Page 35 of Elizabeth is not a Bennet

On the Road to Ravenswood

Two Days Later

Elizabeth sat close beside her husband, with Mr. Wickham across from her and Mr. Adair at the far side of the opposite cushion. The road to Ravenswood was not precisely good, but the Darcy carriage was well sprung, and it was a trip of only six miles. Elizabeth was feeling strangely anxious about the upcoming visit, her first visit to the estate she owned, but had never seen. It was, at least, a deep comfort to know that right behind their own carriage traveled the one with their servants, including the brawny footmen her husband had tasked with her safety. She only wished that her uncle could have joined them, but he had arrived at breakfast looking pale and wan and claimed a terrible headache before retiring back to his chambers with only a cup of tea and a piece of toast.

“Ravenswood is blessed with very good land,” Mr. Adair remarked. “The winters are long and harsh, of course, but the soil itself is fertile.”

“What about drainage?” Darcy asked, squinting out at the fields to his left .

“Well, erm,” Adair replied and ducked his head uncomfortably, “I fear that at least two of the tenants’ fields are prone to flooding.”

Darcy lifted his chin and glared at the other man. “I understood that you were managing the estate. Why did you not pay to have those fields drained properly?”

Adair winced and said, “You must understand that I truly thought that Harold Stowe would inherit Ravenswood on his majority.”

“And Mrs. Stowe asked that instead of spending money on the estate, you save a substantial portion in the bank, perhaps?” Elizabeth suggested. This caused her husband to start in surprise, but Adair nodded and admitted, “For more than a decade, most of the income went into improving the house and land, both of which were, regrettably, neglected during Mr. Bradley Stowe’s life. But some seven years ago, Mrs. Stowe sent a letter ordering me to save as much as possible of the income until her son inherited. I see now that it was a mistake, though I had good intentions.”

“I do not blame you,” Elizabeth said quickly. “It was a reasonable decision, given your understanding of the situation. Nor am I surprised; my stepmother is reputedly in debt, and doubtless she was looking forward to a lump sum to pay them off. ”

“But the money would go to Harold Stowe not his mother,” Adair protested.

“Young Mr. Stowe is entirely under the influence of his mother,” Wickham said. “She is very much the master of Greymere and of her son.”

“Did any of the income from Ravenswood go to Mrs. Stowe these last years?” Darcy demanded, his eyes narrowed.

“No, no,” Adair assured them. “That would have been unethical and illegal. The money has been invested in the Funds. I do not know the exact amount offhand, but it is at least three thousand pounds.”

“How much does Ravenswood earn a year?” Darcy asked.

“It used to earn fifteen hundred pounds a year, which increased to seventeen hundred a year a decade ago, but it now has dropped down to fourteen hundred a year because one of the tenant farms is standing empty; the family living there left for Edinburgh two years ago as their farm had one of the flooded fields, plus their cottage roof fell apart, and Mrs. Stowe would not give me permission to have it repaired.”

“I see,” Darcy said grimly .

Elizabeth reached over to pat his hand reassuringly and said, “Do not fret, my dear. We will fix what is broken.”

“We will,” Darcy agreed, “but it distresses me that some of the tenant families have been suffering in such a way.”

“I should have done more,” Adair said mournfully, “but given that I thought…”

“It is quite all right,” Elizabeth said hastily. “You did not know that I was alive, and since you are a close relation to my stepmother, it would have been difficult to refuse her requests, given that you thought her son Harold would inherit in a few years.”

“Yes, exactly. Moreover, I understand that Mrs. Stowe has had quite a challenging time financially of late, with poor harvests and the like.”

Darcy stiffened at these words, well aware that Mrs. Stowe’s pecuniary issues were due to her own extravagant ways.

“What do you know about the steward of Ravenswood?” Wickham asked suddenly.

Adair appeared startled and said, “What do you mean? ”

“I mean, has he been recently hired? Does he know Moira Stowe? Is there any chance that he is working hand in glove with her?”

Adair now looked horrified and turned his gaze on the Darcys, who were nodding.

“It has to be considered,” Darcy said. “Mrs. Stowe seems to be adept at convincing men to do what she wants.”

Adair took a deep breath and shook his head. “I do not think that the current steward has ever met Moira or Harold Stowe. The man’s father was the previous steward of Ravenswood, and his grandfather before him. The Bartlets have been loyal to Ravenswood and the Mullins for years; your mother was a Mullins before her marriage, Mrs. Darcy.”

“How old is Bartlet?” Darcy asked.

“He must be close to fifty years of age. His own son is articled to a solicitor in Edinburgh, and the expectation is that when Bartlet retires, his son will take his place.”

“That sounds encouraging,” Wickham remarked.

“Is that the manor?” Elizabeth asked, leaning toward the window .

