Fitzwilliam Darcy, Home from Exile
Chapter 1
London’s putrid fog enveloped the single-masted ship. Fitzwilliam Darcy stood at the stern staring at the blurred words that had ended his ten-year exile. Your father is dying. Those four words had dragged him across continents, and now he was not certain he wanted to arrive.
Clustered shadows created by the coal smoke rose from the Thames. The crew moved around him with efficient purpose, tossing lines and strapping down sails while the unrelenting wind pushed them closer to the dock. Darcy pulled his coat tighter around him, unaccustomed to the chill.
The hour was early, and already the docks teemed with life.
Clamors from sailors, dockhands, and fishmongers clashed in his ears.
Darcy swallowed the lump swelling in his throat.
Not since he had left England had he heard so much of his native tongue spoken in one place.
Gripping the rail, he swayed in harmony with the swell of the tide, listening, letting the familiar words wash over him with a calming ease.
He took a deep breath, stench and all, and carefully folded the letter to return to the safety of his breast coat pocket. It had been delivered to him only five weeks before, but the creases were already worn.
I am writing to you at the insistence of my mother, a woman who loves you as much today as she did the day you left.
The words echoed in his mind, the tone of Pemberley’s housekeeper’s eldest son—no longer a young man but a seasoned solicitor in London—penning the message. Ten years of silence, and Reynolds expected him to simply… return?
Mother assures me that Mr. Darcy is a changed man, that sickness has softened him. I am inclined to agree with her, or I would never presume to implore you to return. If you harbor any hope of reconciliation, make haste. Your father is dying.
A loud clap snapped Darcy’s attention to the dock. The plank had been lowered. It was time to disembark.
Steeling himself with another deep breath, he collected his portmanteau and descended to the shore, pausing at the bottom to feel the firm ground under his feet.
A wheelbarrow full of dead-eyed fish landed with a thud at his side.
As though they sensed a newcomer with change to spend (or to be picked from his pocket), costermongers swarmed around Darcy.
Loud men and women pushed carts and wielded baskets full of bread, vegetables, ribbons, and trinkets he did not want; dirty-faced urchins with bare feet and outstretched hands pressed against him. Every port was the same.
On the edge, a girl with crooked, flaxen braids and gapped teeth tried with little success to push her way into the fray. She held a basket over her head. “Flowers for yer mum, sir!”
Darcy flinched.
“Chrysanthemums for yer sweetheart!” she tried again. A boy shoved her to the side to offer Darcy a better view of his eel pies, but the girl stamped her foot and glared at the interloper, shouting over the din, “Flowers to feed an ‘ungry child!”
The coin was already on Darcy’s palm, enough to purchase a bloom that would wilt long before he reached the east side of London.
But when he saw the young girl glance over her shoulder and motion to a bony, bare-kneed little boy clinging to a nearby lamppost not to move from his place, he bought the entire basket.
“Bless you, guv’nor!” She tucked her hard-earned coppers away and looked Darcy over from top to bottom.
He must have looked peculiar to her, dressed as he was like a gentleman but wearing a full beard because it was easier to maintain while traveling.
His valet would follow him once he had sold the apartments and seen to the business left in Darcy’s wake.
Brenner was nothing if not efficient and would, no doubt, arrive expeditiously.
The flower girl finished assessing his appearance and continued, “Or should I be sayin’ seen-yor or seen-yor-ay or one of them other funny words what you furriners use?”
He smiled, as impressed at her knowledge of Spanish and Italian as he was horrified by her pronunciation. “I speak English, and I thank you for the flowers.”
She grinned and twirled the end of one of her braids, the plait coming loose just like Georgiana’s used to do.
Darcy’s imagination swam to the feel of his little sister’s fine, wispy locks slipping through his fingers and his mother’s laughter at his clumsy attempts to braid them.
The memory tore through him like a thousand daggers, so sudden and fierce that his hand shook as he plucked the fistful of bright chrysanthemums from the basket.
“You talk ever so grand for a furriner.”
Truth be told, Darcy felt like a foreigner. The girl looked pale next to him. The Mediterranean sun had darkened his skin.
She stuck her tongue in the vacant space between her teeth, then added, “An’ yer dark as a lascar sailor, ain’t ya?
Come off one of the big ships, ‘ave you?” She narrowed her eyes, inspecting him for more evidence of his origins, perhaps scheming how she might extract more coins from him.
Before he could utter a word of correction, the girl shrugged and skipped away, dragging her brother behind her—likely to the nearest bakery where Darcy hoped they would purchase enough meat pies to fill their stomachs.
He wondered whether they had family nearby.
He watched them disappear into the crowd and then shouldered his way through the press of bodies toward the street and the impatient horses pulling the carriages lining them.
“Grosvenor Square,” he directed, climbing inside a hackney that would take him to Darcy House.
Hooves clip-clopped in a staccato; carriage wheels clattered against cobblestones. The conveyance rolled and swayed in a familiar rhythm that had become comfortable to him. He might have relaxed had he closed his eyes, but like a curious child, he could not resist the view through the window glass.
Rusted gates yielded to freshly painted iron railings. Women in worn dresses and frizzy hair ceded to maids in bright white caps and aprons. The cries of vendors and crowds faded into quiet streets and stately surroundings.
The calm before the storm.
Darcy turned away from the window, clenching his fingers into fists and pushing them against his fidgeting legs. A church bell tolled, and he tried to focus on the shabby carriage squabs, the driver’s rough voice calling to his horses. But the sound was too familiar, too reminiscent of home.
In a blink, Georgiana was perched on his lap, her sticky little fingers gripping his arm as she chattered about the Egyptian exhibition they had seen.
Mother laughed, attempting to wipe the remaining evidence of their stop at Gunter’s ices from Georgie’s cheeks and quietly ushering them inside the house before Father noticed they were late.
Darcy had not minded the punishment. His father spoke at length about responsibility and discipline. All the while, Darcy heard their laughter in his mind, saw their eyes twinkling with delight.
He rubbed his chest, rubbed his eyes. He had not been in England for an hour, and already every sight and sound conspired to drag him back to what he had lost. If he possessed less resolve, he would have fled on the next tide rather than endure this relentless parade of the sweet and the sorrowful.
Taking a shaky breath, he felt for the letter in his pocket.
Would his father receive him? Would they be capable of having a civil conversation?
He had traveled half-way across the world at an exhausting pace to find out.
If you harbor any hopes of reconciliation…
Hope swelled in Darcy’s chest. He tried to calm it, but it overcame him, and he imagined the sound of his father’s voice, the smell of his cologne, the feel of his hand resting on Darcy’s shoulder.
The carriage clambered to a stop in front of the four-bay house, and Darcy hopped out to pay his fare, his heart racing with anticipation and dread… until he turned and it nearly stopped beating.
Black ribbons fluttered from the mourning wreath hanging on the front door.