Kitty Bennet hardly had to convince her mother that she was needed at Netherfield Park before Mrs. Bennet joined her daughter in the waiting carriage. Kitty answered as many questions as she could as to the condition of Jane, but found none of them seemed to satisfy her mother's inquiries. To her greatest relief, her mother did not display a fit of nerves or fuss in a high-pitched voice but showed a remarkable sense that Kitty had rarely seen in her mother.
Upon entering the foyer, Kitty spied that 's study door was open and the butler, Mr. Higgins, stood in the hall.
"I thought I told you to keep him away?" Jane's screams filled the air as Kitty and her mother did not wait for a response from the butler before dashing up the stairs to the mistress suite.
The screams had traveled throughout the house because the door to her rooms was wide open with a pale, thunderstruck Mr. Bingley standing not three steps into the room. Mrs. Bennet practically pushed Mr. Bingley out of the way as she bustled to the bed where her sister Phillips and the housekeeper already saw to Jane.
"There, there, your Mama is here."
"Fanny, what are you doing here?" Lynn Phillips, the elder sister of Mrs. Bennet, chastised her presence against Mrs. Bingley's wishes.
"I might say the same for you, dear sister. This is my daughter. If anyone should have a right to be in this room–"
Jane cried out again bringing the simpered sympathies of both women.
Through clenched teeth, Jane issued her edict.
"Do not argue!"
She followed with another cry as the contractions refused to lessen.
Mrs. Bennet finally took stock of the situation and realized Jane's midsection was entirely too large for one babe. Her eyes widened and her sister Phillips clasped her forearm in solidarity.
"Twins?"
Mrs. Phillips nodded.
Jane's next scream brought a change to the situation and a flurry of activity. The housekeeper began to drape sheets over Jane's knees and encourage her to prop them up. Mrs. Bennet began calling for hot water despite her sister's insistence that such an order was already given and a basin of water stood there on top of the bureau.
"No, no, this is entirely not enough. If there are two babes to come, we need double of everything!"
"It is enough, sister. You are distressing, Jane. Besides, you never carried twins."
"Neither did you, successfully!" Mrs. Bennet's harshness stung Lynn Phillips's sensibilities, but Francine Bennet immediately apologized as Jane screamed again.
Mrs. Phillips sniffed. "This is not the time of the place to discuss the past. Come, Jane, rally through! You are healthy and young. If anyone can do this, you can!"
Kitty's eyes opened wide as she realized that the first babe was on the precipice of being born when she grabbed Mr. Bingley and pulled hard. "Mr. Bingley you must come with me. Jane would not like you to see her this way."
"But my wife!"
"We have her under our care, Mr. Bingley." Mrs. Bennet's tone clashed with Jane's yells as she, too, shooed Mr. Bingley away as though Jane's inconvenience was a minor trifle. "Go with Kitty, and begin the letters. We shall fill in the details once we have them."
For what he was worth, Mr. Higgins stood in the hall and eagerly assisted Kitty in once more removing Mr. Bingley from the birthing room. With the heavy oak door shut, Jane's cries became muffled, and emotion began to overwhelm Mr. Bingley. His knees buckled and Mr. Higgins was the steady arm that caught the man before he collapsed in the hallway.
Catherine Bennet rolled her eyes and wished she had brought Lydia with her when she fetched Mama. If anyone could bring silliness and frivolity to the anxious business of birthing children, it was Lydia. Instead, Kitty would have to make do with her own abilities, and so she came up with an alternative plan.
"Bring him to my studio; we won't keep him occupied in his study. But I can show him paintings and keep him calm, and perhaps I'll even sketch as he will be an excellent subject for study."
"Yes, Miss." Mr. Higgins nodded as he agreed greatly with Ms. Catherine's plan. All of the staff at Netherfield deeply respected the Bennet sisters and did not miss one bit the demands and tantrums of the Bingley set.
At first, Mr. Bingley could do little more than lay upon the couch and worry for his dear Jane. But as Kitty began to show him comedic sketches she had captured of the two of them, and a landscape she had painted, soon the screams of Jane Bingley which could not be heard in the separate wing where Kitty's studio lay, relieved Mr. Bingley of some of his anxiousness. A few times, Mr. Bingley looked furtively at the door, but each time Kitty coaxed him into looking back at the art.
"My sister has the best attendants for her labor and delivery. I promise they all shall be well." Kitty held Mr. Bingley's hands with the love of a sibling.
"How can you be sure?"
Kitty shrugged her shoulders. "My mother is there and if anyone gets her way more than her, I have never met them."