Chapter 47
A LITTLE PERSPECTIVE
E lizabeth watched with dismay as Darcy stormed out of the room. Her heart sank further still when Lady Catherine sauntered ominously into it and settled herself with exaggerated state in a chair.
“That was quite a display. Had you envisaged that my nephew would be overcome with sentiment for a former housekeeper who used him infamously and then abandoned her post?”
“I merely thought it might please him to discover that her actions were not as disloyal as we believed,” Elizabeth replied tightly.
Lady Catherine shook her head, her lips pursed. “Mrs Reynolds was a servant. Your concern for her is absurd. This is not the way to put my nephew’s interests first—this is the way to inconvenience and embarrass him.”
“That is your ladyship’s opinion. It is my opinion that this will give him comfort. I know he was distressed by what appeared to be Mrs Reynolds’s treachery.”
“Insolence in one’s inferiors is always distressing. It should not be mistaken for apprehension about her future living arrangements. She is nothing to him. I may have praised your compassion, but you must be careful not to confuse liberality with radicalism.”
Elizabeth gave an incredulous laugh. “I am not trying to incite a revolution, madam. Only to recognise a very real attachment between two thinking, feeling people.”
“That is precisely the sort of connexion that the mistress of a great house is expected to discourage! Pray cease embroiling my nephew in matters so far beneath him and concentrate your efforts on properly supporting him.”
Elizabeth ought to have known better than to engage Lady Catherine on the subject.
Her pique was up, however, and she was not ready to recede fully.
“I shall. And since you promised your nephew that you would do the same, I hope I may prevail upon you to help. I mean to locate the documents Mrs Reynolds has mentioned, and since one of the places that she suggested I look is Lady Anne’s writing desk, it makes sense that your ladyship should accompany me.
You will comprehend better than anyone what your sister has written, and which parts of it pertain to the estate. ”
She had not truly expected the application to succeed, thus she was not a little surprised to find herself in the Chesterfield room a short while later with Lady Catherine, rifling through the forgotten paperwork of Darcy’s late mother.
They were not at it for long before both agreed there was nothing of use to be found.
Neither was there anything helpful in the two crates Elizabeth asked James to bring up from the Derwent room that Mrs Reynolds had identified.
“Your Mrs Reynolds has not been as useful as you pleaded after all,” her ladyship said with a note of triumph. “The presumption of thinking she knows this house better than Darcy!”
“She was only trying to help.”
“I cannot understand why you are so intent on defending her when you are fully aware of how abominably she used Darcy.”
Elizabeth gripped the top edge of the crate, her forbearance worn paper-thin. “Pray, were her attempts to ‘save Pemberley’s shades from my pollution’ any less abominable than your ladyship’s? If Darcy and I can forgive you, why should not we forgive her?”
Lady Catherine puffed up with affront. “Because I am Darcy’s aunt, and she is a housekeeper. And you, Mrs Darcy, are at serious risk of destroying the accord we have reached with this preposterous fascination.”
“I am not ‘fascinated’ with Mrs Reynolds, but I am vastly grateful to her. Other than my husband, nobody has done so much to help me make a success of becoming mistress of this house. And my gratitude does not stop there. Whatever your ladyship may think of my youngest sister, and whatever I may think of her husband, their marriage was arranged for the best. Mrs Reynolds saved my sister from ruin at the hands of a man who was brought up on this estate by this family. Had not she acted as she did, I and all my sisters would have shared in Lydia’s disgrace.
I do not know how I am expected to turn a blind eye to such a reprieve.
“And it bears mentioning that, unlike others , who attempted to interfere in Darcy’s business in a way that would ensure he never discovered it, Mrs Reynolds told him what she had done.
Even though it meant leaving the only home she had known for most of her adult life.
It is the reason that Darcy and I were reunited, and there are no words strong enough to convey my gratitude for that. ”
Lady Catherine’s lips were thinned almost to extinction with displeasure.
“For somebody who professes to like advice so well, it is a wonder that you will not take this from me. You must preserve the distinction of rank to have a hope of success. I urge you to keep some perspective. Mrs Reynolds was a servant .”
“Yes! The servant who nursed your ladyship’s dying sister on her deathbed!”
Elizabeth instantly regretted her outburst when it drained the colour from Lady Catherine’s countenance.
