabeth tried to push herself more upright, but her arms gave out and she collapsed back against the pillows, gasping. The exertion cost her dearly, and she had to close her eyes against the spots dancing in her vision.
When she opened her eyes again, Mrs. Jenkinson had moved closer. The companion stood at the bedside, looking down at Elizabeth with an expression that mixed pity and something that might have been regret with cold pragmatism.
“What’s done is done,” Mrs. Jenkinson said quietly. “Raging against it will only exhaust you further, and that body can ill afford such exertion. You need to accept your situation and conserve your strength.”
“Accept it?” Elizabeth stared at her in disbelief. “You expect me to simply accept that Anne has stolen my body, my life?”
“I expect you to be practical,” Mrs. Jenkinson replied. “You’re at Rosings, in Miss de Bourgh’s body, under my care. No one will believe your claims. Lady Catherine herself would have you committed to an asylum if you started insisting you were Elizabeth Bennet. Your only option is to cooperate.”
The words settled over Elizabeth like a suffocating blanket.
Mrs. Jenkinson was right about one thing; no one would believe her.
The truth was too impossible, too fantastical.
Anyone she told would think her mad, would attribute her claims to illness or delusion.
Anne had chosen her victim and her moment with careful calculation, ensuring Elizabeth would be trapped in a situation where she could not seek help without being dismissed as insane.
Elizabeth looked up at Mrs. Jenkinson, studying the companion’s composed face, and felt the first stirrings of genuine terror.
She was utterly alone, completely at the mercy of a woman who had already demonstrated her loyalty lay with Anne rather than with truth or justice.
Whatever happened next, whatever Mrs. Jenkinson decided to do, Elizabeth had no power to resist.
Her body was too weak. Her position too impossible. Her isolation too complete.
She was trapped.
Mrs. Jenkinson seized the heavy coverlet and drew it up over her.
The weight of the bedclothes settled across Elizabeth’s body like a physical restraint, pinning her to the mattress.
She tried to push the covers aside, but her hands moved sluggishly, achieving nothing beyond a weak flutter of fingers against the expensive fabric.