Page 22 of The Heroic Mr Darcy’s Bad Manners
Mr Darcy was waiting on the steps of his house, in the freezing cold, to greet his guests when they arrived. Miss Georgiana Darcy clearly had the wisdom to remain inside on the frigid February evening. She welcomed them warmly in the entrance hall with Miss Eudora Darcy at her side.
“Do come in,” she whispered timidly.
Elizabeth smiled to encourage the girl. It was certainly easier to focus her attention on the sister than on her brother, whose rigid stance made her uneasy.
Miss Darcy escorted her guests to a well-appointed parlour. She served the ladies a glass of sherry and the men a tumbler of port while they waited for dinner to be announced.
Lady Glentworth, always effusive in her praise, was complimenting the room and the furniture when the knocker resonated through the house. Whoever was at the door was certainly eager to be inside, which was not so strange when one considered the weather.
“It is probably our cousins,” Mr Darcy informed his sister. “I shall greet them whilst you entertain our guests,” he offered and hastened out of the room.
Miss Georgiana Darcy looked at her aunt for guidance, and Elizabeth realised that the young girl was unprepared to induce conversation. To help her she commented upon the flower arrangements and was so fortunate that her hostess had made them herself. A discussion about the outrageous prices of hothouse flowers followed—a topic that everyone was in consensus about.
“We are leaving!” Lord Limerick’s voice boomed, shocking everyone.
His eyes were fixed on the door, where a distinguished elderly couple followed Viscount Crawford and Colonel Fitzwilliam. The Matlocks!
Elizabeth was close enough to hear her grandmother insisting that they stay and behave with decorum. They were, after all, Miss Georgiana Darcy’s guests, and it was her first time entertaining. The reasoning seemed to work upon her brother, who had the decency to look abashed at his host. Poor Miss Georgiana Darcy seemed to be on the verge of tears.
“Matlock!” Lord Limerick greeted the man without pleasure.
“Limerick!” Lord Matlock retorted, sounding equally displeased. “When I was made aware whom you had chosen as your guests”—he looked accusatorily at Mr Darcy—“I was obligated to come and warn you against the acquaintance.”
“I am my own man and shall invite whomever I choose,” Mr Darcy replied evenly.
If she read the colonel’s lips correctly, he mouthed “sorry” to his cousin, which she interpreted as proof that the Matlock parents were an uninvited addition.
Elizabeth was slightly impressed Mr Darcy dared to call out his formidable uncle. Lord Matlock was a respected earl who was known for his political industry; but that was not why Elizabeth esteemed him. She had recently heard that Lord Matlock was one of the very few peers who was loyal to his wife. Lord and Lady Matlock were known to be devoted to each other, which was a rare occurrence indeed amongst the peerage, and heartily romantic in a young lady’s eyes. Could they truly be so bad?
“Which Bennet daughter is it that my sons are making a fool of themselves over?” Lord Matlock asked, losing some of Elizabeth’s regard. “I warned the king against the Act of Union and allowing the Irish peerage into the House of Lords. Never before have so many been elevated into an undeserved rank.” His emphasis on ‘Irish’ as though it left a foul taste in his mouth bespoke his contempt.
“That is rich coming from you,” Lord Limerick countered.
“I am not Irish!”
“You can take the Irish out of Ireland, but you cannot take the Irish out of the man,” Lord Limerick asserted.
Lord Matlock threw his hands in the air. “It has been eight hundred years since my ancestors left Dublin for the Midlands!”
“Which proves my point!” Lord Limerick smiled victoriously.
Whether one was Irish or English mattered little to Elizabeth. What she could not fathom was why a father would not rejoice at the prospect of such a beautiful, kind, and compassionate lady as Jane for a daughter-in-law. But to her surprise, Lord Matlock’s glare was directed at her.
“Is that the one?” he asked Mr Darcy, but Elizabeth answered before their host recovered from his bewilderment.
“I assure you, neither the viscount nor the colonel has the slightest interest in me,” Elizabeth declared.
