Pemberley (4 page)

‘It could be that she thought you would refuse her,' said the simple, good-hearted Jane, ‘with Mr Wickham so much disliked by Mr Darcy, ever since he was a young man.'

‘She writes to you because she believes you will find a way to persuade me,' cried Elizabeth. ‘It isn't fair on you, Jane; for I shall never be persuaded.'

Mr Bingley came into the room at this point and remarked that he had heard a forceful tone and had come to see if assistance was in order. This was said with a twinkle, for Mr Bingley was as good-natured as his wife. It was nevertheless awkward for Elizabeth to have to give the reason for her raised voice – which had in fact frightened little Emily and sent her scampering from the room.

‘Lizzy has read Lydia's letter,' said Jane by way of explanation.

‘I believe our mother has done all this!' cried Elizabeth, who did not want her refusal of her younger sister as a guest at Pemberley to be relayed in too blunt a manner to Mr Bingley. ‘It can only come from her: it's some notion of getting us all together.'

‘I would not be sorry of that,' said Jane in as quiet a tone as Elizabeth's had been feverish. ‘But you are the mistress of Pemberley, Lizzy, and you are to have the final word. Poor Lydia,' she added, as Elizabeth looked about for a way of escape and saw none. ‘She will find lodgings at Rowsley if she does not leave it too late, I am sure.'

‘I know a farmer who lets rooms just by here,' said Mr Bingley. ‘Emily will like to go from Pemberley and play with her Wickham cousins when we are all there at Christmas.'

‘I will talk to Darcy,' said Elizabeth, for she saw with bitterness that Lydia and Mr Wickham could hardly be seen to be excluded
from so large a house at a time of pious rejoicing. ‘I do not think Mr Darcy will want Mr Wickham in the house,' was all she had to fall back on, now.

‘A man as violently in love with his wife as Darcy is with you, my dear Eliza, would not care if there were a dozen Mr Wickhams in the house,' said Bingley.

The next hours passed happily enough, with little Emily made to laugh and play again by her mother and her aunt Lizzy; and Mr Bingley making a treasure-hunt in the garden that had as its final prize a doll's house constructed by Mr Bingley himself in the barn.

‘It is beautifully done!' cried Elizabeth. ‘A handsome house indeed' – and, lifting Emily high to the windows of the bedchambers: ‘Look, Emily! You shall have some dolls to lie in those magnificent fourposters. And some very smart footmen to serve in the dining-room – I shall make them myself!'

Elizabeth saw the joy in her sister's eyes at the love and practicality that had gone into the making of the doll's house. She was fortunate – but here Elizabeth caught herself up and wondered at the unspoken disloyalty to her own position – her own husband, even. It was true, certainly, that Jane's husband was an easier man to be with than Elizabeth's: Mr Bingley was as sunny as a cloudless day, all geniality and smiles; whereas Mr Darcy, as Elizabeth so well knew after close on a year of marriage to him, could as little evade the dark, thunderous looks that sometimes crossed his face and lingered there as he could sidestep his position as master of Pemberley. He had so many people looking to him for comfort and support; so many decisions to be made in the course of every day that could change the future of the estate and those who worked there – those must be the reasons, Elizabeth always supposed, that he would grow so silent and aloof at times. And and here Elizabeth sighed, set little Emily down on the floor of the barn and went to take her sister's arm, to suggest a stroll on the lawns – there was no child as yet to raise Mr Darcy's spirits, no
reason for him to occupy himself with childish things, as Mr Bingley so gladly did.

If it was hard to think of Mr Darcy as a being capable of so great a change in character and outlook as this (for to see him busy with the construction of a doll's house was far beyond Elizabeth's imagining) it was important to remember that such great changes did not infrequently take place when a man became a father. Mr Darcy would dote – surely he would. Yet a slender doubt remained, and Elizabeth had no wish to own it. She could not recall that Darcy had shown interest in any of the children of the estate workers; and, this being an area of chief concern to her, she had sometimes lightly wondered why this should be. Mr Darcy was kindness and generosity itself, and there was no surprise in this, when it came to hearing his Eliza's requests for funds, clothing and schooling for the children of the men who worked his land for him. All Derbyshire knew of the progressive measures the new Mrs Darcy was putting in place, and that Mr Darcy's good heart was regulated now by the practical suggestions of a wife who would steer him in the right direction. All the same, Elizabeth sensed a distance – which, again, she must put down to the great distance between these families and Mr Darcy's: they depended on him so entirely, after all – as the cause of his almost absent-minded and distracted air when the subject was broached.

