Chapter Twenty
I did everything as Lady Catherine dictated.
She told me daily how much more work was needed on my deportment, mannerisms, and general countenance before Lord Salter would consider me a suitable wife, but the month’s deadline he had set was fast wearing out.
I did not have long to find a chance to return to the parsonage and speak to Charlotte again.
I still prayed for a letter from Darcy summoning me home, and spent every night considering writing to him myself.
I began three different attempts, burning each one.
It was impossible to explain myself without revealing far too much for a letter Lady Catherine was sure to read, and even if I could explain myself, I had no guarantee he would come to my aid.
I endured endless sewing practise, dance lessons, and etiquette refinement. The things I would have most enjoyed practising, I already excelled at, and my time at music practise or speaking another language was restricted in favour of the skills I struggled with.
Occasionally I was allowed to sit at the piano, and I revelled in the chance to feel like myself again.
I dutifully played through some popular airs and reels before I let my fingers carry me into Kitty’s sonata, the music wrapping itself around me in a comforting embrace of memory and feeling and promise.
I could imagine Kitty next to me, pressed too close and almost getting in the way but so, so welcome.
“What is that?” Lady Catherine said, her words clipped. “Who is the composer?”
“I am, ma’am,” I admitted, ending the melody abruptly. My fingers rested on the keys, the final notes allowed to play out in their entirety.
“You will play sensible music,” my aunt insisted. “Not nonsense you make up yourself.”
I wanted to protest that it was sensible music, that I had not simply made it up but carefully crafted it to perfectly reflect the person I held most dear, but I knew arguing would get me nowhere.
“Yes, ma’am,” I said, starting a simple piece I knew she would recognise and approve of.
It was slowly killing me to be so obedient.
I had never taken issue with it before, happily doing as my father or my governesses or my brother asked.
They had never had any reason to cut me off from the things I enjoyed or force me through arduous afternoons of things I did not.
I had never truly realised the degree of freedom I had in being able to pursue that which truly interested me.
Lady Catherine’s opinion of me appeared to change little, despite my best attempts to do her bidding.
I expected it likely had something to do with my lack of success in my attempts.
My dancing was still clumsy and my needlework unrefined.
I received just as much derision and disappointment, but, slowly, a level of trust began to settle in.
I was no longer watched for every second of the day, and my aunt could be persuaded to allow me to go for walks in the gardens.
I made sure not to step one foot off the landscaped paths and to return exactly at the time I was instructed.
Eventually, three weeks after the arrival of Kitty’s letter, I pleaded my case.
I stressed that my dancing was suffering due to my lack of stamina and that building up endurance with some strenuous walking would have me showing much improvement in my lessons.
Insisting I was not to be unchaperoned, Lady Catherine allowed me to leave the house with Emma accompanying me.
She seemed just as likely to get lost in the woods, but I didn’t raise the issue.
I was too thrilled at the very prospect of time away from Rosings.
As soon as we started off down the drive, I was practically running.
“Slow down,” Emma said, laughing. “I was not aware I’d agreed to a race.”
I forced myself to slow a little, quashing the impatient urge to drag my feet in protest.
“My apologies,” I said. “It’s just nice to have a little freedom.”
“So where are we heading to in such a hurry? Is there an admirer waiting?” Emma probed, genuine curiosity in her voice.
“Only a friend.”
Charlotte was not expecting me and was likely in the final stages of her pregnancy. She had every right to refuse visitors, especially the visit of someone who was all but a stranger, but I had to try to see her.
I carefully retraced the path I’d taken home last time until it brought me to the parsonage. Against Emma’s best wishes, I couldn’t help the spring in my step that carried me forwards at a quickened pace.
There was an anxious wait as Charlotte’s maid disappeared to enquire whether I was welcome, but soon I was shown into the parlour, where Charlotte was settled on a sofa. Her dress draped loosely over her pregnant stomach, and a blanket covered her knees.
