The Carriage Ride Page 3

  “How very clever of your mother.”

  As the gentleman spoke, Lizzy saw an entirely different Mr. Darcy from the man who had attended the Meryton assembly. He was a loving son, devoted brother, and caring friend. How could she have failed to recognize any of his attributes? How willfully blind she had been to any evidence that contradicted her entrenched dislike of the man.

  “What would your preference be, Miss Elizabeth? Formal or informal?”

  Darcy already knew the answer: the wildflower garden. In his many encounters with Elizabeth during her walks in the park at Rosings, he had noticed that her preference was for the less-travelled path—those areas that rarely saw the skilled hands of Lady Catherine’s gardeners.

  “Unlike the Darcys, I make no claim to having a scientific mind. Although I am intrigued by all that these astronomers learn from studying the moon—its craters and crevices, distance and diameter—do they ever take the time to enjoy the moonlight given off by that magnificent orb? Would it cross their minds to go out of doors during a full moon and dance in delight at this extraordinary gift?”

  “Is that something you did as a child?” Darcy asked, looking into Lizzy’s eyes.

  Lizzy blushed. Yes, but it was not limited to her childhood as it was not so long ago that a full moon had called out to her. Dragging her sisters with her, they had replicated the rituals of a more ancient, more primitive people, with a dance as unbridled as anything danced by a Druid priestess.

  “If you do not ask me questions, I cannot give you an untrue answer,” Lizzy said, blushing.

  “I would not have thought it of you, Miss Elizabeth.”

  “That I would dance in the moonlight?”

  “That you would hide behind an Oliver Goldsmith quote.”

  Squirming in her seat, Lizzy answered. “Very well, Mr. Darcy, if you must know, my preference would be for an untamed garden. But I shall not allow you to define me by my landscape and literacy preferences. Although I would prefer to read a poem inspired by the moon than study its composition, I am not entirely uneducated. I shall tell you a story that may surprise you.”

  When Lizzy was about thirteen, and Jane just a year older, Mr. Bennet had challenged the two eldest Bennet daughters: If they raised a prized pig for the county fair, he would allow them to have a share in the profit of the sale of the pig.

  “There was never a more pampered pig than Pepin,” Lizzy began. “We watched over and cared for him as if he were a newborn babe. We washed him and dried him and fed him all the best table scraps. He was as fine a porcine specimen as you will ever see.”

  “And you won the prize?”

  Lizzy laughed. “No. But he did sell for a good price nevertheless, and Papa gave us a share of the profits even though Pepin did not win the prize.”

  “And what did you do with your earnings?”

  “Here is the part that will surprise you.”

  The following summer, the Bennets had traveled to Weymouth for two weeks of sea-bathing. It was Jane and Lizzy’s intention to spend their prize money in Weymouth’s shops.

  “Jane headed straight for the milliner’s and bought the cutest bonnet with a beautiful yellow ribbon. I, on the other hand, went to the bookstore and bought a book of sketches of the excavations at Pompeii. So, you see, Mr. Darcy, I do improve my mind by reading—just not extensively.”

  Ah, yes, our conversation in the drawing room at Netherfield Park, Darcy thought. In that conversation, he had declared that in addition to various skills and talents, an accomplished woman must improve her mind by extensive reading. What an insufferable prig I was, Darcy thought, but rather than walking into Elizabeth’s trap, Darcy spun his own tale.

  “This is quite the coincidence. The Darcys and Fitzwilliams jointly own a house near Weymouth, and I remember a time, about seven or eight years ago, I would say, when I went into a bookstore—Fowler’s, I believe—and saw two young girls perusing the shelves, one fair-haired and one with dark tresses, very much like you. The dark-haired girl, the one without the bonnet, was buying a large book. I do believe it was you.”

  Lizzy’s mouth fell open. This was more than coincidence. This was a miracle. But then Darcy gave it away with a smile.

  “Shame on you, Mr. Darcy! You had me believing your every word.”

