Page 48 of The Last House in Lambton (Pride and Prejudice Variations #6)

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

I had been home for a month, and as I knew I would, I filled my time with leisurely walks through the countryside.

I was still, even then, bewildered that so little had changed at Longbourn in the same space of time in which my own world had flipped upside down.

It was a dream-like existence to me—the sounds of Mary playing the same measure over and over, Kitty screeching from somewhere upstairs, and my mother’s strident calls heavenward, asking what was the matter.

The noise seemed incessant, while nothing seemed to move or to change as a result of it.

Yet, into this clamorous state of suspension I carried with me a light that did not flicker. At any time of my choosing, I could sense it nestled in my chest and aglow with warmth and comfort. This is love , I realised with wonder.

This was not at all what I thought love would be—a feverish wish for someone, perhaps, or a feeling I would die without him.

No, I did not pine for Mr Darcy. I knew better than to fall into despair, refuse to eat, or wither into a pile of self-obsessed grief, and what is more, I had a strong sense he would be disappointed in me if I did.

It was of great help to me that his presence never left me. I felt as though he had taken a match to my heretofore unlit heart. It poured out such a breathtaking light that I wished for nothing save the privacy and quietude in which to dissolve into it.

Outwardly, I managed to engage with my family as I always did, but perhaps with less frustration and far less of a personal investment.

My dread of answering questions about my time away had been unfounded, for I discovered that after an absence, I was required to hear almost exclusively about what passed without me.

Save for a brief enquiry here and there, none of which needed much of an answer, my adventure was of little interest.

After a long rest upon my return home, I noticed how calm I had become and marvelled at how I could sit through one of Mary’s performances without writhing in agony for her.

She really was a dear, trying so very hard to be someone worthy and good without once seeing she was already both of those things almost to excess.

Mr Gardiner had invited her to London for the summer, and I felt a complacent relief that she would be away from us and nourished for once.

My poor uncle had also tried to counsel Mama on matters of propriety and the governance of her youngest daughters but was treated to a performance of the vapours for his effort.

We did, in consequence, however, cease to have officers at our table for dinner every night.

This was because, as part of his lecture, my uncle had written out in ink the annual income of such an occupation for Mama, uttering a few fatal words as he did so.

“And do not think any one of them have independent means, Fanny, for no one with any respect for himself would enlist in a militia if he could afford to buy himself a commission. ”

Lydia most loudly mourned the change but without real passion, claiming that since Wickham had gone away, there were no officers worth looking at anyway.

I wished to know the circumstances of that man’s disappearance, but all I could gather was that it had been sudden and unexpected.

Colonel Forster and his wife never mentioned Mr Wickham again, and I knew better than to ask after him, lest I be teased relentlessly for having lost my heart to him.

I had escaped an unnamable fate not so long ago, and from the wide perspective of what real trouble is, I saw my family with fresh eyes. Lydia laboured under eruptions of strong emotion, of enthusiasm, of a life force that wished only for a direction—a racehorse, held in a barn.

Kitty, meanwhile, who only needed a placid existence in which she could feel safe and cared for, was housed with the most demanding, least placid girl in the world.

But not less than half a dozen times in a day, I witnessed her trying to find cheer, even in a puzzle or Mrs Hill’s sugared biscuits, and I thought of her in a much more heroic light.

In the lives of my parents, I saw the sum total of their thoughts and beliefs, nothing more and nothing less.

I sometimes sat with my father and one day asked him to tutor me in Greek so I could read the stoics.

He teased me for it which I saw plainly was his way of protecting himself from feeling too much happiness and, therefore, sparing himself any disappointment that must follow.

It was clear to me that he did everything as an anecdote to disappointment, which when failing to produce an heir for his estate, must have become a crushing force in his life.

He dug around in his shelves, nonetheless, handed me a page-to-page translation of Seneca, and grumbled he would help me with no more than one question a week.

I kissed him on the forehead and promised to torment him with a rash of silly ponderings, and he even kissed me back, before saying, “Go away, Lizzy. What a plague you are today!”

My mother had at first paid me too much attention. She had been appalled by my face, which looked hopelessly ravaged in her opinion. What, she demanded, had I been doing? Had I not applied the lotion she recommended? Had I lost my bonnet? When had I been in sufficient sunlight to sprout a freckle!

I laughed at her, caressed her silken cheek, and said, “Not all your daughters can have such a complexion as yours, Mama.” And then I winked and said, “Perhaps I should marry a farmer who will expect his wife to have spots on her cheeks, hmm?”

