Searching for Pemberley Read online

  We climbed the intricate, double, wrought iron staircase to the first-floor gallery. A photograph propped up in one of several niches showed that two life-sized portraits of William and Elizabeth Lacey from the early 1800s had once been displayed at the top of the staircase. Because the photograph was so faded, it was impossible to know what Mr. Darcy and his “dearest, loveliest Elizabeth” had looked like, except they were very well dressed. When the last of the Laceys sold the house, they had removed all of the family portraits, as well as their art collection, and only empty walls and the shadows of the paintings remained.

  Because most of the rooms on the first floor were the private residence of the Catons, we returned to the ground floor, where Mrs. Caton pointed out the “splendid” mural on the wall between the twin staircases, which had been painted by Reed Lacey, the youngest of the last Lacey family to live at Montclair. The floor tile in the painting matched that of the foyer, creating the illusion of a hallway leading to a vine-covered terrace with a beagle puppy sleeping in the corner. We moved on to an extensive library containing books dating from the early sixteenth century, which had remained when the house had been sold. Maybe, this was where Mr. Darcy kicked back after a long day of riding around his estate checking on his tenants. With his wife sitting beside him on the sofa doing needlework, Mr. Darcy would be reading Henry Fielding's Tom Jones and laughing at its risqué passages, which he would share with Lizzy.

  Crossing the foyer, we moved quickly through the drawing and music rooms, each with its own carved marble fireplace with classical themes, before arriving at the ballroom, which ran the length of the west wing of the house. The room was empty except for the ladders and supplies used by the men who were preparing the walls for replastering.

  “In 1941, because of its proximity to the Peak District, the house was requisitioned by the British government as a retreat for officers of the Royal Air Force from Commonwealth countries, but there were also officers from the Free French, Norway, the Netherlands, and Poland, among others, whose countries were occupied by the Germans.”

  Pamela whispered to me, “I was living in London, but I heard from some of my girlfriends that those airmen did more than rest when they came into Stepton.”

  Our hostess led us to the terrace at the rear of the house where we were met by the head gardener. Leaning against the balustrades, Mr. Ferguson explained that the grounds had been designed by Humphry Repton, who was considered to be the successor to Capability Brown, the designer of the formal gardens at Blenheim. In a bored monotone, the gardener explained that Repton had also designed the terrace. “You can see his work at Longleat, the home of the Marquis of Bath, in Somerset, or at Cobham Hall in Kent, the estate of the Earls of Darnley, if that means anything to anyone.” I had the distinct impression that we were taking Mr. Ferguson away from his work and he didn't appreciate the disruption.

  “During the war, the entire garden was turned under and replanted with food crops, such as potatoes, beets, and cabbage, to help in the war effort. As you can see, the upper gardens have been returned to their original purpose as flower gardens, but because of food shortages, we won't be converting the rest of the gardens any time soon. The park at its largest was ten miles around, but the family sold off large parcels and donated others to the National Trust before its sale to its present owners.” Putting his finger to his lips, Mr. Ferguson told us the sale was necessary in order to pay the tax man, “but I'm not supposed to tell you that,” he said, jerking his head toward the mansion.

  The other couples on the tour had quickly walked the gardens and left, convinced that as lovely as the house was, it was not imposing enough to be the storied Pemberley. I found myself wondering if this country house could actually be the home of Fitzwilliam Darcy. Granted, it was very large, but it did not go on endlessly with a series of additions like I had seen at Blenheim, the ancestral estate of the Churchills. After walking down its front lawn, which was being nibbled away by a dozen or more sheep, and seeing all of Montclair from a distance, I found that I agreed with Elizabeth Bennet's reaction upon first seeing Pemberley: “I have never seen a place for which nature had done more or where natural beauty had been so little counteracted by an awkward taste.”

  While I had been enjoying the gardens, Pamela had returned to the parking area to have a cigarette. Walking down the long drive, I could hear the sound of the carriage wheels and horses' hooves as they made their way up the hill, carrying couples to a night's entertainment. Welcoming them was Elizabeth Darcy, dressed in an elegant but simple ivory-colored Empire dress, while Fitzwilliam Darcy was outfitted in clothing made popular by Beau Brummel: jacket, waistcoat, neckcloth, breeches, and high leather boots.

