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T hey are here,” Mary said. Her voice was quiet, but tense, and her hands were clenched tightly around her workbasket.

“Mary, remember that we agreed to hear her story before expressing our own feelings,” Jane said, urgently.

“I recall it, Jane.” Mary’s voice was impatient.

The four girls peered out the window, hoping for a glimpse of Lydia; Mr. Bennet stood, waiting to greet his youngest with as stern an expression on his face as he could manage.

Mrs. Hill opened the door; her mouth was quivering, but she managed to hide her feelings as she motioned Mr. Gardiner and Lydia toward the parlour.

“Welcome home, child,” Mr. Bennet said. His face remained quite severe, but he could not stop a small quiver of emotion in his voice.

“Oh, Papa –“ And with that, Lydia burst into tears.

Mr. Bennet had his arms around his daughter in a moment, stroking her hair, and murmuring into her ear.

“I should have known he could not be strong enough to be angry at her,” Mary grumbled quietly.

“His baby girl has come back to him, Mary,” Elizabeth replied, whispering. “I would have been everything surprised if he had shown no joy at her homecoming.”

Lydia looked up from her father’s embrace to her sisters. “I know you are all quite angry with me, and I cannot blame you in the least. But I hope you will forgive me someday.”

“Sit, Lydia; there is much to discuss,” her father said. “Henry, I thank you for bringing her to us. Will you stay?”

“I hope to be home before sundown,” Mr. Gardiner replied. “But I can remain here for an hour or so.”

“Doubtless you will be grateful for refreshments,” Jane said. She left the room to request a tea tray with sandwiches as well as sweets, but was back in a moment, not wanting to miss a word.

“I see that she is not with child,” Mary whispered to Elizabeth.

Lydia looked up. “I am not, Mary; that is one blessing, anyway.”

“The main blessing is that you are home, Lydia,” Jane said.

“Oh, Jane! You are so very good. I think I have never appreciated you enough,” Lydia said, warmly.

It was Jane who was the first sister to go to Lydia and hug her hard.

The others followed in turn, Kitty hugging Lydia while whispering that she had known all along that Lydia was not dead; Elizabeth whispering that it was her fault for not telling what she had known about Wickham, and finally Mary, who gave Lydia a brief hug but said nothing at all.

The tea tray arrived and Jane busied herself handing around cups and plates, but her eyes were teary.

Finally, Mr. Bennet said, “I think we must now hear your story, Lydia.”

Lydia told it all again, sparing herself not at all. She admitted quite freely that she had been a very great fool, and it was only by the grace of Heaven that she had been rescued.

“You really worked as a maid, Lydia?” Kitty was astonished.

“Look at my hands, Kitty; they tell the tale.” She held them up for her sisters’ inspection.

Jane winced. “It looks painful, Lydia.”

“It is, Jane, but they will heal once I am no longer scrubbing floors!” Lydia was able to laugh at herself. But she sobered quickly, adding, “Mama would have hated seeing them; you know how particular she always was about ladies’ hands.”

“She would have given you her cream – oh! Wait here!” Kitty dashed away, returning some minutes later with a glass jar. “Here is her hand cream. She would want you to have it, Lydia.”

“I cannot believe that Mama is –“ Lydia’s voice broke. “Will someone tell me what happened?”

Elizabeth turned to Jane. “I was not here, so I cannot tell of it; will you?”

“But where were you, Lizzy?” Lydia asked.

“I was in Derbyshire, but that is a story for a different time,” Elizabeth said.

Jane then spoke, in a soft voice, about how Colonel Forster had come in the middle of the night with the news of Lydia’s elopement, how Mama had taken to her room and refused to come out, and how just a few days later, Jane had found her cold in her bed.

“So it really is my fault that she is dead,” Lydia said, dully.

“It is, I think,” Mary said.

“Mary!” Kitty and Jane spoke together.

“And I think it all my own fault for not telling everyone about Mr. Wickham, which Mr. Darcy had confided in me, and Kitty thinks it her fault for not telling about your letters, and Papa thinks it his fault for letting you go to Brighton,” Elizabeth said, impatiently.

“I had hoped we were done with this discussion about faults, but evidently not.”

“You would like to be done with it because of your own feelings of guilt, Lizzy,” Mary fired back.

“And you, of course, as a perfect daughter, would like to rehearse all these faults every day!” Kitty said, heatedly.

“Is this how it has been since I left?” Lydia asked. “Everyone arguing about whose fault it was that I was so stupid?”

There was a brief silence in the room.

“Sometimes, yes,” Kitty said, at last. “I did rather think we were done apportioning blame, but I suppose we were just waiting for your reappearance to bring it all back. It is true that Jane and Mary are the only Bennets who did not contribute in some fashion to your disappearance.”

Mr. Bennet huffed in exasperation. “Congratulations, Mary,” he said. “Is that what I am supposed to say? Well done, dear! There, I have said it. Let this be the end of it. For now that Lydia has returned, we can leave off our Deception!”

Mary scowled, but did not respond.

“What deception?” Lydia asked.

