Chapter 18
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
A fter walking a mile or two, Elizabeth was ready to admit fatigue and turn back. They returned Freddy to the kennels and continued on towards the manor.
They found Darcy in the entrance hall, struggling to don a glove while barking at a footman to make haste in fetching his hat. His head lifted when the door closed behind them, abandoning the recalcitrant article to the side table as he rushed over, demanding, “Where have you been?”
The colonel leant in Elizabeth’s direction and spoke in a whisper that echoed off the marble lining the hall. “See? I told you he did not send me to follow you.”
Darcy fixed a glare upon Elizabeth. “I went upstairs to see you, only to find you absent. Blake told me that you had gone walking again, expressly against my wishes.”
Instead of feeling that familiar upsurge of irritation with him, Elizabeth experienced only the softness of pity for the young boy who had lost his mother too soon and the man who feared his beloved wife would leave him the same way. She relinquished her companion’s arm and went to her husband, taking both his hands in hers. From the periphery of her vision, she saw the colonel silently slip away, leaving them to themselves. “Forgive me, my love, I ought to have been more considerate.”
Darcy eyed her suspiciously. “You regret walking out? Does this mean you are feeling unwell? I can call for the apothecary if need be, or take you back to London to see my own physician?—”
Shaking her head, Elizabeth calmly interrupted his brewing distress. “I am perfectly well, I assure you. What I meant was that I should not have been so dismissive of your feelings, that is all.”
“So you will refrain from overtaxing yourself from now on? Stay where I can watch over you?”
Elizabeth’s heart constricted at the pained hopefulness in Darcy’s voice. She squeezed his hands, a silent communication of understanding. “Let us adjourn to greater privacy”—she nodded at the space around them, which bustled with the activity of a grand house—“and discuss this further. I am certain we can reach a compromise.”
The wariness lingered on her husband’s features, but he nodded his agreement. “Very well. Then let us do so in our chambers. I would like you to rest.”
Elizabeth’s lips quirked with amusement at her husband’s expense. “I shall submit, but only if you promise to listen to what I have to say. I shall likewise promise to listen to you in return.”
Just as Darcy was leading them to the staircase—“Are you certain you do not wish for me to carry you?”—a strident voice abruptly imposed itself upon their notice. “Darcy, is that you? Attend to me at once.”
Elizabeth sagged with frustration. “Is it too late to pretend we did not hear?”
Darcy urged her closer to the stairs with his hand upon her lower back. “Go on up. I shall make your excuses.”
“No, no, I shall come with you, else you will have no reason to leave her for hours. Besides, I owe her an apology for the incident with the tea. What say I begin to yawn in ten minutes? Then we may both escape upstairs for our conversation.”
Darcy kissed the backs of her fingers. “Very well, but only because I am determined to see you to our chambers myself. You might slip away again if I turn my back.”
Hugging his arm to her—the greatest display of affection she could show in a public space—Elizabeth assured him, “I promise I shall not. I swear to stay with you always.”
As Collins droned on about the same tedious topics he covered daily—her condescension, his gratitude, grief over Anne, and so on ad nauseum—Lady Catherine listened with only half an ear. Her parson never said anything of interest to anyone; his greatest value was in following her commands without the inconvenience of questioning them.
She might have interrupted him or sent him away, but the headache throbbing behind her eyes meant it was far easier to let him carry on with his endless condolences while she stared blankly at nothing and sipped her willow bark tea. She had not slept well of late, finding herself frequently jarred from repose by odd noises: creaking doors, soft footsteps, muffled sobbing, the incessant jangling of a bell—all of them issuing from her daughter’s room. This would have caused her no concern save for the fact that Anne was dead .
The first few times it had occurred, Lady Catherine had risen from her bed and stalked into Anne’s former bedchamber only to find no one present. She had, naturally, believed the perpetrator to be hiding and demanded that they show themselves, but no one would come forwards. Even a search of the room turned up no sign of anyone besides herself.
Dreams, that is all , she had concluded after several interrupted nights. Though why I should conjure fancies of trespassers in Anne’s rooms, I have no earthly idea.
“It was devastation! That horrible beast dug up half my flowers and nearly all of my?—”
“Where have you been?”
Lady Catherine settled her teacup into its saucer with an inelegant clatter as Darcy’s shout overpowered Collins’s monotonous diatribe about his garden. It was followed by the softer murmur of other voices, one of which was the lighter feminine tone of that lowborn wife of his. She could not make out what they were saying with any clarity.
“I say, that was?—”
“Quiet!” Lady Catherine barked, silencing Collins and straining to listen. The dolt shrank back in his chair as if she had physically struck him into compliance.
