Chapter 35

Elizabeth said goodbye to Gene Carter when they arrived at St. Pancras and took a taxi home to Ashworth Road. The garden gate stood open, and she walked up the path and unlocked the familiar front door that squeaked in greeting. By the time she had pushed it closed and thrown her satchel down, her father stood in the parlor entrance staring at her in wonder.

"Elizabeth!" He was surprised at her appearance, her overdue return, but also her rumpled clothes and flighty hair speaking of her experiences.

"Papa," she cried, breaking into a grin. "He's back! Uncle Ned is back!" Uncharacteristically, he stepped forward and wrapped her in his arms for a hug.

"I heard, in a way. I've been waiting for you to return," he said. "Come, tell me."

"Give me a minute," she said, needing to use the bathroom and make tea. She pulled off well-worn wool stockings, washed her face, and pushed her feet into house slippers. That felt almost as welcome as tea in a familiar cup.

After she settled across the piecrust table from her father, she asked, "but where is Jane?"

"She and your mother are shopping for wedding clothes," he answered wryly. Tea spilled in her lap.

"Wedding clothes?" she giggled, "she doesn't have enough coupons!" More laughter broke from her; she spluttered and giggled as words poured forth, "Jane is getting married!"

"Yes! Her young man did the honors the other night when he had leave. Of course, your mother insisted on returning home once she heard the news." Elizabeth put the now-empty teacup down on the table.

"Do you suppose it might be a double wedding?" she asked. It was her father's turn to spill tea on his lap as he coughed.

"My dear! What has happened? You were supposed to be at work, not out romancing!" Elizabeth had never heard her father more shocked.

"We're an odd pair, to be sure. William asked me to marry him while we were on a mission," she answered calmly.

"To be sure," Tom Bennet replied, finding his voice again. "The mission was successful?"

"Mostly," she said, then gave him a succinct version of events, a combination of what William, Colonel Rogers, and Gene had told her.

"Not the hoped-for outcome, but the team is back home, tattered but not broken," he said. "I suppose you think I have some crystal ball that gives me insight into your world, but I don't." Her father looked at her knees, or maybe he was admiring her house slippers. "I hear things, a lot of small things. Some are related to my work, some to yours. One piece of information I knew about was concerning a German communique about two trucks found submerged off of a bridge in Norway with evidence of its being a British mission."

"Colonel Rogers indicated that they left British weapons behind so there would be no reprisals against the Norwegians," she said.

"I have to say I've never worried more than I have this past week," Thomas Bennet told her slippers. "You were too close to danger."

"I'm considering leaving my position." Elizabeth paused, reluctant to continue. "Perhaps I should find a more sensible office where the work is more straight-forward. Or maybe I will merely be Mrs. Darcy and stay home and worry."

Mr. Bennet's eyes darted from her slippers to her teacup, with its spilled tea pooling in the saucer, up to her eyes as he shifted in his chair.

"I would hate to see you undervalue yourself, not that being a wife isn't of importance. But you have intelligence and sense and can contribute much. I suspect you still feel raw after your week away. Give yourself some time to heal even if you don't feel wounded; you have been. What we undergo, even by observation, can nab or prick and be wounding. I suppose you'll be straight into work tomorrow?"

"Yes, carry on," she answered with emphasis, perhaps a hollow emphasis.

"I wish you would rest."

"But if Mum is home, what would I give as an excuse for remaining behind? If it were Jane, I could delay leaving for work and stay, but…" she left off finishing her sentence as she yawned. "I need to bathe before Jane and Mum get home. She'll scold me for the circles under my eyes, for sure."

"I'm proud of you, Elizabeth," he said, giving her a small smile.

"Thank you," she answered and went upstairs to bathe and change.


"Where have you been!" Jane exclaimed, hugging her sister tightly. "You've missed all of the drama and news."

"I had to travel for work, but Papa told me, only in his dry, boring style. You must tell me all about it," said Elizabeth as they settled on her bed. Jane came to find her out as soon as she returned home from shopping.

"We had dinner and danced all night, and then he asked me to marry him," said Jane, sounding almost as dry as their father. "He gave me this ring." The diamond was square-cut, set diagonally, and surrounded by brilliants with a unique design on the band (set with even more brilliants). It had to have cost a small fortune.

"Mum must have flipped," said Elizabeth.

