Page 20

Chapter Twenty

T he silence that followed Mr. Darcy’s statement was profound. Elizabeth felt as though the floor beneath her had suddenly shifted, leaving her unbalanced. Lydia , visiting a midwife known for helping women in compromising conditions? The implications whirled through her mind, each more disturbing than the last.

“You are certain it was Lydia?” Mr. Bennet asked, his normally sardonic tone replaced by sharp concern.

“Quite certain, sir,” Mr. Darcy confirmed.

Elizabeth’s mind flew to the memory of Lydia slipping through the front door just a short while ago, her hems and boots muddied from a long walk, her manner furtive and defensive.

“We debated whether to approach her,” Darcy continued, his eyes still on Elizabeth, watching her reaction with evident concern. “In the end, we thought it best to respect her privacy in the moment and bring the matter to Mr. Bennet’s attention instead.”

Mr. Bennet’s face, normally animated by wry amusement, now displayed a gravity Elizabeth had witnessed only in the direst family crises. His fingers gripped the edge of his desk with such force that his knuckles whitened. “What business could Lydia have with a midwife known for assisting young women in compromising situations?”

Elizabeth’s mind raced, trying to conjure plausible alternatives, but each possibility seemed more unlikely than the last. Lydia’s behaviour that morning, her furtive return, her hostility, her determination to have tea alone in her room... all of it suddenly coalesced into a pattern too troubling to ignore.

“We must speak with her,” she said firmly. “Now, before this goes any further. She was just in the kitchen asking for tea…”

Mr. Bennet nodded once, decisively, and stood. “Gentlemen, I appreciate your bringing this to my attention. This is a matter that requires handling with speed and delicacy.”

“Of course,” Colonel Fitzwilliam replied, also rising. “We shall take our leave.”

“No,” Mr. Bennet said quickly. “I believe your presence may prove useful. Particularly if what we discover has bearing on Wickham’s death. I would ask you both to accompany us.”

Darcy and the colonel exchanged a brief glance before Darcy inclined his head in agreement. “As you wish, sir.”

Mr. Bennet moved toward the door with uncharacteristic purpose, his usual languid demeanour entirely absent. “Then let us proceed. I believe my youngest daughter has some explaining to do.”

Elizabeth followed her father from the study, acutely aware of Darcy’s presence close behind her. Jane stayed close beside her, squeezing her hand briefly, a silent gesture of sisterly support in the face of what lay ahead.

The journey through the familiar corridors of Longbourn took on an almost dreamlike quality for Elizabeth. The house that had been her home for all her life suddenly felt alien, its comfortable domesticity overlaid with the shadow of potential tragedy. What would they discover when they confronted Lydia? What secrets had her youngest sister been harbouring?

Mr. Bennet led their solemn procession up the stairs, his footsteps unusually heavy on the wooden treads. Elizabeth glanced back once to find Darcy watching her with an expression of such concern that her heart constricted painfully in her chest. Whatever revelations awaited them in Lydia’s room, his presence provided a curious comfort, a steadiness she found herself grateful for.

As they approached Lydia’s door, Elizabeth noticed something that caused her steps to falter. A faint herbal scent hung in the air, sharp and medicinal, unlike the usual floral fragrances Lydia preferred. Jane noticed it too, her brow furrowing in confusion as their eyes met.

Mr. Bennet paused before Lydia’s door, his hand raised to knock, but then his expression hardened, and instead of the courtesy of a warning, he grasped the handle and threw the door open with uncharacteristic forcefulness.

“Lydia,” he began, his voice carrying the full weight of paternal authority, “I must speak with you immedi...”

His words trailed off as the scene before them registered. Lydia stood by her dressing table, a small packet of dried herbs in one hand and a cup of steaming water in the other. Her face, turned toward them in shock at the sudden interruption, drained of colour with alarming speed.

For a moment, no one moved or spoke. The tableau held them all frozen: Lydia with her herbal preparation, Mr. Bennet in the doorway, Elizabeth and Jane just behind him, Darcy and Colonel Fitzwilliam maintaining a respectful distance but with clear views of the room’s interior.

Elizabeth’s gaze fixed on the small paper packet open and half-emptied in Lydia’s hand, recognising with a sickening certainty that this was no ordinary remedy for monthly discomfort or headaches. Elizabeth knew, from whispered conversations, exactly what purpose such carefully wrapped herbs served.