“Then who?” Lord Matlock boomed.
“I believe this is not such a good idea,” Mr Darcy deflected. “I would suggest you return to your home.”
“Out of the question. I shall not allow my sons to consort with criminals.”
“You are going too far,” Mr Darcy protested before deaf ears.
“The Campbells are back in town,” Lord Limerick gritted through clenched teeth. “I would not speak about consorting with criminals if I were you.”
“Campbell was acquitted in the court of law,” Lord Matlock replied coldly.
“By your perjury,” Lord Limerick accused him.
The combatants stepped closer and closer to each other.
“I spoke in earnest on behalf of a friend,” Lord Matlock defended himself.
“Yes. Your friend—the lying counterfeiter,” Lord Limerick charged. “Whom you had known for but a year?”
“Our acquaintance was of longer standing than that. We attended Oxford together.”
It was all too much for Jane, who could not stand any argument. “I am she,” she stated as she stepped between the arguing gentlemen. “I shall immediately rescind my permission for the gentlemen to call if my acquaintance displeases you, Lord Matlock.”
“That will not be necessary,” the colonel objected, glaring at his father.
“Father, you cannot accuse this lovely creature of anything untoward,” the viscount defended Jane.
“Lady Catherine Campbell née Bennet, this man’s sister”—he pointed a trembling finger at Lord Glentworth—“was equally beautiful. But looks can be deceiving. She was a fraudster, and a treasonous one to boot,” Lord Matlock informed his son.
The likeness of a young girl in her grandmother’s bedroom sprang before Elizabeth’s inner eye. Her father’s beloved sister whose murder had injured him beyond repair. Could Lord Matlock’s accusations be true?
In the periphery of her vision, she saw her father charge towards the earl.
“You dare accuse my sweet innocent sister! She was deceived and misled by your friend. She had not an artistic bone in her body. It is impossible that she made the counterfeit Egyptian artefacts. It was all your dear friend—Baronet bloody Campbell. You peers are all the same. Disguising and deceiving to protect your own. I loathe the hypocrisy, and I hate the town that sacrificed my sister as the last woman in England to burn at the stake! As a spectacle of entertainment for the depraved citizens of London…”
Elizabeth gasped. It was no wonder her father was disgusted by the mere thought of residing in town.
“Georgiana, you may excuse yourself,” Mr Darcy demanded more than entreated.
The girl dipped into a quick curtsey and fled. Miss Eudora Darcy followed after a wordless plea from her nephew.
“Which of the Campbells are we speaking about?” Mr Darcy asked.
As if which bloodline they have descended from matters in this instance , Elizabeth thought.
“Their seat, Castle Donnachaidh is in Dollar in the Scottish lowlands,” Lord Glentworth added.
“There was proof,” Lady Matlock interjected.
“I had not thought you as easily deceived as your husband,” Lord Glentworth said, turning to Lady Matlock. “Catherine was well known to your family as your sister’s dearest friend, but you are just like the rest of the miscreants, too much like your fraudulent husband. Yet, I was the one who was ridiculed in the newspapers, and even to my face, for my choice of wife. The beautiful Miss Gardiner was a tradesman’s daughter, born to a second son who devoted his talents to maintaining a small country law office. A wise man who served his fellow townspeople was found wanting by your ilk. My wife may not be fashionable or always act within the strictures of the haut ton’s ideas of propriety, but not once, in twenty-odd years of marriage, have I had reason to question her loyalty or her complete honesty. She does not disguise or pretend, she speaks nothing but the plain truth, good or bad, and that is of true value in a marriage.”
Lady Glentworth looked at her husband with devotion and approached him to lace their arms together in unison against the Matlocks. “My dear Lord Glentworth,” she whispered adoringly.
Elizabeth had always secretly thought that her father had been blinded by her mother’s beauty and had entered an ill-advised match.
