Chapter 11 - The Morning After

Elizabeth woke in the early morning, cold. The cover had slipped off. She looked over at Darcy, sleeping beside her about an arm's length away. He was on his back with one arm flung over his face. He was warm, she thought, remembering the glorious feeling of his arms holding her, his bare skin against hers.

She scooted across the bed and cuddled up to him, nestling against the side of his shirt-clad body. At her touch, he turned over and pulled her into his arms. She sighed with sleepy contentment against the fine, soft linen of his shirt, then closed her eyes, still tired.

Darcy was rousing, however. His hands roamed up and down her body and settled on her bottom. "Elizabeth," he said hoarsely. "God, I want you."

For a moment or two, she submitted to his caresses, but when he rolled on top of her and began gathering up the hem of her chemise, something in her rose in protest. No. We are not yet clear.

"I am sorry," she whispered, her hands on his shoulders. "I am feeling a little tender there …"

Darcy stilled, then rolled off her and pulled her chemise down again, giving her a little pat. "Of course, my love. I was not thinking."

She nestled against him again. "You could still hold me?" she offered.

"Of course." His arms went around her.

She closed her eyes again, reassured. Always the gentleman. It was her last conscious thought as she drifted back to sleep.

Darcy sighed, holding Elizabeth and trying not to be aware of every enchanting dip and curve of her sweet body and what he wished to do to it. He forced himself to lie still so as not to disturb her and made himself recite the names of all of the MPs in the House of Commons by county and franchise. It took a long time, but eventually his arousal faded and he went back to sleep.


When Elizabeth next woke, Darcy was sound asleep, lying on his stomach beside her. She regarded him with some contrition. She had not been entirely fair the night before, demanding he tell her about his past, promising not to get upset, then becoming upset and making terrible accusations. But he had not seemed angry. He had been…sweet. And a little melancholy. What did he have to be melancholy about? Did he not have everything - fortune, figure, connexions?

She slid out from under the silk sheets, parted the velvet bed hangings and padded softly to the dressing room to begin preparing for the day.

As the maid brushed and twisted her hair up, she thought about her husband. He was a deep and intricate character to be sure! At their initial meeting, he had seemed arrogant and disdainful, but as they had become better acquainted, she had been delighted by his intelligent and playful side. As a husband and a lover, he had been patient and tender - if occasionally impetuous, Elizabeth smiled to herself.

She considered what she knew of his past - many lovers, but five years since he had been with a woman. It was not, she reflected, because he lacked interest, for he seemed to be a man of strong passions. What had caused him to turn away from women? She thought of Lady Castleton. I was not two and twenty. Yes, that was five years ago; he was twenty-seven now. Lady Castleton must have broken his heart, she concluded.

What was she like, this rich, married beauty who had so captured a young Darcy's devotion? A woman of loose passions who could not be satisfied with her husband? A sophisticated society queen who enjoyed toying with the hearts of young men? Or - worst of all - someone who had truly loved Darcy as he had loved her, but had had to break it off due to her own impossible situation?

Elizabeth resolved to pay greater attention henceforth to the name Castleton when it appeared in the newspapers.

Left alone by the maid, she looked critically at her reflection in the glass. How would she compare among the society beauties of the day, whose charms were continuously extolled, whose charms Darcy, at one time, had perhaps sampled with liberality? Were they really such goddesses as described, or was it only the pedestal of wealth that elevated them to their celestial sphere? What did they offer that she could not? What they did they know that she did not?

She lifted her eyes to her own gaze in the glass and smiled, banishing the look of thoughtful contemplation with a spark of mischief. After all, she was not so very ignorant and helpless. If he was ahead of her, she would catch up. Her father had always praised her for her quickness.

By the time Darcy woke, she was fresh and smiling and dressed in a pretty gown. She greeted him with a kiss and informed him that she had ordered breakfast and would meet him in the sitting room when he was ready. Darcy, a little bemused, left to perform his morning ablutions.

