William’s shout is loud enough that I hear it, just faintly, even in the stillroom. Only a moment later, and he bursts through the doorway to find me with my arms poised above my head as I reach to fasten a bunch of rosemary to its hook for drying.
“They are here!” William says. “My dear—the Darcys have arrived at Rosings Park! I only just saw them pass.”
I lower my hands, brush my fingers against the fabric of my apron. “They are earlier than I expected.”
“No wonder—their horses are very fine beasts, and their carriage, Charlotte—such luxury! Their coachman wears the most elegant livery.” He looks at the table, strewn with herbs I have yet to bundle and hang, and his brow creases anxiously. “This must be tidied.”
“I will be finished shortly,” I say, “though I do not think we can expect them here very soon, and even then, I hardly think Mr. and Mrs. Darcy are going to want to see our stillroom.”
He chuckles, a nervous sound. “I suppose you are right, my dear. But still—just to be sure—”
“I will see to it,” I say as soothingly as I can.
He returns to his book room, no doubt to resume watching the lane. For three days now, he has been watching the lane even more avidly than is usual for him, despite knowing that the Darcys were unlikely to arrive before today or tomorrow. Mrs. Baxter and Martha have been in a frenzy of cleaning and laundering. The parsonage looks as fine as ever it has.
I tie the last of the herbs into bunches and string them up, my fingers moving with the ease of practice while my mind drifts to thoughts of Rosings and what might be happening there. It is hard to imagine Elizabeth spending so much time in Lady Catherine’s company; when she came to Kent after my marriage, she was by turns bored and amused by our audiences with her ladyship, though she was far too polite for her thoughts to be obvious to anyone who did not know her well. And she has not been back since, despite having married Lady Catherine’s nephew. I try and fail to imagine my friend as a married woman, with a cap covering her dark hair and an attitude of deference toward her husband.
THE LETTER FROM Lizzy bearing the news of her engagement had come as such a shock that I found myself still sitting with it an hour later, mouth round with astonishment, when William arrived home from Rosings Park. He was gasping with the news that Lady Catherine had had a letter from her nephew Mr. Darcy, which contained the same information as the correspondence I still held in my hand, and that her ladyship was in a high fury.
“She has cut him off!” William said. “Entirely! She will never speak to him again. For him to have chosen someone like Cousin Elizabeth over Miss de Bourgh—it is unthinkable—so many hopes dashed.” He managed to appear both aghast that his cousin had the temerity to go so expressly against Lady Catherine’s wishes and thrilled that she had risen so high, for, “Now,” he said, in a hushed tone, “I will be related to her ladyship by marriage.”
WE ARE TO dine at Rosings. The invitation arrived not an hour after William left me in the stillroom; he has been alight with excitement all afternoon, banging around the house and driving me and Mrs. Baxter to distraction. Before we leave to walk across the lane and up the long drive to the house, I kiss Louisa good night, brushing my hand over her sleeping head. My fingers still smell of rosemary.
A footman shows us into the drawing room. Lady Catherine is seated in her usual place, with Miss de Bourgh and Mrs. Jenkinson beside her, and there, on the settee where William and I often sit, are Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth.
She smiles at me—a full smile, showing her teeth—but is otherwise restrained as we all make our greetings and William and I sit in the chairs Lady Catherine indicates. I look at Elizabeth, and she gives me that old, wry glance, just for a moment; and then Lady Catherine begins to speak, and Lizzy turns her attention to her.
“My nephew tells me that the roads were very dry all the way from Derbyshire,” Lady Catherine says.
Mr. Darcy makes no effort to reply, and Elizabeth leans forward a little on her seat. “We could not have asked for better weather in which to travel. Truly, the journey was much easier than I expected, even with an infant.”
I open my mouth to inquire after her son, but William is already talking.
“I happened to notice your carriage when you passed the parsonage, Mr. Darcy,” he says. “If I may be so bold, I have rarely seen a handsomer equipage—excepting, of course, Your Ladyship’s.” He gives a nod to Lady Catherine that is more like a bow.
