Chapter Ten Epistles and Epiphanies
ELIZABETH WAS SITTING at the small wobbly writing desk in the guest bedchamber, engaged in the delicate act of writing to her sister Jane. She glanced at her pillow which was hiding beneath it Mr Darcy’s letter and a red rose inside its folds. She sighed, though she scarcely knew why.
She dipped her quill into the inkwell, acutely aware of how careful she must be to avoid any dramatic ink splatters.
Her mind was still ringing with the logic of Anne de Bourgh. The heiress had casually dismantled Elizabeth’s entire worldview in the space of a ten-minute conversation in the grove, leaving her to pick up the broken pieces of her shattered condemnation.
What kind of man allows his sisters and his friend to separate him from the woman he purportedly loves?
Elizabeth stared at the blank paper. She thought of Jane, residing in the bustling sanctuary of the Gardiners’ home in Gracechurch Street, London.
Jane, who was an angel clad in muslin, who had borne the heartbreak of Mr Bingley’s departure with dignity.
Jane, who always assumed the best of everyone, to her own detriment.
For months, Elizabeth had directed all her venom at Fitzwilliam Darcy.
But now, she was forced to look at the pliable Charles Bingley from a different angle.
Mr Bingley had allowed himself to be steered away like a leaf upon a stream.
What kind of man acted like that? What did his actions say about his constancy?
She pressed the nib to the paper.
My Dearest Jane,
I hope this letter finds you well and thriving in the excellent company of our aunt and uncle in Cheapside. Kent is quiet enough, though we have recently been subjected to a rather overwhelming invasion by the inhabitants of Rosings Park.
Elizabeth paused, chewing the end of her quill. How did one gently ask one’s sister if she had realised her former suitor possessed the character of a damp rag?
I find my thoughts turning constantly to you, Jane.
The distance gives one a strange clarity regarding the events of last autumn.
I have been reflecting upon Mr Bingley’s departure from Netherfield.
While I previously laid the blame at the feet of those who influenced him, I find myself increasingly frustrated by the man himself.
Tell me honestly, my dearest sister—how are you faring?
Does the memory of his amiable nature still cause you pain, or has the stark reality of his weak will finally began to eclipse his charming smiles?
I think of him as a weather-vane, pointing wherever the wind blows, and a man who cannot stand firm in his own affections is perhaps not a man worthy of the grief he causes.
It was subtle, but for Jane, it was a battle cry.
Elizabeth signed her name, sprinkled the sand to dry the ink, and folded the paper neatly.
She lit a candle and melted a stick of plain blue wax—suppressing a shudder as the smell of burning wax reminded her of the Darcy crest—and sealed the missive.
She walked out into the corridor and handed the letter to a passing housemaid, instructing her to add it to the post pile.
“Lizzy!” Charlotte’s voice echoed from the bottom of the stairs. “Are you ready? The morning is slipping away, and Mr Collins has threatened to read to us from his agricultural journal if we linger!”
“I am coming!” Elizabeth shouted, grabbing her bonnet and shawl with the haste of a fugitive.
The walk to the village of Hunsford was brisk. The countryside was attempting to transition into spring, offering a watery sunlight that cut through the lingering chill.
Charlotte walked with her usual brisk stride, a basket looped over her arm.
“I must call upon the apothecary,” she explained as the small cluster of village shops came into view.
“Mr Collins has developed a slight tickle in his throat, and he is convinced it is the precursor to a fatal ague. I need to purchase a restorative syrup before he begins drafting his final will and testament.”
“A tragedy,” Elizabeth smiled, lighter than she had in days. The fresh air, combined with the shifting of her own heart, made her almost giddy.
“It is a matter of management,” Charlotte replied. “And what of you? Shall you wait on the bench outside, or do you have errands of your own?”
“I believe I shall step into the circulating library.” Elizabeth eyed the modest crooked storefront at the end of the lane. “I have finished my volume, and I am in need of something that does not involve sermons or the proper spacing of parkland trees.”
“Very well. I shall collect you when the apothecary has finished explaining the humours to me.”
Charlotte veered off to a shop with a mortar and pestle painted above the door, leaving Elizabeth to continue down the cobbled pavement.
The Hunsford circulating library was a dusty establishment that smelled of old paper, binding glue, and the faint, nostalgic scent of lavender.
