Before Luncheon
Georgiana placed the leather packet on Lady Catherine’s writing table.
“When Wickham went north,” she began, “I realised there were very few things at Pemberley that belonged only to Papa. Some had become mixed amongst the estate papers, whilst others had remained untouched since his death.”
Darcy sat opposite her. Richard remained beside the fireplace while Lady Catherine took the chair nearest the table.
“I had thought it was because I could not bear to look at them,” Georgiana continued. “Perhaps that was true at first. Five years is a very long time to leave a room of papers unopened.”
Georgiana looked at the packet rather than at any of them. “I realised I had spent five years being grateful that I had not been there when Papa died, and five years wondering whether I ought to have been.”
“My dear child,” Lady Catherine said, “there is nothing you might have done.”
“I know that now. I do not believe I always did.”
“Mrs Reynolds helped me begin sorting the papers at Pemberley. Some belonged to Papa, some to the estate and some to Wickham. After so many years they had become rather mixed together.”
“And so you kept looking?” Richard asked.
“Yes. I discovered I have become rather more curious than I once was.”
“I have always considered that one of your better qualities,” Lady Catherine observed.
“There were letters amongst Wickham’s papers that I could not understand and references to matters that belonged amongst Papa’s things rather than his. The more I sorted, the more I became convinced that I was looking at something incomplete.”
“Incomplete?” Darcy asked.
“Yes. There were questions that had no answers and references to papers I could not find. I found I had become unwilling to leave them unanswered.”
“You are, after all, a Fitzwilliam,” Lady Catherine said.
Richard laughed. “And a Darcy. It is an unfortunate combination for anyone hoping to keep secrets.”
Georgiana laughed softly. “I am beginning to suspect that is true.”
She rested her hand lightly upon the packet before her.
“I found I had become curious about Papa’s last illness.”
“Papa kept notes?” Darcy asked.
“Of everything,” Richard replied before Georgiana could answer. “I had forgotten that as well.”
“Yes,” Georgiana said. “Mrs Reynolds told me he always did when he was unwell. There were dates beside them, together with notes of what medicines had been administered and whether they appeared to improve his condition.”
“And Wickham’s papers?” Lady Catherine asked.
“There was a letter from an apothecary in Manchester amongst his private correspondence.”
“Do we know why?” Richard asked.
“No. At least, I did not at first.”
She untied the leather cord that bound the packet.
“Which is why I continued looking.”
She laid the first paper on the table.
“Papa’s handwriting. From the last year of his illness. These are the notes Mrs Reynolds mentioned: dates, medicines and observations about his own condition.”
Richard moved away from the fireplace.
“And the pattern?”
“I am not a physician. I cannot say what it means. But there are weeks when Papa writes that he is improving, that he feels himself again and believes he will recover.” She glanced over the papers.
“They are very much Papa’s notes. He complains twice about being forbidden from working and three times about being required to remain in bed. ”
“That sounds very like Uncle George,” Richard said.
“I thought so too.” Georgiana placed a second paper beside the first. “And then they change.”
“How?” Darcy asked.
“He becomes tired more quickly. There are gaps where there were none before, and the entries grow shorter. There are four occasions when he writes that he believes he will recover.”
“And after the fourth?” Richard asked.
“There is not a fifth.”
Lady Catherine indicated the Manchester letter. “And the apothecary?”
“There is no record at Pemberley of anyone consulting an apothecary in Manchester. Papa’s physician was Dr Warren. He remained in attendance throughout his illness, and I wrote to him before I left Pemberley.”
“What did he say?” Darcy asked.
“That Papa’s death has troubled him for five years. He had every reason to expect him to recover.”
“And what do you believe?”
“I do not know what I believe entirely,” Georgiana admitted. “Only that Papa’s papers tell a different story from the one we have lived with for five years.”
She touched the packet.
“I nearly did not come.”
“Why?” Lady Catherine asked.
“Because I was afraid I was wrong.”
“And?”
Georgiana turned to her brother. “I realised I was more afraid that I was right.”
Darcy reached across the table and covered her hand with his.
“You should not have carried this alone.”
Georgiana smiled. “I have spent most of my life carrying things for you.”
“You were eleven when I married,” she continued. “Papa did his best, but Mama was gone, and you still came to my rooms whenever you had a nightmare or could not manage your Latin. I thought that was what an elder sister did.”
“It was more than that.”