Lady Glentworth had been an exceptionally handsome woman in her youth and still was to this day, though her beauty had matured. To hear her father laud her character traits as something to admire removed all concerns she may have harboured. Her parents were not equally matched in understanding but had chosen each other for sensible reasons. It was a revelation—to everyone present, judging by the stunned faces surrounding her. The Matlocks had nothing to say, Mr Darcy frowned, Viscount Crawford looked about to flee, whilst the colonel kept a steady comforting gaze upon Jane.
“We are ruined!” Lydia whispered.
“We are not!” Lord Glentworth protested. “An old lie will not damage you in the eyes of a true gentleman. You may not marry a lord, but a tradesman, a vicar, or an officer will do just as well if not better. Having an honest occupation is the making of any man,” he asserted with conviction.
“I resent your implication,” Lord Matlock hissed. “I have managed my estate for nigh on thirty years and had a successful career in the House of Lords. By your definition, I am an honest man who would never perjure himself in a court of law.”
“Except for the fact that you have.”
“Do you have any proof to your claim?” Colonel Fitzwilliam questioned.
Lord Glentworth lowered his head. “I do not but for the fact that the artefacts appeared before my sister left her home for the Scottish lowlands. I swear on my father’s grave that no one at Longbourn ever had the equipment or knowledge to make any counterfeits of quality, be they Egyptian artefacts or coins. When the first fake scarab was discovered in London, the purchase was traced back to the Campbells’ residence in Dollar. The court did not believe me as the Campbells swore under oath that the equipment and half-finished pieces had been found in Catherine’s dressing room. Your father testified to this piece of fiction as I understood he was visiting his friend at the time.”
“How long ago was it that the counterfeit scarabs were discovered?” Mr Darcy tried to interject, but his uncle heard nothing but Lord Glentworth’s accusations.
“I saw it with my own eyes!” Lord Matlock insisted.
“You worthy wiseacre saw what the Campbells wanted you to. Did you ever question Catherine’s lady’s maid as to whether she had seen the tools in the dressing room before that fateful day? No, you believed your fellow peer, and the pleas of an untitled but honest country girl were nothing to you.”
Lord Matlock remained silent with a deep frown between his brows.
“I thought not…” Lord Glentworth sighed.
Miss Eudora Darcy had returned unnoticed moments ago. “Was the lady’s maid called as a witness in court?” she queried.
“No,” was Lord Glentworth’s abrupt reply. “She had acquired a new position by the time I had the wherewithal to enquire after her, and the baronet was tight-lipped when I demanded to know her whereabouts. I suppose it would have mattered but little. Who would believe the testimony of a servant over that of the then Viscount Crawford?”
Lord Matlock turned to his wife. “Is there any truth to Lord Glentworth’s claims?”
Lady Matlock’s eyes were brimming with tears as she nodded. “It is true that Catherine was not artistically bent. I have it on good authority as she was my sister Felicity’s closest friend. I am ashamed to admit that we used to laugh at her attempts at drawing. According to my sister, her embroidery was not much better, and she could neither play any instruments nor sing a clean note, but she excelled in foreign languages and calculations.”
“She was wasted on the Campbells, who could not appreciate her sharp wit and unconventional accomplishments. She came from a good but untitled family and was the great-niece of an Irish baron, but they denigrated her for not boasting any ancient blood in her veins.” Lord Limerick had stayed in the background but stepped forwards. “To be of exalted Irish ancestry does not matter to Matlock. He is too scared his own line should become known.”
“In this company, centuries of Bennets matters but little. I shall have you know that the Benéts came to the British Isles with William the Conqueror, alongside your precious nephew’s ancestor, Sir Richard d’Arcy. Our extended family still have a seat in Banchory in Scotland,” Lord Glentworth boomed. “Though I wish we did not, because it was whilst visiting our relations that we were introduced to the dastardly Baronet Campbell.”
