CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE The Gardiners Arrive
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
The Gardiners Arrive
Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner came from London ten days before the wedding.
Darcy had heard much of them. Mrs. Bennet had mentioned her brother’s business whenever she feared Darcy might have forgotten the family’s connections. Elizabeth had spoken of the Gardiners with unmistakable affection. Jane trusted them. Mr. Bennet respected them.
Darcy was curious. He was also ashamed to remember that before his accident he had mentally placed the words uncle in trade among Elizabeth’s disadvantages. Mr. Gardiner was a pleasant, intelligent man in his forties with an eye for landscape, fishing, and sound investments.
Mrs. Gardiner had lived near Lambton as a girl and knew Derbyshire. That fact transformed the first dinner.
“You know Lambton?” Darcy asked.
“Very well,” Mrs. Gardiner said. “My father practised there for several years.”
Darcy’s reserve warmed. “Then you know the walk along the river above the old mill.”
“I do. Unless the winter floods have altered it.”
“They have not.”
Elizabeth watched them from across the table.
Mr. Gardiner asked Darcy about trout in the Pemberley streams.
Darcy answered with such seriousness that Elizabeth leaned toward Jane. “They will be planning a fishing expedition before pudding.”
Jane smiled. “Uncle has already asked Bingley.”
“Then I am abandoned by every gentleman I know.” Richard, on her other side, said, “I do not fish.”
Elizabeth brightened. “At last, a useful man.”
Darcy heard. He gave Richard a look.
Richard grinned.
Later that evening Mr. Gardiner joined Darcy in the library at Netherfield. “I hope you will forgive a relation for speaking plainly.”
Darcy closed the book in his hand. “I would prefer it.”
“Elizabeth loves you.”
Darcy’s expression changed.
Mr. Gardiner smiled. “That was not the warning.”
Darcy waited.
“She also values independence of mind more than comfort.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
Darcy almost laughed. The Bennet family had a remarkable fondness for asking him that question. “I am learning.”
Mr. Gardiner sat opposite him. “You are wealthier than anyone in our family. You are better connected. Your habits will set the tone of your household. It would be easy, without intending it, to make Elizabeth a guest in your life rather than a partner.”
Darcy listened.
“My niece will adapt,” Mr. Gardiner continued. “She is capable. That does not mean she should always be the one adapting.”
“No.”
“You do not resent me saying this?”
Darcy thought of his first months in Hertfordshire. Once, he might have. “No.”
Mr. Gardiner nodded.
Darcy said, “I have asked her to choose which rooms she wishes altered at Pemberley. She refused.”
Mr. Gardiner smiled. “Naturally.”
“I thought it generous.”
“It sounds like homework.”
Darcy stared.
Mr. Gardiner laughed. “Ask what she wants to preserve before asking what she wants to change. Pemberley is important to you. She will be afraid of damaging something you love.”
Darcy considered. That had not occurred to him. “Thank you.”
“You are welcome.” They sat in companionable silence.
After a moment Mr. Gardiner said, “Now. About those trout.”
Darcy smiled.
Elizabeth found him the next day in Longbourn’s garden. “I am told my uncle gave you a lecture.”
“He offered advice.”
“You liked it?”
“Yes.” “
How alarming.”
Darcy took her hand. “What do you love most about Longbourn?”
Elizabeth blinked. “What?”
“You will leave it soon. What will you miss?” S
he looked toward the house.
The answer came slowly. “The noise.”
Darcy’s brows rose.
“I know. I complain of it constantly. But I shall miss knowing who is in the next room simply because I can hear them. I shall miss Mama calling up the stairs. Papa laughing behind his library door. Lydia running where she ought to walk.”
Darcy listened.
“The window seat in my room,” she continued. “The hill beyond Oakham Mount. Hill’s plum preserves. Walking without telling anyone where I am going.”
“You may walk at Pemberley.”
“I know.”
“Without asking permission.”
She smiled. “Progress.”
“I will have Mrs. Reynolds put plum preserves on the menu.”
“That is not the point.”
“I know.”
She looked at him.
He squeezed her fingers. “But perhaps some things may travel.”
Her eyes warmed. “Yes,” she said. “Perhaps they may.”