Chapter Five #2
Elizabeth could not fault Caroline for wishing to take her outer garments off before falling into bed, but the other woman was far too drunk to realize that she must not do this in front of Mr. Darcy, who immediately excused himself.
Elizabeth rang for Caroline’s maid, waited until the woman appeared, and then went into the hallway. She expected Mr. Darcy to have gone elsewhere, but he was lingering, pacing in the hall outside Caroline’s room.
“Oh,” she said, “you are still here.”
“I have things I would like to relay to you,” he said. “I was musing over ways to get you alone. I confess I did not think of the idea of taking a drunken Miss Bingley to her bed.”
Elizabeth laughed softly. “Oh, dear, it is alarming how much she indulged. Honestly, this can’t go on, can it? This much drinking, this many lawn games, all day and all night? People will grow weary, will they not?”
“Oh, yes, quite soon, I imagine. Soon half of the guests will likely leave, and we shall find ourselves spending the afternoons in boredom for a week, at least. Then there will be some renewed sense of excitement and someone will have some mad idea, maybe that we should all put on a play or something, and this will be all the rage for two weeks until everyone grows tired of it.”
She raised her eyebrows. “You have been to these sorts of things before.”
“Indeed,” he said. “Is there not some ball at the duke’s home, at some point? That will provide a necessary diversion.”
“Yes,” she said. “So, it is always this way? I sort of thought that being admitted into the circles that I wasn’t usually invited into would be different, that these sorts of people would be more proper and more, erm, staid.”
“No, I think not. As a general rule, it seems to me that the more wealth one has, the more likely one is to indulge overmuch in drink and revelry, and the less wealth one has, the more likely one is to work.”
“Yes,” she said, nodding.
“Of course, we are always looking down upon the working classes and thinking of them as quite wont to wish to indulge, which may be true. I rather imagine everyone wishes to indulge—”
“Not you,” she said. “I wager you’ve not had a drop of anything strong to drink today.”
“Very strong tea,” he said.
She chuckled. “Yes, only tea. That is Mr. Darcy.” She felt a strange wave of affection flood her, and she could not say why this was.
It is not because he admitted that he found me pretty last night! she insisted to herself.
It couldn’t be, but she found that she warmed to this man chiefly when he seemed human in some way.
His indulging in some kind of pleasure, for instance, thinking a woman pretty, having strong tea.
His making mistakes or having foibles. It was these things, these hidden things, that made him seem approachable, after all.
He was embarrassed. “I do drink liquor, you know.”
“Yes, of course,” she said, smiling at him. “Well, should we stand about here in the hallway outside of Miss Bingley’s room?”
“Let us go to the library,” he said.
“The library,” she said.
“No one will be there. If questioned, we shall both say we arrived there independently of the other, and all will be taken to be innocent. We should have enough privacy there to speak, however.”
“The library,” she said, nodding. “Yes, that’s quite good. And it is just down these stairs here, if I remember correctly.”
The library in Barralds was a thing of splendor, very large, with shelves that reached so high that one needed to use a ladder to reach the books on the top shelves, and these ladders were attached to the shelves, rolling on wheels in grooves, through the room.
There were a number of shelves in the midst of the room, too, all full of books.
Elizabeth had come here more than once during her short sojourn.
It might be her favorite room in the house.
They walked together through the shelves, and Mr. Darcy began to tell her that he had ridden all the way to speak to Larilane that morning, and he recounted to her everything that Larilane had said, and she listened in rapt astonishment, even letting out gasps here and there, especially when Mr. Darcy filled in the bits about the late duke’s delight in cruelty.
Once he was done, it was her turn to relate everything it was that she had discovered that morning from the current Duke of Neithern, including his age, and the madness of his father, and the way he’d been locked away.
They turned this way and that, walking together through the library, talking in low voices.
“There was never another duchess!” said Darcy to her.
“I am coming to this same conclusion, sir,” she said. “But I don’t understand it, I must say, because I cannot think what it could mean.”
