Page 45 of The Countess and Her Sister

“Just us three?” Mary frowned, and turned to address Kitty and Lydia. “Mamma has sent Jane a letter of apology and invited us all to dine with her, but Jane will not forgive her, though it is the Christian thing to do.”

Kitty gasped, and Lydia laughed. “I should not wish Mamma to make a great scene and mortify me in front of so many handsome men, as she did when we visited Mr. Bingley.”

“Very sensible,” Lady Augusta primly agreed.

“And if Mrs. Bennet was so forlorn, why did she never write to Jane and Lizzy?” Rebecca sipped at her wine, wearing a look of challenge.

“We returned her letters unopened,” Jane murmured.

Mary looked dismayed, but Elizabeth could not share Jane’s sudden doubts. “After what the first one contained, we wished to spare ourselves any more of Mamma’s poison. Mary, nobody will prevent you from visiting with her – move back to Montrose if you pity her.”

“Lizzy,” Lady Gardiner sternly admonished her niece. “Show your sister some compassion. Think of what their lives were, since losing Mr. Bennet, compared to what yours has been.”

“We are doing our best,” Kitty said, coughing nervously.

“Papa always said we were the silliest girls in England, but Lydia and I want to do better! Cannot it be the same for Mamma? Last night Lydia and I stayed awake half the night talking about ways we can make you proud of us. Maybe Mamma did too.”

“I never said….” Lydia threw her fork down onto her plate and crossed her arms, turning pink with embarrassment.

Rebecca pursed her lips, puffing out her cheeks as she exhaled forcefully. “If you can comprehend that Mrs. Bennet’s behavior was a disgrace, then there you have it. Why are we still discussing the matter?”

Lady Augusta frowned. “Girls, I beg you would cease this arguing. Poor Jane!”

Jane looked as if she would begin weeping. She pushed her chair back and stood from the table. “I only want a little quiet to reflect!” And then she turned and fled the room.

Elizabeth was about to go after her, when Rebecca said, “Let her go write in her diary, Lizzy. She will see sense.”

“You mean, that she will not see Mamma?” Kitty’s voice quivered.

“I think a party at Montrose would be perfectly lovely,” Lydia chimed in. “If Mamma made a scene because Jane would not see her, then she will not make a scene is Jane does she her.” She gave a shrug of her shoulders, as if her simple logic was irrefutable. Mary eagerly agreed with her.

Elizabeth had heard enough. She threw her glass of wine against the wall in a fit of pique before storming out of the room.

***

“That woman locked Jane in a room with that drunken monster, and then she drugged me and locked me up on the wedding day so that I could not prevent it, I could not save her!” Exhausted and sensible of what a wreck she was, Elizabeth threw herself into Mr. Darcy’s arms, past caring for decorum.

She had not slept the night before, nor eaten the breakfast tray she requested, nor had she spoken to anybody until the late afternoon, when Sir Edward returned to Matlock with the gentlemen from Pemberley and Cameron Court.

They had searched the local villages and questioned every innkeeper, and reported no sighting of Lady Catherine and the Tilneys, nor anybody who matched the trio’s description.

Georgiana and Lady Susan had come to visit the ladies while the gentlemen conducted their reconnaissance. The younger Bennet sisters had worked on Jane, as Elizabeth feared they would. Even Lady Gardiner and Lady Augusta had been moved by the plight of a grieving mother.

While her other sisters entertained Mr. Tilney and Mr. Bingley, Elizabeth had been lured to the library to discuss the matter at hand, and it was not going well.

Mr. Darcy wrapped his arms around Elizabeth and stoked her hair. Elizabeth took solace in the feel of his chest against her cheek, and tried to calm her raging breaths. Finally, she stepped out of his comforting embrace and looked around at her relations.

“I am sorry I threw the wine glass last night. I… was tired. I am tired.” Elizabeth could not meet Jane’s eye.

She was tired, and had been tired for longer than she had realized.

She sighed down at the fire blazing in the hearth.

“I have always tried to cede to your feelings, Jane, but you have lately asked me not to, and so now I must protest.”

“I never asked you to be so yielding,” Jane said. “You have fought your feelings for Mr. Darcy and fretted over me before agreeing only to courtship, and I never asked it, nor meant to seem so feeble.”

“Well, that is a relief, because we are secretly engaged,” Elizabeth said in a desperate attempt to avoid the subject of Mrs. Bennet.

Jane smiled, but Mr. Darcy looked wounded. “I had hoped to announce the fact in a happier setting.”

Elizabeth flinched, her heart sinking. “Of course. I am sorry.”