“Oh, Kitty has been kept very busy writing letters from you to us,” Elizabeth said, grinning. “We call it the Deception, with a big capital ‘D.’ “

“Aunt Gardiner did mention that. How very clever!”

“We had to show the neighbours something in order to prove that you were – well, first quite ill in Brighton and then with the Gardiners in London. I think it has been, what, a letter each fortnight, Kitty?”

Kitty rolled her eyes. “At least! I made copies of each of them, Lydia; you will have to read them so that you will know what you wrote, particularly the letter I wrote to Maria Lucas on your behalf.”

“It was your sketches that brought me home, Kitty; I shall always be grateful to you. But tell me, is it true that Mr. Darcy wishes to marry Lizzy? I cannot fathom it.”

“A good deal has happened here at Longbourn while you were gone, Lydia,” Kitty said. She went on to explain that Jane was now engaged to Mr. Bingley, and that Lizzy was almost – almost! – engaged to Mr. Darcy.

“Yes, Mr. Darcy explained that I was the difficulty,” Lydia said.

“Mr. Darcy?” the Bennets asked together, shocked.

“Oh, indeed!” Lydia said, and then she explained how she had been discovered by the Countess of Matlock, who then summoned Mr. Darcy.

“It was Mr. Darcy who brought me to the Gardiners. I did not even know they were acquainted. But he told me that Lizzy would not marry him if there was any chance that the union would damage his sister’s chances of marriage. ”

Lydia sighed deeply before continuing. “I am sorry to have caused so much trouble, Lizzy. Jane, Mary, Kitty, Papa, I will say it every day. I am sorry, and it is entirely my own fault. Not Lizzy’s, not Kitty’s, not Papa’s – only my own.

I hope you will be able to forgive me and let me stay here.

If not, Aunt Gardiner says I may go back to Gracechurch Street, but I would much rather be here with all of you. ”

“There is no question of that, Lydia,” Mr. Bennet said at once. “Yes, we are all upset and angry, but this is and always will be your home.”

“Though I have taken your place in Kitty’s room,” Mary said, coolly. “We have put all your things in the room that was once mine.”

“I see,” Lydia said. “Very well. But tell me, Mary, since you seem intent on seeing me punished, what would satisfy you?”

Mr. Bennet broke in. “It is for me to decide on an appropriate punishment, not Mary.”

“I know that, Papa, and I will submit without complaint to any punishment you choose to mete out. But I wonder what my sister Mary thinks on the subject. Mary, yes, I was terribly, terribly stupid. But I spent two nights huddled in a London doorway with no food or drink. Then I labored, scrubbing floors, emptying bedpans, and changing linens for almost four months. Do you doubt me? This is what I wore for those many weeks.”

Lydia opened her satchel and pulled out the thin grey uniform she had worn at Greenfield House.

She held it up for Mary’s inspection before continuing.

“I slept on a thin mattress on an iron bed, in a room so hot that sleep would not have been possible, were I not so exhausted. I hated myself the entire time for having given up so much for so little! I thought about what you would say, Mary, that I had traded my birthright for a mess of pottage. I did not know what pottage was, but I thought if I ever saw you again, I would ask you to explain it. I worried about my sisters, and prayed that my actions had not ruined them; then I decided it would be best to never go home again, so that everyone could say I was dead. Now I must live with the knowledge that I very likely killed my mother and caused my entire family no end of grief and trouble. Tell me, what else is necessary, in your view, to properly punish me?” Lydia’s voice trembled as she spoke.

Mary was silent for a long time, staring at her shoes. When she looked up, her eyes were wet. “I am sorry, Lydia; you have been punished more than enough. I am glad, more than I can say, that you are home again.”

“Thank you, Mary. I know there is still a good deal more to say, but might I be allowed to rest for a short while? I slept very little last night.”

“Of course, Lydia,” Mr. Bennet said at once.

“And I must be off,” Mr. Gardiner said, getting to his feet.

“I cannot tell you how grateful I am, Henry,” Mr. Bennet began, but his brother-by-marriage waved away his gratitude, shook his hand, and climbed into his coach.

Lydia was escorted to her new room by all her sisters. When she saw the small vase of flowers on the dresser, she first smiled and then laughed aloud. “How kind! How very kind, to put flowers in my room! I deserve no such consideration, but I am very grateful nonetheless.”

Mary muttered to Kitty. “She does not sound like Lydia at all! Are we certain this is actually our sister?”

But Lydia overheard the remark, for she turned at once and said, “The old Lydia died in a doorway in London; this new Lydia is grateful for any kindness shown to her.”

Mary was abashed, and quickly offered an apology, adding that the flowers had been Kitty’s doing.

Jane said, “You see that all your things are here, Lydia, including what you left behind at Brighton, though we shall all be in mourning clothes for some time yet. Some of Mama’s jewelry was saved for you and placed in your jewelry box. But let us go, sisters, and allow Lydia to rest.”

The sisters left Lydia in peace, closing the door gently behind them. As they descended the stairs, Mary whispered to Kitty, “I am still not certain that she is really Lydia!”

Lying on her bed, Lydia could only wonder why it was that she had never before appreciated her family.