“Well,” said Darcy, “we do not know how long it was your mother was married to the duke. Maybe it was long enough for her to have given birth to the current duke, and then she escaped with you in her belly.”
“I don’t think so,” she said.
“No, the age doesn’t work,” said Darcy. “But that can mean only two things.”
“Oh?”
“Well, yes, either you and the duke are twins—
“Oh, dear, yes, it could be that!” said Elizabeth, hand to her chest.
“No, but that makes little sense,” said Darcy. “Why would she hide you away and let her son be raised as the duke?”
“She thought to protect me, I suppose,” said Elizabeth. “But that doesn’t make sense to me, really, because if she knew he was locked away, then why wouldn’t she take residence there as the duchess and raise me herself, or if there were two of us, raise both of us?”
“Yes, precisely,” said Mr. Darcy. “She would wish to protect both of her children, it seems.”
“There’s more to it, because she had no reason to wish us protected if he was locked away.”
“That may not be true,” said Mr. Darcy, thinking that over. “And anyway, there is the fact that Larilane did things he thinks will endanger him, and I don’t know what they are.”
“You said, just now, it could mean one of two things.”
“Oh, yes, that your mother made it all up, and you were never the child of the duke, but always the child of Larilane.”
Elizabeth blinked. “Well, then where would the current duke have come from?”
“Some other woman,” said Mr. Darcy. “Perhaps your mother even met her somehow, got her story, and pretended it was her story. She could have used it to deceive Larilane.”
“No,” said Elizabeth, “because Larilane would not be my father, then.”
Mr. Darcy thought this over. “Perhaps he is not.”
“But then, who is my father, if not the duke? We still don’t know?”
“Think about it, Elizabeth, she wrote those letters to Larilane, angry that he had spoken to the duke, but she knew she was lying about the duke being the child’s father, so she didn’t wish to be found out!
And then Larilane, entangled in her lies, did things he was ashamed of.
And it makes sense why he left her when he found out. ”
Elizabeth furrowed her brow, trying to make sense of everything he had said. Maybe it made sense, but it seemed a bit complicated to her.
“I know, you do not wish your father’s identity to be unknown,” said Mr. Darcy.
“Well,” said Elizabeth, “there is the fact that I was thinking that I don’t look much like the current duke. If he were not actually my half-brother, then I wouldn’t look like him. And if we were truly twins, surely I would look like him, would I not?”
“One would think,” he said.
“On the other hand,” said Elizabeth, “the duke waved away the idea that he resembles Mr. Houseman as some coincidence that means nothing. So perhaps I’m overthinking the idea of familial resemblance.”
“They do look alike,” said Mr. Darcy, rubbing his forehead.
“Well, what if they are related somehow?” said Elizabeth.
“How many concealed children could the late duke have?” said Mr. Darcy, shaking his head.
“Maybe he did it more than once,” said Elizabeth. “Eloping with women in secret, I mean.”
“Hmm,” said Mr. Darcy. “It does seem like the sort of thing a man like that would do.”
“Doesn’t it? He would ‘marry’ any number of women, keep them and use them, get children on them…”
“And Houseman knows,” said Darcy. “He knows that he’s the son of the duke.”
“Yes, and that’s why he built this house right here, that’s why he is trying to thrust himself into the society of the Neithern house. It all makes sense.”
“It rather does,” said Darcy, thinking it over.
She thought it over, too.
“Yes, but it doesn’t explain everything,” said Mr. Darcy. “It doesn’t explain why your mother broke with Larilane.”
“Nor why the duke was suddenly locked up,” said Elizabeth. “If he was at it for long enough to get that many children, why did his family wait so long?”
“Maybe they didn’t know about it until Larilane went to them and told them of your existence.”
“Maybe,” said Elizabeth.
“Of course, it seems likely, if they knew of your existence, they would have done something for you,” said Mr. Darcy. “Maybe not a great deal of money, but something to buy your silence, to buy your mother’s silence.”
“Oh, yes, perhaps,” said Elizabeth, thoughtful. “Perhaps, yes.”
