Page 42 of The Next Mrs Bennet

“Y ou brought this on yourself,” Hattie Philips told her younger sister. “How did you think the rest of us would react when it became known you sold one of your daughters to a man so very old, and even worse, from all accounts, an absolute reprobate.”

Fanny had been convinced her easily led sister, the same one who had assisted in her compromise of Thomas Bennet all those years ago, would never stand up to her in this way.

“How can you be so disloyal to your sister?” Fanny demanded with asperity. She did not enjoy Hattie having her own opinions.

“My first loyalty is to my husband, who I married without any subterfuge, unlike you who with all of your beauty and charm had to entrap a man into marriage,” Hattie shot back.

Her husband had informed her about her brother’s removal of her nieces from Longbourn. At first, she had felt sympathy for her sister, but the more her husband revealed regarding Thomas and Fanny’s callous and mercenary behaviour, the more she had come to opine it was no more than her sister and brother-in-law deserved.

A look of outrage was returned by Fanny, but unlike in the past where a display of anger would make her sister waiver, there was no effect now.

There was one thing Fanny knew her sister would not be able to resist, tears. “You have cut me to the quick,” Fanny moaned as she squeezed out some crocodile tears. “How can you be so heartless when I suffer so?” She dabbed her eyes with her delicate lace handkerchief.

“If you think I will be swayed by your fake crying any longer, you are sorely mistaken, Sister!” Hattie stated firmly. “It has been some time now since I realised I should never have participated in any of your dishonourable schemes, not the least of which was your entrapment of your husband.”

Fanny Bennet was reeling. Not only had she lost her children, but now her sister’s support—something she had counted upon all these years without question. At least she still had her friends in the neighbourhood. She would enjoy boasting of how she would soon be the mother of a duchess.

“I take no leave of you, Fanny, you deserve no such compliments. My husband and I will not admit you or Bennet to visit us socially any longer. My Frank will continue to act as Thomas’s solicitor for the good of your children. That is the only contact we will allow.” With that, Hattie turned on her heel and marched out of her younger sister’s drawing room without a look back at Fanny.

She stood frozen to the spot. Hattie had just broken all connection with her, and then cut her. Fanny was reeling.

“You are just jealous!” Fanny screeched at the spot where her sister had stood. “Regardless of what Miss Lizzy says, I will be in the Duke’s company and he will get my children back for me. Him a brute! What stuff and nonsense! Other than not having the good sense to choose my Jane over Miss Lizzy, he is a very proper gentleman.”

Pushing the visit out of her head, Fanny ordered the butler to have the carriage readied. It was time to go lord her daughter’s soon-to-be rank over those in the neighbourhood, starting with Lady Lucas.

How jealous that lady would be. Her husband was only a lowly knight while she would soon be the mother of the Duchess of Hertfordshire!

~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~

“I know it is not ideal as we only have two chambers for the five of you,” Gardiner told his nieces the next morning.

Jane and Lizzy had shared the bed in the smaller room while Mary, Kitty, and Lydia shared the one in the larger bedchamber. None but Lydia had raised a word of complaint regarding the sleeping arrangements.

From the day Lydia had been moved from the nursery, at eight rather than ten, or in Elizabeth’s case twelve, she had been given a large bedchamber which she did not have to share. At Longbourn, Jane and Elizabeth always shared, as did Mary and Kitty. Their mother had never hidden her favouritism of the youngest Bennet.

“I still do not see why I have been taken away from Longbourn and Mama,” Lydia whined.

“Lyddie, we will address this later, let us hear what Uncle Edward has to say first,” Jane suggested.

She pouted, but Lydia clamped her mouth shut.

“Thank you Jane dear,” Gardiner smiled. “Some months ago, I purchased the house next door to us, the one which shares a wall with this house. I had intended to create space for offices there, but your Aunt Maddie and I have spoken. With our three and you four who will remain with us for the foreseeable future once Lizzy is married to that man , we will open the walls between the two houses and make one big dwelling. There will be more than enough bedchambers for each of you to have your own and when Lilly, Eddy, and then May move from the nursery, they will have their own rooms as well.”

