Epilogue Chapter 1
Nursery
Pemberley
Morning
Elizabeth Darcy stared out the window of the east room in the nursery, which faced the rose garden.
The window had been opened to admit a whisper of warm breeze, the heady scent of the roses, and hopefully no adventurous bees.
It was a sea of color at this time of year, white and red and yellow and pink blooms almost obscuring the green or rusty purple of the leaves.
A bevy of gardeners spent time year round maintaining the delicate plants, honoring the memory of the departed Lady Anne, who had so loved the garden she had designed.
Elizabeth could only admire the taste of the mother-in-law whom she had never had a chance to meet.
The garden was always putting on a show as soon as the weather began to warm, the varieties carefully selected and cultivated to bloom starting in spring and not dying back until late autumn.
A constant, delicate perfume sweetened the air.
White gravel paths wended meandering ways through the vine-covered trellises, ornate benches were tucked pensively into shaded arbors, and every so often, decorative fountains provided needed water.
The cherub pouring from a pitcher into a large round basin was visible from the nursery window.
Though Elizabeth would never tire of looking at the blooms, something far more important easily claimed her attention these days.
A quiet grunt drew her eye, and she looked down at the tiny, precious bundle in her arms. Nicholas Darcy, three months old, bald as an egg, although much cuter, and the heir of Pemberley, was currently nursing enthusiastically.
He was wrapped in an exquisitely soft blanket, and he clutched the edge of it in both small fists, his eyes fluttering halfway between sleeping and waking.
Elizabeth smiled down at her tiny son. He was a happy, contented, and easy baby, universally pleased with the world.
Even more importantly, he was hale and hearty and healthy, and he was growing rapidly.
He was already nearly twice the size of the shriveled, reddened infant that had been placed in her arms some few months previously.
The door opened, and she turned toward it and smiled as her husband entered the room.
“How are you, my love?” he asked and leaned over to kiss her on the head.
“I am well, and you?” she replied as he straightened and then sat down on the padded chair across from her.
“Very well. I visited the Astleys this morning. Their new cottage is nearing completion.”
Elizabeth blew out a relieved breath. “I am grateful that the builders are working so quickly and that the weather has been reasonably dry. It is hard for the Astleys to be living with their Simpson relations, but at least the weather is warm so they can spend the majority of the day outside. Their new cottage will be ready by the time the nights grow cold.”
“Yes, and since we are using slate for the roof instead of wood shingles, I hope there will not be another fire.”
Elizabeth nodded and said, “I am thankful that the family escaped the fire unharmed.”
A soft snore interrupted their conversation, and husband and wife turned adoring looks on their infant, who had fallen asleep, his eyes firmly screwed shut.
“Did he eat enough?” Darcy asked, and Elizabeth said, “Yes, would you care to place him in his cradle?”
Darcy’s large hands reached out to carefully gather up his son and heir, and Elizabeth watched fondly as the great master of Pemberley gently carried the baby into the next room, where his crib and loyal nurse awaited.
She was intensely grateful for her husband, who loved her and her child dearly, while also overseeing his vast estate.
Of course, she too, as the mistress of Pemberley, had numerous responsibilities in overseeing the servants and the tenant families.
They both took their duties very seriously, but nonetheless they made certain to spend time together almost every day, whether in the library or Darcy’s study.
On those days when their obligations kept them apart from dawn until dusk, they at least spent time in one another’s arms at night.
She knew it was unusual for couples to sleep in the same bed every night, but she would not have it any other way, and neither would Darcy, even when his sleep was interrupted by his wife rising to nurse their enthusiastic babe.
How very blessed they were.
***
Whaling Ship Amelia
Off the Coast of Greenland
“Up you go, Wickham!” the captain ordered, and George Wickham obediently scampered up the mast and made his way to the crow’s nest.
Billings was waiting for him there and handed over a pair of binoculars before descending to the deck far below.
Wickham sat down on the small bench attached to the crow’s nest, reached into the pocket of his waterproofed jacket, pulled out a biscuit, and shoved it into his mouth.