  I found Pamela talking to a man who introduced himself as Donald Caton. “As I have been explaining to your friend, many scholars who have studied Jane Austen's writings believe her model for Pemberley was Chatsworth, the home of the Dukes of Devonshire, and one of the largest estates in the country. When people look at Montclair, they are disappointed because they are expecting Chatsworth.” I assured Mr. Caton I was not in the least disappointed.

  After a long pause, Mr. Caton said, “You're probably wondering if these stories about the Darcys can possibly be true.” Pointing down the hill in the direction of a nearby town, Mr. Caton continued, “There is a couple who lives in the village of Crofton by the name of Crowell. Mr. Crowell and his family have been associated with this estate for generations. He most firmly believes Montclair is Pemberley. You might want to talk to him.”

  Following Mr. Caton's directions, Pamela and I found where the Crowells lived, just outside the village proper in a lovely home called Crofton Wood, set back from the main road. The front of the house was covered in vines with small yellow flowers, and purple and yellow flowers lined the stone path to their door. A man, whom I assumed to be Mr. Crowell, was standing outside the front door smoking a cigarette.

  “Mr. Crowell, you don't know me. I'm Maggie Joyce, but I was wondering if…” But that was as far as I got.

  “You're here about the Darcys, right? Don Caton rang me to let me know you might be coming 'round. Come through. Any friend of Jane Austen's is a friend of mine.”

  Chapter 2

  JACK CROWELL WAS A tall man in his mid-fifties with dark graying hair, piercing blue eyes, and the ruddy complexion of someone who enjoyed the outdoors. He explained that coffee was still hard to come by but that he had brewed up some tea.

  “I grew up in Stepton,” Pamela said while pouring out, “but I'm living in London now. I'd like to move back home at some point, but there are no jobs to be had. So I'll stay in London and type, type, type for the crotchety old solicitor I'm working for. I'm not complaining, though. My boyfriend was demobbed out of the Army six months ago, and the only work he can find is the odd construction job. We can't get married until he finds work, and right now my chances on that score are crap.”

  Pamela was definitely not shy, and she quickly proved it when she asked Mr. Crowell if the chicken coops we had seen from the road belonged to him. After he acknowledged that they were, she said, “I haven't eaten an egg that came out of the arse of a chicken in a year. All we ever get is that powdered stuff.”

  After Jack stopped laughing, he told her he would send her home with at least a half dozen eggs. After thanking Mr. Crowell for the eggs, Pamela said she remembered the harvest festivals the Pratts had hosted in late summer.

  “That was a tradition of long standing,” Mr. Crowell explained. “My father was the butler up at Montclair, and my mother was the housekeeper. We lived below stairs in the senior servants' quarters. We loved it. Great place for my brother and me to run around and explore—lots of nooks and crannies.

  “When I was a lad, every August, the Laceys invited the locals up to the house to celebrate 'Harvest Home.' Everyone had a job to do. The two oldest Lacey boys were in charge of games, the daughter told fortunes in one of the smaller marquees, and the youngest son was an artist who wou
ld make funny sketches of the children. My brother, Tom, and I would take all the young ones for pony rides around the fountain on a tether. If the wind was blowing, they'd get wet from the spray, and the kiddies would all squeal with delight.

  “The largest marquee was where all of the food was served, with roast beef and ham, plum puddings, loaves and loaves of bread, fresh fruit, petit fours, and all the lemonade you could drink. There were about a dozen or so tables out on the lawn, all covered with white linen, and Sir Edward and his wife would walk the grounds making sure that everyone had enough to eat and were enjoying themselves.”

  After refilling my cup and adding the milk for me, Mr. Crowell asked what I thought of Montclair and if it measured up to Jane Austen's Pemberley. I said that it did, but I also told him that I doubted Jane Austen had used real people for her novels. Certain people may have influenced her writing, but it seemed impossible to me that there was such a person as Mr. Darcy.