“Is there nothing which can be done with regards to my marriage?” Elizabeth asked.

“If I had known of this before your father,” Gardiner noted his niece’s scowl when he referred to Bennet in that way. “Excuse me, before Mr. Bennet signed the settlements, there may have been a way, but now there is not. If you refuse to marry him, he will assume guardianship of all five of you. He has enough wealth that he would be able to beat back any challenge.”

Elizabeth felt like she had to ask. She was well aware of the terms of the settlement and that she had sacrificed herself to protect Jane. If she could have been assured Jane would be safe, she would have run away already. She would never do that to her most beloved sister.

“But why must I stay with you?” Lydia whinged.

“Lyddie, did you not hear what was said in the drawing room at Longbourn yesterday?” Madeline who had been silent up to now enquired.

“Yes, but Mama tried to say it was not true,” Lydia claimed.

“Mrs. Bennet was prevaricating,” Elizabeth stated stridently. “Do you think a parent who is willing to sell one of her daughters for her own future comfort truly loves any of her children?”

“But Mama never liked you; she would not have done so to the rest of us,” Lydia reasoned, with much less confidence than she had before.

“Did you not hear Aunt Maddie remonstrate with Mama because she had wanted me to be the one to marry that ancient man…I am sorry, Lizzy,” Jane rebutted.

“Please Jane, you, and any others, may insult that man as much as you choose. It is after all nothing but the truth,” Elizabeth allowed.

“W-was t-that t-t-true?” Lydia queried tremulously. “I-I thought M-Mama loved you well, like m-me.”

“It was all true Lyddie…” Jane told her sister exactly how their mother had tried to push her forward as the one to be sacrificed. “She only became sanguine with Lizzy being the one to be offered to the man when he offered to end the entail and dower the rest of us.”

The tears fell freely from Lydia’s eyes. It was not easy to see the pain it caused her to have her illusions shattered regarding Mrs. Bennet being a loving mother—at least to some of her daughters.

~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~

Robert Darcy had been in London for two days when he saw the announcement in the Times of London that the dissipated duke was taking another bride. That her name—Miss Elizabeth Bennet of Longbourn in Hertfordshire—was unknown was no surprise.

Rumour had been circulating according to his brother Reggie Fitzwilliam that Hertfordshire had turned to look in the countryside for his next bride when he had come to realise all doors in polite society were closed to him. No one he knew of would allow their daughter to become the Duke’s next victim regardless of his rank or wealth.

The announcement said nothing of the young lady’s family. Darcy wondered how old she was knowing the Duke was past five and sixty years.

He made his way to the main drawing room where his wife was entertaining their sister, Lady Elaine Fitzwilliam, Lady Sarah, the Countess of Jersey, and Lady Rose, Duchess of Bedford.

Darcy bowed to the ladies. “Anne and ladies, I just saw a distressing announcement in the papers, Hertfordshire is to be married again,” Darcy shared.

“Do we know the lady?” Lady Anne enquired.

“No Anne, she is a Miss Elizabeth Bennet from an estate in Hertfordshire.” Darcy turned towards the Duchess of Bedford. “Lady Rose, as your main estate is in Bedfordshire, have you heard of this family?”

“No, it is not a name known to me. Mayhap Sedgewick knows of them, but I doubt it,” Lady Rose averred.

“It is obviously a family who only saw his rank and either did not know of his reputation or cared more for the societal advantages of such a match,” Lady Jersey opined.

“We can only pray this lady has the strength to survive where his previous wives did not,” Lady Anne stated sadly. “If her family did not know what he is, then they were wilfully blind.”

“Or they cared not enough for their daughter and were seduced by his rank and wealth,” Lady Matlock surmised.

There were sad nods from those in the room. It was a fact of life that there were parents who would sacrifice one of their offspring for purely selfish motives.

“Such a pity the King did not act when my husband and others tried to have the disgusting man hobbled,” Lady Rose sighed.