“You dreadful girl,” she cried but with a touch of pride I had never heard from her.

Of course, I had so rarely complimented her, I could not wonder at the effect of at least acknowledging she was still quite beautiful, and what is more, she did not dislike my ability to make her laugh in spite of herself.

“Mama,” I asked soon after this exchange, “how much is a reasonable sum to pay for wax candles?”

From that point, I became her third favourite child.

If she began to carp at my inevitable spinsterhood, I had only to beg for a bit of her wifely wisdom, as though I were in training for employment with some husband somewhere.

I gleaned from her various notions of setting a menu—fish no more than once a week since it came up from coast only on Tuesday and must be served on Wednesday at the latest—and the secret to selecting the best cook—a woman, not young nor wiry of build, but plump and cheerful—and other such entertaining gems.

With an eye to my future entertainment, for so much of what she said was a mixture of wisdom and nonsense, I wrote down her advice and sometimes the stories that went with them.

This attention suggested to Mama she had a protégé, and her nervous complaints became infrequent in consequence.

Seeing this, Jane joined me in this occupation.

When my eldest sister began to write out these notes in fair copy and to organise them by topic, our mother became positively animated, bursting with an urgent bit of wisdom remembered in the night that we must be told, and setting us to work directly after breakfast. These recollections were compelling.

Her vision seemed to blur when she thought of this burnt roast or that glorious bargain, as though she were visiting the great milestones of her life.

I wished to laugh but knew better, and soon, Mama was expounding on millinery, linens, restoratives, and remedies.

We even skirted lightly around the topic of midwifery.

We were taught how a good tinker could be identified—not that there were really any good tinkers, she warned us with her eyes in a squint.

Certainly, if he had all his teeth and a winning smile, we should run away, for he was likely an enchanter.

She herself, she confided in a deafening whisper, had nearly fallen in love with one when she was newly married.

Jane and I exchanged a look at that, and I at last felt the need to excuse myself so I could have a good chuckle.

Early the next morning, my sister and I engaged in a private conversation much as we used to do when we were on the verge of coming out.

“Lizzy,” Jane whispered as I woke up. It seemed to me she had been staring at me for some moments.

“What is it?” I whispered back.

She sank back into her pillow. “Nothing, really. I should not have said anything.”

With my eyes still closed, I smiled sleepily. “You have not yet said anything, Jane, so perhaps you should just ask me what you will before you close up like a clam.”

She turned on her side to face me. “What is wrong, Lizzy? You have changed.”

“Ah,” I said, turning on my back and staring at the ceiling.

“It is not a bad change,” she quickly clarified, lest I take her observation as a criticism.

“I do not deny it.” I turned back on my side with both hands folded under my cheek in order to face her.

“I have fallen in love,” I said, “and I do not know if I should laugh or cry. There are times when I must blink back tears of adoration at the sight of a green bud on the chestnut, or I must force myself not to dance with the willow branches that wave at me when I pass by the creek. Well, it is impossible to explain.”

Jane turned towards me with wide, questioning eyes. “But who is he?”

The tears that seemed ever present since I returned home from Pemberley spilled over on my pillow, and I said, “The best of men, Jane. But our circumstances are not promising. He is of a different world than I.”

“Oh Lizzy,” she whispered mournfully.

“Hush. I am content. I have said my goodbyes to him. Think of it as though your sister has fallen prey to a handsome tinker, and smile indulgently at me when I look to be swooning under a spell he has cast from afar.”

“Can you not tell me?”

“I will of course, but not today. I cannot bear to say his name aloud just yet. It is still too precious to me. Do you understand?”

“More than you might think,” she whispered.

Thus, we sat at the table on yet another morning, well occupied with our mother and still thinking of tinkers, when Kitty called from the parlour .

“Mama! There is a carriage in the drive—lord, two carriages! And all with four horses apiece!”

We nearly threw back our chairs onto the floor, so quickly did we stand. There I stood rooted to the floor with my chest heaving and my eyes closed almost desperately, while my sisters and my mother gathered in a knot of babbling excitement at the window in the next room.

I had not long to wait to hear what I already knew.

“Mr Darcy!” cried Lydia. “My word, Mama, what is he doing here?”

“Lizzy!” my mother roared, “Mr Darcy is here. Come and see! But why—and who is that? A lady? Has he married?”

“That is his sister,” I said as I went into the parlour, speaking more forcefully than I wished so I could be heard. “I met her in Derbyshire and formed a friendship. Did I not mention it? I am certain she is paying a courtesy call on her way to London. Come, shall we meet them on the steps?”