CHAPTER 75 #2
Jane’s hand covered hers. “Come upstairs.”
That was better than contradiction.
They took her from the dining room not in panic, but in a motion so restrained it made fear sharper.
Richard had already gone. Mrs. Doddridge followed.
Edward rose and opened the door before any servant could reach it.
His father remained seated, one hand fixed upon the arm of his chair, his face grey with more than firelight.
Darcy did not look back.
Elizabeth was taken upstairs to the western apartments. Darcy followed as far as he was permitted, which proved to be farther than sense and not nearly far enough for love.
By the time they reached the western sitting room, the rooms had begun to answer.
Mrs. Reynolds appeared from nowhere with keys at her waist and command in every step.
A maid was sent for Mrs. Tate. Another went to the linen room.
Richard’s message had gone for Mr. Grant.
Fires were built up; warming pans ordered; water carried; screens shifted; clean cloths brought; broth remembered; candles multiplied.
Mrs. Tate had the room. Mr. Grant would be admitted when she required him and banished when she did not.
Mrs. Reynolds ruled everything beyond the bedchamber door.
It was a system made of women, linen, heat, water, and experience, and Darcy hated it for being competent without being able to promise him anything.
Elizabeth was taken from the sitting room into the bedchamber. Darcy was allowed near her long enough to understand how little nearness could do.
She sat on the edge of the bed while Jane loosened the clasp of the pearls. They came away into Jane’s hand, one pale coil of ceremony, and were laid upon the dressing table beside pins, folded cloth, and a glass of water.
Elizabeth saw him looking at them.
“Do not let anyone put them in the wrong case,” she said.
He came nearer. “That is your present concern?”
“One of them.”
Her voice was thinner than before.
Another pain came. Her face changed despite her effort to prevent it, and the hand in his tightened until he felt each bone of her fingers.
“Elizabeth.”
She waited until she could speak again. “You must go.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“I can remain out of the way.”
“No,” she said, and there was enough of herself in the word to cut him. “You cannot.”
Mrs. Tate, a calm woman of middle years with sleeves already turned back and no interest in masculine devotion, said, “Mrs. Darcy is correct, sir.”
Darcy did not look at her.
Elizabeth’s eyes had opened again. They were clear, though the rest of her was not.
“I do not want you to see me so,” she said.
“Elizabeth—”
Her hand tightened round his. “Not because I am ashamed. Because you cannot help, and it will hurt you.”
That reached him where command would not have done.
He bent and kissed her forehead, then her hand. She closed her eyes while he did it, and when he straightened, she had already turned toward Jane because the pain had not finished with her.
Mrs. Tate looked at Jane. “You may remain a little while, Mrs. Bingley, if Mrs. Darcy wishes it.”
“I do,” Elizabeth said.
Jane sat beside her at once.
Darcy was guided out by Mrs. Doddridge with no visible force and complete success.
The door closed.
The gentlemen were not permitted to remain in the western apartments.
Mrs. Reynolds settled that without appearing to settle anything.
Messages would come more readily, she said, to the west parlour below; the stair was near, the fire there was good, and no one would be in the passage to obstruct what must be carried.
It was phrased as comfort. It was command.
Darcy went down because he had no useful disobedience to offer.
The west parlour had been opened and lit. It was close enough that he could hear movement above when the house grew quiet, and far enough that he could not mistake himself for necessary. That was the cruelty of the arrangement and also its sense.
Edward came with him. So did Bingley, looking as if he would gladly suffer every terror Jane felt if someone would only explain the method.
Richard was absent, then present, then absent again, his restlessness made useful by errand.
His father remained below at first, but not in the parlour.
He had been taken back toward his own rooms, protesting less than his face suggested, while Mr. Grant was fetched and Mrs. Reynolds made the western stairs impassable to panic.
In the blue sitting room, Richard reported later, Georgiana, Kitty, Mary, Miss Bingley, and Pom-Pom had been established with tea, work, books, and instructions not to make the dog more important than the occasion. Pom-Pom had objected to the last restriction.
Darcy stood by the parlour door.
Edward put a glass into his hand.
“Brandy,” his uncle said.
Darcy did not drink.
Edward did not press him. He only remained there, close enough to prevent folly, silent enough not to insult terror with comfort.
The clock on the mantel had not yet struck ten.
