Epilogue
Elizabeth woke in Portman Square with her hair in no condition to defend itself, and the immediate conviction that she had behaved with very little sense the night before.
They had come down from Derbyshire a fortnight before, and Portman Square had not yet settled into obedience.
Servants still found reasons to ask where things belonged; Mrs. Albright still discovered Derbyshire habits in London rooms; and Elizabeth, who knew every stair and bell, had the satisfaction of disturbing them all again.
This was fortunate, for she meant to disturb it considerably.
It was also unjust to accuse herself of want of sense. She had behaved with judgment for nearly the whole day. She had approved flowers, silver, place cards, Georgiana’s music programme, and the number of chairs required for a dinner large enough to alarm Mrs. Albright without defeating her.
After that, recollection became less useful.
There had been candlelight. Fitzwilliam’s hand at the fastening of her gown. Her own laughter, too near his mouth. One pin had been discovered later in a place no pin had any business being. She had told him that Portman Square was not to be reopened by people incapable of rising punctually.
He had agreed.
The agreement had not prospered.
Elizabeth opened her eyes.
Her husband was awake beside her, looking neither repentant nor nearly tired enough for safety.
“Good morning,” he said.
The words were civil. His expression was not.
“You are pleased with yourself.”
“A little.”
“A gentleman would deny it.”
“I have never wished to deceive you.”
Below stairs, the house had begun to stir: a door closing carefully, a maid’s step in the passage, the discreet haste of a household preparing for too many guests and pretending not to hurry.
Fitzwilliam’s hand found her waist beneath the coverlet.
“Do not,” Elizabeth said.
His thumb moved once.
“That was not obedience.”
“No.”
“Mrs. Albright will expect me below.”
“She expects many things.”
“Georgiana has lists.”
“She enjoys them.”
“Kitty will have Ellie half eaten by paper horses before breakfast.”
“Then the nursery is occupied.”
“Eleanor cannot yet defend herself against literature.”
“I have every faith in her.”
Elizabeth laughed.
That was her mistake.
He kissed her as if the day had not yet begun, as if no carriage would arrive, no sister require judgment, no baby crow from the nursery, and no dinner for half their acquaintance depend upon Elizabeth becoming respectable before breakfast.
It was not a long kiss at first. It merely failed to remain brief.
When she drew back, his hand was warm at her back and her own had found his hair without the least intention of apologising.
“This,” she said, less steadily than she preferred, “is how houses fall into disorder.”
“No,” Fitzwilliam said. “This is why one keeps a good housekeeper.”
Elizabeth stared at him, then laughed against his shoulder.
There it was still: that quiet, immediate ease in him when she touched him. Familiar now, but no less dear.
She traced one finger along his jaw. His eyes softened at once.
“You are supposed to help me govern this day.”
“I am helping.”
“You are delaying me.”
“I am improving your spirits.”
“My spirits require no improvement.”
“No,” he said, looking at her mouth. “But I am fond of them.”
By the time Elizabeth left the bed, Portman Square was certainly awake, Mrs. Albright almost certainly knew too much, and the house was in imminent danger of being reopened by a mistress whose hair had begun the day in open rebellion.
She found she did not mind in the least.
She reached the breakfast room late enough for Mrs. Albright to know everything and early enough to deny her the pleasure of saying so.
Mrs. Albright stood by the sideboard with a list in one hand and neutrality in every feature.
“How many disasters?” Elizabeth asked, accepting coffee.
“Three, ma’am.”
“Only three? The day lacks ambition.”
“The flowers arrived with too many lilies. Miss Darcy has removed them from the dining room and put the best in the hall.”
Elizabeth paused. “Miss Darcy did?”
“Yes, ma’am. She said Mrs. Bingley might dislike the scent.”
“Very thoughtful.”
“And the extra footman from Brook Street believes himself ornamental.”
“That is a common delusion.”
“I have put him under James.”
“Then he will improve or be improved upon.”
Mrs. Albright permitted no smile, which meant she agreed.
Fitzwilliam entered then, looking so composed that Elizabeth nearly laughed aloud. He kissed her hand with perfect gravity and sat opposite her as if he had done nothing whatever to delay the mistress of the house before breakfast.
“You look very innocent,” she said, when Mrs. Albright had gone.
“I have had little opportunity to offend.”
“That has never stopped you.”
Before he could answer, Georgiana appeared in the doorway with a folio in her hand and a pencil tucked behind one ear.
“I beg your pardon,” she said, “but I have changed the music order.”
Elizabeth set down her cup. “Without a council?”
“I thought it unnecessary.”