  Mr. Crowell, who insisted that I call him Jack, said, “It's not my job to convince you, Maggie, but I have a feeling you want to be convinced.”

  “I would think that if people believed Montclair was actually Pemberley, they would be beating a path to its door.”

  “You'd be wrong, my dear. Here's what I think,” he said, settling back into his chair. “Jane Austen didn't want her identity known. When Pride and Prejudice was published, she identified herself only as 'the author of Sense and Sensibility.' Originally, her writings were for the entertainment of her family, but they convinced Jane that her stories should be published. She had a decent-sized following before Queen Victoria's reign. However, most Victorians didn't take to her. Silly mother, a lazy father, a fallen sister who wasn't punished. The Victorians would have had the deflowered Lydia dying in the snow on the road to Longbourn. No, they were too serious for someone as lighthearted as Jane.

  “People started to rediscover her in the 1900s, but then came The Great War. Ten men from Crofton were killed outright. There's a memorial dedicated to them on the village green.” After Jack mentioned the war, there was a long pause before he continued, and I had no doubt that someone he cared about was on that memorial. “The walking wounded, widows, and orphans were everywhere. No one was thinking about Jane's tale of two lovers. Then it was the Depression, and right after that, we were again at war. Not much time for Jane.”

  “Is there anything to support your idea that the Laceys and Darcys are one and the same?”

  “It's more than an idea, Maggie. My family has worked at Montclair longer than anyone can remember. My father's father worked for the Laceys. He had met the Binghams, or the Bingleys, as Jane Austen called them. These stories were all passed down.”

  But would Jane Austen have written a novel that often ridiculed people who could possibly be identified by their neighbors, for example, Mrs. Bennet, with her fragile nerves and poor judgment?

  “Do you know when Jane first wrote the novel?” he asked.

  “When she was twenty, so that would be about 1795.”

  “But it wasn't published until 1813,” Jack said, jumping in quickly. “By that time, the Laceys had been married for twenty years! If anyone was trying to figure out if these characters were real, they would have been looking at people in their twenties in 1813. Some of the characters in that book were already dead and buried by the time Pride and Prejudice was published.”

  I was enjoying our conversation so much that I almost forgot about Pamela. She had sat there quietly for a while, but once Jack and I started talking about Pride and Prejudice, she started to walk around the room, looking at family pictures. I hoped she wouldn't start opening drawers which, with Pamela, was a possibility. There was so much I wanted to ask Mr. Crowell, but Pamela had promised her brother she would have the car back to him by 7:00.

  “Not to worry. If Pamela wants to go on ahead, I can drive you over to Stepton myself. Besides, I'd like you to meet my wife. She's very keen on people who are interested in Elizabeth Bennet's story.” After some discussion, I accepted Mr. Crowell's offer, and Pamela left with her six eggs.

  Shortly after Pamela drove off, Mrs. Crowell came in carrying groceries. Following a brief conversation with her husband and after handing him her shopping bags, Mrs. Crowell introduced herself. She was a very attractive woman with light brown hair, cut in a short, simple style, which accentuated beautiful dark eyes. She was wearing black slacks and an ivory turtleneck sweater, and after she sat down in a chair across from me, she pulled her long legs back so that she was almost sitting sideways. Obviously, this was someone who had been taught that a lady never crossed her legs.

  “On its face, it seems difficult to believe. But I grew up very near to this village, and it has been a part of my family lore for generations.” Mrs. Crowell was even more sincere than her husband.

  I realized how late it was only when Mrs. Crowell said she was going to start dinner. I was sure I had overstayed my welcome, and I had to get back to Pamela's house.

  “You are welcome to stay the night,” Mrs. Crowell offered. “We have a guest bedroom with its own bath, and please call me Beth.”

  Jack jumped in. “I'll ring over to Stepton. You can tell your friend that I'll have you back at her house in time for the evening train to London. No worries.”

  “I can hardly believe I'm saying this, but I accept.”