With a sigh, she dragged the chair from the writing desk and sat in front of her.
“Her correspondence with my aunt shows that Mrs Reynolds cared for Lady Anne through all her miscarriages, through her daughter’s birth, and through her final days.
And afterwards, it seems that she wrapped this whole house in cotton wool, doing everything she could from afar to look after Darcy, his father, his sister—and now me. ”
“And Pemberley, too, it would seem.”
They both started at the interruption. Elizabeth knew not how long Darcy and his cousin had been stood in the doorway, or how much they had overheard, but she was vastly relieved to see that he no longer seemed angry. On the contrary, he looked happier than he had in some time.
“What is your meaning?” his aunt enquired, reverting to cold austerity.
Darcy came farther into the room, followed by Colonel Fitzwilliam, who began lifting the crates off the table.
“I sent someone to fetch the drawing from Mrs Wickham’s cottage.
” The table cleared, Darcy unrolled a sheet of paper onto it, pinning it open with books and pointing at what he had unveiled.
“This used to hang on the wall in my father’s study.
I remember it being there, though I never looked at it closely, and I certainly never noticed it was gone. ”
“What is it?” Lady Catherine asked impatiently.
“One of the original design proposals for Pemberley, dated 1660—five years before this house was built, and drawn by a different architect. It shows a house in the same spot, but with only two wings. And this—” he moved his finger, “—shows the mine.”
“We were not sure at first,” the colonel said. “It could easily be mistaken for a feature of the landscape if one did not know what was underground, but Darcy’s steward agrees that it aligns with what we know is there.”
“So, they knew about it?” Elizabeth asked. “Why, then, did they build over it?”
Darcy shrugged—an uncharacteristically carefree gesture that matched his buoyant mood. “This architect may have resigned before telling anyone what the lines represented. Or been dismissed. Or died. Or been kidnapped.”
“Or your ancestor ran roughshod over his advice not to build there. It is scarcely unheard of for a Darcy to like to have his own way,” the colonel interjected, grinning almost as widely as his cousin.
Their joint ebullience was extraordinary—and infectious.
Elizabeth found herself smiling with them.
“Or they gambled that the rock was sufficiently sound foundation regardless,” Darcy went on. “Which technically it was, for the house stood for almost a century and a half before a blocked culvert upped the ante.”
Fitzwilliam agreed. “Particularly if they knew this was where the mine ended.”
“Did they know that?” Lady Catherine enquired.
“It seems so. The entrance is not shown—the mine heads off the page in an easterly direction,” the colonel replied, wiggling his finger over the plan in vaguely the right place.
Darcy took up the explanation, jabbing at the page triumphantly. “But this clearly shows the passage ending here, before what is the central part of the existing house.”
Elizabeth looked up at him in surprise. “So, the rest of Pemberley is safe?”
He nodded and then laughed slightly, as though he could not contain his relief. “It is the most hopeful indication to that end that we have found so far. And I am more than ready to believe it.”
She gave a little cry of happiness and flung her arms around him, heedless of the apoplexy it was sure to give Lady Catherine. “I am so happy for you!”
Her ladyship made a noise of disgust, and Elizabeth laughed quietly into Darcy’s shoulder before relinquishing her hold on him. He was less eager to relinquish his on her, she noticed, which pleased her very well.
“Come, madam, this news is worthy of celebration, surely?” Colonel Fitzwilliam said soothingly to his aunt.
“Perhaps, but I have been treated to a glut of Mrs Darcy’s excess of feeling already this morning.
I have no desire to witness any more.” She hauled herself to her feet and turned to Darcy.
“I am delighted for you, of course, but you must excuse me. My head is aching.” She narrowed her eyes at Elizabeth for a moment, before adding, “I daresay you will do well enough, Mrs Darcy. Only pray do less of it near me.”
It was as close to a joke as Elizabeth had ever heard the woman come, and she liked her better for it, despite how clearly it vexed her husband.
The colonel rose to escort his aunt out of the room, giving Elizabeth a wink as he went.
As soon as they were gone, Elizabeth returned to embracing Darcy. “This is the most wonderful news!”
She shrieked when he lifted her off her feet and spun her around. “Not quite the best news I have had all year, but as near as blazes.”
“What was the best news?”