"She did. I wondered if her excitement might give her a heart attack when I called her on Saturday morning, she was screaming so much. She actually took the train home and didn't wait for Papa to get her or for Uncle Clarence to arrange something," Jane explained.

"Frances needs something to be hysterical about," murmured Elizabeth. "But did he propose to you at the club?"

Jane blushed. "No, he took me to his house, and we had cocktails there."

"I suppose that's all right with Caroline to chaperone," Elizabeth murmured. Jane's cheeks colored even more, and Lizzy wondered what the two had done that night.

"Caroline is visiting a friend in the country. After her break-up with Lord Wingrave, she's been…out of sorts and needed some time alone," said Jane.

"Nothing drastically wrong?" Elizabeth asked. She felt as if they were speaking in code as she pondered whether Caroline Bingley had disappeared because she was pregnant. It was odd that she and Jane couldn't talk more openly about sex when Lizzy had no trouble speaking about the topic with her female friends at the office.

"No." It was a decisive answer. "But Lizzy, I still feel sorry for her," said Jane. "And since she's to be my sister-in-law and this affects me now, I need to tell you something." Elizabeth shook her head as Jane's voice became serious. They had ventured away from the ecstatically, gloriously, happy subject of her marriage proposal to…Caroline Bingley.

"Yes?" she prompted, in what wasn't the most sympathetic tone.

"It's about the Bingley's past. You remember that grandfather who had gone to Argentina to make money?" Jane asked.

Elizabeth nodded. "And he met a woman there and married her." She imagined a dark-haired, dark-eyed local.

"You see…she was Jewish."

Elizabeth blinked in surprise; she hadn't anticipated that twist. She knew no one who was Jewish, though there was a lot of hatred for the Jews that poured out of Germany. Some in England picked it up and parroted it. She could only nod and let Jane finish.

"That's why Dryden Avery broke things off with her. He told her he wouldn't marry a Jewess, even if she's never been raised in that faith," Jane explained.

"That's awful," said Elizabeth. "He said that to her?"

"Yes, but she made me swear not to tell anyone. But I feel that now I'm to be family, I should tell you. I'm not sure how Mum would feel—so I won't tell her—because it also means that Charles is part-Jewish. She's his grandmother too."

"Wow, and I thought we would just share about weddings and clothes and lament about the lack of coupons," said Elizabeth, distracted. She thought about Noddy, Sir Robert Morris. He was a decent man, and she suspected he hadn't minded about the Bingleys' ancestry. Caroline had missed her chance when she had him.

Jane had been staring across the room, lost in thought, but her head turned abruptly.

"Weddings? Lizzy! What do you mean?"

"William asked me to marry him," she said quietly. "He's recuperating, so I'm not sure if we can have a double wedding or not. How long of an engagement were you planning? We only need to wait for him to heal." Then she bit her lip as mentioning healing meant having to explain why. Jane's squeal was one that equaled something they might hear from their mother.

"Oh, Lizzy! How wonderful! I'm so excited!" They had settled on Elizabeth's bed, but Jane leaned over to hug her, leaned back, then clasped her again as she rocked her side-to-side. "This is the best day ever! Who would have thought he could fall in love with you so quickly! Remember how grumpy William was that day in the park!"

"Actually, Jane." Elizabeth thought it was time to confess. "I've known William for many years. That day was practically the first time I'd seen him in three years; he'd been, on assignment for a long time, but I've known him for years."

"What do you do?" Jane shook her head yet again, though she didn't honestly mean the question.

"I met him when I first started working on Baker Street." Jane at least knew which exit she took every morning, "It was when the British Expeditionary Force was still on the Continent, and the situation was such that I didn't tell anyone in the family about him." She danced around, mentioning Jane's former fiancé, not wanting to spoil her best day ever. The topic didn't mar Jane's brightness.

"I understand. And you claim I'm the kind sister. So I didn't introduce you two?"

Elizabeth looked sheepish. "No. We've loved each other for years, even if circumstances prevented our forming a little family of our own until now." Jane looked markedly at her.

"You have changed. I can see that love has changed you. I think a double-wedding would please Frances. It might give her enough happiness to last until the war ends," said Jane.

