Page 22 of To India with Mr. Darcy

A fter a few more days of travel, the carriage rattled up the long, familiar drive towards Longbourn, its wheels crunching on the gravel path that curved around the budding hedgerows. It was all so familiar, the trees arching overhead, and the lawn was bright with the first blush of spring. Elizabeth leaned forward, her gloved fingers pressed against the glass in the same way that she had when they reached the ship. There it was. Home .

The carriage barely rolled to a halt before the front door burst open and the sound of shrieking reached them like a wave.

“There they are!” came Mrs Bennet’s unmistakable voice, high-pitched and trembling with joy. “My girls! My precious girls! Oh, thank goodness you’re safe!”

She surged down the steps, shawl flying, apron strings flapping behind her like streamers. Kitty and Lydia followed in a blur of movement and flounces, nearly tumbling over one another in their haste to reach the carriage. Behind them, Mary lingered at the threshold, lips pursed but eyes eager, while Mr Bennet stood just inside the doorway, leaning casually against the frame, arms folded, gentle smile on his face.

“Lizzie!” Kitty cried, wrenching the carriage door open. “Jane! Tell us everything this moment! Did you see elephants? Did you meet any Rajahs? Did anyone fall overboard?”

“Was the ship very dangerous?” Lydia squealed, grabbing Jane’s hand and nearly pulling her down the steps in her excitement. “Did you wear those hideous long dresses the whole time? I heard you have to when you’re abroad or you’ll catch a fever and die.”

“Gracious, Lydia,” Jane said with a laugh as she stepped down, already being hugged tightly by both younger sisters at once. “Can we at least be allowed inside before you demand a full account?”

“Oh, but we’ve been simply dying for news!” Kitty said, bouncing on her toes. “You’ve missed so much. There was a ball in the church hall, and the vicar’s wife got locked in the privy, and someone from Meryton has gone mad, though we’re not entirely sure who.”

Mrs Bennet reached Elizabeth next, her hands fluttering to her daughter’s face. “My darling girl, look at you! You look as though you’ve been working in the fields, and you are positively waif-like. Did you eat at all? I’ve heard the food is appalling. And your bonnet! Oh dear, India has not improved your fashion sense one bit, has it? No matter, we shall restore you. Come in, come in at once!”

“I am glad to see you too, Mama,” Elizabeth said, allowing herself to be embraced, kissed on both cheeks, and ushered onto the gravel in a swirl of colour and voices.

Mary approached more quietly and offered her hand to Elizabeth. “Welcome home,” she said, somewhat stiffly. “I’ve kept your books in order. The parlour copy of Fordyce is slightly water-damaged, but I suspect no one noticed.”

“I have always relied on you for vigilance, Mary,” Elizabeth said with a smile, taking her hand warmly.

Through the whirlwind, Elizabeth glanced back at the house and found her father watching. He hadn’t moved from the doorway, but there was something in his expression, a softness beneath the arch of his brow. He met her gaze and gave a quiet, contented nod. Elizabeth smiled, knowing it to be the warmest embrace from her father, and when she reached the steps, he offered his arm. She took it without hesitation.

“I see you’ve returned to us in one piece,” Mr Bennet said as they stepped inside together.

“More or less.”

“I expect we’ll hear tales of your grand adventures for weeks.”

“Only if you ask nicely.”

He chuckled and gave her shoulder the briefest of squeezes. “It is good to have you back, Lizzie. I’m proud of you.”

And she felt that it was good to be back. It was. She was grateful—truly. For the familiar warmth of the hearth, for her sisters’ chatter, for the smell of honey cake and polished wood and something floral in the air that must have been Mary’s new soap. It was all exactly as she remembered. And yet, she was not.

The house was the same, the people the same, the weather, the rooms, the tea. But Elizabeth felt some invisible barrier now, a quiet space between herself and the life she had left behind. She could not unsee what she had seen or unknow what she had come to know. Her days at sea, the heat and colour of Calcutta, the storm, the quiet music of water against the hull, and the face— his face—that kept coming back to her in half-remembered glances.

“I hope you haven’t been courted by any unsuitable men,” Mrs Bennet said brightly as they stepped into the drawing room where a tea service had been set with unusual care. “Though it would hardly surprise me. There’s a shortage of gentlemen out there, I imagine. Now that you’re back in civilisation, we must make haste. Mr Morley has a good fortune, you know. Not that he has shown any interest in Meryton girls, but I daresay your foreign charm might tempt him.”

Elizabeth exchanged a look with Jane, who shook her head with a soft chuckle.

“We have been home five minutes,” Jane said gently. “Allow us to put down our bags first?”

Mrs Bennet waved her hand. “Yes, yes, of course. But I must say, I shall sleep easier knowing you are back where young ladies belong. And just think of the prospects, girls! You shall no doubt have the most engaging conversation to attract any suitor.”

Elizabeth sat with her teacup in hand, nodding and smiling as appropriate, but her mind wandered even as the house buzzed with questions and laughter. She was home, yes, but she was no longer who she had been. Not quite. And the world, it seemed, had not changed to meet her.

***

The days that followed unfolded with the quiet predictability Elizabeth had once found comforting. Now it only served to highlight all that had changed within her. That predictability pressed against her like a too-tight bodice, constricting and stifling her, impossible to ignore.