After chewing and swallowing, he enjoyed a nip of brandy from his hip flask before turning his attention to his duties, namely the search for whales.
His eyes were sharp, and he had sighted a number of whales during his service on the Amelia.
Moreover, it was, while a trifle cold, pleasant to be up in the nest alone.
The Amelia was always crowded, with various crewmen running hither and yon.
Wickham slept in a hammock in a small cabin with four other men, all of whom were odiferous.
Well, he was odiferous too; there was no denying it. It was quite impossible to stay clean on a whaling boat.
His mind drifted back to the previous year and to the fateful day which had seen such a change in his fortunes.
Mrs. Younge's hissed warning had sent him fleeing in precipitate haste, deep into the seediest parts of London's underbelly, into filth and vermin that had made him shudder.
Yet what was behind him was even worse. It had been shocking that Darcy had hit him in the Black Stork in Lambton, but he knew that Georgiana's other guardian was far more violent.
Colonel Richard Fitzwilliam would have had no compunction about burying a bayonet in Wickham's belly or, scarcely less terrifying, packing him straight off to Marshalsea.
Campaigns on the Continent had destroyed whatever fastidiousness had been instilled in Fitzwilliam by either nature or nurture, and for three days Wickham had clung to noisome shadows and the pits of human misery in London's darkest slums, terrified and looking over his shoulder lest Fitzwilliam pursue him even there.
By the end of those three ghastly and miserable days, his nerves had been shot and his resolution had grown to flee England’s shores.
Better to remove himself from English society than to face the wrath and whim of Darcy's martial cousin.
Wickham had slunk down to the docks and approached the first ship he saw, the Amelia, her decks busy with crew and hands as she readied to depart.
He had no funds to purchase passage, so he had asked to join her crew, confident that among so many men his indolence would pass unnoticed.
It had not taken him a full day at sea to realize the catastrophic depths of his mistake.
No laziness was tolerated aboard Captain Williams's ship, and Wickham, far from passing unnoticed, had been signed aboard to take the place of two men who were, by various means, no longer among the crew.
The expectation of significant work had been bad enough, but even worse, Wickham had not been at all certain that he would live to fulfill it.
He was one of those unfortunates whom the tossing of the seas rendered miserably ill, and he had scarcely been able to drag himself from his hammock every morning to go topside and slouch through his duties.
Eventually, however, the illness had passed, and Wickham had gotten his sea legs under himself.
He had taken to his duties with a new strength, if no real enthusiasm.
Two weeks out, and he had grudgingly begun to accept his new life when yet another peril had made itself violently known.
The North Sea, cold and heaving, produced raging storms unlike anything Wickham had ever experienced or dreamed.
He had clung, terrified, to the lifelines, scrambling on shaking legs to carry out the captain’s and first mate’s orders screamed above the storm.
Massive waves had crashed over the deck, sweeping away anything not battened tightly down, water more powerful than anything Wickham had ever imagined tugging at his legs and a gale bearing down on him with all the power of a runaway horse, driving him towards the rail.
He had all but wept with gratitude when at last the storm had blown itself out and the majority of the crew had stumbled below for a few hours of rest. Exhausted and freezing and soaked right down to his bones, Wickham had devoutly hoped never to encounter such a storm again.
It had not taken him long to learn that such storms were a staple of the North Sea.
The next one had been just as terrifying as the first, the one after scarcely less so, but time after time, he had learned to fight alongside the other sailors to bring the Amelia safely through.
His blood never stopped singing in his ears, his heart never stopped pounding, but eventually his legs stopped shaking, and his hands turned quick and steady even as the wind howled and screamed and the waves rose taller than the houses of London.
Then there were the whales. Wickham had never so much as wrung the neck of a chicken, and he was entirely unprepared for the hunt itself; the fight, the flight with the tiny whaling-boats skipping along behind the enormous marine beasts at breakneck speeds, the blood, the massive carcass, the slick oil.
The first one had been a bad shock, but being bawled out by the first mate was thoroughly unpleasant, and after that he had heaved to with a will.