  “Even so, you caught on quick enough,” he said with a laugh. “As to your appetite for reading, I think you read more than you were willing to let on that night at Netherfield.”

  Of course, Mr. Darcy is right. Caroline’s remark that I preferred reading to cards or just about anything else raised the hackles on my neck because I understood the reason for her remarks: Caroline wished to diminish me in Mr. Darcy’s eyes by inferring that I was dull and not good company.

  “I was annoyed when I said that.”

  “A common reaction to Miss Bingley.”

  That remark did not surprise Lizzy. Caroline’s use of every arrow in a female’s quiver to pin Mr. Darcy down had been so obvious that only the dullest of men would not have noticed her efforts. Mr. Darcy was many things, but a dullard he was not. Even though none of Caroline’s arrows had hit their mark, it did not stop her from trying.

  “Miss Bingley was very keen to have your approbation.”

  “Yes, but as my sister, who is not even out in society, says, ‘I hope when I have an interest in a man that I am not quite so obvious as Caroline is about you.’ But in Miss Bingley’s defense, the Bingleys are new to society. Of course, Bingley will be accepted as a gentleman because of his university education, his fortune, and, at some point, his estate. Mrs. Hurst has made a good match—”

  “Has she?”

  “Yes. Yes, she most definitely has. The Hurst family… Quite an interesting story there.”

  According to Mr. Darcy, the Hursts were an ancient family from the North of England, a region that had held stubbornly to their Catholic faith long after Queen Elizabeth’s ascension to the throne. But not the Hursts. They had cast their lot with the Protestant cause early in Elizabeth’s reign and supported her in her role as the head of the newly organized Church of England.

  “As a result, the Hursts were rewarded with considerable properties in the North, especially after the Duke of Norfolk was executed for conspiracy against the Queen. Unfortunately, they did lose a good portion of their wealth in the South Sea Bubble in the early 1700s, but they are solid enough to live in a townhouse in Grosvenor Square, that is, with the help of Louisa Bingley’s dowry.”

  “I had no idea,” a surprised Elizabeth said. When she thought of Mr. Hurst, she saw a man with no gift for conversation but an ability to consume considerable qualities of food and port. Such indulgences frequently resulted in the gentleman falling asleep on the sofa and belching in his sleep. “Obviously, if Miss Bingley were to succeed with, say, the grandson of an earl, it would go a long way to establishing her own bona fides.”

  “Exactly.”

  And it does not hurt that you are rich, handsome, and well connected. Little wonder Caroline is so determined to have you as her husband.

  When Lizzy suggested Colonel Fitzwilliam, a man in need of a rich wife, for Caroline, Darcy shook his head vigorously, and Lizzy quickly added that she was only teasing as she had a very high regard for the colonel and only wished him happiness.

  “I shall tell you why my cousin will never consider such a marriage. Colonel Fitzwilliam’s brother, the current Earl of Stepton, is in one of the unhappiest marriages I have ever known or even read about, with the possible exception of the Regent and Princess Caroline or Henry II and Queen Eleanor, whom he imprisoned in a tower when she tried to overthrow him in favor of her son.”

  “An understandable response considering the circumstances,” Lizzy said with a giggle.

  “But Briarwood has no tower, and Richard has declared that he would rather remain a bachelor than enter into a union with a woman whom he does not at least admire.”

  “Considering the strained relationship of Lord and Lady
Stepton, that is understandable.”

  Darcy raised an eyebrow.

  “Your cousin’s marital misfortunes are well documented.”

  “You read the London scandal sheets?” a surprised Darcy asked.

  “Mr. Darcy, I live in the provinces. Of course, I read the scandal sheets. We must have our entertainment.”

  “And my cousin provides the entertainment,” Darcy said with a sigh. “Antony reads the rags every day, and if he is not in at least one, he does something scandalous so that his name will appear the next day. Because of such attention, I am very happy to be a Darcy and not a Fitzwilliam.”