A few years back, the Duke of Bedford and the Earl of Jersey, among other peers had applied to the King to have Hertfordshire’s rank and wealth stripped from him. The King had been disinterested—part of his malady in the peers’ opinions —and nothing had come of it except an angry and vengeful Duke of Hertfordshire once word got back to him.

Given the group who had applied to the King were made up of dukes and a few earls, there was nothing—so far—other than bluster Hertfordshire had been able to do.

“If we are able, we will assist the new Duchess,” Lady Matlock stated. “However, I expect he will isolate her from society like he did his other wives.”

No one disagreed with her.

~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~

As soon as he had arrived in London, Hertfordshire had the settlement papers sent to his solicitor. Yes, he had agreed to some things which raised his lawyer’s eyebrows, but he fully intended to survive his new wife like he had the others so it was of no consequence to him.

The same day he sent Wickham to deliver the notices to the papers. If only he could have been present in the homes of members of the Ton when, despite their attempts to hobble him from finding a new duchess, they learned he had successfully secured a fiancée.

The next two days he spent between two of his mistresses. How it pleased him to be able to exercise his power over the doxies. As much as he would have liked to have Wickham procure him a wife of some peer or another, he knew he needed to refrain until after he was married. He did not want to give the Bishop of St. Paul’s reason to deny him being married at that church.

Before returning to London after the summer upcoming, he would need to get the spitfire with child. Once she was sent away to one of his estates for the duration of her confinement, he would be able to enjoy himself and take his pleasures.

On his third day in Town, the Duke remembered he should send an engagement ring to his fiancée. He was at the largest of his four homes in London, Hertfordshire House on Berkeley Square. Hertfordshire pulled a bell pull. When the butler entered he told him to summon Wickham for him.

While waiting for Wickham, he swung the painting opposite him on the wall open and opened the safe behind it. Without paying attention he pulled open a drawer of rings and grabbed one from the top.

It was a gold band with a large emerald surrounded by smaller diamonds.

By the time Wickham knocked and was bade enter, the safe was locked and the painting back in place. “Ride to Long…whatever the name of the estate is, and present my fiancée with this ring.” Hertfordshire tossed the ring at his man carelessly. Luckily Wickham caught it.

“It will be as you wish, Your Grace,” Wickham bowed and then inspected the ring. “If I may point this out, Your Grace, your betrothed’s fingers are somewhat thinner than this ring, it will not fit her.”

“What care I, tell the father to have it made smaller then. Away with you.” The Duke waved Wickham away like he would anyone of no consequence.

Wickham schooled his features, bowed and left the room. In short order, he was on a horse headed to Longbourn.

~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~

“The Duke of Hertfordshire’s man to see Mr. Bennet and Miss Elizabeth,” Wickham told the butler who opened the portal after he had let the knocker fall against the oak door.

Without a word, Hill made his way to the study. He returned anon and led Wickham into the room. Wickham looked around, other than at Pemberley and the Duke’s libraries—and that man disdained reading, his libraries were to impress—he had never seen so many books in one place.

“My daughter is no longer here,” Bennet stated gruffly without standing and greeting his guest.

“You have allowed her to run away?” Wickham thundered. “His Grace will be most displeased and you will feel his wrath…”

“I said she was not here, not that I do not know where she is,” Bennet interjected.

“Then where is she?” Wickham demanded.

The worst thing for his health would be to return to Berkeley Square and report Miss Elizabeth was gone.

“She is at this address,” Bennet proffered a piece of paper.

Wickham read:

Edward Gardiner

23 Gracechurch Street

London

“Why did you not write and tell His Grace she is in London?” Wickham insisted.

“I knew one of his lackeys would call.” Bennet blanched when he saw the man bunch up his fists. “You are correct, I should have done so. With everything which has occurred of late, it was an oversight on my part.” Not wanting to be hit again, Bennet had used a more conciliatory tone of voice for the latter part of his speech.

Wickham relaxed and opened his balled-up fists. “Good day,” he intoned and then was gone.

Bennet breathed a little easier. He had avoided another beating.