“Lydia,” Mr. Bennet spoke again, his voice dangerously quiet. “What, precisely, are you doing?

Lydia’s initial shock gave way to a defensive lift of her chin, though her hands trembled visibly. “I am having tea in my room, Father, as I informed everyone I wished to do. Is that now forbidden at Longbourn?” Despite her attempt at defiance, her voice quavered tellingly.

“And where have you been this morning?” Mr. Bennet said, eyebrows arched. “You did not tell anyone you were leaving, or where you were going.”

“I merely... I wanted to visit the haberdasher's shop in Little Whittling,” Lydia said, the lie transparent in her hesitation. “Their selection of ribbons is far superior to anything in Meryton.”

“And how did you propose to travel there?” Mr. Bennet asked. “For I am certain you did not walk the five miles.”

Lydia swallowed hard, then lifted her chin with a shadow of her usual defiance. “I hitched a ride on Farmer Harlow’s cart when he passed on the lane. He was taking vegetables to market.”

“You rode alone with a man who is not a relation?” Jane exclaimed. “Lydia, how could you be so improper?”

“It was only Farmer Harlow,” Lydia protested weakly. “Everyone knows him. He has granddaughters older than me!”

“That is hardly the point,” Elizabeth said, taking a step forward and noting that Lydia immediately clutched the cup closer to her chest. “And you still have not explained what you are drinking, for I can smell from here that it is not tea.”

“It is merely a... a tonic,” Lydia mumbled. “For headaches.”

“I was not aware you suffered from headaches,” Mr. Bennet remarked dryly. “Nor that you had any interest in medicinal remedies. Your usual cure for any ailment, as I recall, is a new bonnet or a visit to the officers.”

At the mention of officers, Lydia flinched visibly, a reaction that did not go unnoticed by anyone in the room. Elizabeth exchanged a quick glance with her father, seeing her own suspicions reflected in his shrewd gaze.

Jane stepped forward, her gentle nature asserting itself even in this tense moment. “Lydia, dear, if you are unwell, you should have said something. We would have sent for Doctor Jones.”

“I do not need Doctor Jones,” Lydia replied, her voice rising. “There is nothing wrong with me that requires his attention.”

Elizabeth watched her sister carefully, noting the hectic flush now replacing her earlier pallor, the way her gaze darted to the window as if calculating escape routes. This was not the behaviour of someone suffering a mere headache, nor was it consistent with Lydia’s usual forthright approach to physical complaints, which typically involved dramatic declarations and demands for attention.

“Mr. Darcy and Colonel Fitzwilliam saw you at the midwife’s house this morning,” Elizabeth said quietly. “The same midwife known for helping young women in... difficult circumstances.”

Lydia’s gaze snapped to Darcy, naked fury replacing her previous fear. “You were spying on me? How dare you! You have no right to follow me or report my movements to my family.”

“You are a child,” Mr. Bennet corrected sharply, “not yet sixteen years of age, and still very much under my protection and authority. I am more than grateful that the gentlemen have brought your whereabouts and actions to my attention. Now, I will ask once more, and I expect a truthful answer: What are those herbs for, Lydia?”

The direct confrontation seemed to deflate Lydia’s defiance. Her shoulders slumped, and for a moment, Elizabeth glimpsed the frightened child beneath the facade of independence Lydia had cultivated of late.

“It is nothing sinister,” Lydia insisted, though her voice had lost its earlier conviction. “Merely a preventative measure.”

“Preventative,” Mr. Bennet repeated, his expression darkening further. “Are you suggesting, Lydia, that you believe you may be with child?”

The question hung in the air like a physical presence, so weighted with implication that Elizabeth felt her breath catch. Jane made a soft sound of distress beside her, while behind them, Colonel Fitzwilliam cleared his throat uncomfortably.

Lydia’s eyes filled suddenly with tears, her carefully maintained composure crumbling. “I cannot be,” she whispered, the words barely audible. “I cannot bear his child. Not now. Not after everything.”

The admission stunned the room into silence. Elizabeth felt a complex mixture of emotions: pity for her sister’s predicament, horror at the solution she was attempting, and a growing suspicion that continued to build with each new revelation.

“Lydia,” she said gently, moving past her father to approach her sister, “is that why you visited the midwife? To procure these herbs?”