“The material point to my coming here,” Matlock interrupted, choosing not to address Lord Limerick’s nor Lord Glentworth’s set-downs, “is that the old grievance has reappeared. I suspect the return of the Campbells to London, in addition to Mr Bennet’s elevation to an earl, has spurred the tattlers. It will make Lord Glentworth and his family’s entrance into society exceedingly difficult, and I have no wish to have my family name dragged through the mud with yours. Boys, I suggest we return home forthwith and do not further the acquaintance with Glentworth or Limerick. Including any of their, admittedly beautiful, daughters.” The viscount sprang to his feet and glanced ruefully at Jane, who raised her chin in defiance, whilst Lord Matlock turned to his nephew, who was fixed in astonishment. “I suggest you distance yourself as well, Darcy. No good can come of sullying your respectable name by associating with their tarnished ones.”
“I am grieved indeed—grieved and shocked!” Mr Darcy exclaimed.
“Is it absolutely certain that Lady Campbell was guilty? Her family has good reason to believe otherwise,” Miss Eudora Darcy interjected. “I am certain that something could be done…”
“There is no doubt in my mind,” Lord Matlock confirmed with conviction.
“Have you even attempted to determine who speaks the truth? And what has been done to quash the rumours?” Miss Eudora Darcy insisted.
“My eyes were opened to Lady Campbell’s true character twenty-three years ago, and I have no wish to stir a past best forgotten. As to the gossip, you know as well as I that nothing can be done to stop it. The houses of Glentworth and Limerick will be subjected to derision or will simply be shunned—if they are fortunate.”
Mr Darcy made no answer. He seemed scarcely to have heard his uncle’s reply and paced the room in earnest meditation. Regarding his contracted brows and gloomy air, Elizabeth instantly understood. Her power over him, if such a thing had ever existed, had depleted with the assurance of their disgrace. She had thought his opinion of her had improved as they, against their inclination and by the perversity of mischance, had been thrown repeatedly into each other’s company. Their similar roles in supporting a sister and cousin on the treacherous path to romance had created a sort of bond between them, and the consequences of becoming better acquainted had culminated in a better understanding.
He would certainly wish to distance himself from her family in the foreseeable future, and she could not condemn him for it. But the chasm between them brought nothing consolatory to her bosom, nor did it palliate her distress. It only confirmed the wishes she had fought so valiantly to repress. Never had she felt so honestly that she loved him—as now when all love must be in vain. His pride would not allow the shades of Pemberley to be polluted by the family of a convicted counterfeiter…
Elizabeth staggered to a chair, sat, and closed her eyes. A tear leaked from her eye and ran unchecked down her cheek, and she bowed her head. By the shuffling feet and the opening of the door, she reckoned the Matlocks were leaving. Mr Darcy must have long desired their absence, and she prayed her father or uncle would soon end this misery.
It could not be a coincidence that dinner had not been announced. The servants were certainly listening outside the door, waiting for the bickering to end, and she was not so na?ve as to think they would keep quiet. Oh no, everything that had been said—with added embellishments—would be all over town by morning. What did it matter that her great-uncle was a marquess? Nothing in this instance…
A shadow fell over her eyes, and she opened them to study an immaculate pair of Hessian boots.
“Is there anything I can bring you for your present relief?”
Mr Darcy was all politeness. In truth, he had proved himself to be the perfect gentleman during adversity, and she would reciprocate by offering him the same. She would not prolong their suffering.
“I thank you, but no.”
The awaited departure came. Lord Limerick kindly asked Mr Darcy to give Miss Georgiana Darcy his excuses and say that matters had arisen that demanded their immediate attention.
Mr Darcy rigidly complied and escorted his guests to the street when the carriages were ready. Colonel Fitzwilliam, who had remained after his brother and parents departed, offered Jane his arm and whispered fervently into her ear all the way to the carriage—occasionally soliciting a nod in response.
The gloomy night sky matched Elizabeth’s mood perfectly. Heavy clouds obscured even the slightest ray of moonlight from illuminating her path as she walked towards the dark outline of their carriage. She swallowed a sigh of relief they were leaving. Mr Darcy escorted the Glentworth ladies, and she would not insult him by making known how she wished to escape his presence.
“Do not despair,” Miss Eudora Darcy whispered in her ear.
It was a well-meant sentiment, though impossible to adhere to.
