38. Completion
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
COMPLETION
Thomas perched triumphantly astride Darcy’s shoulders, his legs kicking with wild abandon. “Faster, Da!”
From beneath the shade of an ancient oak, Elizabeth watched her husband carry their son across the rolling lawn toward Lady Anne’s pavilion.
Baskets and blankets were arranged upon a gentle slope overlooking the Pemberley lake, creating an idyllic scene that stirred something warm and enduring within her heart.
“I am the tallest, Lizba! Look! Higher than the trees!” Thomas called down to her, bouncing enthusiastically upon his father’s shoulders.
“Not quite taller than the trees, my spirited champion,” Darcy replied with a wince. “But certainly taller than Harley, our long-eared friend who supervises most affairs of state from his blanket.”
The basset hound in question lifted his mournful head, decided the conversation did not concern him, and promptly returned to his important duties of overseeing the unpacking of hampers.
Elizabeth watched as Darcy set their son down, her smile lingering on the small, perfect details: the careful brushing of grass from a tiny coat, Thomas’s immediate dash toward Hannah, who appeared with a moss-lined basket and the entire snail dynasty in tow.
Georgiana and Prue had already settled on a blanket beneath the great oak, giggling and sharing whatever confidences young ladies shared when they believed themselves unobserved.
“Elizabeth!” Georgiana beckoned. “Come join us! Prue has brought the most fascinating manuscript—she is writing a novel, did you know? About a governess who inherits a castle!”
“A very small castle,” Prue amended. “More of a fortified manor, really, and she does not precisely inherit it—there is a mystery involving a forged will and a secret passage and a gentleman who may or may not be the villain, depending on how the next chapter unfolds.”
“It sounds wonderfully Gothic,” Elizabeth settled beside them. “I trust the governess triumphs in the end and the villain receives his just desserts?”
“I am still working out the particulars,” Prue confessed, warming to her subject with growing animation.
“The gentleman keeps refusing to be properly villainous, you see—every time I try to make him do something dreadful, he insists on being complicated instead, and I find myself rather sympathizing with him despite my better judgment.”
“Such is the way of gentlemen, villainous or otherwise,” Elizabeth agreed, and her eyes found Darcy across the lawn, where he had joined Thomas in the serious business of snail supervision. “They are remarkably resistant to simple villainy, particularly when one has grown rather fond of them.”
“Oh!” Georgiana exclaimed, hurriedly producing a letter from her reticule. “I had quite forgotten, but Jamison brought a letter from Longbourn—for you. From your mother, I believe.”
“Mrs. Bennet?” Elizabeth’s heart gave a little leap. Her mother rarely put pen to paper, preferring to dictate any admonitions to Jane for transcription. What could occasion this uncommon correspondence?
She broke the seal and recognized her mother’s hand immediately—the dramatic flourishes, the excessive underlining, and the profusion of exclamation marks. “Why, my sister Jane is to marry the Viscount, Edward Apethorpe. How incredible.”
“A Viscount!” Georgiana clasped her hands together, her eyes widening. “You must be delighted. How did this transpire?”
“Apparently, he had gone to Longbourn discreetly, making inquiries—possibly about me. He is Thomas’s uncle, you know, and instead of gathering answers, he was entirely overcome by Jane—at first sight. They are to be married at Michaelmas, and we are all invited for the wedding.”
“How perfectly romantic,” Prue sighed. “Your sister will be a countess someday.”
Elizabeth laughed. “Mamma is beside herself with triumph.”
“She will be insufferable for months,” Georgiana said cheerfully. “In the very best way, naturally.”
“In the only way Mamma knows how to be insufferable—thoroughly and without apology.” Elizabeth laughed, shaking her head in wonderment just as Darcy appeared at her elbow, Thomas trotting beside him with a dish of lettuce upon which Sidney and his relations were scrutinizing with their mouths and eye stalks.
“You are smiling,” Darcy observed, settling onto the blanket beside her. “More than usual, I mean. What has occurred to brighten your countenance so beautifully?”