Mr. Darcy says, “Thank you, sir,” and sets his jaw.
There is a little silence. Miss de Bourgh is looking off into the distance. I have long wondered whether she used to entertain the same hopes as her mother regarding marriage to her cousin, and looking at her now I cannot tell whether the disinterest she displays is genuine or affected. Her fingers toy with the fine embroidery at the edge of her shawl. I look at Lizzy to find that she is watching Miss de Bourgh as well, a considering expression on her face—a face, I realize, that is a little rounder than it used to be. Elizabeth is altogether more plump than she once was, and it suits her, just as the gown she wears—made of a deep blue silk, with the most exquisite lace at the bodice—suits her, and the delicate jewels at her ears and throat. In contrast, her hair is arranged simply—very like she wore it in Hertfordshire—but there is no denying that her position has changed.
“You did bring him then?” I say, to break the silence. “Little Thomas?”
Lizzy smiles. “We did. He is with his nurse just now, but I would love to bring him to visit you tomorrow. And I must meet your daughter, of course—how old is she? She must be nearly a year.”
“She is. She is walking, and she makes sounds that are nearly words—”
“I hope that you will play for us after dinner, Mrs. Darcy,” Lady Catherine interrupts. Both Elizabeth and I subside, and William gives me a look of admonishment. “I understand from Georgiana’s letters that you are learning from the same music master who taught her. I hope you have been practicing as diligently as my niece.”
“I practice often, Lady Catherine,” Elizabeth says. “Though my duties to Pemberley and to my family do take up a great deal of time.”
“There is no excuse for—” But Lady Catherine breaks off, for the drawing room door has opened to admit a liveried footman.
“Dinner is served, ma’am,” he says.
“I THOUGHT MY cousin looked very well,” William says as we ready ourselves for bed. “Marriage and motherhood are good for her; she was far more restrained in her opinions than she used to be.”
“Mmm.” I remove the pins from my hair one by one and take up my hairbrush. From behind me comes the rustle of cloth as William removes his clothing.
“Mr. Darcy must be very pleased to return to Rosings,” he says, his voice muffled as he pulls his nightshirt over his head. “I can only imagine the distress of being denied entry here for so long. Did you think he seemed pleased, my dear?”
Mr. Darcy was as taciturn tonight as I remember his being both in Hertfordshire and when he came to Kent just after my marriage. He was quiet at their wedding as well, though Mrs. Bennet was so talkative that she scarcely left room for anyone else to speak. Lizzy told me, when she wrote of her engagement, that Mr. Darcy’s behavior had undertaken a dramatic change for the better, but this evening I could not see it.
I draw the brush through my hair again and again. “I imagine he is happy,” I say.
“Yes.” William sits on the edge of the bed. “How could he be otherwise?”
Lady Catherine’s determination to never see her nephew again softened when she learned that Lizzy was with child—for, as she said to me over tea one day, Mrs. Darcy would need her guidance if she was to properly raise the heir to the Pemberley estate. Lizzy confessed to me in a letter that neither she nor Mr. Darcy could decide whether Lady Catherine’s forgiveness was more blessing or curse.
“Make sure that Mrs. Baxter knows she must serve cake when they come to call tomorrow,” William says as we settle into bed.
THERE IS PLUM cake, and the silver with which to eat it gleams from Mrs. Baxter’s careful polishing. And there is plentiful sunshine, making the front parlor bright and cheerful. Were it not for the stream of nonsense issuing from William’s mouth, I would be perfectly content. As it is, Lizzy and I have not managed to say more than three words to one another, and Mr. Darcy, who is the object of my husband’s unwavering attention, seems to be making an effort to say as little as possible. Only baby Thomas seems unconcerned by the awkwardness in the room; he sits in his mother’s lap, round faced and handsome, looking about him curiously.
“Mr. Collins,” Mr. Darcy says suddenly, in the brief space between one of William’s thoughts and the next; his voice is too forceful, and we all give little starts, William especially. “I hoped you might indulge me. I have the responsibility of installing a new rector at Lambton, and if it is agreeable to you I thought we might discuss the candidates. Your, er, expertise would be appreciated. Perhaps the ladies could enjoy a turn or two in your garden.”