  It was Lizzy’s opinion that although Lord Stepton’s affairs with various married women was immoral and very wrong, Lady Eleanor garnered no sympathy from the reading public as it was well known that she had her own lovers and a vicious disposition.

  “It is not as if Lord Stepton is the Prince Regent and heir to the throne,” Lizzy said by way of consolation.

  “Yes, that is true. Antony embarrasses only his family, not the nation,” an exasperated Darcy sighed.

  Lizzy wanted to know if the stories of Lord Stepton’s antics were even remotely true.

  “The one about him jumping out of a one-story bedroom window into a holly hedge is not true. He jumped from the ground floor, and it was not a holly hedge but boxwoods.”

  After Lizzy stopped laughing, Darcy explained that it was impossible to take anything the Earl of Stepton did seriously.

  “Antony is truly harmless. But Eleanor… I have encountered bees with less sting.” Darcy looked at Elizabeth. “Knowing of my cousin’s misadventures, you must think me a hypocrite to have criticized your younger sisters when I have such a relation as Antony.”

  During her frequent readings of Mr. Darcy’s letter, and knowing of his rapscallion of a cousin, such an idea had crossed her mind, but then Antony was an earl, and male members of the aristocracy could get away with almost anything short of murder. But if a young girl laughed too loud or openly flirted with soldiers—that was worthy of censure.

  Lizzy reluctantly admitted that Mr. Darcy’s criticisms of the young Bennets were not without merit. “I do wish Mary would not sing in public, and I do wish my mother would check Lydia and Kitty’s behavior more than she does. But I also know that my mother, in her enthusiasm to have her daughters well married, says and does things that are inappropriate, but then Lydia and Kitty are so young. Is it so wrong to frolic and flirt when you are just fifteen and seventeen? You see, Mama married when she was seventeen, Kitty’s age, and she knows only too well how soon the burdens and responsibilities of being a wife and mother are felt, a time when beaus and balls become a thing of the past.”

  “I understand what you are saying, but from my own experience with Georgiana and George Wickham, I know the damage that can be done as a result of one unfortunate decision made by a young woman inexperienced in the ways of the world.”

  “Other than Colonel Fitzwilliam, are there others who know of your sister’s misfortune?” a concerned Lizzy asked.

  Darcy shook his head. “Not at this time, but Wickham has reneged on contractual obligations in the past, so there is no guarantee that he will adhere to the terms of our agreement.”

  Such thoughts were often on Darcy’s mind as he felt the weight of all that had happened at Ramsgate. He told Elizabeth that he would have sooner believed that the sun would not rise in the east than that his sister would consent to an elopement.

  “Of course, Wickham cloaked himself in familial connections in order to get Georgiana to consider such a reckless endeavor. After all, Wickham was my father’s godson and the son of Pemberley’s trusted steward, and as far as she knew, he was a good friend of mine. After generously settling with Wickham following my father’s death, it never occurred to me that he would again intrude on my life, and because of that, I said nothing to Georgiana about his lack of character and low tastes.”

  “Your actions are understandable. You would not wish to have such discussions with someone so young. What would have been the benefit of maligning the character of someone she regarded as a family friend? You had no way of knowing that George Wickham would retaliate against you through your sister.”

  “So, you believe what I wrote about Wickham?”

  Lizzy nodded. “I am ashamed to admit that I ever believed him and doubted you. The words in your letter about Mr. Wickham and your sister struck me as if they were a blow. I, too, had been deceived…” Lizzy shook her head. “We promised not to speak of the letter. How does Miss Darcy fare?”

  For weeks after the failed elopement, Georgiana had kept to herself at Pemberley. Fortunately, the solitude and magnificence of the nearly Peak had proved a balm for her injured heart.

