Apprehension and Desire: A Tale of Pride and Prejudice (38 page)

His eyes swept over her lovely body one last time, and he threw the covers over her, up to her chin. He was a low man that all he could think about were her sweet places when her life could be threatened as the result of the fall at this very moment.

He put another thick blanket over her and picked up all her clothes, strewing them on the floor, in front of the fire so they would dry through the night.

The girls very much wanted to see the guest, so he let them stay with Jane for the time he needed to check whether his people had properly closed the stables for the night. When he returned half an hour later, Jane had still not moved, and his daughters were perched around her on the bed, watching her quietly.  He hoped she would wake up in the morning without any permanent damage. The bump on her head did not look serious, as he put a cold rag with  snow on it to help the swelling.

It was difficult to put the girls to bed, as they were so curious about the unexpected guest. When he managed that at last, after sitting for nearly half an hour beside Mary till she dozed off, he put a few additional logs on the fire in the girls' room and left.

As he entered his bedroom, he noticed that Jane was turned on her side. He thought it a good sign. Her face was peaceful, as if she was sleeping soundly. He looked longingly at the big bed. It had been a long day, and he was tired. He could go downstairs to sleep on a sofa that was too small for him in the first place. That would be the right thing to do. He could not imagine leaving her alone here though. She might need him during the night. He stared at the bare hard wood floor. Had he been gentleman, he would have chosen sleeping there, next to the bed.

“She will never know,” he whispered as he removed his own clothes. “I will keep her warm and safe through the night.”

He checked the fire and climbed into the bed. He did not dare to move closer and touch her. He was afraid not only of disturbing her, but also his own reaction at having her snuggled against him, almost skin to skin.

***

Joe woke up at his usual early hour, when the sky was yet gray. He felt a warm, soft shape next to him. Somehow during the night, he had shifted closer, and now he spooned behind her, her bottom nestled against his morning erection.

He wished to stay like that forever, but it  would be no good if she had woken up and found herself in bed with him. With reluctance, he got up and shrugged into the clothes he had worn yesterday. Her clothes were dry, so he gathered them together, placing them on the bottom of the bed. He put new logs on the dying fire so she would stay warm.

With one last look at her calm form buried under the covers in his own bed, he left the room.

***

Jane opened her eyes and gazed about the unfamiliar room.  She was naked apart from her undergarments, and all her clothes were placed neatly on the foot of the big bed she was in. Then the recollection of what happened to her yesterday came and she screamed.

Loud, heavy steps were heard outside the room and the next instant, the door fell open and a man stepped in.

Her heart stopped, but then when she recognized his face, she closed her eyes in relief.

“Do not be afraid,” he said slowly.

“I am not.” She opened her eyes.

He sat on the edge of the bed, his eyes searching her face. “How are you feeling?”

“Well, though my head hurts.” She touched her forehead, feeling the bump.

“No other pains?” he asked, almost tenderly.

She shook her head and gazed around the room. “Where am I?”

“At my home. I found you yesterday, late in the afternoon in the snow on my pasture. What were you doing so far away from Pemberley? ”

Jane stared at him for a moment, silently.

“Do you remember what happened to you?”

She nodded. “I went on a walk around the park. My sister was busy with Mrs. Reynolds, Georgiana stayed with Amy and the baby, because the boy seemed to have developed a slight cold. I was all alone. I walked perhaps too far, almost to the end of the park, where it turns into a forest behind the manor. I only noticed how far I walked when two men appeared out of nowhere. The put a sack on my head, and though I struggled, they put me on a horse and we rode somewhere.”

“Do you know who they were?” he asked urgently.

“I do not know them, but from I what I heard of their conversation, I think that they wanted to capture Georgiana and not me. They must have mistaken me for her because we are of the same height, similar figures and both blondes. They brought me to some place, and when they removed the sack, I could see that it was a cottage, old, dirty and shabby. It could not be that far from Pemberley because we did not ride for a very long time.”

“You say they mistook you for Miss Darcy.”

“I heard them speaking that now when they had his little sister, Darcy would pay them for all the wrong he had done to them. They sounded very proud of themselves.”

“It must be Kirby.”

“Who?”

“Your brother-in-law’s tenant. Darcy decided to terminate his lease on the farm because of his drinking and overall uselessness. Kirby must have gone completely mad to attempt something like this. Darcy will tear him apart. But somebody must have helped him. There were two of them, you say?”

Jane nodded.

“How did you escape?” he wanted to know.

“It was not that difficult. They did not even tie me down. I think that they were quite a bit drunk, because their speech slurred, they did not smell nice, and to the very end they thought that I was Georgiana. Besides, they drank more after they had brought me in. I used the moment when one of them left the cottage, and the other turned to build the fire. I hit him with the chair and ran outside. There was a horse in the front yard, so I mounted it somehow. As you know, I cannot ride well, and I had never ridden astride like a man, so it was very difficult to keep myself in the saddle, but I knew I had to run away as far as I could. The last thing that I remember was that the horse threw me down and I hit the ground. Then I woke up here.”

“Thank you, God, nothing worse happened to you.”

“I am only surprised they did not follow me. After all, they had two horses... I took one, but the other was left.”

“They could have followed you, I think they did, one of  them at least,” he explained. “But then they saw me coming to you, and they preferred not to take the risk, or they were already too drunk to follow you.”

Jane shook her head, her eyes wide. “How very strange. I can hardly believe all that.”

Joe reached instinctively to her cheek, cupping it with his rough hand. “Thank you, God, that nothing worse happened. You were very brave.”