“My sister Jane is to be married to Viscount Drake. Thomas’s uncle, as it happens. He came to Longbourn making inquiries and came away engaged instead.”
“Ah.” Something softened in Darcy’s expression. “Then our families are to be doubly connected. Little Tom,” he addressed his son. “Your uncle Edward is marrying your Aunt Jane.”
“And she shall be called Lady Jane,” Georgiana added. “She shall be a countess someday.”
Thomas looked up, a leaf of lettuce clutched in one fist. “Will she have snail?”
“I do not believe countesses typically keep snails,” Darcy said.
“Then I give mine.” Thomas returned to Sidney’s family, all crawling on top of each other as if pondering which of Sidney’s offspring to spare.
Servants poured from the house to replenish the hampers, Hannah in the lead while Jamison followed with a parasol.
“Hannah seems quite recovered from her unfortunate encounter with the rose bushes last week,” Georgiana observed. “Though I cannot help but notice that Jamison has appointed himself her personal guardian and protector, hovering about her as if he fears she might stumble at any moment.”
“Perhaps he is merely concerned for her safety,” Elizabeth said. “Hannah does have a tendency to stumble as her feet cannot quite keep up with her tongue.”
“Or…” Georgiana’s smile suggested she suspected something more than footwork was involved.
And then, Harley proved her point admirably.
With a lunge that seemed impossible for a dog so low to the ground—with ears that flapped over his eyes, and short, bowed legs—Harley launched himself at the platter Hannah was carrying.
His leap caused a collision with her elbow and Jamison’s pitcher that sent both servants stumbling and a linked string of sausages arcing through the air in a beautiful display of basset hound fever dreams—right into Harley’s greedy jaws.
Hannah made a valiant attempt to rescue both sausage and platter, her arms flailing before she pitched forward.
“Get the dog!” someone shrieked as Harley, moving faster than Elizabeth had ever seen a sausage-shaped dog move, escaped over the lawn.
Jamison, whose duties included restraining the dog, was instead entirely occupied with Hannah—catching her as she stumbled against his chest, seemingly reluctant to release her even after the immediate danger had passed, his face crimson as she looked up at him through her lashes with an expression that suggested they had quite forgotten about the sausages entirely.
“Oh!” Hannah breathed, her own cheeks flaming to match his, her hands somehow resting against his waistcoat in a manner that could not possibly be explained by the mechanics of preventing a fall. “Mr. Jamison, I am so terribly sorry, I do not know what came over me, the platter simply—”
“Not at all, Miss Hannah, the fault was entirely… that is to say, the sausages were already… the platter was clearly unstable, and anyone might have—”
Neither of them noticed Harley gamboling past them with a string of sausages trailing from his jaws. Thomas, however, gave chase with a battle cry that startled the ducks, geese, a pair of swans, and possibly an insomniac owl.
“Well,” Prue said, eyes dancing. “I believe I have found my subplot.”
Wickham chose that moment to appear, fashionably late and dressed in his most expensive buckskins and a coat of bottle-green superfine that must have cost more than his quarterly allowance—unless, of course, the tailor was still awaiting payment.
He sauntered across the lawn, the smile Elizabeth once found so charming already locked in place.
He would depart for India in a couple of weeks and become the brave uncle who sent letters from exotic places.
Or he would become nothing at all—another absence, another disappointment, another promise unfulfilled.
After greetings were exchanged, his gaze wandered toward Prue in a manner that made Elizabeth’s protective instincts flare.
“Miss Duntze.” His voice was smooth as honey. “I wonder if you might correspond about that fascinating novel we discussed.”
“Mr. Wickham.” Elizabeth’s voice was pleasant but edged. “I understand the mail from India takes months to arrive. I do hope you are not contemplating a correspondence you cannot maintain. Young ladies grow so impatient, and you have never been one to wait, have you?”
The barb landed precisely where she intended. Wickham’s smile faltered, something hard glinting behind the charm, but he recovered with a bow that managed to be both graceful and dismissive.
“You are quite right, Mrs. Darcy. I shall content myself with preparing for my journey. Time passes quickly when one has so much to arrange.”