Elizabeth stood, pulled open her dresser, and pulled out the ring William had given her. He told her to consider it an engagement ring, but she had taken it off until she could speak to her family—it was so distinctive that it would have been immediately remarked on. When she had taken it off, she noticed that inside, beside those entwined hearts, the inscription read: Fitzwilliam and Elizabeth * Where you go, I'll follow. That long-ago great-grandfather and great-grandmother had born similar names, though she didn't know the story about that sentiment.

She turned and handed the ring to Jane, whose eyes lit up. Her sister turned it over carefully, and without curiosity, so Elizabeth sat down and opened the tiny flaps to show her the hidden message, which made tears of joy fall on Jane's cheeks.

"It's the most precious thing that I've ever seen," Jane whispered, crying. "He loves you with a depth and breadth that I envy." Elizabeth slipped the ring on her finger and hugged her sister again.

"Let's select a date then go tell Mum her good fortune."

"Let's," Jane agreed.


Frances Bennet sent her favorite teacup sailing across the kitchen to smash on the linoleum as she screamed.

Her screams were mostly the same, whether joyful or anxious, but the force of this one was different. So too was her posture, her hands in the air, her mouth wide open, and an addictive sparkle in her eyes. The despair and fear that had driven her from her home the previous month were gone as she considered the planning of a double wedding for her two oldest daughters.

"Both of you!" she cried when she was finally able to recover. "New dresses, I don't care if we have to get them on the black market. You need new dresses." Elizabeth wondered what her mother knew of the black market, but dutifully picked up the broken teacup, mopped up the spilled tea, and answered questions about William. When Mrs. Bennet heard that his mother was still alive, she insisted on getting her address and writing to Ana Darcy.

"I don't know her address. William was going to phone me while he was away," Elizabeth explained, relieved. She wasn't sure what Frances and Ana might say to each other; there seemed to be no two more dissimilar women.

"Hrmph!" Frances exclaimed. "You modern young people have no manners. Using the telephone instead of corresponding! In my day…" Elizabeth tuned out her mother and the lecture as she considered more pleasant thoughts of talking to William on the phone.

However, she was disappointed—even if she understood—when Sunday came to an end, and he hadn't called. She hoped he had slept the entire day.


Elizabeth returned to work at the Baker Street office. Like Gene Carter, she thought she had been matured by her experiences. More than simply reckoning that time had passed, she noted that her experiences were ones that had changed her even though she had been gone for such a short time.

No one seemed worried that she had disappeared for a week; after all, many people went away for weeks or months on end before reappearing. It was common enough that no one said anything.

Ruby, the new secretary, was the only person who eagerly greeted her because she had many procedural questions. Elizabeth dove into work and slogged through the morning and past lunch. But there was a point in the afternoon when she faltered; there was no particular trigger. No one came to speak to her. It wasn't the document in front of her, a single word that invoked some memory of her experiences, but she thought her father was correct that experiences could be damaging even if mentally wounding and even if they hadn't physically harmed her.

She searched for Mrs. Annesley and the tea trolley but waited for the women to finish in the Companies division, not yet wanting to discuss Agatha Christie books with Thelma or to encounter Orestes Kokkinos' effusive personality. Elizabeth had carried on, but did she need to carry on in the Baker Street office? Was she too at a crossroads? Her father said that he hated for her to undervalue herself, but Elizabeth thought she might contribute to another organization, one without such dangerous and nerve-wracking missions.

Self-reflection needed to wait for solitude, as soon as she returned to her desk, Ruby bombarded her with questions again. A new set of recruits was due the following week on March first, which meant reviewing procedures. The pair worked late. Elizabeth headed home, wondering if she and William would get an opportunity to speak.

The front door squeaked as she opened and closed it and Lizzy began to unbutton her coat intending to hang it up. The phone which sat in a nook right next to the closet rang, and she picked it up.

"Hello?"

"Hello," said the voice she most wanted to hear—part of her melted inside into a pool of happiness.

"How are you? I miss you," she said.

"I miss you too," said William. "Did you get into the office today or did you stay home and rest?"

"Office, it's been quite busy, lots to do. How are things in Derbyshire?" she asked, leaning her shoulder against the wall. Movement caught her eye, and she looked down the hallway to see Mrs. Bennet and Jane peer around the kitchen door at her. Elizabeth turned her head so she wasn't distracted by her family.

"Quiet, it's the country," he answered. She could still sense her family's eyes on her.

