Chapter Four
To Jonathan it seemed that Netherfield remained frozen during the short time it took for the physician to examine Mr. Hurst’s body, and for Miss Tilney to arrive—as though every person present had joined the late Mr. Hurst in the icehouse, impervious to the last summer warmth.
Most kept to their rooms, even taking their food on trays.
Jonathan did the same regarding his meals, but remained on watch in the house… though for what, he knew not.
Finally, the word came: The autopsy had found the telltale signs of poison. Mr. Hurst had indeed been the victim of murder.
Jonathan and Mr. Lucas broke this news to the Bingleys that evening. Although Aunt Jane had scarcely ceased weeping, her tears came afresh, and Uncle Bingley seemed as sad as Jonathan had ever seen him. “A pity, a great pity indeed,” he said. “You truly believe someone in this house has done it?”
“I cannot see any possibility of an intruder,” said Jonathan.
“Additionally I must state that I have spoken to various members of your staff since the fatal event, and none of them know of any problems between Mr. Hurst and any of the servants. Therefore, the culprit is almost certainly a person not only known to us but also an intimate of the family.”
“Unthinkable,” his uncle Bingley said, but as an exclamation rather than denial. “How very terrible. At least you are here to assist us, Jonathan. I do not know what we would do without you.”
“And Miss Tilney, too,” added Aunt Jane, between sniffles. “Oh—Mr. Lucas—please do not think we fail to value your—”
“I know nothing of investigating murder,” said Mr. Lucas, “so I have no pretensions to expertise and am as grateful for Mr. Darcy and his friend as you can be.”
After this there was nothing to do but to retire. However, Jonathan lingered a moment longer to speak privately with Aunt Jane. “I wished to ask—when you wrote my mother about all this, did you mention—had you yet mentioned that Miss Tilney—”
“I have not yet written Elizabeth,” Aunt Jane said.
“How terribly I have neglected my duty to her as your mother!—but every time I tried to begin, my tears would spoil the ink. And I know they are much concerned with the earl and countess at present. I did not wish to add to their concerns, though I know I must.”
He could scarce believe his good fortune. “Do not do so yet, please,” he said. “You know how worried my parents have been regarding my health, though you see for yourself I am entirely recovered. There can be no cause yet to disturb them.”
Aunt Jane agreed entirely, and Jonathan felt guilty—for while he did wish to avoid alarming his parents, his chief desire was to conceal Miss Tilney’s presence in Hertfordshire as long as possible. Its importance made the deception imperative, no matter how regrettable.
After a long journey, much jostled and ill-rested, Juliet Tilney arrived at Netherfield Park shortly following dawn.
Sore and weary, aware that she must look bedraggled at best, she descended from the carriage in front of a fine country house—not so grand as some she had visited, but elegant all the same, situated upon a small hill that overlooked the verdant countryside. Dew still glittered upon the grass.
Naturally, Juliet had anticipated that a servant would show her in.
To her surprise, however, a genteel woman bustled out, showing no sign of discomfiture at welcoming a guest hours before breakfast time.
“Miss Tilney, is it not? I am Mrs. Bingley. How good it is of you to have come! What a journey you must have had, to arrive so swiftly. We cannot thank you enough.”
Juliet had not been received so graciously by anyone outside her family since she had been “ruined.” In her current state, this unexpected kindness moved her greatly.
“Thank you, Mrs. Bingley. I am gratified that you wished for my assistance at this difficult time, and I shall do my best to help in any way I can.”
Mrs. Bingley looked her over, head to toe, not with judgment upon her disheveled state but with an almost maternal solicitude.
“You must be tired, and thirsty and hungry, too. Cook is still preparing breakfast, but we can offer you tea and toast, and the cakes shall be done very soon. We will have your room ready later today—”
“It is being prepared as we speak, Aunt Jane.” Jonathan Darcy appeared at the front door, and Juliet saw him for the first time since the aftermath of his duel with Laurence Follett.
Her first thought was only that Mr. Darcy looked very well—as hale and handsome as he had ever been, and perhaps even more so.
This was a great contrast to their last encounter, when he had been wounded and weak.
Her second thought was that she scarcely knew what to say to him, the person to whom she had once felt freest to speak in all the world.