Fitzwilliam looked gravely at his sister. “A dangerous beginning.”
Georgiana coloured, but did not retreat. “Mary should not begin with Mr. Pratt’s piece. Everyone will watch her too closely. I thought I might play first, and then she may play when the room has settled.”
Elizabeth looked at her properly then.
“That is well judged.”
Georgiana’s fingers tightened on the folio. “And Lydia should sit where Mrs. Gardiner may speak to her without appearing to guard her. She will not like being guarded.”
“No,” Elizabeth said. “She will not.”
“But she may like being consulted.”
Elizabeth heard the difference at once: a young lady who had once been pressed by obligation now arranging safety without humiliation.
She smiled. “Very good, Georgiana.”
Fitzwilliam said nothing, but his expression warmed so openly that Georgiana had to look down at her papers.
A sound of animated protest rose from above stairs — Kitty’s voice, not Eleanor’s.
Elizabeth rose. “I had better see whether literature has survived the nursery.”
Fitzwilliam stood. “Shall I come?”
“No. You are to remain here and approve whatever your sister does next.”
Georgiana looked startled.
Fitzwilliam bowed. “I shall be governed.”
Elizabeth left them there: her husband smiling, his sister with a pencil behind one ear, and Portman Square awake around them, not quiet, not perfect, but gloriously alive.
The nursery was in cheerful disorder.
Eleanor sat on the carpet, supported by cushions and her own opinion of herself, with one fist closed around a strip of blue ribbon. Kitty sat opposite her, a stitched paper book open across her knees.
“There you are,” Kitty said. “Tell Ellie she must not eat chapter two.”
“I never interfere between an author and her public,” Elizabeth said, sitting beside her daughter.
The pages were unevenly sewn, the drawings lively rather than correct: a family of horses who conducted their true affairs after the grooms had gone to bed, all of them possessing more expression than many people Elizabeth had met in drawing rooms.
Eleanor reached for the book again.
“You see?” Kitty said. “She understands taste.”
“She understands paper.”
“That is where taste begins.”
Elizabeth kissed Eleanor’s head. Eleanor seized one of her curls at once.
“No,” Elizabeth said. “That belongs to me.”
Eleanor disagreed.
Kitty laughed, then looked down at the book with sudden uncertainty. “Lizzy, do you think it very foolish?”
“The books?”
Kitty nodded.
Elizabeth looked at the crooked stitches, the earnest little horses, and her sister’s hopeful, anxious face.
“I think the Gardiner children will be very angry if Lydia has promised them copies and you do not provide them.”
Kitty brightened. “She truly asked for them?”
“She did. She said improving books are never half so grateful to be read.”
“That sounds like Lydia.”
“It also sounds true.”
Eleanor shouted, as if in support.
Elizabeth left them there: Kitty bent over her pages, Eleanor bright-eyed on the carpet, and the nursery full of that useful nonsense by which children, sisters, and households were sometimes kept happiest.
The day gathered after that.
Notes arrived. Hampers arrived. One box of music was discovered in the servants’ hall, where Cook had formed a low opinion of composers as a class.
Mrs. Doddridge, who began by declaring that large dinners existed to prove mankind insufficiently grateful for small ones, took charge of the spare shawls with the grim satisfaction of a general defending a pass.
Elizabeth moved from room to room, and everywhere Portman Square opened under her hand.
A packet from Pemberley came near noon.
Elizabeth knew George Darcy’s hand before she opened it. It had grown less firm since his illness, and never sentimental; even his affection moved as if uncertain whether it had the right to cross the page.
For Eleanor, the note said.
Inside lay a small silver cup, not new. Elizabeth turned it over and found the Darcy crest worn almost smooth by use. There was a second note, shorter still.
It was mine. If you think proper, let it be hers.
Elizabeth stood a moment with the cup in her hand.
George Darcy remained at Pemberley, cared for, answered, and limited. He wrote now rather than command. He sent rather than summon.
It was not nothing.
Fitzwilliam found her there.
“My father?” he asked.
She handed him the note.
He read it once, then again, his face still. At last he touched the rim of the cup with one finger.
“Do you object?” Elizabeth asked.
“No.” He drew a breath. “No. It is hers, if you do not object.”
“I think she may have it.”
His hand covered hers briefly over the cup.
Neither of them said more.
There were other papers, less tender and more useful.
Mr. Hartwood sent a question regarding a lease whose tenant had developed principles only after rent became due.
Mr. Beaker sent an account, neater than kindness and twice as useful.
Mr. Terling’s note contained three facts, two requests, and no poetry, for which Elizabeth blessed him.