  After dinner, the Crowells and I returned to the living room for tea. The remainder of the evening was spent discussing how it was that Jane Austen's Fitzwilliam Darcy, a member of the privileged landed gentry, came to know Charles Bingley, the son of a man who had made his fortune in trade. Jack related the events that led to the lifelong friendship of the real William Lacey and Charles Bingham.

  “The head of the Bingham family was George Bingham, a financial genius. Along with his brothers, Richard and James, they owned a large import/export business with warehouses in India and America. When the Revolutionary War broke out, the warehouses in New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston were shuttered. Once the war was over, George sent Richard to America to check on the condition of their properties, and he took Charles with him. But after a year, Richard sent him home. Compared to his colonial friends, who had been educated in England, Charles was coming up short.

  “A Mr. Montaigne was hired to tutor Charles in the usual subjects a gentleman of that era would have been expected to know: Latin, French, science, mathematics, and the classics. Socially, George Bingham wanted Charles to be comfortable in any situation, including attendance on the king at the Court of St. James. For that, he turned to William Lacey, Jane Austen's Mr. Darcy.”

  “The Laceys were an old Norman family, their land grant going back to the twelfth century and the reign of Henry II. Will's father, David Lacey or Old Mr. Darcy as Jane Austen called him, married Anne Devereaux, a pretty young lady from another of the old Norman families.

  “When David Lacey died, young Will went over the accounts of the estate with George Bingham, the co-executor of his father's will, and found out that all of his mother's dowry had been spent on the remodeling and expansion of Montclair and that the estate was deeply in debt. Will decided that if he was to maintain the Lacey lifestyle, as well as provide for the proper support of his sister, Georgiana, he had to come up with other ways of making money.

  “This is where George Bingham came in,” Jack continued. “He had a reputation for helping out some of England's finest but financially stretched families. George and Will worked out a deal. In return for taking Charles under his wing, George Bingham would make the necessary loans to get Will Lacey out of debt as well as provide investment opportunities in the Bingham enterprises. That was the start of Charles and Will's friendship. It was an odd pairing, but it worked because they balanced each other out.”

  I knew little about the English aristocracy or how one got to be a duke or an earl, but I did know that titles were important. I wondered why the Lacey family did not have one.

  Beth chose to answer my question. “
Great deference was paid to these old Norman families because of their ancient ties to the monarchy. The Lacey name and land grant were much older than most of those who had been granted earldoms and dukedoms, so the Laceys rested on their ancient Norman laurels.”

  A combination of the train ride from London, the visit to Montclair, and an overload of information had left me exhausted, and I called an end to the evening. I was shown to a large room that had once been the shared bedroom of their two sons. A dozen pictures of the boys hung on the walls, and more pictures were displayed in a glass case along with their many trophies and ribbons. The evening had been so interesting that, although we had spent eight hours together, I never once thought to ask the Crowells about their children.

  Lying in bed, I tried to take it all in, and a lot of what I had been told made sense. It certainly explained how someone from a family as prestigious as the Laceys came to befriend a man whose family had acquired its wealth by trade. But the one question that kept popping up in my mind was, “How on earth did the Crowells know so much about the Bingham and Lacey families?”

  Chapter 3

  WHEN I CAME DOWNSTAIRS the following morning, Jack and Beth were at church, but Beth had left a note on top of a large manila envelope saying, “I think you'll be interested in this. Help yourself to some tea and whatever is in the icebox, Beth.” Inside the envelope was a letter yellow with age.

  11 September 1813

  Dear Charlotte,

  Thank you for your kind letter. My father's health is much improved, so much so that I believe I will be able to return to Canterbury within a fortnight. I long to be back in my own home where I will be safe from Lucy's complaints. Conversation of any length inevitably leads to a discussion of Pride and Prejudice, Miss Austen's book. I have assured her that no one would recognize her in the character of Lydia. These events took place twenty years ago, and there are very few who remember or care about something that happened at such a distance in time. She's afraid that Jake will learn the whole of the story if he reads the book. Jake read a work of fiction? When? The farm takes up all his daylight hours, and my nephews' demands on him in the evening do not allow time for anything but smoking his pipe.