“…went upstairs…to find you gone…expressly against my wishes.”
Darcy seemed to have gained control of himself, for Lady Catherine could discern nothing more than reverberating murmurs after that. She had heard enough to understand the gist of their conversation, however, and a gleeful smile crept across her lips. It seems my nephew is regretting his choice already. I need to see this for myself.
“Darcy, is that you?” she called. “Attend to me at once.”
There was no direct response, merely more incoherent muttering, and she was on the point of sending Collins to fetch them when the door opened and Darcy strolled in with Miss Bennet on his arm. Her nephew did not look best pleased to be there, but then that was his usual way; he had sported that grim expression in her presence since he was a boy.
As for Miss Bennet, she blithely walked into the room as if she belonged there, as if she were not present on Lady Catherine’s sufferance. She smiled in that coy, teasing way that had always characterised her expressions, and Lady Catherine had no doubt that she was mightily pleased with herself for having ensnared Darcy and elevated herself to a sphere in which she did not belong. I would cast her out but for the sweetness I anticipate from my revenge.
“There you are. It has been an age since I have seen either of you.”
“Apologies, Aunt,” said Darcy as he gently settled Miss Bennet on the sofa nearest to her. He then took the seat next to his so-called wife. “Mrs Darcy has required more rest of late. It was not our intention to neglect you.”
“If Miss Bennet is so unwell, you really ought to try the tonic I recommended last evening.” The same tonic that had ended up in her lap; her lip curled at the recollection. “Of course, one must actually drink it for it to be effective.”
The clock struck one, and Lady Catherine frowned at it. The hands read a quarter past midday; it must still be broken even though she distinctly recalled ordering its repair.
Miss Bennet cleared her throat. “I owe you an apology for upsetting my tea into your lap. I have no notion of how it happened, but I must have been clumsy and incautious. I do hope you can forgive me.”
Never. “If you are truly repentant, you will partake now. Collins, ring the bell and order a fresh pot of tea.”
“Of course, my lady! Right away. I have always lauded the benefits of a good cup of tea and?—”
“ Now .”
Collins stumbled to his feet and scurried across the room.
“Given that your tonic provokes Mrs Darcy’s stomach?—”
“I have always much admired this room,” Miss Bennet said, interrupting her husband. He glowered at her, but she continued without paying him any mind. “The theme is fascinating. Sir Lewis was knighted, was he not?”
Lady Catherine nodded. “Yes, it was a great source of pride to him and his father. They renovated Rosings Park in honour of his title. Arthur de Bourgh did not live to see it finished, of course, but they undertook most of the project together.” And nearly bankrupted the estate trying to fashion it after a medieval castle. Imbeciles.
Miss Bennet’s lips twitched. “Arthur de Bourgh? What a happy coincidence.”
Impertinent chit. “Quite.”
Sir Lewis had been a silly nincompoop of the same ilk as Collins, lacking the dignity of his station or the wit to manage an estate without running it into the ground. Of course, had he not done so, he would not have required Lady Catherine’s dowry and contracted their marriage, so she supposed that she must be glad of his idiocy to a point. Even if Sir Lewis had been an oaf so enamoured of fairy stories that he had wasted the bulk of his fortune, he had at least left her Rosings. Well, he had left Rosings to Anne , but that amounted to the same thing—until Anne had reached her majority. After that, stewardship of the estate had become more…complicated, but Lady Catherine had managed. She was confident that Rosings Park would devolve to her in the end; it was hers by divine right.
While Rosings had been grand at one time, it was sadly beginning to show its wear. Lady Catherine made a point of covering up the most egregious cracks and stains with tapestries and the like, but without more extensive repairs it would continue to wilt in the same fashion as the daffodils Collins had brought her. Her refined taste and keen eye for furnishings could only go so far. Curse that artful girl. Were it not for her, Darcy would have married my daughter and funded all the necessary improvements. Because of her, I am forced to resort to patching and covering blemishes like a painted whore.
The maid arrived with a fresh pot of tea, forestalling any further conversation on the subject. The tray was piled high with various edibles as well, which Darcy foisted upon his wife as if she had not eaten in a week. Instead of issuing him the same sort of irritated glower she had sported during their recent encounters, Miss Bennet smiled sweetly and made no protest as he filled her plate. There was no way the girl would ever eat even half so much, but she seemed content to allow him his peculiarities. Lady Catherine wondered what had changed her position on Darcy’s overbearing manner.