Breakfast was served at precisely the same hour each day, with the same soft-boiled eggs, the same toast, the same idle chatter. The afternoons brought needlework in the drawing room, where Mary read aloud from Fordyce’s Sermons , only to pause for unnecessary commentary that no one requested and even fewer appreciated. Mrs Bennet alternated between napping and launching into spirited diatribes on the inadequacies of Hertfordshire’s current crop of eligible bachelors.

“I swear the standards have slipped since you girls have been gone,” she declared one afternoon, thumping her teacup down onto its saucer. “Mr Montrose at Ashby Hall has taken to wearing blue cravats! Blue! What self-respecting man wears blue? And don’t even get me started on Mr Norton’s dreadful gait. I will not have one of my daughters married to a man who walks like a goose. At least, not unless he is terribly wealthy, which Mr Norton most definitely is not.”

Elizabeth had learned to offer vague sounds of agreement while fixing her gaze on her embroidery hoop, trying not to impale her fingers in frustration. Jane, for her part, was unfailingly sweet as always, but even she had begun to offer strained smiles and polite noncommittal responses that suggested her patience was wearing thin.

At first, Elizabeth had thought herself simply weary. After all, they had travelled a long way. It was normal to feel the strain of travel. But as the days wore on, the feeling did not lift. It only intensified, manifesting as an inexplicable restlessness that tugged at her during the quiet hours, leaving her unsettled and irritable.

She wandered the gardens more than usual, seeking solace in the spring air, but even the once-familiar paths now felt strange. The trees had lost none of their beauty, nor the early blooms their colour, but they felt somehow smaller. The air smelled too still. The sky too flat. Everything was the same, and that was the trouble.

It surprised her how much she missed the sea. She missed the briny air, the roll of the ship beneath her feet, the unpredictable rhythm of each day. She missed the sound of ropes creaking, the lapping of water against the hull, the sense that she was always in motion, moving towards something. And, if she was honest with herself, she missed the people too. She missed her aunt and uncle’s quiet wisdom. She missed the camaraderie of the passengers she had come to know. She missed…

Well. That was the problem, wasn’t it? She missed Mr Darcy.

Not the Mr Darcy who had proposed so inelegantly, who had insulted her family and made a mess of Jane’s heart. No, she missed the other one, the man who had carried her when she couldn’t walk, who had stood beside her when others hesitated, who had looked at her across a room with something so soft in his expression it made her breath catch. She could still feel the press of his hands against her waist as he lifted her, still hear the quiet murmur of his voice when they had worked to save the injured sailor.

And he had said he would visit. At Longbourn. But she had heard nothing since their return. She told herself not to be foolish. He would not come. Why should he? The voyage was over, and he would no doubt have forgotten all about her by now. His obligation to Mr Bingley was fulfilled. Their strange, storm- tossed camaraderie had been forged at sea, and it would remain there. She would never see him again.

Late one afternoon, she and Jane took a walk through the fields behind the house, the sun low on the horizon and the grass damp with dew. They strolled with their arms linked, their pace unhurried, but their silence felt heavier than usual.

“I’m glad we are home,” Jane said softly. “Aren’t you?”

Elizabeth glanced at her, noting the faint crease between her brows. “Of course I am,” she said, though even she could hear the hesitation in her voice.

Jane offered a small smile. “And yet, you don’t sound it.”

Elizabeth looked out across the field and sighed. “It’s strange. I thought I would feel more myself here, but if anything, I feel less so. Here, I am Lizzie, but there…” she sighed again. “Oh, I don’t know. Everything feels different.”

“Everything?” Jane asked gently.

Elizabeth shrugged. “Perhaps not everything. Perhaps it’s only me who has changed.”

“It’s not only you who has changed,” Jane said quietly.

They walked in silence a little longer, until they reached the gate that marked the boundary between the Longbourn grounds and the neighbouring estate. Jane rested her arms on the top rung, gazing out into the trees beyond.

“I’ve been thinking about him,” she said quietly.

Elizabeth didn’t need to ask who she meant but she did all the same. “Mr Bingley?”

Jane nodded. “I keep telling myself it was nothing. That I imagined his attentions, that I misunderstood everything. But I can’t quite believe that. It felt so real.”

Elizabeth swallowed. “It was real. I saw it too.”

“Then what changed?” Jane asked, turning to her. “Why would he pull away so suddenly? Do you think I disappointed him somehow? Did something wrong?”

“No,” Elizabeth said at once, fierce and sure. “You did nothing wrong, Jane. If anything, I think he…” She paused, remembering all the hurtful things she heard Mr Darcy say to Mr Bingley and wondering whether she should say anything at all to Jane. “I think perhaps he was influenced.”

Jane swung around to look at her. “By whom?”

Elizabeth hesitated. “By someone who believed they were doing the right thing, even though anyone could see they weren’t.”

“No, they weren’t,” Jane said quietly. “Not for me.”

“No,” Elizabeth agreed. “Not for you.”

Jane looked back at the fields, her eyes distant. “I wish I could forget him.”

Elizabeth squeezed her hand. “So do I. But I don’t think it works like that.”

Jane didn’t reply, but she leaned into Elizabeth’s side, and together they watched the sun sink a little lower. The silence between them was different this time, no longer heavy but shared. Elizabeth felt a little less alone, knowing that Jane was experiencing something similar.