“Yes,” Georgiana said softly. “I know.”
“I have spent a great many years forgetting that I am only eight years older than you,” Georgiana said.
Darcy laughed. “Only?”
“When I was nineteen and you were eleven, it seemed an enormous difference.”
“And now?” Richard asked.
“Now I am twenty-eight and he is twenty. It is scarcely any improvement at all.”
“I am afraid I still think of him as being eleven whenever he is unhappy,” Lady Catherine said.
“I confess I feel much the same whenever I look at you,” Darcy replied.
Georgiana smiled. “When I married, I worried about leaving him far more than I ever worried about leaving Pemberley. I suspect Papa would be very annoyed with me for admitting as much.”
“He was considerably more annoyed that you were leaving him,” Richard observed.
“That is also true.” Georgiana lowered her eyes to the papers. “I had forgotten quite how happy he was. I think I had forgotten that Papa was happy too.”
“You thought only of his illness,” Lady Catherine said.
“Yes. And of his death. I had forgotten there was so much life before that. There are pages and pages that have nothing whatever to do with accounts or medicines. Mrs Reynolds apologised for that before she gave them to me. She appeared to feel I had been looking for something more useful.”
“Mrs Reynolds has occasionally been known to misunderstand what is useful,” Lady Catherine observed.
“I told her very much the same thing. Papa wrote down everything. Anne’s first tooth.
Little George’s birth. An argument with Mrs Reynolds regarding whether he was sufficiently recovered to return to his correspondence, followed three days later by another argument with Dr Warren upon precisely the same subject. ”
“Two arguments upon the same point in three days,” Richard said. “He was nothing if not thorough.”
“He also appears to have become increasingly convinced that George and I conspired together whenever he was refused anything by anyone else.”
“I imagine he was perfectly correct,” Lady Catherine said.
“Almost certainly. There are also several pages lamenting that George smiles too much.”
Darcy raised an eyebrow. “Too much?”
“Apparently no gentleman ought to appear quite so pleased with life before breakfast.”
Richard laughed. “I find I like Uncle George considerably better with every passing moment.”
“So do I.” Georgiana ran one finger along the edge of the paper. “He writes that London became easier for me after my marriage.”
“Did it?” Darcy asked.
“Very much so. There were so many people, and I was always conscious that I disappointed society by not being somebody else. George never appeared to think I ought to be.”
“No,” Lady Catherine said quietly. “He never did.”
“He knew when I wished to leave before I did. He was never ashamed that I was quiet and never expected me to become louder merely because other people wished it. Papa writes that he had become resigned to the fact that George could persuade me to attend almost anything, provided he attended it with me.”
“That sounds remarkably useful,” Richard observed.
“It was.” Georgiana’s smile faded. “I loved him very much.”
“Papa loved him too,” she continued. “I think that is one of the reasons I was so frightened when I began reading these papers. I did not know whether I could bear discovering that I had been mistaken about everything.”
Darcy covered her hand with his. “And were you?”
Georgiana considered the question. “No. I think that would have been easier.”
“There is something I have never understood,” Darcy said.
Georgiana turned her hand beneath his and held it. “What is it?”
“The night before the wedding, I found you crying in Mama’s sitting room. You told me you were tired, and the next morning everyone behaved as though nothing had happened.”
“I remember.”
“I thought you were unhappy because you were leaving.”
“I was.”
“And because you were frightened?”
“Yes.”
Darcy was quiet for a moment. “I remember wishing I was older.”
“Older?”
“Old enough to understand why everyone was unhappy when they were all pretending to be pleased. Old enough to know what to say. Old enough to make it better.”
Georgiana smiled. “You did make it better.”
“Georgiana—”
“Fitzwilliam, I was nineteen. I was frightened and happy and ashamed and excited all at once. There was nothing you could have made simple.” Her thumb moved once across his hand. “I needed my little brother to sit beside me while I cried and tell me how greatly he would miss me.”
Richard’s mouth moved. “I imagine he accomplished that with considerable solemnity.”
“Extraordinary solemnity,” Georgiana agreed.
“I have always been solemn,” Darcy said.
“No,” Richard replied. “You were merely born forty.”
Georgiana laughed, and after a moment Darcy did too.
“You also brought me my favourite book and three sugared biscuits from the kitchens,” she said.
“I had permission.”
“No, you did not.”
“I believe I had implied permission.”