Chapter 40
The Little Season was in full swing and in early November and Lady Mary Rhys-Davies, was sure that she was with child.
It was her third month with no courses, and recently she had started casting up her accounts in the morning and felt tired during the day even though she was sleeping well.
Another indication was that her breasts, never as large as some of her sisters, had started to grow in size.
Her maid, Miss Reid, had kept her mistress’s confidence, but both knew that the master suspected that there was something amiss with his young wife.
Rather than keep him guessing, Mary headed to her husband’s study to go and talk to him.
“Come,” was heard in her husband’s deep bass voice when Mary knocked on the study door at Birchington House.
“I need to talk to you, Hugh,” Mary told him as she closed the door.
“You know that I always have time to talk to the woman that I love.” He came around to the chair that she seated herself in and kissed her lightly.
“I am yours, my love. What would you like to talk about? Perhaps you are ready to share why you have been sick in the morning and so tired?” He arched a brow as he assessed her for any illness.
Mary laughed softly. She should have known that nothing escaped her beloved’s attention when it pertained to her. “It has been three months since I last had my monthly trouble,” Mary stated calmly, now the one with the arched brow.
Birchington sat stock still in his chair for a few moments and then his face broke out in an enormous grin that lit the room like the rising sun. “I suspected as much, but are you saying what I think you are saying?” Asked an extremely excited Marquess.
“Yes, Hugh, I believe I am enceinte,” Mary informed her husband. No sooner had she said the words; her husband had stood, pulled her up and enfolded her in his arms, raining kisses down on his wife.
“Have you been seen by a physician for confirmation yet?” asked her husband with no little concern in his voice.
“I have not yet, but I would like to make an appointment with the accoucheur that both Jane and Lizzy saw. He has the best reputation in Town,” Mary told him.
“Then we shall make an appointment, my love,” Hugh stated emphatically.
“The accoucheur told Lizzy that he believes she is carrying more than one babe. Before I forget, when I saw Jane a few days ago she told me that she has recently felt the quickening,” Mary smiled in happiness for her sister.
“Do you prefer that we wait to tell our family until after Sir Frederick has confirmed your state, love?” Hugh asked, wanting to shout it to the whole world.
“I do prefer we wait until we see him,” she nodded. Then she added, “Unless we see my Mama first; I am shocked that she has not noticed yet.”
That afternoon the Marquess and Marchioness of Birchington took the carriage to Sir Frederick’s house on Berkeley Square.
While Mary waited her husband gave his card to the butler and was admitted.
He returned shortly and told Mary that she was now scheduled for an appointment on the morrow at ten o’clock.
The next morning the Birchington carriage arrived at the accoucheur’s house ten minutes before the appointment. While he waited in a parlour, a nurse led his wife into the chambers where the examinations were done.
About half an hour later, Mary re-joined her husband, and after he left the ‘gratuity’ in the appointed place, they left the house and climbed into their town carriage, where Hugh could wait no longer since he was bursting with curiosity.
“Well, my love?” he asked softly, tucking her into him and looking down into her eyes. Mary simply nodded as he enfolded her in his arms.
“He said that I should enter my lying-in in five to six months, so in late May or June next year.” She snuggled into him.
“Thank you for this wondrous addition to our family.” He kissed the top of her head over and over.
“It was not all me, Hugh,” Mary blushed happily, “you were integral to the process.”
“Yes, I suppose that I was,” he agreed with a smug chuckle. “Would you like to speak with your mother, my love?”
“Your parents will not take offence if we tell Mama first, will they?” she worried her lip.
“No love, they will understand that the first person that you would want to tell is your mother.” He kissed her forehead and cheeks.
“We will all be having dinner at Jersey House on the morrow so we can tell the rest of the family then, but after we share the news with your parents, we will go to see mine at Rhys-Davies House so they know within minutes of one another.”
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
On the way to Jersey House the three Darcys were discussing their joy that the whole family had accepted the invitations to come to Pemberley for Christmas.