‘My dearest Lizzy,' said Jane, for she had a gift of knowing sometimes to the point of the uncanny what transpired in her sister's mind, ‘are you quite certain that we will not be an imposition at Pemberley for Christmas? It is perfectly easy for us, you know, to come in the chaise for a day and put up with friends for the night before we return home. Mama would still see as much of us as she pleased, for she can come here with us when we return. She exaggerates the inconvenience of the journey greatly.'

‘Jane!' cried Elizabeth in return, and laughed aloud to find her fears so neatly caught once again, though she intended never to confide Mr Darcy's black mood at the mention of the opening of
the nurseries to her sister if she could help it. ‘I am such a novice at this kind of thing, that's all. I have the best housekeeper in the world – Mrs Reynolds – but I am still shy with her and I think she will discover all the little habits we had of dining and arranging ourselves at Longbourn, which would not do at Pemberley at all! No, I confess I fear the very idea of Mama and Lady Catherine de Bourgh both under one roof – and that roof mine!'

Elizabeth broke off and Jane clasped her close. ‘I understand, Lizzy. And my heart aches for you now that Lydia announces her intentions.' She paused, then said on a quieter note: ‘Suppose Mr Darcy finds Lydia's children very bothersome, my dear. He is not used to them, you know. He has lived at Pemberley a bachelor so long – and Georgiana was often at Rosings with her aunt, so I've heard. Why should we then impose our own child …?'

‘But Jane! Emily will bring the joy of Christmas to the place!' cried Elizabeth. Then, no longer able to resist, she held Jane close and murmured that she hoped the presence of the child would make it possible for her to conceive; would lift what she now began to see as a curse of childlessness that hung over Pemberley. ‘I do not even know any longer that Darcy wants a child as I do,' she ended on so dejected a note that it was Jane's turn to laugh and tease her sister for an attack of over-sensitivity.

‘Darcy is in love, Lizzy!' said Jane when they had both wiped the tears from her eyes. ‘It is not a sentiment of which he has much knowledge. He was accustomed always to have exactly what he pleased – as you know – for he was proud and lofty and assumed you would be flattered to accept his proposal before the words were out of his mouth. He learned he must make himself worthy of you, before you would take him.'

‘I was pleased to accept him when I saw what a magnificent place Pemberley is,' said Elizabeth; and she and Jane both laughed again.

‘There, you are feeling better already! But you must understand the novelty for Mr Darcy in this whole situation. He loves you –
and he does not think of a child yet, for you are wife, child and lover to him.'

That may be,' said Elizabeth; and she turned to walk back along the lawn to the barn, where Emily played entranced with the miniature house her father had built for her.

‘Have you spoken of a child with Darcy?' asked Jane as she hastened to catch Elizabeth by the door of the barn.

‘Goodness, no!' came the answer; and, before Elizabeth could go on, Mr Bingley had come out from the shadows at the back of the barn with a spar of wood he would cut down as a table for the doll's house.

Mr Bingley was all affability and declared himself delighted at his forthcoming visit to Pemberley. He had stayed there at this time of year before, because, as sister Lizzy knew, he had been a good friend of Mr Darcy for as long as anyone could remember. ‘It will be a merry and happy place this year, with Elizabeth Darcy at the foot of the table,' Mr Bingley said with gallantry. He enquired as to the party for the children of the estate workers, which was by tradition in the way of taking place just two days after Christmas Day.

‘I am the organiser this year,' said Elizabeth, who was by now much soothed by the sympathy of Jane and the kind interest of Mr Bingley in the party, which would be held at Pemberley. ‘It will have a larger number of presents and parcels to give out than before,' she continued. ‘I do not like to ask for charity – but the neighbouring families have been generous in their donations.'

‘And no doubt you will invite them to the New Year's Ball at Pemberley,' said Mr Bingley, as the maid came down the lawn and said Mrs Darcy's chaise was at the door.

