Longbourn to London (15 page)

***

Elizabeth flew up the stairs of Longbourn and went directly into her room. Although provoked to slam the door, she did not, for she did not wish anyone to know she was disquieted, with the exception of the man riding away in his coach. She had no doubt that, had she wished, she could have slammed the door full loud enough for him to hear it over the clopping of the horses’ hooves. Without hesitation, she sat at her escritoire and pulled out a sheet of parchment.

14 November 1812
My dearest Fitzwilliam,

Elizabeth looked at her handwriting, and realised she was about to compose her first letter to Darcy, and a love letter, at that. She felt inclinations of desire adrift within her and decided, although it was against all notions of propriety to express such sentiments, she would not refrain.

You have just driven away, and I must let you know that your merest touch has awakened in me such feelings— I am shocked to admit it but shall not keep it from you. Until tonight, my waking thoughts of your expressions of affection have limited themselves to your warm kiss and the secret thrill when you breathe upon my neck. I have dwelt upon these things when alone ever since you first kissed me weeks ago, and these actions affirm my knowledge of your regard in a way much different from your words of love or any talk of excessively generous marriage settlements.

Tonight you went further. Your touch filled me with the strangest need for you, which I cannot explain away. To have it happen now, when you are to be gone from my side for a full week, is a torture most cruel.

These are feelings a maiden ought not express to her betrothed, yet there they are, and you have often said you wish to be told my sentiments and preferences, no matter the kind. My preference, my dearest, is for you to touch me as you did tonight, but not when you must leave me within minutes. Surely, such sensations deserve to be lingered over.

Often I find myself worrying what you would think of me if you knew my dreams. They are just dreams and do no harm, but I do dream of us. There have been other dreams since the first, though none so disturbing or improper. But your touch tonight was an all-too-brief waking version of similar liberties I have already allowed you whilst I sleep. Perhaps when you come back to me, I shall relive those recent milder dreams while awake? You are the experienced one, and I trust you will know best which expressions of love should be allowed between us, and which must wait.

When you return, there will indeed be a great deal less time to wait, and I feel I shall still have many lessons to learn about being a loving wife.

Your adoring pupil,
E.B.

Elizabeth sat, breathing quickly. Her desire was there on the pages for him to read. She felt the sentiments swirling within her would subside upon being put to paper, but they did not. Before she could think twice, she folded and sealed the letter, addressed it, and quietly descended the stairs to place it on the salver in the foyer for the morning’s post.

She slept, when at last sleep did come, with her hand over the path of his finger.

Chapter 10

An Eventful Week…part one

“To be a well-favoured man is a gift of fortune; but to write and read comes by nature.”
William Shakespeare
Much Ado about Nothing

Fitzwilliam Darcy’s mind was still enflamed by Elizabeth’s parting words as he drove his horse towards London the next morning. His heedless touch of her neckline had opened a door of intimacy between them, and he wholly understood and shared her annoyance at the arrival of the carriage outside Longbourn. But if he had not tried her forbearance, he would not have learnt her desires. How delightful to know she would allow something more. He was well exercised and light of heart by the time he reached the cobbled streets outside town. Darcy went directly to his solicitors, Steveton & Sons, still grimy from the road but unconcerned. He had sent an express two days previously, alerting them as to what was required and stating when he expected to arrive in their offices.

After setting the solicitors to their task, he stopped to refresh himself at Darcy House and spent a pleasant hour in conference with the housekeeper, Mrs. Chawton, on making changes to his new bedroom. Darcy planned to move, at last, into the master’s suite. Somehow, at Pemberley, it had felt right to change to the corresponding rooms immediately following his father’s death, but in London, where he came and went in a random manner and lived a bachelor’s life, the change had not seemed necessary. Now it was time for fresh draperies, better bathtubs, and new mattresses for both bedchambers. His first night in those rooms would be Elizabeth’s as well. He smiled at the thought of selecting in which room to sleep—
mistress or master, or both?

He entered the library, hoping to find any book on marital relations secreted there. Mrs. Chawton looked in to ask if he would remain at home for dinner, making him jump even though the book he was consulting at the moment was a recently arrived volume on the birds and flowers of Derbyshire. He thought he might send it to Elizabeth as a gift.

“I’m sorry to have alarmed you, Mr. Darcy. I ought to have knocked.”

“Nonsense, the door was open. I was merely lost in my thoughts. Once I have written a note to Miss Elizabeth, I would like this book wrapped and sent to her. I shall ring when the note is ready. And yes, I shall dine in this evening.”

Mrs. Chawton smiled. “Very good, sir. And may I say, sir, how delighted we are by the news of your wedding. If I may beg your pardon, we have just had word from Mrs. Reynolds at Pemberley, and she sends her unqualified approval of your choice of wife. Not that the approval of servants matters, sir, but we do want you to know we are pleased.”

Darcy started to laugh. “You mean relieved, do you not?” Darcy had no illusions about how both Caroline Bingley and his cousin Anne de Bourgh—and her mother— plagued his servants when they were entertained at either of his residences.

It was not an easy thing to make Mrs. Chawton blush should one wish to do so, but she did. “Yes, sir. I shall not say more.” She smiled and left him to his writing.

15 November 1812
Darcy House, London

For my dearest Elizabeth,

It is my fond wish for this volume to answer those questions about the natural surroundings of your future home that are beyond my knowledge. I can claim to know the best place to watch the Black Kites soar over the Peaks, which I know you will enjoy. I look forward to seeing Pemberley anew through your beautiful eyes.

