Page 94 of I Thee Wed (Pride And Prejudice Variation #2)

Darcy and Richard were squatting beside the unconscious man. Richard lifted Mr. Seton’s head to see if he was bleeding.

“I feel a bump, but there is no blood.”

Darcy’s eyes fell on Elizabeth. “Darling, your lips are blue.”

Phillip said, “I will bring blankets from the carriage.”

Elizabeth looked to Abby. “Do you have smelling salts with you?”

Looking at Charlotte, she said, “Perhaps we can revive him with salts.”

Abby searched through her reticule and produced a little vial. “Here. I opened it for you.”

Elizabeth waved the vial under his nose. On the third wave, he stirred.

“He is waking up, but he is shivering.”

Elizabeth turned to Darcy. “Fitzwilliam, where are the blankets?”

While he was standing to find his cousin, Phillip appeared with a stack. Elizabeth snatched one and threw it to Charlotte, then took a second and wrapped it around Mr. Seton’s legs. He continued to shiver violently.

Abby had drawn near. “Lizzy, can I help?”

Elizabeth said, “Ask the housekeeper to send for a doctor.”

Abby left, and then Elizabeth saw Mr. Seton’s lips. They were blue; his face was ashen. He had stopped breathing.

Suddenly, she could no longer hear the people around her, and her vision constricted to a narrow, dark tunnel.

How was this happening again? Elizabeth’s mind slipped into terrors she had long forgotten.

His eyes were closed, and he was sinking.

She was frantic and felt the panic rise to her throat, and then felt as though she was suffocating.

Alexander had fallen off the jetty and was now in the water, sinking into the dark depths of the pond. She started screaming.

Charlotte had turned to her, and then she saw him too. His face was underwater. His bright golden hair was moving with each ripple. It was a ghostly sight. His eyes were closed. Alexander was unconscious. He would die unless she saved him.

She dove into the water, and in the periphery, she saw Charlotte dive in as well.

Elizabeth reached him, clutched the back of his collar, and then paddled as hard as she could, struggling to keep his head above water.

She was beginning to tire when Charlotte reached them.

She clutched his other side, and together, they pulled him to shore.

They crawled out of the pond and dragged him out onto the dirt. Alexander was blue. He was not breathing.

“Get the doctor.”

Charlotte ran to get help, but Elizabeth saw her fall; her wet skirts, clinging to her legs, had tripped her up and were slowing her down. Elizabeth was crying.

“Alexander, do not die.”

She threw herself on top of him, clinging to him, begging him not to die.

Then she saw water draining out of his mouth.

His lungs must be full of water. she pressed down on his chest again, this time on purpose, and more water drained out.

She continued to apply pressure until no more water drained, and then she remembered something she had read.

A Scottish surgeon had used a procedure to revive a coal miner who had suffocated.

He blew air into the coal miner’s mouth.

She crawled to Alexander’s head, bent down, and placed her lips on his cold, lifeless ones, and blew. His chest rose. She took another breath and blew again. His chest lifted again. She kept breathing for him until she heard him gasping and coughing.

Then she rolled him onto his side, and more water drained out of his mouth, but now he was breathing on his own.

She cried over him as she held him clutched against her breast, both of them shivering.

She moved beneath him and lifted his head and shoulders onto her knees and watched him breathe until Charlotte returned.

“The doctor is on his way. I sent Maria to find Mamma at the butcher’s shop, and Robby is riding out to find Papa.”

“Charlotte, he is shivering, bring blankets.”

Her friend ran back for blankets, and when she returned, Lady Lucas was with her.

Elizabeth continued to hold him while they wrapped him in blankets.

Alexander was still blue, but he was breathing.

Both Charlotte and Elizabeth wrapped their arms around him to keep him warm, and within a few minutes, Sir William arrived with two footmen, and they lifted him into the cart.

Elizabeth clambered in first, and they laid his head on her lap.

She held him all the way back to Lucas Lodge.

Alexander survived. He caught pneumonia, and all three women took turns at his bedside, applying hot compresses and periodically performing percussion on his back.

These were the doctor’s orders, and the treatments worked.

He recovered. And to look at him now, one would never know he had stopped breathing and then nearly died from pneumonia. ”

“Lizzy! Lizzy!” Abby held her elbow and was shaking her.