Pemberley had never looked so beautiful as it did today: so Elizabeth was able to reflect, as she went through the park; for, entering at one of its lowest points, she was granted the opportunity to enjoy the mystery and delicacy of the woods in winter, and to appreciate the extent of land that was covered with ancient trees. After half a mile she was at the top of a considerable eminence, and here she alighted, electing to walk down to Pemberley House, situated on the opposite side of the valley and approached by a well-tended road.

She halted awhile to look over at the handsome stone building, standing well on rising ground, and backed by a ridge of high woody hills; and she smiled to see the stream in front, widened even further under her own instructions a few months past and now forming a lake that was neither artificially swollen nor falsely adorned. All in all, the new mistress of Pemberley was confirmed yet again in her first impression, when she had come as a traveller with her aunt and uncle, that she had never seen a place for which nature had done more, or where natural beauty had been so little counteracted by an awkward taste.

Elizabeth walked down towards Pemberley as the shadows lengthened and candles were lit in the house, casting a light on the stone balustrades and gravel walks of the terraces outside. She paused again, before going to the side door she was accustomed to use – for the front door, in all its carved splendour, was opened only on formal occasions – and considered the words her kind sister Jane had spoken, and with them her own foolish attitude (sometimes, at least) to her husband and to her position as his wife.

She was in no doubt that Mr Darcy hoped for an heir one day. But that he was happy with things as they were was only too evident. His sister Georgiana, Elizabeth knew by watching first consternation and then relief in her eyes when she was with the newly wedded couple, had feared at first that Elizabeth's open, sportive nature might offend her brother. Certainly, she had learnt in the months since Elizabeth and Darcy had been together at Pemberley that there are liberties permitted to a wife that a sister more than ten years junior is not accorded; and as she felt on safer and safer ground with the spirit that now took over the old house, her expression of delight grew increasingly marked. Darcy an object of open pleasantry! It was wonderful indeed, to her, to see him unbend and soften at Elizabeth's touch. Her gratitude to her sister she tried to show with as many spontaneous demonstrations of affection as she was capable – but an absence of Elizabeth at Pemberley, even if it were only for a day, returned the girl to the shy, proud ways of her past, when she had been raised by Lady Catherine do Bourgh at Rosings. Then, she had not been permitted for the space of one moment to forget her rank – and the aloofness this required of her and of her inferiors at all times. Now, for all the joy she wished to express at the sound of Elizabeth as she opened the door into the Great Hall, she lingered at the top of the staircase and waited for the call and embrace of Mrs Darcy to come first.

Mrs Fitzwilliam Darcy! Elizabeth was sometimes herself amazed to think of the respectful manner in which she was approached by the wives of the county as well as the tenants and many retainers at Pemberley. Was she too informal, too indiscreet for them? Did she glimpse sometimes a look of dismay, as she laughed and waived the more stringent of the courtesies? She did not think so; but, as she reflected once more – and paused at the foot of the wide staircase – this was another subject on which she and Darcy shared no views. Was Jane right, that a more open, shared marriage, such as hers with Mr Bingley, would banish
Elizabeth's fears and lead her to greater understanding of the man she had found herself, to her own great astonishment, to love extremely? Was not the silence, as if by tacit consent, on many matters close to Elizabeth's thoughts, a part of the allure of the union these two unlikely people had formed? It was as if, by guessing and by saying nothing, the love between them grew daily stronger. Elizabeth could not see herself demanding an interview of Mr Darcy on the subject of future progeny; and just as she knew from his warm and loving smiles that she was not too open with visiting gentry – and would be as happy as he to jest about the most foolish of them when they had gone – so she could only intuit that if Mr Darcy were fretting to see her with child, she would know it and they would talk.

Elizabeth resolved to banish her fears and suspicions and to rejoice in her happiness. She would not allow even the prospect of breaking to Mr Darcy the expected arrival of Lydia and Mr Wickham, and four little Wickhams, to spoil the happy openness and independence of spirit for which she knew he really loved her. She would not permit the sensation, which she knew to be foreign to her nature, of looking for Darcy's disapproval in his every glance, on the occasion of her family's visit to Pemberley. Christmas would be a penance that way; and her fears, she knew, were groundless. For if she, Eliza Bennet, were to be cowed by the size of Pemberley and the possible inconvenience of her husband at the company of her sisters and mother, this would set a precedent that would indeed show a marked change in her personality.