As it did not matter and she did not especially care, she turned her attention to pouring the tea. Into Miss Bennet’s cup she added a large dollop of the tonic and a heaping teaspoon of sugar to disguise the taste, then stirred the concoction until it was perfectly blended. She passed it to the trollop, who accepted it with a murmur of thanks. The blasted clock chimed again, this time thrice, and she glared at it; she would enquire of Mrs Knight which of the servants merited dismissal for disregarding her explicit command. She would not stand for such egregious laziness. “My lady!”
Lady Catherine was afforded no more warning than this before Collins abruptly flung himself upon her person and wrestled her to the floor. She shrieked in protest, but it was barely audible above the deafening crash that coincided with it. A subsequent crisp tearing sound, like fabric being violently rent, followed, then a crunch, a crash, and finally comparative silence.
“Get off me!” Lady Catherine snarled, thrusting Collins’s meaty body from her own. He smelt abhorrent. Does the man never bathe?
Collins tumbled onto the floor and curled on his side, groaning in pain. “F-Forgive me, your ladyship,” he wheezed, his face contorting with every slight movement. He then collapsed into an insensible heap, having fainted.
She raised herself upon the point of her elbow and found herself bemused by the bits of rubble that tumbled about her. She inclined her head to where she had been seated and discovered that her beloved chair lay in pieces beneath an enormous painting. The portrait of King Arthur—previously suspended above the mantelpiece—had fallen from its prominent position and been ripped to shreds on the jagged remains of her ruined throne. The tea table had also collapsed, crushed beneath the debris that had so unceremoniously fallen upon it. Her tea service had not survived the ordeal either.
It occurred to her that Collins had perhaps just saved her life. I suppose I must reward him for this.
“Aunt, are you injured?”
Lady Catherine turned towards her nephew’s voice and found him several yards distant, separated from her by the deluge of destruction that had destroyed half the room. His arms were wrapped tightly about his wife, cradling her to his chest with one hand clutching at her hip and the other pressing her head into the crook of his shoulder. The chit clung to him likewise, eyes squeezed shut and coughing at the plaster dust, which settled over them like a London fog. She turned more deeply into him, protecting her mouth and nose, while Darcy bundled her yet closer. He looked pale and vaguely ill.
Behind them, nearly to the far wall, the sofa they had been seated upon was overturned as if they had jumped back and out of calamity’s way with a great deal of force. How it had landed quite so far from its original position was a mystery, but her nephew’s innate strength must have been supplemented by his panic.
Darcy called to her again, though he did not yet relinquish his hold on Miss Bennet’s trembling form. “Aunt? Are you harmed?”
Lady Catherine took stock of herself but could find nothing amiss other than a touch of soreness where Collins and his bulk had collapsed upon her and pinned her to the floor. She was about to answer him and insist that he set aside that ninny he called a wife to aid her when the door burst open and Fitzwilliam darted in just ahead of a contingent of servants. “What happened?”
“There has been an accident,” replied Darcy, nodding to the pile of detritus that used to be her sitting room. “See to Lady Catherine and Collins.”
Fitzwilliam was already in motion again, picking his way through the clutter in his aunt’s direction. He held out his hands to her and lifted her off the floor, depositing her into a lesser chair before seeing to Collins. A quick press of his fingers to the parson’s neck later, he assured the room, “He lives. I think he has merely fainted. We ought to call for the doctor.”
The servants drew nearer, all of them looking about them in horrified wonder at the scene.
“The plaster has cracked,” commented Percy, peering up at the empty place where the painting once hung. A fissure split the wall like a bolt of lightning, spreading nearly to the ceiling, where it was blocked by the fan vaulting.
Mrs Knight peered up at the damage with bafflement. “How in the world…?”
“It was bound to happen sooner or later. Have you seen the water damage behind that tapestry of Guinevere?”
During the confusion, Lady Catherine caught a glimpse of Darcy scooping his wife into his arms and making for the door. “I am going to take Mrs Darcy upstairs and out of harm’s way. I shall return once I am assured she is well.”
“Stay with your wife, Darcy, I can handle this.”
At that, Darcy swept out of the door without another look back.
Fitzwilliam then directed the servants to stop gaping at the wall and get to work cleaning up the debris, which they immediately did. He sent one of the footmen to seek out Nichols, then set about attempting to rouse Collins himself. The parson grumbled his way into consciousness, then hissed in pain while Fitzwilliam assisted him into a sitting position.
At least I am spared the search for a new clergyman.
Lady Catherine did not move from the chair Fitzwilliam had planted her in until her lady’s maid arrived to lead her upstairs. As she quitted the room, that stupid broken clock chimed again, its sound a tinny ring of triumph to her ears.