By the time he entered the sitting room, she was drinking coffee and reading The Times. She looked up when he entered and was pleased to see his gaze linger on her, and especially the daring bodice of her gown, which was normally worn with a fichu to cover her bosom, and which she had elected to omit this morning. He averted his eyes and picked up The Morning Chronicle.

He sat down on her couch an arm's length away from her and unfolded his newspaper, but before he began reading it, he explained that he had spoken to his coachman. They could leave this hotel immediately, he said, and if they travelled very steadily with few stops they ought to reach Northamptonshire only a few hours after nightfall.

"Oh!" said Elizabeth. "That is not necessary. I am not upset about that any longer."

"No, I should never have taken you here," he spoke gravely. "It was not an appropriate place to take one's wife on her wedding night. You will find my house in Northamptonshire much more to your liking, I think."

Perversely, Elizabeth felt no relief, only irritation that he thought her sensibilities were so fragile that she could no longer tolerate what was, by all appearances, an excellent hotel. "As you wish," she shrugged. Recovering her bravado, she added brightly, "I thought we could continue our conversation of last night."

He looked wary, but nodded in assent. "Yes, I believe I promised you information."

"You did, but I think the proposition was not entirely fair," she smiled, her newspaper now ignored in her lap. "It is too one-sided. After all, if I am going to demand that you tell me about your exploits, do you not think that I should be willing to regale you with tales of my exploits?"

"Your exploits!"

The range of emotions that crossed his face was so ludicrously transparent she almost laughed aloud. She could see him recalling the events of the day, wondering if he might have been mistaken in believing her to be a maiden.

"Yes, my exploits." She smiled saucily, placed the newspaper on the table and tucked her legs under her skirts on the couch as she turned to face him. "You surely did not think that I would reach the seasoned age of twenty with such an array of charms and have no conquests? Why, I would not be surprised if my achievements outshine yours in the end."

She ignored the confusion and suspicion on his face and took a delicate sip of her coffee. "It all began when I was ten years old and had fixed my affections on the vicar's nephew, who was visiting one summer and who at eleven was well on the way to being in love with Jane. But Jane did not want him; she did no more than seek to escape every time he sought to accost her. So I became his friend and confidante, and before the summer was out he had pledged his heart to me and sealed it with a chain of daisies woven specially for me."

Darcy's look of suspicion had relaxed into a smile. "Ah. Those kinds of exploits. For a moment, I had thought - but no matter. I surmise that you kept the daisy chain forevermore?"

"Indeed, it is a cherished layer of dust at the bottom of my wooden box of treasures. But that was only the beginning."

Darcy lifted his eyebrows at her questioningly and she smiled in return and continued.

"My next conquest was the cause of a minor scandal. Every spring, the village boys and some of the girls would gather to play cricket1 on the common near Longbourn and I liked to join them when I could. I was quite an accomplished cricketer, and therefore generally welcomed. One day, I batted fifteen runs to bring us to victory and the captain, who was the blacksmith's son, ran over and threw his arms around me and kissed me on the lips. Yes, you should be surprised," she said at Darcy's expression, "shocked, even. For I was; so shocked that I could not think of anything else to do but kiss him back - in full view of the vicar's wife, whose garden backed onto the green. Unfortunately, she then told my father, and I was barred from further cricket."

"I am not the only man to kiss you, then," he said in mock horror, entering into the spirit of the play.

"Far from it, I am afraid. You might be the tenth or the twelfth, but it is hard to say; kissing games and mistletoe were common, and the Bennet girls were popular targets. So I am afraid I did not go into marriage quite the untouched maiden."

"Madam, you break my heart."

"Oh, I hope not; if it is as fragile as that, it will surely not survive what I have to say next."

Darcy raised another eyebrow at her, unsure if he should be amused or concerned.

"You were not the first man I would have agreed to marry either."

"Mrs. Darcy," he growled, in real disapproval this time. "Who was he?"