  “Georgiana did not brood or cry. There were no scenes of hysteria about a lost love—just an unsettling silence witnessed by a brother who was helpless to comfort her. It was about a month or so before she finally opened her heart and mind to me about Wickham: her sense of betrayal and her thoughtlessness in deceiving her brother. She was very hard, sparing herself nothing, and when she had finished, she declared that she was a better person for the experience. She would never again fall victim to the lies of a handsome man.” Darcy became quiet and then smiled. “Actually, I am quite proud of her. It was she who made the decision not to come out this season, much to my aunt’s chagrin, and that is why she was not with me at Rosings. She wished to avoid the lecture about ‘other girls getting the best of the crop of bachelors.’ She will come out next year.

  “Because of the unpleasantness of Ramsgate, I longed to be in the country, but as my sister was in London seeing to her studies, I did not wish to travel as far as Derbyshire. That is why I agreed to join Bingley at Netherfield Park. Earlier, we spoke of Bingley being new to the world of a gentleman, and in my mind, he is a gentleman. He has a university degree, just as I do—although I actually attended to my studies, whereas Bingley played sport. Bingley’s father was so keen to have him acknowledged as a gentleman, and all the rights associated with a man in possession of considerable acres, that he left his oldest son an absurd amount of money to build a great estate.”

  Before Bingley embarked on such an undertaking, Darcy had counseled his friend to rent a manor house so that he might determine what he wanted in an estate. The original plan was that Netherfield Park would be a bachelor’s retreat where riding and shooting were the order of the day. But those plans went awry when Caroline declared that it was necessary for her to come to Hertfordshire to keep house for her brother and that she would be accompanied by the Hursts. Rather than enjoying manly pursuits, Darcy was now required to converse nightly with Bingley’s sisters and attend various social engagements amongst strangers. His plan for a few quiet weeks in the country had been utterly ruined.

  “That is a poor excuse for my behavior in Hertfordshire, but I hope you will understand that for months, I had been in a constant state of agitation. As harshly as Georgiana had judged her own performance, it was nothing compared to my own self-criticism of my failure as her protector, and with a house filled with Bingleys, there was no time for reflection. I behaved badly as a result.”

  Lizzy looked directly at Mr. Darcy. “You were not the only one who behaved badly. My first impression of you was that of a proud man who was above his company, but when you made attempts to be congenial, I would have none of it. You were the villain in my novel. I would not have you redeemed.”

  “And when you learned that I had interfered in Bingley and your sister’s relationship, you were rightfully angry. It was none of my affair, and I would have done well to have kept out of it. But as I said in my letter, my interference was based on my concern for Bingley and my failure to recognize your sister’s true feelings.”

  For Darcy, recognition of such failure had been growing with every passing hour since Elizabeth’s rejection of his offer. How could he have not understood that Elizabeth was as fond of Jane as he was of Georgiana and
that any injury to Jane was an injury to Elizabeth? He had been so concerned about how news of his marriage to Elizabeth Bennet would be received by friends and family that he had ignored the feelings of the woman he loved. With so little regard for the person he had hoped to make his wife, he now understood that his proposal had been destined to be rejected.

  Darcy leaned forward, his knees now resting against Elizabeth, and such intimacy gave him courage. “During your time in London, would you accept an invitation to dine at Darcy House? I would love for my sister to meet you, and as an inducement, I shall extend the invitation to your sister and Charles Bingley. My hope is that such a setting will prompt Bingley to action and that a great injustice will be remedied. I can tell you that Bingley has been perfectly miserable since we left Kent, so I have no doubt that your sister’s presence will spur him to action.”

  Lizzy could not conceal her excitement at the prospect of a reunion between Jane and Charles. If left to their own devices, she had no doubt a courtship would follow, especially in light of Mr. Darcy’s comment about Mr. Bingley’s emotional state.

  “I would be honored by such an invitation.”

  “Then it is settled,” Darcy said, slapping his knee as if to close the deal. But there was something else on his mind. “May I ask another favor?”

  Lizzy nodded.

  “If you have not already done so, will you please destroy my letter?”

  Lizzy reached into her reticule and retrieved Mr. Darcy’s letter.

  “You carry it with you?” a puzzled Darcy asked.