"I'm speaking in the hallway. I just got home, haven't taken off my coat," she explained.

"I'm in the study at the house," William answered in kind. "Have you decided on a wedding date?"

Elizabeth's insides continued to dance in happiness at the sound of his voice, but they lost step for a minute before maintaining their warm, almost mesmerizing gyrations as a movement made her turn her head. Mrs. Bennet was waving a hand; Elizabeth turned to stare at the lounge door and ignored her mother.

"If you're amenable, and only if you want to, Mum and Jane would be thrilled with a double wedding," she said. A long pause ensued, and she wondered what William was thinking. Speaking on the phone was difficult when you couldn't see the other person's face. A familiar grunt came over the line.

"Apparently, I need to get a hold of Charles?" he murmured.

"Yes," she answered with a slight giggle. Elaborate movement from her mother made her turn. Frances Bennet now was waving her arms wildly back and forth, almost as if exercising. Elizabeth shook her head and turned her back on her mother.

"I hadn't considered it," he said slowly. "I'll admit to wanting it to be your day, our day," William paused. Elizabeth thought she heard sounds in the background on his end. "My mother's here and wants to speak to you." The joy that danced inside her stopped as she stood straighter and reached up to pat her hair even if Ana Darcy couldn't see her.

"Alright," she said as there wasn't anything else to say. Muffled sounds came through the receiver, then a voice.

"Elizabeth, this is Ana, thank you for giving me my son back." Whatever Ana Darcy had to say, Elizabeth hadn't anticipated that statement, and her throat constricted, making her unable to speak for many heartbeats.

"You're welcome," she finally blurted out, not sure what else she could say. There were so many ears listening. A sound came through the receiver, she wondered if Mrs. Darcy wasn't crying, but she had no way to know if they were happy tears or sorrowful ones. The mere thought that Ana Darcy was crying made Elizabeth tear up slightly, but then she thought, this will never do. I'm standing in eye-sight and within ear-shot of my mother!

Small breaths calmed her nerves before she asked how he was doing. Mrs. Darcy replied that she had been dismayed when he showed up with his wound and wouldn't share what had happened to cause it. She spoke a little about his care and her fears about the injury.

"But on the other hand, he's happy again, and I attribute that to you." The mother paused then said, "I would love to come dress-shopping with you. Once I'm sure Guilelmus has recovered enough and is merely convalescing, maybe I can come up to London for a few days?"

Ana Darcy and Frances Bennet fussing over my wedding dress together—what could be more painful? thought Lizzy.

"That would be lovely," she answered automatically; there wasn't anything else Elizabeth could say.

Mrs. Darcy began asking a litany of questions, but she heard a deeper voice in the background, not precisely arguing with her, but probably telling Ana there was plenty of time to shop and speak with Elizabeth, but he needed to finish his call. She heard Ana switch to Greek, and there were some rapid words spoken back and forth before Mrs. Darcy politely said good night and handed the phone back to William.

"I think your worry that phone calls might break my bank was correct," he laughed gently. "As much as we want to talk, we may need to limit our calls to once or twice a week."

"I can attest to something similar here," she said, having turned to find her mother had walked through the breakfast room into the lounge and stood in that room's opening, staring at Elizabeth with the largest frown on her face. "Let's try writing." Something on Mrs. Bennet's face brightened as she listened, and Lizzy recalled her mother wanting to write to Ana Darcy. Their meeting seemed inevitable; after all, their children were marrying.

"If you truly just walked in and haven't even taken off your coat, I'll let you go. I love you," said William.

"I love you," she said in return and hung up.

"Lizzy! Why didn't you let me speak!" cried Mrs. Bennet as soon as the receiver was hung up. "Did you get his address? I need to write to his mother!"

"He will write," Elizabeth assured her, finally tugging off her coat. She didn't mention that his mother wanted to come to town to shop for a wedding dress—that would probably have made Frances swoon.


A/N: I have a friend, Alejandro M. (or Alex) who was born in Argentina and only moved to the States when he was six. His immediate family moved there before WW2, but he had extended family who lived there before. They had fled Germany because of persecution. He liked to introduce himself with his full name and see people's eyebrows raise as he had a Spanish first name and obvious Jewish surname. He was very proud of his heritage and is my inspiration for this little side arc.