Mr. Adair looked out and nodded. “Indeed. I have not visited it for some months, and there are only a few servants keeping the place up. Again, Mrs. Stowe did not wish to pour money into the house, as she said she and Mr. Stowe would be living in Northumberland for the foreseeable future. I am certain that Mr. and Mrs. Cummons, the butler and housekeeper, have done their best, but it is a difficult task with insufficient funds.”

“The house is an interesting style,” Elizabeth said thoughtfully, staring at the mansion, which was growing larger in her vision by the minute.

It was a rambling house, with one obviously newer wing along the south, built from gray stone, though some of that hue might come from the dirt that discolored it. Gray shingles covered the roof, missing in some patches, and the chimney pots at the top were cracked and sagging. The windows stood in good need of a wash, visible even at that distance.

The horses turned right, pulling the carriage onto a long driveway. The carriage rocked and jolted, and Darcy pulled Elizabeth protectively closer to him.

“The driveway needs a load of gravel,” Adair said, clutching a handy strap.

Darcy nodded but kept his lips tight. The lawn had not been mowed, and fencing was falling down, and in general, the area emitted an air of gentle decrepitude. It would cost a great deal to bring Ravenswood into order. He could afford it with ease, of course, but since he and Elizabeth would not be living permanently here, it might not be the best use of money to have the manse repaired. On the other hand, it did an estate no good to have no one living in the main house.

Elizabeth turned to him at this moment and smiled, and his anxieties and irritations gave way to a sudden surge of adoration. He had his dear wife with him, and together they would sort it all out. He need not worry about it right now.

The carriage came to a gentle, swaying halt, and one of Darcy’s servants opened the door from the outside. The gentlemen descended, and Darcy handed out his wife, even as the other carriage came to a halt some yards away. Four of Darcy’s burly servants appeared and came closer, determined to protect their mistress. Darcy knew that Elizabeth was almost certainly secure here, but he did not care to take any chances on the safety of his precious wife.

“Shall we?” Darcy asked, holding out his arm to Elizabeth. She nodded, tucked her gloved hand into his arm, and they walked toward the stone steps leading to the porch. Adair, Wickham, and the servants followed them, and Darcy used a knocker shaped like a lion’s head to knock, provoking a deep booming noise to rattle through the air .

A minute later, a thin, dark-haired woman of some fifty years opened the door partway. She was dressed in a simple blue dress with an apron over it, with faded blue eyes, and her dark hair partially silvered under her mob cap. For a moment, she stared at the Darcys, and then her gaze shifted to Mr. Adair, standing a few feet away.

“Oh, Mr. Adair!” she cried out, opening the door wider. “Sir, I had no idea … do come in, come in! If only we had known, we would have…”

“It is quite all right, Mrs. Cummons,” Adair replied with a reassuring smile. “How is your husband?”

“Oh, well enough, sir, though his gout … but never mind that. Do you wish to come in? I fear there is no tea, oh dear!”

Elizabeth smiled kindly and said, “We do not require tea, but we would like to come in out of the cold.”

The woman looked helplessly at Adair, who said, “Yes, of course, Mrs. Darcy. Perhaps we can sit in the drawing room?”

“The Holland covers are over all the furniture in there, sir,” the housekeeper said, “and one of the windows has been leaking. Perhaps the front sitting room? It is the coziest in the house. ”

“Lead the way,” Darcy ordered, and Mrs. Cummons, relieved at the clear instructions, obediently guided the Darcys and Wickham into a front sitting room, where Darcy guided Elizabeth over to a sofa near the unlit, empty fireplace. Adair paused in the door and said, “Mrs. Cummons, is Mr. Bartlet about?”

The woman nodded and said, “Indeed, sir, he is in the kitchen speaking with my husband about one of the tenants. Do you wish for me to fetch him?”

“Yes, and your husband as well,” Adair directed, and the woman scurried out of the room.

“It is rather cold in here,” Darcy remarked. “Does this chimney draw well?”

“It did the last time I was here,” Adair said.

“Simmons?” Darcy said, turning toward the door where his male servants were waiting.

“Yes, sir?”

“Find wood for this fire.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Rykes, stay here in case we need you, and you other two, tour the house and note any issues you see with leaks and the like.”

“Yes, sir. ”

“Darcy,” Wickham said, “Would you like me to make a tour of the grounds for you and make a list of problems with fencing, and the stables, and the like?”

Darcy looked rather startled but nodded, and Wickham departed with the servants, just as Mrs. Cummons returned with two men at her heels. One was some fifty years of age wearing threadbare garments which identified him as the butler, and one was a grizzled man of roughly the same age, clad in a warm tan coat, a white linen shirt, and buckskin trousers, and reasonably well-polished boots.

“Mrs. Darcy, Mr. Darcy,” Adair said, “Mrs. Cummons, Mr. Cummons, and Mr. Bartlet.”