Mr. Darcy, at least, was more at ease. “I have vacated what was my room here at Netherfield that it might be made ready for you,” he said. “I shall stay nearby with my grandparents at Longbourn, and—Oh, I ought first to have said welcome, Miss Tilney.”
“Thank you, Mr. Darcy.” Juliet heard her calm voice almost with wonder. “That is most kind of you.”
“It is the least that I could do. You have come a very great distance to help solve the murder of Mr. Hurst, and I am most thankful that you have.” Mr. Darcy smiled at her then, and Juliet ought to have smiled back, but all her weariness seemed to have settled upon her at once, and she felt as though she might swoon.
Mrs. Bingley must have glimpsed this, for she took Juliet by the arm. “Come. While the maids make up the room fresh for you, you shall have some tea and food. After that you must rest.”
“Not for long,” Juliet said. “I wish to begin as soon as possible.”
“I have made preliminary inquiries and taken notes,” Mr. Darcy said. “These we can discuss after you are refreshed. I look forward to it.”
“Come, now,” Mrs. Bingley said gently. “Let us get you that cup of tea.”
Mr. Darcy seemed to realize that Juliet was in no state to converse with him, at least not to any purpose, and he made a small bow as Mrs. Bingley shepherded her inside.
The rest was a haze of politeness and orange pekoe, until at last Juliet was free to bathe herself with a cloth and basin of water, then to sink onto the comfortable bed that awaited her.
For an instant, as she lay there, she recollected that Jonathan Darcy had slept in this bed only an hour or two before.
How strange, yet how easy, to imagine that he lay beside her—
But exhaustion was more overwhelming than even this novel image, and within seconds, Juliet was fast asleep.
Jonathan Darcy intended that Miss Tilney should never know the level of sacrifice he had made so that she might stay in comfort at Netherfield. This sacrifice was great indeed, for there were few houses in which he felt more uncomfortable than he generally did at Longbourn.
“Well!” Mrs. Bennet said upon his arrival.
“Not that Longbourn should not be good enough for you to stay, but I see you will only come to us at a time of extremity. Only to make way for that Tilney girl, of which so much has been said in the papers! Make no mistake, I know well what ‘Miss T—’ stands for, and so does everyone else.”
“You must forgive your grandmother,” said Mr. Bennet, who was already settling back into his armchair with a book.
“Anyone else would be more struck by the fact that a murder had been committed than by a young lady’s crimes against propriety.
One would think that the latter, no matter how egregious, could scarcely eclipse the former. ”
Jonathan had worked hard at becoming an easier conversationalist, at being able to speak readily upon topics beyond his principal interests (namely, the Roman Empire and the works of Sir Walter Scott).
However, his grandmother’s remarks often left him at quite a loss, disrupting his best efforts.
“I cannot tell whether you are unhappy that I did not ask to stay with you at first, or that I am to stay with you now.”
“Of course we are most happy to see you at any time,” said Mr. Bennet, never looking up from his reading, “for you are our eldest grandson. Even if you are abundant in the caprices with which wealthy young men amuse themselves, to be sure, you are far from the most bothersome person I have known. Indeed, you are not even the most bothersome person in the room.”
Mrs. Bennet took little notice of this. “I wager you now ’twas no murder at Netherfield Park. Mr. Hurst simply took sick and died. Little wonder, as he drank more than was good for him. This is but a mistake, mark my words, and thus all this upset and change is for nothing.”
“Then it is most striking that arsenic should have been put in Mr. Hurst’s coffee cup on the very morning illness struck,” Jonathan said.
He did not bother quoting the results of the autopsy, as this would only extend the conversation.
“I shall spend most days at Netherfield, the better to investigate what has happened there. But I thank you for your generous hospitality.” Jonathan said this last because he had noted that expressing gratitude for behavior not yet exhibited by a person often inspired that individual to behave in precisely that manner.
People generally wished to live up to good expectations of themselves.
Mrs. Bennet was not particularly susceptible to this attempt, as it would have required her to reflect upon her own behavior, a task she seldom undertook.
However, she did at least sense that the time to protest his stay had passed.
“All well and good, then. Not that I do not wish to see my grandchildren as often as possible—how I do miss little Susannah!—but to be sure, you will be less in the way if you spend your days elsewhere.”