He retreated toward Harley, who was still sniffing the grass where the sausages had fallen in hopes of discovering overlooked treasures, and Elizabeth felt Prue’s hand squeeze her arm.
“Thank you,” Prue whispered. “I did not know how to refuse without seeming rude, and he was so very persistent—”
“You need not worry about being rude.” Elizabeth patted her hand. “Some men do not deserve the courtesy of a reply.”
The afternoon passed comfortably into a golden dusk, and the company began to disperse—Georgiana and Prue wandering toward the rose garden, Thomas demanding to show Sidney to Cook, Hannah and Jamison finding reasons to depart in the same direction while carrying blankets, parasols, and platters.
Darcy’s hand found Elizabeth’s as they watched their family scatter across the lawn.
“Shall we go in?” he asked. “I believe the day is spent, and our family is now complete.”
“A successful day, ma’am?” Clarice’s voice was carefully neutral as she helped Elizabeth out of her evening dress.
“Yes,” Elizabeth replied, stepping out of the grass-stained silk, feeling the cool air against her skin like a promise of the night to come.
“A very successful day. Perhaps the most successful day since I arrived at Pemberley, though the competition for that honor has become surprisingly fierce of late.”
Her nightgown slipped over her shoulders with the familiar coolness of fine lawn, and Elizabeth drifted to the dressing table, watching in the glass as Clarice removed each pin with the same unhurried assurance she applied to all things.
The ritual unfolded: brush, pins, the soft hush of dark hair tumbling loose.
“You have done well, ma’am. Very well indeed.”
Elizabeth felt the weight of that touch, the significance of it, appreciating her maid’s observation.
“I dressed Lady Amelia in the mornings,” Clarice said without intonation. “For nearly four years. I knew.”
“I see.” Elizabeth’s voice was steady, although a chill had overtaken her veins, unsure of the implications. “And you are telling me this because?”
“You are not her.” Warmth softened her maid’s features as they gazed at each other in the mirror. “You never were. She entertained… you didn’t.”
She was circling the question of Thomas’s paternity—of whose blood ran in his veins.
“It does not much matter, does it?” Elizabeth heard herself say.
“No,” Clarice agreed. “I believe he has never considered the possibility.”
“He does not need to know.” Elizabeth made her decision, her eyes drifting to the crack in the ceiling she had studied on so many sleepless nights. “And I shall have that plastered over tomorrow.”
“Yes, ma’am.” The look Clarice gave her contained newfound respect, perhaps understanding, and she departed as silently as she had entered.
Crossing to her desk, Elizabeth retrieved the folded papers Prue had pressed into her hand as the guests departed—the torn registry pages bearing George Wickham’s false signature, the lie that had brought her to Pemberley.
The connecting door opened at her touch, and she stepped through without hesitation, without ceremony, as though crossing that threshold were the most natural thing in the world.
For it was.
Darcy turned from the fire, and his eyes found hers with the expression she had come to know so well—wonder and tenderness and a love so vast it seemed impossible to contain.
She went to him. His arms came around her, warm and solid, and she melted in his embrace, breathing him in, feeling the steady beat of his heart against her cheek.
Then she drew back, looking up into his face, and held out the folded papers.
“Prue gave these to me as she was leaving. The old registry entries with the false signature.”
Darcy took them, understanding dawning in his eyes. “The documents Blythewood asked Duntze to remove.”
“I thought we might dispose of it.”
“Yes, together,” he agreed, his voice thick.
Crossing to the fire, standing side by side, Elizabeth took one edge of the papers, Darcy took the other, and with a flick of their wrists, they consigned George’s treachery into the flames.
Her hand drifted to her belly and rested there, Darcy’s gaze following the movement with both hope and understanding.
“Elizabeth,” he breathed.
She smiled, leaning into him, feeling the warmth of his body and the promise of the future stretching out before them like a path bathed in golden light.
“Our family is complete,” she said. “Now there is only us.”
“Maybe not.” His familiar smirk was the last glimpse as he reached past her and extinguished the candle.