Lydia nodded mutely, a tear spilling down her cheek.

“Whatever trouble you are in,” Elizabeth said softly, taking another step toward her sister, “concealing it will only make matters worse. Please, tell us the truth.”

For a moment, something vulnerable and frightened flickered across Lydia’s face, so foreign to her usual carefree expression that Elizabeth felt a chill of genuine fear. What could have happened to transform her perpetually joyful sister into this pale, secretive stranger before them?

“I cannot,” Lydia whispered, her eyes darting once more to the cup in her hands.

Mr. Bennet’s hand shot out with surprising speed for a man who spent most of his days seated comfortably in his study. He plucked the teacup from Lydia’s grasp before she could protest, his expression a mixture of anger and profound disappointment that Elizabeth had rarely witnessed on her father’s ordinarily sardonic countenance. The dark liquid sloshed against the porcelain sides, its herbal, slightly acrid smell filling the small space between them.

“What foolishness is this?” he demanded, holding the cup away from Lydia’s reaching hands. “You would poison yourself with some concoction from a village wise woman rather than confide in your family?”

“It is not poison,” Lydia protested weakly, her eyes still fixed on the cup as though it contained her very salvation. “It is merely to... to restore certain... functions.”

Mr. Bennet looked around the room, his eyes lingering briefly on Jane, Colonel Fitzwilliam, and Darcy before returning to his youngest daughter. With quiet authority that brooked no argument, he said, “Everyone, downstairs to the study. Now.” He handed the cup and packet of herbs to Elizabeth. “Carry these for me if you would, Lizzy.”

Lydia let out a sob, and her shoulders slumped with defeat. Jane came forward and put her arm around Lydia’s shoulders, and steered her towards the door, and Lydia went, all the fight gone from her.

As the party reached the bottom of the stairs, Mr. Bennet paused and said “Elizabeth, I require your assistance. Please would you return to Lydia’s room and search it thoroughly. I suspect we may find further evidence of her... situation there.”

Elizabeth nodded, grateful for a task that might bring clarity to this increasingly disturbing situation. She turned about but had taken only two steps back up the stairs when Lydia suddenly sprang to life, lunging at her with a cry that was half sob, half shriek.

“No! You cannot! There is nothing to find! I forbid it!” Lydia’s voice rose hysterically as she attempted to block Elizabeth’s path, her arms flailing wildly.

“Lydia, control yourself!” Mr. Bennet commanded, reaching for his daughter’s arm.

But Lydia was beyond reason. With strength born of desperation, she twisted away from her father and made to run after Elizabeth, who had paused, startled by the vehemence of her sister’s reaction. Before Lydia could escape, Mr. Bennet caught her around the waist, but she kicked and scratched like a wild thing, her composure entirely abandoned.

“Let me go! You cannot search my things! You have no right!”

Mr. Bennet struggled to contain his daughter’s thrashing limbs. Lydia might be the youngest, but she had always possessed a vigour that often exhausted those around her. Now, driven by fear and desperation, she fought with alarming intensity, her heel connecting painfully with her father’s shin.

“Mr. Darcy,” Mr. Bennet called, grimacing as he maintained his grip on Lydia’s waist, “might I prevail upon you for assistance? I fear my daughter has temporarily lost her senses.”

Without hesitation, Darcy stepped forward. His tall figure loomed over Lydia as he grasped her flailing arms, his expression grave but not unkind. Together, he and Mr. Bennet managed to guide the struggling girl into the study and to a chair, where they held her firmly despite her continued resistance.

“Elizabeth, go now,” Mr. Bennet instructed, his voice tight with the effort of restraining Lydia. “Search thoroughly.”

Elizabeth hesitated only a moment longer, torn between concern for her father and the urgent need to discover whatever Lydia was so desperate to conceal. With a quick nod, she left the cup and packet of herbs on the desk and hurried from the room, Lydia’s protests echoing behind her as she climbed the stairs.

Lydia’s bedroom, as always, was in a state of cheerful disarray: ribbons draped over the looking glass, dresses tossed carelessly across the bed, and an open box of hairpins spilled across the dressing table.

Where to begin? Elizabeth surveyed the chaos, trying to think as Lydia would. If there was something to hide, where would her impulsive sister conceal it? Methodically, Elizabeth began to search, looking first in the obvious places: beneath the pillows, under the mattress, inside the drawers of the dressing table. Nothing unusual revealed itself aside from the normal trinkets and treasures of a young girl: a pressed flower, a length of lace, a scrap of paper bearing what appeared to be a half-finished poem in Kitty’s hand.