She allowed their eyes to meet for a long moment, before breaking the contact and leaning away from his touch

Jane took a peek beneath the covers. “Who removed my clothes?” she asked very quietly.

“I.”

She gasped. “You should not have.”

“I had to. They were wet. You could have become very sick had I not taken them off.”

“You could ask a servant.”

“I have no servant in the house at the moment. I was on my way back from Lambton where I tried to hire one without success when I found you lying there in the snow.”

Jane bit her lower lip, lifting the sheet higher, her eyes averted.

“I cannot say I did not look at you,” he admitted, “You are the finest woman I have ever seen. But I did not harm you.”

Jane’s face bloomed in intense blushes. “I did not want to imply that you hurt me.  It is just…”

“I am of a lower class than you, but I am a man,” he grunted. “And I think that you are lovely. You can slap me for that.” He sounded rebellious.

Jane looked up and smiled. “Thank you for rescuing my life.”

“I will leave you now.” He moved from the bed to the door, his expression all businesslike, his voice firm. “I must see to the horses, later I will send someone to Pemberley. They must be dead worried about you.”

***

When Joe returned upstairs after nearly an hour, he found his bedroom empty, and most of her clothes gone, apart from her coat and gloves.

“She could not have gone far,” he murmured, running down the stairs. She must have thought him some brute, no better than the ones who had abducted her. He cried for the girls. Perhaps they had seen her.

“We are in the kitchen, Papa.” Abigail’s voice answered.

As he stormed into the big kitchen, he saw Jane was by the stove, dressed in her very own, now very wrinkled dress, her pale, straight hair let free, hanging down her back.

“What are you doing?” he barked, frowning at the skillet in her hand.

Her pink mouth fell open. “I…” she stammered, “The girls were hungry,” she explained. “They said they did not have anything for dinner yesterday, and I thought it was because all that fuss with me, so when I saw those eggs...”

He looked at his daughters. They were eating scrambled eggs and bacon. He felt hot in the face; he was ashamed he had forgotten to give them dinner last night. What kind of father was he; keeping them hungry through the night? What was worse was that it had not been the first time it had happened.

“Sit down, you must be hungry too,” she added shyly.

“You should be in bed,” he grunted, his expression almost hostile.

Jane shrugged. “I am feeling well. Just a slight headache.”

He looked at the girls, who seemed not to pay attention to them, only munching their food noisily, their forks moving busily.

He moved onto his usual place behind the large table. “I did not know that a woman of your station could cook, Miss Bennet.” 

“Our mother was rather thorough in our education,” Jane explained with ease, putting a plate with food in front of him. “We did not have to prepare meals, of course, but I observed our cook many times.”

Joseph tasted the food. “It is good.” He could not remove the surprise from his voice.

Jane smiled.

He frowned at her in response. “Sit down and eat too,” he ordered.

After the meal, he wanted her to return to bed, but she refused. He sent her with Mary to the front room, and he started to clean up after the breakfast. Becky and Abigail stayed to help him to dry the dishes and put them into the cupboard, as they always did when they had no servant at home. Jane asked whether she could help, but he spat at her brusquely in response, showing her out of the kitchen. Darcy should be here soon, and the last thing Joe wanted him to see was his sister-in-law washing the plates and scrubbing the pans in the cold water. 

Elizabeth sat next to the fireplace, her back limp. She had spent the last several hours in the smaller drawing room, which was the closest to the main entrance to the manor. At last she heard the anticipated noise in the foyer.

“Jane!” she cried breathlessly as she ran out of the doorway, her feet slipping on the marble mosaic.

Darcy, standing with his back to her, his dark outwear dusted with snow, talked with the chief footman. There was no sign of Jane.

“Where is she? Where is Jane?”

Her husband turned very slowly, and she read the answer on his face. “We have not found her. We shall start the search again tomorrow at first light.”

“But what could have happened?” Elizabeth’s eyes pled. “She has been gone for so many hours. Something must have happened. She said she would take a turn around the park.”

Once out of his coat and hat, Darcy put his cold hands on her shoulders. “We found only this.” He looked at the servant behind him, who took out a navy blue bonnet from behind his cloak.

Elizabeth reached for it and examined carefully. The ribbon on one side was torn. “Someone took her, abducted her?” she whispered, as she searched the faces of Darcy and the footman.

“It is an only explanation, I am afraid,” Darcy agreed gravely. “Unfortunately there are no traces, as the snow covered everything. We barely noticed the bonnet. But if someone took her by force, it means that now she has at least some shelter for the night, that she is not lost somewhere in the woods.”

Tears stood in Elizabeth’s eyes. “But why… who…?” she asked, her eyes shifting hopelessly from her husband to the servant.

“We have some suspicions,” the servant said, his voice cautious.

“We cannot look  for her now,” Darcy explained, his concerned gaze on Elizabeth. “We must wait till it stops snowing, till the morning. It is a pitch dark right now.”

Elizabeth swayed and stepped back awkwardly. Darcy was beside her in a second.

“She is all alone out there,” she croaked. “What if she freezes to death somewhere in the woods?”

“We cannot think the worst,” Darcy tried to soothe her. “If someone kidnapped her for ransom, and in my view it is the only logical explanation, then he will not hurt her; she is too precious.”

Elizabeth’s  face went white, her pupils dilated, and she began breathing heavily, as if wheezing.

“Come, my love, you should retire.” Darcy directed her towards the stairs, his voice quiet. “We shall start to look again in the morning.”