Page 16 of The Last House in Lambton (Pride and Prejudice Variations #6)

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

I did not bother to undress. I loosened my sash, kicked off my slippers, and fell into a shivering heap under a pile of blankets on my bed. The squalls of shaking continued off and on with diminishing severity, and soon, I fell into a heavy sleep.

But rest eluded me and I continued to startle awake periodically, my heart pounding dreadfully.

Each time, I lay in the dark and fell victim to flashing images of leering grins and other possibilities that I did not wish to imagine, yet the pictures came regardless.

I tossed and turned as though trapped in an airless cellar until I could eventually calm myself enough to again fall into restless sleep.

After the third unsuccessful attempt, however, I rose, put a shawl around my shoulders, and knitted slippers on my feet, thinking that if I sat in the parlour where I could breathe—or run—at least I might doze.

Anything was preferable to lying awake in a closed room with only my mind for company.

I crept down the stairs so as not to wake the maids, but the treads were old and creaked in spite of my caution .

Suddenly, out of the gloom, Mr Darcy was there before me. I stifled a small scream.

“Forgive me. I did not mean to startle you. Is there aught you need?”

“I cannot sleep,” I whispered.

“Perhaps some warm milk.”

I was too dazed to mention we had no milk left and let him again whisk me back into the kitchen. But within a very few minutes, he produced a cup of warm milk. I looked wonderingly at this offering.

“I sent to Pemberley for a few things,” he explained, and then, because I could not cease staring at him, he added, “I will go before the maids come down.”

I blinked twice. The kitchen was aglow with the unmistakably soft light of candles, and indeed, there on the table burning in merry haste, stood two long, white tapers. My eyes rose once again to the gentleman’s face.

“Would you rather have brandy?” he asked with a slight frown. Perhaps he had mistaken my hesitation as a dislike of milk.

I spoke distantly, as though in a dream. “No. I become sadly chatty and cannot remember a thing I have said.”

“Oh? And how do you know?” he asked, smiling for perhaps the first time in our acquaintance.

I smiled shakily in response. “My father has taken great pleasure in repeating my own words back to me on a few occasions.”

After pouring himself a portion from a glass bottle on the sideboard, Mr Darcy took a chair facing me.

“Do you have many occasions to indulge in brandy, then?” he asked, still smiling and causing my wits to vanish.

Oh, if only I could think of something clever to say. But at that moment, I could only mumble that I had once cut my knee to the bone after tripping on a flag in the kitchen. I sighed and looked down into my milk.

“Forgive me, I did not mean to force you to recall something you would rather not remember. You looked so downcast just now. Perhaps we should not talk of?—”

“Oh, you misunderstood. I was thinking of the rather funny things I could have said in response to such a question if only I had thought of them first.”

I never imagined Mr Darcy could look so sweetly amused, so—but wait, he was speaking.

“Might we try again?” He cleared his throat and frowned. “Do you have many occasions to indulge in brandy, then, Miss Bennet?”

I shook off my amazement and replied in a breezy imitation of my former, saucier self. “Hardly ever, sir. Only when I gamble, of course, and in the back pew at church when Mr Collins is sermonising, and always after I have robbed the mail coach—otherwise I never touch the stuff.”

Mr Darcy sat before me, his smile fading into a more pensive look. “I am glad you are recovering your sense of humour. Might you—are you equal to telling me what happened?”

“There is little to tell. I came down to the kitchen after sitting up with Auntie. I heard a thump, and since the neighbour’s man had used our barrow, I thought perhaps he was returning it.

I opened the door to see if it was indeed him, and four men swarmed into the kitchen.

All I could think to do was to feed them as a way to keep them occupied, and when they had eaten everything, they asked for drink.

I had held back the ale in the cellar until the last possible moment and felt that distraction was my last resort.

I told them they could haul it up the ladder themselves, hinted there might be wine in the parlour cabinet—” My eyes rose gravely to his face.

“What would I have done had you not come? ”

After a heavy pause, he cleared his throat and replied, “Whatever you did would have been equally brave.”

“I do not rightly know if that is true. I had come to the end of my courage.” He reached for and gently squeezed my hand in reassurance. “What has happened to them?” I asked.

“We trussed them up and sent them up the road. I did not want them in Lambton. But perhaps we should decide what is best to be done now. You and Mrs Jennings will come to Pemberley, and I will send an express to your fath?—”

“Oh, I wish you would not, Mr Darcy!” I cried.

“What? But you cannot continue here.”

“I must stay. Do you not see?” I stood abruptly.

“If I give up—if I run away now, I will concede to defeat and perhaps never know… Oh, I wish I could explain it,” I said, rubbing absently at my forehead.

“Did you not say every boy has been on a tramp at least once in his life? This is my tramp, Mr Darcy. This is my one chance to fend for myself, and I would like to—indeed, I must see it through!”

He had shot up out of his chair during my agitated plea and began to pace before me. “That is nonsense. Of course you must come to Pemberley and?—”

“And what? What do you think will be said of me when it becomes known a mob of men spent several hours in this house and that Mr Darcy rousted them, spending the better part of the night here in doing so, and that I am moved to his house and put under his protection? What next? Are we to marry in haste, or do you plan to send me to my father under a cloud of ruin?”

He stared at me for one long, throbbing moment, before barking back at me. “Just how do you suppose that staying here alone under these conditions will spare you the same talk?”

“I do not know! But I do know I do not relish being talked of as your fancy bit as they say! And what of your sister? What talk will she be subjected to if she is made to treat your rumoured mistress as her guest?”

I began to stack the dishes out of the need to vent my frustration and spoke with bitter certainty. “I would rather take my chances with whatever gossip arises without reference to you.”

“Is my assistance so offensive?”

“I would rather not be under an obligation to you, sir!” I cried.

I had turned to speak to him directly, and since he was still staring at me with a heavy frown, I felt compelled to elaborate—heatedly—my feelings on the matter.

“Surely, I must be allowed a particle of dignity! If not—and if I am to run away from this awful circumstance—then I may as well go to London on the morning stage and take poor, bewildered Mrs Jennings with me. Once there, my father, uncles, and perhaps even my cousin Collins can decide what is to be done with me.” I turned my back to him and began to briskly scrape the plates into the floor bucket, ridding them of the dried food and scraps that could only remind me of my ordeal.

“There are plenty of men, Mr Darcy,” I said grimly, “who are as capable as you are of managing my life.”

I did not realise that I was scraping madly at a single plate long after it was clean until Mr Darcy gently gripped my wrist.

“You are overtired,” he said in a low voice into my ear.

I felt his nearness—his warmth. He stood directly behind me, and merely at the insistence of his touch, the knife with which I had been scraping clattered to the floor. This time, he did not just assist me. He picked me up and carried me up the stairs and into my room, depositing me onto my bed.

“Go to sleep,” he murmured sternly.