The wardrobe, then. Elizabeth opened the doors, confronted by the jumbled mass of gowns, stockings, and spencers that composed Lydia’s wardrobe, many of them altered hand-me-downs from her older sisters. She began to sort through them carefully, feeling each fold and pocket for anything unusual. When this too yielded nothing, she knelt to examine the floor of the wardrobe, running her fingers along the wooden boards.

It was then that she noticed the white corner of a garment protruding from beneath a stack of winter clothes piled at the very back. Elizabeth reached in, pushing aside the heavy woollen items to reveal a bundle stuffed as far into the corner as possible. With growing trepidation, she pulled it out, unwrapping what seemed to be a petticoat wound tightly around something else.

As the final layer came away, Elizabeth could not suppress a gasp. In her hands lay one of Lydia’s day dresses, a simple muslin that had once been pale blue. Now, however, much of the skirt was stained a dark, rusty brown: unmistakably blood, long dried but still telling its grim story. Elizabeth sat back on her heels, her mind racing as she examined the garment. The blood was concentrated in several places, and there was a small tear in the fabric near the largest stain.

With trembling hands, Elizabeth carefully rewrapped the dress in the petticoat. Rising to her feet, she took a moment to compose herself before leaving the room, the damning evidence clutched tightly against her chest. As she descended the stairs, she could still hear Lydia’s voice, though it had subsided from screams to pitiful sobbing.

Elizabeth paused in the study doorway, surveying the tableau before her. Lydia remained seated, no longer fighting but slumped forward in the chair, her face buried in her hands. Mr. Bennet stood beside her, one hand resting on her shoulder, while Darcy had withdrawn to stand near Jane’s settee, where Colonel Fitzwilliam had taken the seat beside her and was speaking to her quietly.

“Father,” Elizabeth said, drawing all eyes to her. “I have found something.”

She stepped forward, unwrapping the bundle just enough to reveal the bloodstained fabric. Mr. Bennet’s face grew even graver as he examined it without touching.

“Lydia,” he said, his voice deceptively calm, “I believe you owe us an explanation for this.”

Lydia raised her head, her face blotchy from crying, eyes red-rimmed and swollen. When she saw the dress in Elizabeth’s hands, she let out a low, pained moan, as though something vital had been torn from her.

“It is not what you think,” she whispered, though her eyes told a different story.

“And what do I think?” Mr. Bennet asked, kneeling before his daughter despite the protest of his aging joints. “Lydia, whatever has happened, we are your family. We can help you, but only if you tell us the truth.”

Elizabeth watched as something seemed to break within her youngest sister. Lydia’s shoulders sagged, and when she spoke again, her voice was barely audible.

“It was Wickham,” she confessed, the name causing Jane to gasp softly from her place on the settee. “He... he took an interest in me, months ago. Before he ever paid any attention to Lizzy.”

Elizabeth felt a chill run through her at the mention of Wickham’s name. She glanced at Darcy, whose face had hardened into a mask of controlled fury at the mention of his childhood companion.

“He said such pretty things to me,” Lydia continued, staring at her hands twisting in her lap. “He told me I was beautiful, that I was more woman at fifteen than most were at twenty. He... he met me in secret, when I said I was visiting friends or shopping in Meryton.”

“And he compromised you,” Mr. Bennet stated rather than asked, his voice flat.

Lydia nodded miserably. “He said he loved me, that we would be married as soon as his circumstances improved. I believed him.”

Elizabeth felt sick, imagining her vibrant, foolish little sister falling prey to Wickham’s practiced charm. How many other women had he deceived with the same hollow promises?

“When did you first suspect... your condition?” Jane asked gently from the settee, her own distress momentarily forgotten in concern for her sister.

Lydia’s face crumpled again. “A month ago, when I missed my courses the first time. I thought perhaps it was a mistake, that they would return. But they still have not come!” She turned pleading eyes to her father. “I did not know else what to do! Mama is always saying how we will be thrown into the hedgerows if we do not marry well, and what gentleman would have me now?”

