Chapter 30
In what was a surprising turn, though perhaps it should not have been, Bingley and Jane announced they would like to wed as soon as possible, right there in Margate.
He said he did not care if his family or friends were there, as long as he was married at the end of it.
He could invite a friend in London to stand up with him and preferred his sisters not attend.
Jane agreed. They had spent enough time waiting and thinking about each other; she was ready to begin their life together.
She would have liked Lizzy to be there with her, but she knew her sister was in the middle of her wedding tour and very far away.
It would take her a week to get to Margate, only to return north after a few days.
Not wanting to subject her sister to such rigors, she sent a letter asking if Elizabeth would mind terribly if she married without her, and she and Bingley would visit Pemberley after their tour.
Mr. and Mrs. Bennet had no choice but to agree with the young couple.
Mrs. Bennet bemoaned ever being able to decorate the chapel at Longbourn and have all her Meryton friends see one of her daughters wed.
She was resigned to it soon enough, though, when Lydia blithely suggested it was much less likely Mr. Bingley would disappear again if they married quickly.
After that, Mrs. Bennet threw herself into planning a simple but beautiful wedding, and Mr. Bennet was pleased to save the cost of a lavish affair.
He only wanted to see his very worthy daughter well settled.
The same dressmaker that made Elizabeth’s wedding gown was commissioned to make Jane’s, and Mary was to stand up with her.
The friends they made in Margate were all invited and the Gardiners would come for the week of the wedding.
The new couple would leave immediately after for Brighton.
Bingley had let a house there for the remainder of the summer.
All was put together rather quickly and before anyone really knew what had happened, Jane Bennet was Jane Bingley, waving to her family from the coach as they pulled away from their small but elegant breakfast.
“Fitzwilliam!” Elizabeth called as she rushed into his dressing room.
“Yes?” he replied, amused at her entrance and at his valet’s quick exit.
“You will never believe what Jane is doing!”
“I thought she was marrying my friend Bingley. Is that not the case?” he asked sardonically.
“Ha ha. You may think you are funny now, Mr. Darcy, but I know something you don’t know,” she said in a sing-song voice.
“How do you know I don’t know it? It’s likely I have a letter from Bingley waiting for me as we speak.”
“Fine. If you’re so sure you have no need of my information, I shall leave so you may finish preparing.”
He smiled at her as she flounced out of the room.
Once he was finished dressing, he looked in his room for a letter but saw nothing on the table where a letter would usually be found.
He then checked the salver near the door and nothing was there but a packet on its way to Georgiana.
He asked a footman if there had been a letter for him that day and the man said there had not been, but that Mrs. Darcy had received three.
Gritting his teeth, Darcy turned and found his wife in the sitting room, seated by the window and reading a letter with a look of pure happiness on her face.
He sat down and watched her, saying nothing for several minutes.
She bit her lip and laughed out loud and gasped more than once at what she was reading. Finally, he could take it no longer.
“Any news?”
“Hmm? Oh! Just something with my family. I’m sure it wouldn’t interest you,” she said simply.
He caught her lip twitching but was impressed by her ability to keep up her little game this long. Usually she could hold nothing in when she was excited.
“That’s all right. I should come to know your family better. What says your father?”
“They are planning to return to Longbourn in early September. Mother wants him to stop in London for a week and he is trying to find a way to avoid it.”
Darcy smiled. “Has he been successful?”
“Not yet.” She gave him a look he’d seen often before. Half sympathy, half mischief. Lord, she is delightful!
“Tell your father they may stay at Darcy House if they wish. It would be tight at the Gardiners,” he said.
Her head snapped up. “That is very generous of you. Are you sure you wish to do that?”
“Of course. I shall write to your father if you prefer.”
“No, that won’t be necessary. I can take care of it. Thank you,” she said sincerely.
He nodded in response. He had won; his wife was no longer teasing him. He waited, wondering how long it would take for her to tell him the news.
“Jane and Bingley have decided to marry in Margate, in three weeks,” she said. “Two weeks now. Can you believe it?” Her eyes went back to her letter.
“Are you sad to be missing the wedding?” he asked.
“A little. I had always thought I would stand up with Jane. But she stood up with me, something I never thought would happen, so I suppose it is all right in the end.” She shrugged her shoulders.
“They wish to visit Pemberley in the autumn and then go on to Scarborough for Jane to meet his family. They will return when my family arrives for Christmas.”
“That sounds wonderful. We will see more of them on a visit than if we were to go to the wedding.”
Elizabeth nodded. “Are you sorry to miss it? He is your closest friend.”
“Yes and no. It would be nice to be there, but not nice enough to forego my own wedding trip.”
He smiled in the way that always made her stomach flip and she blushed.
“Why did you think Jane would not stand up with you? I know it is usual for it to be a maiden, but married women sometimes perform the office. And she would not necessarily marry first just because she was the eldest,” he asked.
Elizabeth chuckled. “It is Jane, Fitzwilliam. She is the sweetest, most beautiful creature in the world. Why would I ever think I would marry before her? Or marry at all?”
“And yet you did.” He shot her a meaningful look and she looked away. “Why did you think you wouldn’t marry at all?”
“I simply didn’t think it very likely. I am not as sweet or as pretty as Jane, I have very little money and few connections, and I am not nearly docile enough for most men.”
He rose and walked toward her. “Good thing I am not most men,” he growled as he slipped onto the settee next to her.
She laughed. “You should never be given a docile creature. You would eat her alive in minutes!”
By this point he was nibbling at her neck and his hand was wandering dangerously high on her thigh.
“I was of the opinion some women liked being eaten alive,” he murmured before he nipped her ear.
She gasped and smacked his shoulder lightly. “Fitzwilliam Darcy! How could you say such a thing to a lady?” She tried to look indignant, but it was difficult when her eyes were filled with mirth and her shoulders were shaking with suppressed laughter.
“When the lady is my wife, I believe the rules differ,” he said huskily before rising and throwing her over his shoulder, causing her to shriek loudly.
“Put me down, you brute!” she cried as forcefully as she could while laughing uncontrollably.
“Never!”
The servants in the house looked the other way when a laughing mistress thrown over the shoulder of a running Mr. Darcy rushed into the master suite and slammed the door behind them.