Lady Augusta drew Elizabeth into an embrace. “It is not like you to behave badly, my dear girl.”

Tears spilled down Elizabeth’s cheeks. “ She locked us up. ”

Lady Gardiner stepped forward to soothe Elizabeth with a sad smile. “And now you believe that she deserves to be kept away all alone?”

“But you are better than her,” Jane said.

“You are,” Georgiana agreed. “Just like William. Remember what I told you?”

Elizabeth shook her head in confusion. “What? Oh Georgie, not you, too.”

“She is a tender-hearted girl,” Lady Susan said.

“I, for one, simply wish another meeting with the woman who puts to rest any fears I once had at being a bad mother. I would have done the same as she with my Frederica, but when she caught the sweats I promised her that I would allow her to marry for love, if only she would live. I wonder if grief has similarly altered Mrs. Bennet, though I doubt it. And if she remains as horrid as she ever was – as horrid as she was at Cameron Court – surely your younger sisters will see it, and agree to sever their ties to her as you have done.”

“That is sound,” Richard agreed, looking at Lady Susan with such affection that Elizabeth briefly wondered what on earth had been going on at Pemberley.

Lady Augusta released Elizabeth from her maternal embrace, and Georgiana took her hands.

“We are to be sisters,” she said with a smile, before turning more serious.

“You must remember what I told you of that fellow that used our family so ill. Despite everything, William went to his aid in London, when he caught the sweating sickness.”

Elizabeth felt something sink inside herself.

Jane believed she was better than Mrs. Bennet, but Elizabeth did not know if she could be as good as Mr. Darcy.

She looked over at him, her heart aching from how she had spoiled what might have been a joyous announcement.

He mirrored her own anguish back at her.

Elizabeth turned away and met Jane’s eye.

She had let resentment she had never been conscious of cause her to lash out, mingling with the anger at her mother that Elizabeth feared would never ebb away.

“I am so heartily ashamed of myself,” she groaned. Through gritted teeth, she added, “One visit. That is all.”

“We might invite her here, instead,” Lady Gardiner said. “If she is still harboring Lady Cathrine and the Tilneys, we can prevent them from working any mischief.”

“But can we not all be done with this gothic drama, and congratulate Darcy and Lizzy?” Richard clapped Mr. Darcy on the shoulder. “Well done, Darcy. I knew just how it would be, from the very night you first met – er, saw her.”

Elizabeth laughed in spite of herself. “Richard, that is horrid!”

“I have heard all about it,” Lady Susan said, giving Richard a devilish smile. “How much does Lady Rebecca owe you?”

“She will think it twenty pounds well spent.” Richard moved to the sideboard and began pouring drinks for everybody.

“I knew you were only cross that night, for Lizzy is one of the handsomest women in England – many of whom are all in this room, to my good fortune! But I knew it – she had only to fly at you in a rage, Darcy, and you would be instantly beguiled.”

“True, but I cannot think Elizabeth was,” Mr. Darcy said with a twinkle in his eye.

“And she flew at you in a rage, Richard,” Lady Augusta chided her son.

“What did you do, young man?” Sir Edward grinned before sipping at his whiskey, and Richard regaled those who did not know of it with the tale of his wicked prank, their drawing room brawl after Mr. Darcy departed, and his subsequent and exceedingly gallant apology.

When the tension of Elizabeth’s tantrum had eased, and they had all drunk to Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy’s future happiness, they agreed to rejoin the rest of their party downstairs. Elizabeth lingered, and her pleading gaze entreated Mr. Darcy to remain in the library with her.

When they were alone, he swiftly drew her into another embrace. “Oh, Lizzy, I am so proud of you.”

She looked up in surprise. “You are not cross with me for spoiling our secret? I wielded it to wound Jane, that is not how I wished it to come out.”

“You have wounded her in not believing that she could be happy for you – for us. Believe me when I tell you how well I understand the protective impulse you have felt for her – it is one of the first things I came to love about you. After I was instantly beguiled by your ire, of course.”

Elizabeth laughed. “Were you really?”

He pursed his lips, looking a little chagrined. “Yes. Even before I walked into the room, when I heard your laughter. But there was something so tempestuous about you, when everyone had been in a stupor for so long.”

Elizabeth felt every uncomfortable emotion that had riled her into a frenzy dissipate entirely as she stood up on her toes and brushed her lips against his.

She stared into his eyes, dizzy from exhaustion as much as the romance of the moment.

“I am sorry you saw me in such a state then, and especially today, Mr. Darcy.”