“Forgive me for not standing to greet you,” she said. “Only it takes me far too long to get up and down these days, and I would barely be on my feet before it was time for you to leave.”
I wanted to tell her that was perfectly understandable, to acknowledge that by even being out of bed, she was far excelling the usual activities of most women waiting to be delivered.
Instead, safely out of the oppressive walls of Rosings, however temporarily, I wilted onto the sofa opposite Charlotte.
The tears I had spent three weeks holding back fell in rivers, and my hands shook as I tried to brush them away.
Despite her pregnancy, Charlotte was beside me in seconds.
“What’s wrong?” she asked. “Are you in pain?”
I shook aside my overwrought emotions and helped her to sit beside me.
“I can only offer my apologies,” I said through sniffles. “I should not have come here only to cry all over your upholstery.”
“Better here than at Rosings,” Charlotte said diplomatically. “Our furnishings are far less expensive. Now, tell me, what has happened up there that has chased you here?”
Against my better judgement and without all my faculties securely in place, I told her.
“My aunt intends to marry me to a Lord Salter and is determined to shape me into a suitable wife for him, but I have no desire to be married and I just want to go home. Kitty sent me a letter, and it was the one thing that might have raised my spirits but I just couldn’t let my aunt read it so I had to burn it and now I will never know what it said because I cannot talk to her and I miss her and… ”
I was revealing far too much, but I had bottled it up within me for far too long, and I struggled to restrain even the most sensitive details.
Charlotte took in every word. She held my hand and let me ramble until I stuttered to a stop. It was only once my brain caught up with everything I had been saying that I panicked, my eyes going wide. I held my breath, hoping I had been right in my suspicions.
“I… I don’t… It is not…” I began, but there was no way to take back words already spoken, and trying to correct myself with more rambling would only make things look worse. At least Charlotte didn’t look scandalised. Then she started to talk.
“I married out of necessity. I was risking spinsterhood and could not put the burden on my family to continue supporting me for the rest of my life. There was no fortune set aside for me,” she said, with a very direct look.
“All women have to make a choice. I made mine and now I live with it. It is perhaps better than any realistic alternative, but I will not pretend it to be the life of my dreams.”
She shifted to get comfortable again, but I sensed she wasn’t finished with her advice. Desperate for guiding wisdom, I didn’t say a word.
“You are more lucky than you realise. Your choices are more free than I could ever imagine. Choose wisely. If you have someone you hold dear, don’t let go of her.
You are not the first young woman to be swayed by curls, flushed cheeks, and delicate features,” she said, leaving me little room to misinterpret.
What she was proposing still seemed so impossible. The notion that Kitty was a choice I could make outside the safety of a daydream was overwhelming.
“I… I’m not sure I know how,” I whispered.
Charlotte squeezed my hand tightly.
“Have you ever heard of Lady Eleanor Butler and Miss Sarah Ponsonby?” she asked. “Or perhaps you may know them as the Ladies of Llangollen?”
I sifted through all the information I could recall ever reading, searching for a memory of the names but coming up short. When I shook my head, Charlotte offered me a soft smile.
“Lady Butler and Miss Ponsonby are two women who have made a home together in a cottage outside Llangollen. I am not saying it is common or that it is easy, but it is possible. They live in peace and attract interest from writers, and from the queen herself, but that interest is rarely negative—merely curious. I doubt they can be the only pair who manages to live quite happily that way. All others presumably enjoy more anonymity. Perhaps that kind of life could be something to pursue.”
What Charlotte was describing sounded perfect. Just Kitty and me undisturbed in a cottage. A few more tears tracked down my cheeks, and Charlotte pulled out a neatly folded handkerchief to pat them dry.
“Think very hard about the life you are willing to live, Miss Darcy,” she said.
“If you truly could be happy with things the way your aunt would have them, then by all means, take the trodden path. But if not, please remember you do deserve to be happy. And you might be one of the few people in a position to get what you deserve.”