William touches the fingers of both hands to his lips and closes his eyes. “It would be my honor,” he says after a moment, then stands quickly. “Mrs. Collins—be sure to show the roses to Mrs. Darcy. They were”—he gives a slight bow in Mr. Darcy’s direction—“your aunt’s idea entirely, Mr. Darcy, and let me assure you that her generosity and solicitude are felt deeply by both Mrs. Collins and myself. Come—we can adjourn to my book room; it is from the window there that I was fortunate enough to see your carriage pass yesterday morning . . .”
His voice fades as he goes down the hall. Mr. Darcy pauses to cast a look at Elizabeth that is at once exasperated and laughing, which she returns with a brilliant smile, and then he follows William from the room.
We hear the door to the book room close a moment later, and our eyes meet. Eliza’s mouth twitches. “He knew I wanted time to visit alone with you,” she says.
I should not laugh, not when William is, however obliquely, the butt of the joke, but I cannot help it. “How very inventive of him.”
She steps toward me, and suddenly she has wrapped the arm not holding Thomas around me in a quick, fierce embrace. “I’ve missed you,” she says.
WE HAVE BEEN nearly an hour in the garden together when we see Mr. Darcy and William emerge from the house, the latter looking much more pleased with the world than the former. Mr. Darcy comes straight to Elizabeth, who is sitting beside me on a bench with the baby in her arms. I collected Louisa from the nursery before coming outside, and she is exploring the nearby hedgerows, Martha following at a little distance.
“We should be going,” Mr. Darcy says upon reaching us. “Lady Catherine will be expecting us for tea.”
“And I am meant to practice the pianoforte for at least an hour before dinner.” Lizzy’s smile has a sardonic edge. “As you heard yourselves last night, my playing has not sufficiently improved for her ladyship’s taste.”
Lady Catherine winced and tutted through last night’s performance, and dismissed Lizzy from the pianoforte when she had finished playing with a disgruntled wave of her hand.
“It would behoove you, my dear cousin, to take her ladyship’s advice to heart,” William says. “She wants only that the mistress of Pemberley be worthy of the role.”
Mr. Darcy’s face is a picture of outrage, but Elizabeth merely rises from the bench, obviously diverted.
“You are quite right, Mr. Collins, I am sure,” she says. She turns to me. “I wish we could stay longer—”
I shake my head. “I understand. And we will see you at the ball in only a few days.”
“If Lady Catherine does not invite you to tea or dinner before then.” Elizabeth smiles, glancing at Mr. Darcy. “Now the families of Rosings and Pemberley are reconciled, I expect we will be visiting here more often—and hopefully for longer than a week next time.”
Mr. Darcy makes a noncommittal noise, but the harsh lines of his face soften, just a little, when he looks at her.
William and I walk them to the gate, William pausing beside the rosebushes. I feel a little drop in the vicinity of my stomach and bend to neaten Louisa’s bonnet, affecting deafness. But he only says, arms wide and palms raised, “These, Mr. Darcy, are the roses your aunt so magnanimously gifted us.”
Lizzy and Mr. Darcy look. Even the single blossom has long since died, leaving the bushes looking more bedraggled than ever.
“They are,” William hastens to add, “still immature, of course, and I could never presume to think that my garden could ever be the equal of Rosings’s—or, indeed, of Pemberley’s, Mr. Darcy, for I assure you that Lady Catherine speaks of your estate in the most flattering terms. But I do look forward to our roses reaching their potential—they can but stand as testimony to her ladyship’s generous spirit.”
After a pause, he adds, “They are rather small, still. Perhaps we ought to have Mr. Travis back to look at them.”
I stand quickly, deafness forgotten. “No!” I say, with such vehemence that three pairs of startled eyes turn to stare at me. William’s mouth gapes.