Mr. Seton was going to die if someone did not breathe for him. Elizabeth shook her head to clear it of the memories that had flooded her mind. She grabbed Charlotte’s arm and shook her. Charlotte was screaming. She, too, had seen that Mr. Seton had stopped breathing.

“Breathe for him, Charlotte.”

Elizabeth pushed her friend to focus, to do what had to be done.

“Breathe for him, Charlotte. Put your lips on his and breathe into his lungs.”

Her friend looked at her as if she had lost her mind. Elizabeth moved to his head and bent over him.

She put her mouth over his and breathed into it. She was facing his chest. It did not rise. She felt pressure, as if there were an obstruction. She breathed again but blew harder this time. Still, his chest did not rise. She blew a third time. Elizabeth was getting tired.

Darcy yelled, “His chest rose.”

Elizabeth sat back on her heels. “You take over, Charlotte.”

Her friend bent over and breathed into her husband’s mouth.

Abby said, “His chest rose.”

Their friends began to encourage her.

“Breathe again, Charlotte. Keep breathing for him.”

After she had delivered several breaths, Mr. Seton gasped and began to cough. His color was now pink and healthy. His lips were no longer blue. Charlotte began to weep. Both women were shivering.

Darcy wrapped a blanket around Elizabeth’s shoulders, and Abby wrapped another around Charlotte. Darcy and Richard bent near Mr. Seton.

“Seton, can you stand?”

The man said yes.

“We are going to bring your carriage closer, and then we will help you in.”

The man shook his head. Darcy turned to Elizabeth. “Perhaps Mr. and Mrs. Seton should come home with us, so she can have assistance during the night if needed.”

Elizabeth turned to her friend. “What think you, Charlotte? Do you go to your home or to ours?”

Charlotte said, “Mr. Darcy, I accept your hospitality. If Mr. Seton takes a turn for the worse, I will not know how to help him.”

Mr. Darcy nodded. “It is well. I will ask the housekeeper to direct the physician to the house I have leased. Once your husband is in bed, we will send the carriage back to collect clothing for both of you.”

That afternoon, Charlotte tapped on Elizabeth’s bedchamber door.

“Come in.”

Charlotte stood in the doorway. “Do you have a few minutes to talk, Lizzy?”

Elizabeth was sitting on a fainting couch, wrapped in a blanket. “Yes, come sit with me. How is Mr. Seton?”

Charlotte sat down. “He is asleep now, but he has no fever and has no complaint of pain. The physician said he will probably be back on his feet tomorrow because you and I pulled him out very quickly. He does not believe he got any water in his lungs. He referred to this incident as a dry drowning. The cold water may have caused his airway to constrict, making him unable to breathe.”

Charlotte placed her hand over Elizabeth’s. “Lizzy, how did you know what to do?”

Elizabeth began to cry. “When Alexander drowned, he stopped breathing. Do you remember how blue his lips were?”

Charlotte nodded.

“I remember reading about a physician who breathed for a coal miner, and he saved the man’s life. I breathed for Alexander, and I breathed again and again until he started breathing for himself.”

Charlotte was stunned. “You saved Alexander’s life, and then he abandoned you.”

Elizabeth wiped her eyes. “I wanted very much to be part of your family. You were all close, and you all loved each other. Your mother had more affection for me than my own mother did. You remember. My mother has never liked me. Alexander and I loved each other, and I loved you and your mother. I never would have believed that a day would come when Alexander would go his way and I another, or that I would be married to someone else, but that is exactly what happened.”

Charlotte was silent for what seemed a long time, and then she said, “You must hate our entire family.”

Elizabeth looked into her friend’s eyes.

“No, I feel no hate for any of you. What I learned is that people change, and so does love. It does not last forever, so I will enjoy it while I have it in my life. I was blessed with Alexander’s love for many years, and now I am blessed with Mr. Darcy’s love.

Charlotte, I will enjoy his love as long as I have it and be grateful, and if it is ever taken away, at least I will have known that I was loved, and I will remember. ”

Charlotte embraced her friend. “Lizzy, I cannot thank you enough for helping me find my husband, and now for helping me save his life.”

The two friends held each other for a long time, and when they parted, their bonds of affection were stronger than ever before.