Chapter Twenty
Lizzy sat in the orangery, brushing Harry’s coat. She had vented her spleen during her walk. Now, sadness hung heavy upon her heart.
I thought he liked my animals…I thought he would be willing to endure the challenges of my talent…
I thought…Lizzy carefully brushed Harry’s forelock, sighing as she did so.
Has he been pretending all this time? To please me?
I would rather he be honest. Why waste his time, and mine, on a flirtation that means nothing?
“I am rather pathetic, boy,” she whispered to him. “Sighing over a man like I am still five-and-ten instead of twenty. It is best that I know, now, that he will not be patient with my love of animals. Perhaps he is jealous of the attention I pay them? Is that likely, Harry?”
Harry chuffed and nuzzled her cheek.
“I love you, too,” Lizzy said, smiling fondly.
She collected his forelock into one fist. “If you were a Harriette instead of a Harry, I would put a riband in your hair instead of letting it hang down over your eyes.” She dropped the hair and moved on to brushing his legs.
“I suppose you have to chase every squirrel in the home wood? Look how muddy your legs are.” He tried to look but Lizzy chuckled and pushed his head back out of the way.
“People say I have a way with animals, that I can get them to do anything I want. Well, I must say that all they need to do is look at your legs and belly to know that my talent is all a lie since I have asked you and asked you not to chase squirrels—particularly through muddy ground.”
“His love for the sport must overshadow his love for you,” Mary said, her indoor shoes whispering across the red and black quarry-tile floor.
Lizzy looked up at her sister and smiled. “Back from your errand, I see. How is the Gregg household?”
I hope I do not look as weary and heartsick as I feel.
“We only saw Mrs. Gregg and Oscar,” Mary said. “No one is ill there, thankfully. The typhus in the infirmary has not spread.”
“That is a blessing, indeed.” Lizzy switched to Harry’s hind legs. Without looking at her sister, she said, “Mary, perhaps I am out of line to say this, but I think you should marry Oscar. He is sweet on you—has been for an age. Surely, you know that?”
“I…I…” Mary stuttered.
“I think he may need a little encouragement,” Lizzy added, looking up and smiling at her dumbfounded sister. I think she thought no one has noticed her love for our old friend.
“H…he should m…marry someone with more m…money,” Mary said, looking as though she might swoon.
“Nonsense,” Lizzy stated trenchantly. “He has prospects. You could continue to live with Dr. and Mrs. Gregg for a while. Oscar will inherit his father’s practice, and his home.”
“H…he never…he never…”
“Sit in my desk chair, Mary, before you fall down,” Lizzy ordered. She asked Harry to turn around so she could reach his other side and continued brushing her dog. Lizzy watched Mary perch on the edge of the chair, staring at nothing, unblinking. “Would you like to marry Oscar?”
Mary’s pale face suddenly flooded with color. She slowly nodded. “Do you think…?”
“Even when we were little, Oscar always favored you. Jane was so pretty, and I was more lively, but he always sat beside you when he could.”
Mary pressed her palms against her cheeks. “He went away to school, and I thought…I thought his feelings had cooled. Oh, dear…oh dear.”
“Has he given you no indication that he cares for you as more than a friend?” Lizzy asked, frowning a little in spite of her crooked grin.
Her sister rubbed her forehead, thinking. She met Lizzy’s gaze, who saw hope in Mary’s eyes. “Oscar did say that he had meant to ask me to dance with him at the assembly,” Mary offered, wonder in her voice. “I told him I would have said yes.”
“He is not coming? Because of the typhus patient?” Lizzy asked. She worked to remove a stubborn bur. Without waiting for a reply, she said, “That sounds promising.”
“And…and today, he came to Mrs. Gregg’s study door just to speak to us, even though he could have avoided seeing me if he wished. Unless…Georgiana…”
“Georgiana is too young,” Lizzy stated firmly. “I am certain Oscar does not consider her as anything more than a girl.”
“Yes…yes,” Mary said in a whisper. “How…oh dear…how do I show him my regard? I cannot go near him. I cannot see him at the infirmary…what can I do?”
“Let me think,” Lizzy said, patting Harry’s rump and shooing him away now that she had finished brushing him.
“Perhaps you can give him a book to read. I have overheard you both talking together about your favorite authors. Did you not buy that book on colors and their effects on human beings, by Goethe? I think Oscar, being a doctor, would like it exceedingly well.”
Mary stood up abruptly. “I have mentioned it to him. He did say he thought it sounded interesting.”