Colonel Fitzwilliam and Darcy exchanged a glance, their military and aristocratic bearing momentarily abandoned in the face of this family tragedy unfolding before them. Elizabeth felt a surge of gratitude for their discretion and continued presence; lesser men might have fled such an improper scene.

“And the dress?” Mr. Bennet prompted, indicating the bloodied garment still in Elizabeth’s hands. “How does that relate to your... situation?”

A flash of something like hatred crossed Lydia’s tear-stained face. “When I realised he was going to marry Elizabeth, I was so angry! I had given him everything, and there he was, making eyes at my sister as though I meant nothing to him! If she was compromised with a kiss, what about what he had done to me? I sent him a note and said that he must meet me, and before the banns began to be called, or I would tell everyone that I was carrying his child. He said he would meet me in the woods at three o’clock on Saturday, so I went to confront him.”

Elizabeth felt the room tilt slightly. Saturday . The day Wickham had died, stabbed in those very woods.

“I told him,” Lydia continued, her voice gaining strength from righteous indignation, “that he had to marry me, that I was carrying his child! I told him he had made promises to me first, before Lizzy!”

“And how did he respond?” Darcy asked, his first contribution to the interrogation, his deep voice startling in the charged atmosphere.

Lydia’s eyes flicked to him briefly before returning to her father’s face. “He laughed at me,” she whispered. “He said I was a stupid little girl, that he would never marry me, that I was only good for... for one thing, and he had already had that from me.”

Elizabeth closed her eyes briefly, pained by the cruelty Wickham had shown her sister, even as part of her recoiled at Lydia’s revelations. A child . Lydia carried Wickham’s child, and had confronted him on the very day of his death. The implications were too terrible to contemplate, but the bloodstains on the dress in her hands could not be ignored.

“Lydia,” Mr. Bennet said, his voice gentler than before, “what happened next? We must know everything.”

Lydia stared at the bloodied dress, tears once again flowing freely down her cheeks. “He told me that if I ever told anyone about the baby, he would deny it was his. He said everyone knew what a flirt I was, that I had probably been with half the regiment.” Her voice broke. “But I hadn’t! It was only ever him!”

Elizabeth moved forward, setting the dress aside to kneel beside her father in front of Lydia. “We believe you,” she said softly, taking her sister’s cold hand in her own. “But you must tell us the rest. About Saturday, in the woods.”

Lydia raised her eyes to Elizabeth’s, her expression a mixture of defiance and despair. “I was so angry when he pursued you,” she admitted. “I thought he had forgotten me, that all his promises meant nothing. When I discovered I was with child, I was terrified but also thought... perhaps now he would have to marry me.” Her voice hardened. “But when I confronted him on Saturday, he put his hands around my neck and threatened to kill me if I spoke of it again. He said he would rather see me dead than married to me.” Reaching up, she plucked away the lacy scarf wrapped around her throat, a scarf Elizabeth now realised she had not seen Lydia without for some days.

A collective intake of breath sounded through the room as the marks on Lydia’s pale throat were revealed; dark bruises unmistakably the shape of a man’s fingers. Elizabeth felt her father tense beside her, while behind them, Darcy took a step forward as though unable to remain still in the face of such villainy.

“So you took a knife,” Elizabeth said quietly, the pieces falling into place with horrible clarity. “You suspected, didn’t you, that he might not take your ultimatum well? You took it to protect yourself.”

Lydia nodded, her expression suddenly childlike in its vulnerability. “I only meant to threaten him, to make him listen to me. There was a scuffle when he tried to take it from me. He tripped and... and the knife...” She buried her face in her hands again. “I did not mean for it to happen! But I was so frightened when he began to strangle me, and then there was so much blood...”

“Oh, Lydia,” Elizabeth whispered, struggling to reconcile the frivolous, flirtatious sister she knew with this desperate young woman who had stabbed a man in the woods.

“I loved him,” Lydia sobbed, the words muffled by her hands. “Despite everything, I loved him, and now I have killed him, and I carry his child, and I do not know what to do!”

The silence that followed was profound, broken only by Lydia’s quiet weeping. Elizabeth looked at her father, seeing the weight of this revelation etched in the new lines around his eyes, then at Darcy, whose expression of contained fury had given way to something more complex: a mixture of concern, disgust, and what might have been pity.

A family’s reputation hung in the balance, along with the fate of a foolish girl and her unborn child. And somewhere in Meryton, the magistrate was looking for a murderer.