"His name was Mr. Peabody. Somebody Peabody; I never caught his first name. He was a shipbuilder's agent and did business with my uncle. I was fifteen years old and visiting with Mr. Gardiner, and Mr. Peabody would come to the house sometimes on business and twice stayed to dine. He was very tall and handsome, like you" - she gave him a cheeky smile - "and he drove a dashing curricle. He had sailed the world before settling on land, and he told of distant shores and strange societies.

"I wrote him poetry," Elizabeth said dreamily. "which I signed Elizabeth Peabody. I did not give it to him, of course, but my Aunt Gardiner discovered it one day and Mr. Peabody was not invited to the house again. She told me only that he was a little wild in his private life, but I found out later that he had a mistress, a foreign woman brought from the colonies."

"May I see this poetry?" Darcy asked, his tone carefully neutral.

"Certainly not!" Elizabeth said sharply. "I burnt it long ago, shortly after that episode."

"I suppose you have not written poetry about me," Darcy said jealously.

"No, I have not. And you should be thankful too, for my poetry was truly wretched. I am ashamed to admit, but I rhymed violet with pirate." She shuddered, then smiled. "I decided after that it was best if I left the writing to others."

Darcy crossed his arms. "What else?" he demanded.

"Really, sir, you cannot expect me to detail every encounter! Suffice it to say that I eventually came to understand my arts and allurements and use them to some effect on the young men of Meryton and surroundings. I cannot tell you how many times I was told that so-and-so acknowledged me to be a 'charming girl. Nothing to the elder Miss Bennet, of course, but with such a winning way.'"

"Hmf. I can well believe it. I have felt the power of your 'arts and allurements' from the first."

"Did you?" She arched a questioning eyebrow at him. "Not consciously on my part, I assure you. I had already determined from your unpleasantness at the Meryton Assembly that you were not a man I wished to know better."

"I was not? You laughed at me and teased me."

"To avoid showing I was angry at you," she pointed out.

"Did you not seek out my company?"

Her forehead knit in confusion, then cleared. "Ah - yes, but only because you had my book."

"Before that, I mean." When she still looked confused, he added, "Why did you come to Netherfield if you did not wish to see me?"

She gave him an indignant look. "For Jane, of course."

"Jane only?"

"Of course, Jane only!" she cried. In a calmer tone, she added, "Mr. Darcy, I will not deny that my feelings for you eventually enjoyed a great revolution in sentiment, but I can assure you I did not walk to Netherfield in hopes of encountering you, only my sister."

For a moment, Darcy looked disappointed. Then he said, more hopefully, "Some of the gowns you wore while at Netherfield were very pretty. Were they not designed to catch a gentleman's eye?"

"One would not wish to look less than one's best under the very discerning eyes of Mrs. Hurst and Miss Bingley," she said primly.

"So you were thinking of the judgment of Mrs. Hurst and Miss Bingley only?" he said skeptically.

"Yes," she replied firmly.

"For every gown?"

"Most definitely."

"Even the pale yellow one that you wore for dinner the night we quarreled over Bingley's good nature? The yellow gown with the ribbons?"

Elizabeth suddenly coloured. Her yellow gown with pleated ribbons across the bodice was a daring concoction that never failed to attract her admiring glances and which she had, indeed, chosen to wear that evening, knowing that the gentlemen would be dining at home.

Seeing her hesitation, Darcy lifted his eyebrows, smiling a little. "Elizabeth?"

"It…it is not what you think," she stammered, her face hot.

"No?" he inquired.

"Very well, I did wear that gown for you! You had spoken so unkindly of all of the ladies at the assembly that I wanted to show you that the ladies of the ton do not hold the entire monopoly on charm."

He smirked and moved closer to her on the couch. "So you did care for my good opinion."

"Yes, but I was not seeking to please you. I wished to - to annoy you. "

He smiled broadly and caressed her thigh with his hand. "I am very sorry to inform you, but I did not feel the least bit annoyed at the sight. Rather the opposite, in fact."

She looked at him with dislike. "Your behaviour at the time was unpardonable and merited the severest reproof."

"Oh, indeed," he agreed, his other hand now caressing her bare arm. "And if you wish to mete out further reproofs of that nature, I would bear them most willingly."