He turned to the steward and the Cummons and said, “I am certain all this will be a great surprise. Mrs. Darcy is the former Miss Elizabeth Stowe, daughter of Mrs. Isobel Stowe, formerly Isobel Mullins, who lived here at Ravenswood as a child.”

Mr. Bartlet merely looked confused, but Mrs. Cummons jerked and shook her head. “Miss Stowe … but Mr. Adair, I was told the child died!”

“I did not die,” Elizabeth said, “but my stepmother, Mrs. Moira Stowe, told Mr. Adair and, indeed, all of her relations that I passed away during the smallpox epidemic which claimed my father’s life. In truth, I have been living for many years in Hertfordshire in the care of my father’s close friend from Oxford, a Mr. Thomas Bennet.”

The woman continued to stare at Elizabeth in wonder, and then tears filled her eyes and began dripping down her cheeks. She hastily lifted her apron to wipe her face and said, “Miss Stowe, oh, I apologize, Mrs. Darcy, oh, I can hardly believe it! I knew your mother very well, you know. I was an upper chambermaid here when she married Mr. Stowe so many years ago. You look just like her. Oh, I can hardly believe it, it is absolutely wonderful! Oh, I do apologize for my tears. ‘Tis so…”

“Nonsense, Mrs. Cummons,” Elizabeth interrupted, rising to her feet and smiling into the woman’s face. “This has all been a shock for you. My husband and I arrived only a few days ago in Kelso, and Mr. Adair was as startled as you are that I am alive and well.”

“Praise God for that!” the housekeeper cried out. “And will you be settling here then, Madame?”

Elizabeth glanced at Darcy, then back at the woman, and shook her head. “I will not, as my husband has an estate in Derbyshire, and we are happily settled there. But I recently turned one and twenty and am now legal mistress of Ravenswood, so we decided to journey here to discover what needs to be done to bring the house and estate back into good order. ”

“I fear that so much has been neglected,” the woman replied sorrowfully. “Cummons and I have done our best, but with only a daily girl, we could not keep the house in order.”

“That is not your fault,” Elizabeth assured her, just as a servant appeared with a load of firewood in his arms. Darcy pulled his wife back into her seat, and within a few minutes, a fire was burning brightly. To the considerable relief of all, the chimney drew very well, and Elizabeth, who had been feeling chilly, found herself leaning gratefully toward the flames.

Mr. Bartlet, who had been watching with a peculiar look on his face, coughed and said, “Mrs. Darcy, Mr. Darcy, I hope you do not mind if I find this rather, erm…”

He trailed off and looked at Adair, who said, “You have every reason to be doubtful. I was equally doubtful when the Darcys appeared on my doorstep two days ago, but they brought a great deal of documentation. More than that, they have proof that Mrs. Moira Stowe, mother of Harold Stowe, not only knew that Elizabeth Stowe was alive and due to inherit Ravenswood, but she paid a man to attack Mrs. Darcy. She was actually shot, but thankfully she was not badly injured.

Darcy frowned at this horrible memory, and Bartlet turned an amazed look on the Darcys .

“Surely you are not serious!” he cried.

“We are entirely serious,” Darcy said grimly. “The attack occurred last autumn before our marriage, and only a last-minute movement on Elizabeth’s part prevented a fatal wound. Moreover, an agent of ours, Mr. Wickham, managed to trick Mrs. Stowe into writing letters wherein the woman also asked Wickham to murder my wife.”

“It seems beyond belief!” Bartlet exclaimed. “I have never met Mrs. Stowe, but she is a lady, is she not?”

“By birth, yes,” Adair said grimly. “However, it appears that she and her son have been spending recklessly for many years, and young Mr. Stowe would inherit Ravenswood on his majority if his half-sister died.”

“Dear God,” Bartlet murmured gruffly.

“Gentlemen,” Elizabeth said, “I know there is a great deal of business to discuss regarding my stepmother, my half-brother, the condition of the estate, and other such details, but I want nothing more than to speak with Mrs. Cummons about my mother. Would you mind if Mrs. Cummons and I spoke in the kitchen, perhaps?”

“You should stay here near the fire, my dear,” Darcy said instantly. “Perhaps the men and I can retire to the kitchen? ”

Elizabeth opened her mouth to protest and then closed it without a sound. Darcy was looking determined, and she knew that he only cared about her well being.

“Very well,” she agreed. “Mrs. Cummons, would you be kind enough to sit down and tell me about my mother?”

The woman looked startled and even nervous, but with nodding encouragement from the gentlemen, she took a seat.

Darcy, after making certain that his beloved was comfortable and warm, ordered the manservant by the door to keep watch over Elizabeth, and the men retreated to the kitchen, which was not as warm as would be expected because the windows were very drafty. Obviously a great deal of work needed to be done.