I inhale a steadying breath, take in the summer smells of sun and flowers. “My dear,” I say, and my voice is calmer. “There is no need to bother Mr. Travis, not so close to the harvest. Perhaps after the ball, if you really think it necessary.”
Elizabeth meets my eyes, one brow just slightly raised, as William makes a tetchy noise at the back of his throat.
I RETURN TO the lawn with Louisa and Martha and settle back on the bench while the two of them play at hide-and-seek among the hedgerows. I should really find something productive to do, but my body is listless, my mind pensive. My thoughts keep returning to Elizabeth and her husband and then shying away again. I feel almost embarrassed to have witnessed the affection that does, apparently, exist between them; and more than affection, a true intimacy of the sort Elizabeth always said she must have or never marry, the sort of intimacy that allows for communication without speech. I only saw a little—just moments, out of months and months of a marriage—but I am unsettled, as if I went for a walk in Rosings’s woods and came across some lovely, fabled creature, the sort of thing one might tell children about in stories but which one never expects to find in life.
Unaccountably, there is the tingling behind my eyes that presages a hard, cleansing cry. I tip my head up and widen my eyes to keep the tears away. I want to ask Elizabeth so many impertinent questions, but I do not want to hear the inevitable sympathy in her response. Lizzy, pretty Lizzy, who refused the man whose later proposal to me was not repugnant, as it was to her, but salvation. Or so it seemed at the time.
Were I born with Elizabeth’s looks, perhaps I’d have had other suitors at a much earlier age, though it is hard to imagine myself, under any circumstances, being a true romantic. Years of observing my parents’ marriage, and the marriages of other couples in the neighborhood, had convinced me that wives guided their husbands subtly when they could and obeyed them when they must, and that felicity was something a woman found in other areas of her life—her children, perhaps, or her friends. My thoughts turn, as they so often have of late, to Mr. Travis. The book he borrowed was tangible proof that I am, at least sometimes, in his thoughts, that this improbable fixation is not entirely one-sided. The need to take to the woods seizes me, and I curl my fingers around the edge of the bench’s seat to keep myself in place.
This would be no decorous stroll—if I let myself move, I will run, and run, and run until my poor body cries out at me to stop. I will kick up dust from the lane, my gown will be hopelessly dirty; I will run like Louisa, heedless of how I look, until my bonnet flies off and bounces against my back, its ribbons catching around my throat.
I lean forward on the bench, rocking slightly with my hands still firmly anchoring me in my seat, and close my eyes. A deep inhale, the smell of the garden, the drone of the bees, and then Louisa’s high laugh. My eyes open, catch and hold on the sight of my daughter—she stands, bonnet in hand, as Martha scolds her for removing it. Louisa’s hair, so fine that pink scalp is visible, stands up all over her head in mad wisps, like seedlings just sprouting. When she laughs again, suddenly and for a reason that is obvious only to herself, her smile, with its uneven distribution of teeth, steals my breath entirely.
“Make her beautiful,” I whisper, and it is not a prayer. It is an order, fierce and emphatic. My body hums with the force of it. I imagine my mother whispering those same words above my cradle; feel her creeping despair as it became clear, as the years passed, that her demand had not been answered. I carry her fear inside me now; it is a thread that connects us intimately, generation to generation. Louisa will never understand how desperately I love her, unless she has a daughter of her own.
Of course, when William inherits Longbourn Louisa will have more prospects than I did. I have no doubt I will be able to ensure that William manages the estate more carefully than Mr. Bennet has, and so she will have a fine dowry. But still I long for the world to see her as I see her. The world must see her and recognize her worth. For I am not, for all the subjectivity of mother love, actually blind; though Louisa is still so small that it is hard to know how her features will change as she grows, I know the unlikelihood that William and I could ever create anything but a plain daughter. And yet—oh, no matter her looks, she is lovely, so lovely I ache with it. My girl turns in an unsteady circle, evading Martha’s grasp, searching until she finds me with her eyes. She waves her bonnet like a flag of triumph. My heart beats hard and steady in time with the refrain inside my head.
Make her beautiful, make her beautiful, make her beautiful.