He leant in to kiss her, but she turned her head and batted his hands away, though playfully so he did not take offence. "You really are the most conceited man," she said, smiling.

"And you really are the most provocative woman," he retorted. But he did not attempt to touch her again, and instead laid one arm along the back of the couch, facing her.

"Now, sir, do not think you will be let off so lightly as that! You promised me information, and I am determined that you shall keep your promise. I have told you my story, so I think some reciprocation is in order."

For a moment, Darcy looked resistant, then capitulated. "Very well," he sighed. "What do you wish to know?"

"To begin with, how many?"

He leant back on the couch and looked up at the ceiling. "I told you, I do not keep an exact tally."

"Surely you can count."

He looked at her shame-faced. "Yes, but I am not certain I can remember."

"Ah," she said, clarity dawning. "You were drunk, then?"

"Quite."

"Every time?" she queried.

"Not on every occasion, of course, but enough of them."

"These were not women of the ton, then?"

"No, except for the one - Lady Castleton."

"I see," she said, though she did not entirely.

"It was mostly when I was at Cambridge," he confessed. "I was very wild for my first years there. My friends and I would go to London to gamble or Newmarket for the races,2 and we often met women there."

"And you have truly not been with any other woman in five years?"

"Truly, I have not."

Elizabeth, her arm propped up on the couch, leant her cheek against her hand, smiling.

"You are not upset?" he looked at her.

"No, I understand that is normal for men of your station."

"What station is that?" He was bemused.

"The peerage, and those connected to it?"

"Is that how you see me? My father was a mere gentleman."

"Not a mere gentleman. And your mother was the daughter of an earl and the niece of a marquis. And not any earl and marquis, but the most renowned in the land."

He traced a line on the soft skin of her forearm and said, slowly, "True, but neither my uncle nor my great-uncle espoused the licentiousness practiced by some of their rank. Nor did my mother. I have often wondered if she sought to flee from it, marrying my father."

"Did your father also disapprove, then?"

The corner of his mouth lifted, but his smile was abstracted, as if his thoughts were elsewhere. "Oh yes, he disapproved of it very heartily," he said. "We were always quite careful to keep it concealed from him."

"We?"

"Wickham and I."

His eyes met her curious expression and he continued in a serious tone, "I suppose it is not fair for me to blame my dissipation on Wickham, but I do blame him somewhat. I have often wondered what my life would have been like had he not been part of it."


Trinity College,3 Cambridge University, approximately eight years earlier

"Come, Darcy, leave off your books for a minute. This is important."

Darcy sighed and, suppressing mild irritation at the interruption, sat back from where he was bent over the mathematical tomes neatly laid across his desk.

"What have you done now?"

Wickham, who had let himself into Darcy's chambers moments ago, flung himself onto his friend's couch and helped himself from the tray of biscuits and other refreshments that Darcy's manservant-of-all-work, Parker, liked to keep his master's chambers supplied with.

"Not what, Darcy. Who." He chewed slowly, then said, after a pause for dramatic effect. "Polly Plimmer."

"Mrs. Plimmer from the George?" said Darcy, surprised. Mrs. Plimmer was the wife of the owner of the George and Dragon, a tavern located in nearby Chesterton, which many students frequented for its picturesque public houses and friendly billiards halls. No such amusements were permitted within Cambridge town lines, where the proctors and bulldogs - as the university constabulary were called - reigned.4

"Yes, pretty Polly Plimmer. I went for a pint with Badger and ended up pledging my troth to Polly over a private barrel in the cellar. The lads will have to drink my health tonight."

"Mrs. Plimmer," said Darcy thoughtfully, then asked, "Do you think Old Plimmer knows that his wife is not faithful?"

Wickham shrugged. "He should. If he does not know, he is an idiot."

"They have not been long married, I thought." He felt a little sorry for Old Plimmer, who was good-natured and more tolerant of Cambridge students' antics than some of the other tavern owners, and who clearly doted on his much younger and high-spirited wife.