With deepest love,
F. Darcy

Darcy folded the note and slipped it inside the front cover, then went to find Mrs. Chawton. He returned to the library until dinner was served, having been unsuccessful in his search for secret information in hidden books.

After dinner, in a moment of sudden inspiration, Darcy betook himself to the master bedroom’s bookcases, where his careful father would have been more likely to have a cache of books he would not have wanted his son to find. On a bottom shelf, after moving the bed to reach it, he found a stack of books on their sides. He suspected the first one he opened might be identical to the volume of naughty French cartoons that Elizabeth had found in her father’s desk. As he turned the pages, the pictures became exceptionally detailed and amusing, but not exactly informative.

Darcy picked up the second book, containing hand-tinted drawings of naked women of many body styles—flat chested, plump, buxom but long-legged, long-limbed but too skinny, perfect derrieres, and some less than perfect—some scantily draped with fabric, and although beautifully rendered, the images were not instructional. He wondered which image he would find his Elizabeth to most resemble.
I shall know soon enough
.

In the very back of the book was a surprising page tipped into the binding from some other source and on different paper, containing a pen and ink drawing of the surface structures between a woman’s legs, quite medical in its thoroughness. He had not realised the maidenhead was so close to the threshold. This book he set aside for further review. The tinted pictures were lovely and he was inclined to learn the Latin names of Elizabeth’s parts, but how such knowledge would help him comfort her on their wedding night, he knew not.

The last book was indeed a marriage manual, verbose on the topics of abetting conception and managing intimate congress with a woman already with child. In Darcy’s opinion, it was far-fetched in how to stimulate an elderly husband, and gave no suggestions for the wedding night. The book seemed to take into account a lady’s emotions and sensations not at all. It was published in 1782, the year his parents married.
This cannot have been much help even then,
he decided.

With a disappointed sigh, Darcy returned to his old bedroom with the picture book of female nudes. After pouring himself a half tumbler of brandy, he was ready for bed. It had been a long day; he had tossed and turned the night before, with Elizabeth’s parting words echoing in his ears. No, she did not think him a rake for touching her intimately, but rather she was annoyed with him for not trying further, and for attempting anything at all just before departing. What a miraculous and confounding thing was the female mind, or at least Elizabeth Bennet’s.

It was with these weighty but gratifying issues that he occupied his mind before falling to sleep.

***

Miss Elizabeth Bennet stepped into the billiard room at Netherfield Park. Darcy straightened from aligning a shot, and bowed slightly. He had taken off his frock coat, and he was in his waistcoat with his shirt sleeves rolled up almost to his elbows. She appeared confused about what room she was in and met Darcy’s gaze with a slight tilt of her head. She was wearing the elegant gown from the Netherfield ball, half of her creamy bosom exposed above pale yellow polished muslin. In the autumnal afternoon light, she looked ethereal, a shaft of sunshine in a dark masculine room.

“Miss Bennet!”

She started to back out of the room, stopped when he said her name, and bobbed a brief curtsy. “Mr. Darcy.”

“Do you play?”

She eyed him warily. “If I say yes, I am too modern in my habits and not feminine, and if I say no, then I am a country miss with no experience of the world. Surely, sir, you know there is no billiard room at Longbourn, nor is it considered a woman’s game.”

“It seems I have earned your distrust. But be assured, I agree few women take the opportunity of playing. It is a relaxing pastime and, like archery, improves hand-to-eye coordination. Would you care to try?”

His tone seemed to challenge her and she took a step or two into the room, chewing the corner of her lower lip in the most beguiling manner.

“Perhaps if you cared to demonstrate, Mr. Darcy,” she finally suggested, “I could answer you properly.”

“I shall most happily oblige.” He met her gaze with a slight smile that deepened his dimples. She coloured slightly, and he wondered why. He stood at the centre of the table end nearest him, and surveyed the balls on the felt surface. “The object is to use the cue stick to hit the plain ball, the cue ball, into the coloured and striped balls, knocking them into the pockets. After each successful shot, one reassesses the remaining combinations on the table, and selects the next shot based on how easily one thinks another ball can be hit into another pocket.” He pointed to the red ball.

“I have been amusing myself hitting in the solid colour balls first. The red ball is close to the pocket, and I should be able to tap it in with just a touch of the cue ball. However, one does need to think ahead to where the cue ball will roll after the shot, and perhaps if I hit the ball harder, the cue ball will come to rest in a way that will produce another easy shot.”

“Like chess, then,” she responded, “one thinks a few moves ahead?”

He was bent over the table, aiming, but looked up, reappraising her. “You play chess, Miss Bennet?”

“Oh, yes, I play with my father.” She smiled a little.

“Somehow I find I am not surprised. Let me continue: in billiards, one always assumes one will make the next shot, and one’s opponent will not.” He leaned in, and with precise efficiency, pulled the cue stick back and took his shot with the desired result.

She was standing at the corner of the table where the red ball dropped smartly into the pocket. She widened her eyes. “Oh!”

He had been aiming at her.

The cue ball rolled to the centre of the table, and presented a fairly simple angled shot to put a purple ball into a side pocket. “Come, Miss Bennet, grab a stick.”

She went to the rack of cue sticks affixed to the wall between two windows. As she stood, the afternoon sun revealed the outline of her legs under her gown, and Darcy quietly held his breath at the sight. He shook his head to clear his mind.