Lizzy gathered up the detritus of her work on Harry and deposited it in a tin bucket. She straightened and beamed at her sister. “That sounds auspicious. You could put a nice bookmark in it, or…or…you could put an invitation in it to meet and discuss his thoughts once the typhus scare is passed.”
Mary’s expression brightened further. “At the lending library! That should be unexceptional.”
“Perfectly so,” Lizzy stated, nodding once. “If you order another copy now, you will be able to reread it in time for your meeting.”
“I do not need to,” Mary said, clasping her hands together before her chest. “Father has a copy. I will reread his.”
“I think you should go immediately and implement your plan,” Lizzy urged. She approached Mary and squeezed her arm. “Send the book, wrapped in plain paper, with one of the grooms. Do not forget the invitation.”
“There is no fear about my forgetting that,” Mary promised. She hesitated, and asked in an apprehensive voice, “Am I being too bold?”
“What did Virgil say in the AEneid?”
“‘Fortune favors the bold’,” Mary quoted. “Yes. Yes, I will do it.” She impulsively hugged Lizzy. “Thank you.”
Lizzy embraced her back. “You are most welcome. Now, go and be bold.”
Mary released her and rushed away.
“And good luck,” Lizzy added softly. She glanced down at the guinea pig enclosure. “Oh, you approve, do you?”
Jeffry wheeked.
Lizzy walked over to the glass windows and reached down to the large pot of mixed herbs sitting next them. She pinched off a stem of fresh mint, containing only a few small leaves, and set it down in his food dish. “A treat for you, then, since you agree.”
Jack thumped his foot.
“Oh, ho. You want some too?” Lizzy laughed and gave the rabbits a few mint leaves as well. A pang twisted in her heart. How can Mr. Darcy object to these little darlings?
*
“How can you object to Lizzy’s pets?” Georgiana asked Darcy as they rolled along in the gig, making their way back to Netherfield.
She and Miss Mary had arrived back at Longbourn to discover Darcy visiting with Mr. Bennet.
They all discussed the time when the Darcys would return to pick up Mary for their journey to the farm where Georgiana’s puppy lived at the moment.
“I do not object to them,” Darcy protested. He breathed hard out of his nose, once. “I did not mean for Miss Elizabeth to think I objected, either.”
“I am not surprised,” Georgiana retorted.
“It is a one-ton bull!”
“I suppose you were annoyed to see her inside the paddock attending to the bull’s malady instead of the farm manager?”
Darcy bit back a hasty rejoinder. He took several slow breaths and then replied. “I may have seemed annoyed, but I was frightened Miss Elizabeth would be trampled and gored.”
Georgiana seemed to consider his words. She looked up at him and then out at the passing farms, and then back at him. Darcy waited for her to speak.
“Did you tell Lizzy you were afraid for her safety?”
“I most certainly did.” Darcy fell silent, thinking back. “Well, perhaps I did not say so specifically. But it was implied.”
“It sounds to me as if you shouted at her,” Georgiana said, her eyebrows high. “I know I am young, but I do not think it good policy to shout at the woman you love.”
Darcy took his gaze off the road and stared at his sister. “What did you say?”
She stared blandly back at him. “You heard me. And do not glower at me. I am not afraid of your moods—though I do not like them when I am the cause.”
Darcy returned his attention to the road. Her easy acceptance that he loved Miss Elizabeth helped smooth his agitation over the revelation.
I do love Miss Elizabeth. Why did it take my sister to declare it before I realized how much I love her. She is the liveliest, most exasperating woman, with the softest heart, I have ever known.
“Good Lord.”
“What language,” Georgiana teased. “What is it?”
“How am I going to get Clover to Pemberly? It is over one hundred-twenty miles.”
“You will need to engage a drover, I suppose, like you did when you bought those milk cows from that farmer in Yorkshire.” Georgiana shrugged and chuckled.
“I think you are putting the cart before the horse, dearest. You must first convince Lizzy that you love her and that you accept her talent with animals.”
“You are right,” Darcy said, pressing his lips together.
They entered Meryton where several redcoats could be seen strolling along the high, nodding to passing ladies and generally making themselves agreeable. Georgiana leaned into his side, an anxious expression on her face. She kept her gaze firmly on her lap.
“I do not see him,” Darcy assured her.
Georgiana shuddered, but did not look up.
Darcy took a deep breath. “I smell a bakery,” he said, trying to make her think of something else.
His sister did not take notice. Instead, she said, “I told Mary about what happened last night.”
“Oh?”
“I had already told her my history—when I behaved like a foolish child.”
“You were young, true, but I have never blamed you,” Darcy promised her, yet again.