Anne and Ian would make the trip to join the Bennets, Gardiners, Rhys Davies, De Melvilles, and the Fitzwilliams for the family to celebrate the birth of the Son.
The Elliots would join them, although for them it was but a short walk from the parsonage to the great house.
The Darcys were scheduled to leave town at the end of the month.
Once the school term ended, Lord and Lady Longbourn and the three unmarried daughters would make the journey, along with Ladies Tiffany and Loretta and Lily Gardiner and their companions, into the wilds of Derbyshire and the frigid temperatures found there at that time of the year.
Lord and Lady Hilldale, Lord and Lady Matlock, Sir Edward and Lady Gardiner, and Sir Richard and Lady Jane would follow four days later. The Ashbys, Rhys-Davies, and De Melvilles would arrive a sennight before Christmas.
“If Jane felt the quickening in the past sennight, then when should you feel something from our daughters, Lizzy?” Darcy asked, renewing the ongoing playful disagreement.
“You mean when will our sons make their presence known?” retorted his impertinent wife.
“You may both be correct; it could be one of each could it not?” Georgie interjected, playing the adult finding the middle ground.
“Yes Georgie, that is a possibility. It could also be that I only carry one babe and I am just adding weight thanks to cook’s sumptuous food,” Elizabeth arched her eyebrow in challenge as she said the last.
“Come now, dearest, you know that is not true,” her husband scolded her for talking about herself in such a manner.”
“By the time that we return to Town toward the end of January our babe or babes should make their presence known. Once I feel the quickening, I will see Sir Frederick and hopefully he should be able to hear the heartbeats with that cone device that he uses,” Lizzy winked at Georgiana.
The Darcy carriage came to a halt at Jersey House.
After being relieved of their outerwear by the footmen, they were shown into a large drawing room where they noted that they were the last to arrive.
The Countess of Pemberley took one look at her younger sister sitting between their mother and the Duchess and she knew exactly what the glow emanating from Mary meant.
She said naught, waiting for an announcement to be made if that is what her sister and brother decided to do.
Lord and Lady Jersey thanked the Darcys for the invitation to celebrate the Christmas season at Pemberley and the Twelfth Night ball that would follow.
At dinner, Lord Hugh announced that his Lady Mary was with child, about two to three months enceinte. The announcement was a surprise to few. All of the mothers and mothers-to-be had seen the signs just as Elizabeth had as soon as they saw Mary.
Tim Jacobson still had to pinch himself to make sure that he was not dreaming about having such a large extended family.
The thing that impressed him the most is that none of them ever lauded their titles over anyone and he was made to feel part of the family without reservation, just as had happened when their dear departed father had asked the Bennets to become Helen’s guardians.
Tim was sitting between Lydia and Helen, as he always seemed to be regardless of conscious thought or not.
He felt drawn to Lydia in ways that he could not explain.
He knew that there were two large impediments to dissecting his feelings.
There were still four months left to mourn his Papa and close to two years before Lydia would come out.
He was determined to behave within the bounds of propriety and never have his character questioned, so he buried the feelings.
He was friendly and obliging, but nothing more.
As was befitting to honour their father, until they reached half mourning in a few weeks, Tim and Helen only attended family dinners outside of the home.
Tim Jacobson would be one of the party to travel to Pemberley, and he was looking forward to seeing that estate.
He had been impressed by the Bennet’s three estates in Hertfordshire where the topography was not dissimilar from the area around Janet’s Well.
He loved exploring and was anticipating seeing the snow-covered Peaks, especially now that he knew that some were an easy distance from the Darcy’s estate.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
Lord Pemberley was a worried man. His rather petite wife was increasing at an alarming rate.
Being one who liked to study whatever he could from his books, he had made himself very nervous after reading about a case some ten years ago where the woman had a strange growth in her belly that made her increase rapidly and ultimately both mother and babe perished.
As he did when he was worried, he got tunnel vision and missed all of the other symptoms listed that accompanied that case, which his wife displayed none of.
He was close to calling off the trip back to Pemberley he was so concerned.