Mr Darcy waved away the footman and handed her mother into the carriage. The unwavering Colonel Fitzwilliam aided Jane. There was a small chance that he would not abandon them completely. Elizabeth procrastinated to allow Mr Darcy to make his excuses and move away. It was not to be, and she took the offered hand of the man who could not even bear to look at her. His expression was unyielding, as if he found the service particularly distasteful but his upbringing did not allow him to shirk what he believed was his duty.
Elizabeth set her foot on the first step, and the hold on her hand tightened. She may have been too hasty stepping up onto the second, though the poor light must take some of the blame for what followed. Something cold and slick hit the sole of her shoe, which slipped on the patch of ice. Her feet were swept away from beneath her, and she braced herself for the hard impact of the pavement.
It did not come—instead, she was enveloped in two strong arms and cradled to Mr Darcy’s chest in a swift motion that planted her lips on something soft. She wrenched away, but the grip tightened and would not allow her to move more than an inch.
“Elizabeth!” her mother screeched. “Thank heavens for your quick thinking, Mr Darcy. I am certain she would have been knocked senseless if her head had been allowed to hit the pavement.”
Mr Darcy did not answer, and she dared look into the dark pools of his eyes glittering in the faint lamp light. He was frozen in place; in distaste she reckoned, and she was desperate to escape the embarrassing moment as quickly as possible.
“You may put me down now, Mr Darcy.”
Elizabeth’s soft request only made him blink once. He still held her as a recalcitrant child about to be put to bed.
Then Mr Darcy drew a harsh intake of breath and lowered her slowly to the ground.
“Thank you,” she whispered and grabbed the door with both hands and hoisted herself into the carriage whilst Mr Darcy’s large, warm hand lay steadying on her lower back. She seated herself and glanced at the gentleman, who still held his left hand raised as a support for something invisible.
A footman wiped the step before he folded it and closed the door, whilst Mr Darcy’s unwavering gaze held her captive until he disappeared from sight. Could it have been his lips I crashed into? No. It must have been his cheek. Dear Lord, let it have been the latter and not his mouth. How utterly mortifying! She touched her cheek to feel the texture. It was not soft enough. Then she felt her lips to compare. Heaven forfend! I kissed Mr Darcy! Though it was an accident and the impact too hard to be deemed pleasant…
“Have you injured your face, Lizzy?” Mrs Bennet asked.
“No, I do not believe so,” Elizabeth admitted, abashed, having forgotten that she was not alone.
“I am ashamed of you,” Lady Glentworth admonished. “You could at least have thanked the gentleman for his assistance.”
I did! Elizabeth wanted to say, but to her consternation, she had not thanked him for his timely rescue but rather for putting her down afterwards.
“You owe him an apology for your clumsiness and should express a modicum of gratitude for not allowing you to fall to a certain death.”
“I hardly believe I was in mortal danger,” Elizabeth protested.
Lady Glentworth huffed.
“Good gracious,” her mother whispered. “Fitzwilliam Darcy! Heaven forfend. I did not recognise him…” She turned to Elizabeth. “He was the one who rescued you from the wild beast in Lambton.”
“He was,” Elizabeth confirmed and turned her gaze out of the window.
“He has rescued you twice!”
Elizabeth chose not to answer. It did not matter—nothing mattered any longer. Whatever feelings Mr Darcy had once expressed to his cousin must have sailed away on the HMS Family Scandal . A scandal that would not be contained to the guests at Darcy House. It would spread through the drawing rooms as the latest on-dit. She would not be surprised if it already were. A lady had turned away from her when she was out riding. In a retrospective light, it may not have been a coincidence.
If Mr Darcy had wavered before, which had often seemed likely, all doubt must now have been settled in her disfavour. If he were determined to be as happy as an unblemished family name would allow, he would return no more to Limerick House.
Should he not return in a sennight, or a fortnight at the most, she would understand and give up every expectation, every wish to be the subject of his admiration. Most likely, he was congratulating himself on his lucky escape, and she was the only one who harboured any regrets…