It felt impossible. Elizabeth had left the table a lifetime ago. The pudding had belonged to another year. The pearls had been at her throat in a world that had ended and been replaced by this parlour, this closed stair, this glass in his hand, and the muffled movements overhead.
The clock struck ten.
Darcy hated it for being so early.
Mr. Grant arrived before eleven, cold still on his coat and professional gravity in his face. Darcy met him at the parlour door before the footman had finished announcing him.
“My wife?”
“I am going up to Mrs. Darcy now, sir.”
“That is not an answer.”
“No,” said Mr. Grant. “It is not yet one I can give.”
He went upstairs.
Darcy remained below.
The night arranged itself into duties.
Richard came and went, too restless for stillness and too useful to be spared.
He checked that Mr. Grant’s man had been provided for, carried messages, and returned once with the news that Darcy’s sister was steady, Kitty frightened but useful, Mary solemn, Miss Bingley silent, and Pom-Pom conducting himself like an officer wrongfully deprived of command.
Bingley asked twice whether Jane was wanted and once whether he ought to send for anything from his own rooms, though he could not name what thing might save anyone.
Edward told him, gently enough, that remaining clear of the stair was a service.
Bingley accepted this with a strained nod and sat down for three minutes before rising again.
At half past eleven, Mrs. Reynolds came down.
Darcy was before her at once. “What is wanted?”
“More hot water, sir, which is already ordered. More linen, which is already sent. Mrs. Tate says Mrs. Darcy bears it well.”
“Is she in danger?”
Mrs. Reynolds looked at him with all the honesty of a woman who had served Pemberley too long to flatter a Darcy for his comfort. “Mrs. Tate did not say so.”
“That is not the same as no.”
“No, sir.”
He turned away.
Mrs. Reynolds did not soften. That was perhaps why he could bear her presence. “Mr. Grant is with her now.”
“Why?”
“Because Mrs. Tate thought it proper he should see her, sir. Not because she spoke of danger to me.”
That was an answer with edges. It did not satisfy him. It was therefore probably true.
At midnight, Mr. Grant came down.
Darcy crossed the room before anyone could prevent him.
“My wife.”
“She is tired, Mr. Darcy. She is in pain. I see no cause for present alarm.”
“Present.”
Mr. Grant held his gaze. “I will not purchase your comfort with false certainty.”
Edward, behind Darcy, was very still.
Darcy said, “Is this ordinary?”
“Birth is ordinary,” Mr. Grant said. “That is not the same as easy, and it is not the same as safe beyond question. Mrs. Darcy is strong. Mrs. Tate is capable. I am satisfied for now.”
“For now.”
“Yes.”
He wanted to hate the man. He nearly did. It was easier than hating the clock.
Mr. Grant went back upstairs.
At half past one, Mrs. Tate came down herself. Darcy met her in the passage outside the parlour.
“Is this usual?”
Mrs. Tate looked at him without offence. She had the calm of a woman who had long since learned that gentlemen in passages were another household inconvenience.
“Yes, sir.”
“Then why does no one look easy?”
“Because usual is not easy.”
He had no answer to that.
She added, not kindly, not unkindly, “Mrs. Darcy is doing what she ought.”
“And the child?”
“The child gives trouble and no explanations. They often do.”
Mrs. Tate went upstairs again.
At two, his father came.
He should not have come as far as the west parlour, and the effort showed in every line of him.
A servant walked behind him; Edward rose at once, not as if surprised, but as if he had expected pride to attempt some folly and had only been waiting to see which one.
His father lowered himself into the chair nearest the fire, one hand tight upon his cane.
Darcy stopped pacing.
His father looked at him. “You will not frighten her safe by standing.”
The words were rough, and not quite steady.
Darcy could not answer.
His father’s mouth tightened, whether with pain or memory. “I know.”
The room went quiet.
Above them, faint through floor and distance, there was movement: footsteps, a low voice, the sound of something set down. Not enough to know. Too much not to imagine.
Then Elizabeth’s voice came, altered by pain, and Darcy was on his feet before he knew he had moved.
His father’s cane struck once against the floor.
Darcy stopped.
Not because his father commanded him. That had been broken too thoroughly to return in one sound. He stopped because above him were the women Elizabeth had chosen to trust, and the man whose honest limits he hated, and his entrance would serve no one but himself.
The thought was almost unbearable.
His father watched him from the chair. His face had gone old in a way Darcy had not seen before Pemberley began telling the truth.
“I know,” his father said again.
That was all.