It was a far cry from the magnificent, towering shelves of Hatchards in London which Elizabeth adored and never missed to visit when in Town, but it would do.
The bell above the door chimed a tiny greeting as she entered.
The shop was narrow, the shelves packed tightly together. Elizabeth navigated past the front counter, where the proprietor was fast asleep, and slipped into the fiction aisle. She trailed her gloved fingers over the leather spines, relishing the silence.
“I assure you, it is a masterpiece of political philosophy.”
The voice, a smooth, cultured, drawling baritone, drifted from the next aisle over. It was instantly recognisable.
Elizabeth stopped, and then peered carefully through a gap in the books.
Standing in the cramped aisle, taking up an unreasonable amount of space, was Robert Fitzwilliam, Viscount Keathley.
He was holding a massive tome in one hand, and a much smaller, suspiciously brightly coloured volume in the other. He was speaking to a bewildered clerk who was clutching a feather duster.
“Plutarch’s Lives,” the viscount was saying, holding up the tome with deep reverence. “It is essential reading for any man who wishes to understand the foundations of republics and the fatal flaws of ambition. Excellent work. Truly.”
“Yes, my lord,” the clerk rasped, not knowing what to do with a six-foot-two peer in his dusty aisle. “And the other one?”
The viscount glanced at the smaller volume and coughed, a somewhat unconvincing sound. “This? Oh, this is a... a botanical study. For my cousin. Miss de Bourgh is very interested in... the flora of the Italian Alps.”
Elizabeth squinted through the gap. The title on the spine of the smaller volume was visible: The Mysteries of Udolpho.
A bubble of laughter burst from her lips before she could smother it.
Lord Keathley’s head snapped up. His hawk-like eyes darted to the sound. He stepped around the bookshelf, spotting Elizabeth standing there with her hand clamped over her mouth.
“Miss Elizabeth.” The viscount’s drawl faltered. “Good God. Have you come to witness my intellectual downfall?”
“I have come to browse, my lord.” Elizabeth smiled, stepping fully into the aisle.
She dismissed the clerk with a nod, and the boy scurried away to the safety of the front counter where his father was still sleeping.
“Though I must admit, I am fascinated to learn that Mrs Radcliffe’s Gothic romances are now considered botanical texts.
I must have missed the chapter where the heroine identifies a fern while fleeing from a haunted castle. ”
Lord Keathley sighed, looking down at the two books. “You have discovered my secret,” he confessed, slouching against the bookshelf. “I am a fraud, Miss Elizabeth. A hollow, frivolous shell of a peer.”
“I am sworn to secrecy,” she assured him, her eyes dancing. “Your reputation as a serious, brooding intellectual is safe with me.”
“Thank God. If Richard found out I was reading about swooning maidens and secret passageways, he would mock me until the end of my days. And Darcy...” Robert shuddered theatrically.
“Darcy considers fiction to be a moral failing. He would probably force me to read a treatise on agricultural reform twice a day as penance.”
Elizabeth’s smile softened at the mention of Mr Darcy. “Mr Darcy is a man of strong opinions.”
“That is an exceptionally polite way of saying he is as rigid as a marble column,” Robert observed.
He moved closer, abandoning the lazy drawl for a moment. The mask of the rakish, carefree viscount slipped, revealing the perceptive, loyal, and deeply sympathetic man beneath. He looked at Elizabeth with an earnestness that surprised her.
“How are you faring, Miss Elizabeth?” Robert asked, his voice low and kind.
“Truly. Our invasion the other day was a fearsome thing to behold, and my aunt’s presence is generally a suffocating blanket upon the entire county.
You have endured much. I am aware of how our lot has kept you on your toes. ”
Elizabeth saw the genuine concern in his eyes. He was not flirting. He was checking on a casualty of the Fitzwilliam family crossfire.
“I am faring quite well, Lord Keathley,” she replied. “I have a robust constitution. And I find your family... illuminating.”
“Illuminating is one word for it. Exhausting is another.” He tapped the spine of Plutarch against his palm. “We are a difficult bunch. We have too much money, too much pride, and a staggering inability to communicate our actual feelings without making a complete mess of things.”
He paused, his eyes holding hers with a significant, penetrating weight.
“My cousin,” he said, choosing his words with deliberate precision, “is an idiot.”
Elizabeth let out a short, startled laugh. “You speak plainly, my lord.”