"Long enough to tire of being leg-shackled to that Old Shambles," Wickham grinned. "Surely you have noticed her making eyes at you. She even asked if you would be joining me. Why you have not taken advantage of it, I do not know."

"Perhaps I did not enjoy the thought of Old Plimmer serving us all poisoned ale the next time we visit," Darcy said dryly.

"Polly can keep a secret," Wickham assured him. "In any case, I doubt she has a care for you now, after the thorough going-over I gave her. You've missed your chance."

"I would not be involved with a married woman anyway," Darcy said with disapproval.

Wickham raised his eyebrows. "Always the dutiful son, Darcy?" he jeered affectionately. "Well, it is easy to be choosy when you are the heir to Pemberley and all the women know it. But truly, I cannot think what you would be without me. I can see you now, half-strangled by your neckcloth with your nose buried in a book and ignorant of the touch of a woman."

Darcy bristled. "I cannot think what you would be without me. Up to your neck in gaming debts, no doubt."

Wickham laughed. "I admit, you have saved my skin on occasion. It can be damned hard keeping track of those cards when you have had a few too many. I really do not know how you do it, nobody does."

Darcy's indignation dissipated under Wickham's words of praise. "I have a knack, I suppose," he shrugged modestly.

"You with cards, and I with women," Wickham grinned. "Speaking of which, I am a little light in the funds. As a gentleman, I felt I ought to make Polly a present for the repair of her gown. I don't suppose you can see your way clear to -?"

Darcy reached around into the pocket of his tailcoat, which hung on the chair, extracted a full purse and threw it to Wickham, who caught it handily.

"Leave twenty," he said. "Lamb is having a sizing party5 in his chambers tonight, and we are playing whist after."

Wickham transferred notes and coins to his own pockets, then threw the purse back to Darcy. "Many thanks, you are a good friend."

"As are you."

Wickham gave him a warm smile, full of charm. "We have been friends for a long time, have we not? What did we used to say when we were children? Friends to the end? Brothers for life?"

Darcy smiled back. "Something like that."


Footnotes:

1. It was not unusual for girls to play cricket, and Catherine Morland in Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey is described as enjoying cricket and baseball as a girl. Cricket in the late 18th / early 19th Century was still evolving from its roots in lawn bowling, and was a more genteel sport than it is now. For one thing, no (fast) overarm bowling was permitted, and even side-arm bowling was controversial - balls were to remain on the ground. Nobody bothered with protective equipment either.

2. Both London and the Newmarket racecourses were popular destinations for Cambridge students, much to the chagrin of the proctors and tutors who sought to uphold a strict morality among their charges. London, 51 miles away according to the 1803 edition of Paterson's Roads, was easily reachable by coach services that ran several times a day and through the night, while Newmarket at 13 miles away was an easy jaunt by horse or private carriage. The letters of Viscount Melbourne's family members show that the older brothers who had graduated from Cambridge would occasionally take pity on a younger sibling and drop in at their alma mater to take him to the Newmarket races.

3. Trinity was the largest of Cambridge's 16 colleges at the time, with 548 members, according to The New Cambridge Guide by M. Watson, published in 1804. Trinity and St. John's, the next largest with 465 members, attracted the bulk of the wealthy and connected students. The other colleges were much smaller, all with less than 150 students.

4. Cambridge University's charter gave it unusual control over the town of Cambridge, including the ability to prohibit amusements deemed corrupting to the morals of the students and raid houses suspected of gambling and vice. Nevertheless, the students found their outlets in the village of Chesterton a mile north, and the nearby "rookeries" of Barnwell and Castle End, notorious for the availability of women of ill-repute. At Cambridge, venereal disease was colloquially referred to as "Barnwell ague."

5. Provisions from college kitchens were referred to as "sizings," hence the Cambridge appellation for charity students, who ate after the other classes of students in the Commons or dining hall, as "sizars." A sizing party was Cambridge lingo for a potluck dinner. For a small fee, students could send the college servant boys known as "gyps" to the kitchen to get them sizings.