Chapter 6
Lady Catherine
The maid named Clark arrived at the Clarendon precisely at the mandated time. Lady Catherine was pleased by her punctuality and supposed that the servant would have some good news for her.
But the woman entered her presence looking entirely too uneasy. She clenched her hands in front of her, and her eyes did not quite meet Lady Catherine’s.
With a sigh, Lady Catherine realised that there might be bad news or, worse, no news at all.
“Well? You have done as I asked?” she demanded without preamble.
“Yes, Your Ladyship.” Clark gulped and continued, “I put all the sheets into the small trunk you provided, and I kept it out of the way, near the back door, and….”
The maid halted and allowed her eyes to widen, as if that would tell Lady Catherine anything.
“And you brought it to me, as I demanded?” Lady Catherine’s voice was sharp. She added, “As I paid you to do!”
“Well, Your Ladyship, I meant to, I truly did, but some footman must have seen it, although it was not with the trunks Mr and Mrs Darcy arranged to go on the carriage, but he must have decided it was meant to go, too, and so he put it on the carriage. I suppose.”
Lady Catherine was appalled. “My trunk, with the sheet I paid you to provide, unwashed, is on Darcy’s bridal tour?”
“Yes, Your Ladyship. At least, as far as I can tell. I asked everyone, and most people claimed that they had not seen the trunk at all, and a few people admitted that they had seen it but had not opened or moved it.” A few tears escaped Clark’s eyes, and she said in nearly a whisper.
“One of the stablehands said he had seen that there were five trunks on the family carriage, one quite small, and he had originally heard that there would be only four on that particular—”
The maid stopped murmuring her useless report because Lady Catherine cried, “I cannot believe the incompetence!”
“So sorry, Your Ladyship. I did exactly what you said to do, but I suppose you did not expect someone to steal away the trunk.”
“Wait a minute! You said all of the sheets. I said for you to keep the bottom sheet of the marriage bed. What do you mean by saying all, when it should be just one?
“The—the maid who brings down the things first brought down the sheets the evening after Mr and Mrs Darcy arrived. The—the master had given particular orders not to be disturbed, and it turned out that the sheets were not removed from the rooms for more than four and twenty hours.”
“That is entirely odd, but I still do not see why there was more than one.”
Clark’s face had been slowly reddening during the interview, which was understandable; she had much to be embarrassed about. But now her face blushed a deeper red, and she said, “Well, I asked, because you had said, and I did not know why you wished to have the sheets, and—”
Lady Catherine pounded her walking stick on the floor, silencing the maid. “Girl, you are making no sense at all! Why was there more than one?”
“Smith—that’s the girl what does the bedchambers, Your Ladyship—she said that when she was finally allowed in those rooms to deal with the bedding, there was a dirty bottom sheet on each of the two beds plus another dirty sheet in the corner of each bedchamber.
Naturally enough, she did not know by the time she got downstairs which two sheets had been on the bed more recently and which two were the original bedding, so I had to take all four. ”
“I said I wished for the bottom sheet only, not the top and bottom.”
“Yes, there were six sheets altogether. Smith explained that she knew four were bottom sheets because…well….” She stopped talking and reddened even further.
Lady Catherine was horrified. Were there multiple sheets with evidence of…? Her mind shut down—she did not wish to think that respectable, upright Darcy was capable of…? Her mind revolted again. She had to accept that there were four sheets, and she would no longer consider the implications!
“You stupid girl!” she said, seizing on another aspect of four sheets instead of one. “I am positive that the loss of four sheets will be noticed! One sheet might possibly go missing every once in a very long while, but four all at once?”
“Yes, Your Ladyship. So sorry, Your Ladyship”
“I am most displeased. Leave my presence at once!”
Clark turned and fled.
Lady Catherine had been quite pleased with her choice of agent.
Clark had been extremely ambitious, eager to please, intelligent enough, it had seemed…
. But now the evidence she had arranged to have was out of her reach.
The evidence that would prove to Darcy and whoever else needed convincing that this…
creature he had wed was grasping and wanton, unworthy by any measure, and therefore almost certainly not intact on her wedding night…
that evidence was rolling away…somewhere south of London.
Too late, Lady Catherine thought of another question she should have asked. Oh, well, she would send for a stable hand. She might send for all the stablehands, and the stable master as well.
She would eventually learn what she wished to know…. She would eventually prevail.