They both regarded each other, confusion writ plainly on their countenances. Then they continued to walk through the stacks of books.
“Well, we need to find out more,” said Mr. Darcy.
“I think we must speak to Houseman,” said Elizabeth.
Darcy nodded. “Aye, that seems a good idea.”
“Perhaps I can speak to the duke again,” said Elizabeth. “Do you think I should conceal what I know of myself, however? We are not sure if I even am his sister.”
“He was open with you about his father. I think you can trust him to be discreet. Besides, this would be something he would wish to conceal about his family as well.”
“Yes, but he might think I am seeking something from him, money or the like, and I am not,” said Elizabeth. “I told him that I do not feel… financially secure, I suppose.”
Mr. Darcy shifted on his feet. “This is my own fault, I think.”
“What?” She gave him a strange look. “How could it be your fault, sir?” The way this man lay blame on himself was something to behold, truly. “I know! Yesterday it rained, and this, too, was your fault.”
He gave her a beleaguered look at her teasing.
She shrugged, smiling at him.
He shook his head. “I was angry with Richard. He was hesitant to marry you, saying he didn’t have the money to keep you, and I said it was his problem, but I could have helped, and I should help, should help you both.
It is only that he…” Mr. Darcy’s nostrils flared.
“He is so impulsive, and he—apologies, I know you are in love with him, and I know we agreed last night that I must not speak disparagingly of him.”
“We did agree that,” she said, and she knew it was right, because she should be in love with her husband. “I am in love with him, of course.”
“Yes, that’s not even a question,” he said.
“It has always been him. You have responded to him since the beginning. You were never happy to see me, for instance, but you were always happy to see him. There was a point in time in which I did not realize this, however, not seeing that it was him you favored, not understanding—”
“Well, I never thought I could actually marry him!” she said. “It is not as if I hated you, Mr. Darcy.”
He scoffed. “Is it not?”
She licked her lips. “All right, perhaps I disliked you. But, no, never hate.”
“You didn’t even read that letter I left for you, did you?” he said, shaking his head. “You weren’t even interested in hearing me defend myself.”
“The letter!” She put a hand to her chest. “Oh, I had forgotten about that. You know, I did want to read it, but I forgot I had put it in your jacket when I gave it back. I was going to read it, but after all of that… with Mr. Wickham… the awfulness of it… I was not in the frame of mind for it, I suppose.”
“Oh,” he said, looking her over. “It was not intentionally done?”
“No,” she said. “Mr. Darcy, I have to say this. I have said it a number of times, and you have never given me a satisfactory answer, so I don’t know why I say it.” She shook her head. “No, never mind.”
“You cannot say ‘never mind,’ Miss Bennet—Mrs. Fitzwilliam.”
“Call me Elizabeth.”
His lips parted.
“It’s… amiable,” she said with a shrug.
He looked at his feet.
“We are family now,” she said.
He let out a breath. “Yes, you are his wife.” He said this to his feet firmly, “You really cannot say ‘never mind.’ You must come out with it.”
“Oh, fine,” she said. “Why?”
“Why? What do you mean by that?”
“I seem to cause you nothing but pain, Mr. Darcy. Why do you persist in doing things for me, helping me, looking into the secrets of my past, all of that? Why?”
“Oh, God, Elizabeth, you know the answer to that, and I shan’t say it aloud.”
“Well, if I am not allowed to say ‘never mind,’ then you are not allowed to dodge the answer!”
“You know it.”
“I do not.”
“I am in love with you,” he whispered.
“But you cannot be, because it only brings you pain,” she said. Then she licked her lips. “Well, perhaps that is the way of love in the end, though, isn’t it? My love for Richard, it has only brought me…”
“Pain?” he whispered.
“Not only pain,” she amended. “But a great deal of it, and only a little pleasure.”
Darcy let out a sharp wheeze of a breath.
“Shouldn’t have said that,” she realized.
“No,” he agreed. “I don’t think you should have.”