Chapter 4
December 1801
"Mama, why are we never included when our stepfather and his daughters travel?" Caroline Bingley whined. At twelve, she was even more homely than she had been as a younger girl.
"He does not care about you, my child; he only cares about his own children. Have you not seen all they have when we receive nothing?" Martha repeated her oft told refrain shifting the blame away from her own actions and onto someone else.
"As they are away, why can we not take some clothing and jewellery from their chambers?" Caroline asked.
"The doors are locked when they are away Caro, there is no way to enter their bedchambers. Besides, Jane and Eliza usually take almost all of their possessions with them. They have been away since June, Mama. Will they return?" Louisa asked between each mouthful of biscuits. "Do we have to hate them Mama?" the fifteen year-old asked.
"You most certainly do," Martha replied indignantly. "It is because they are jealous of you that their father treats you so ill!" Before Louisa could challenge the logic of her statement, Martha changed subject. "I heard from your brother. He is with Uncle Jack in Scarborough for Christmastide. After Twelfth Night he returns to Eton for his final term."
"It is most cruel of our stepfather to never allow Charles back at Longbourn, all he wanted to do was prank that high and mighty Jane!" Caroline complained.
"Sister, do you forget what he was doing to us?" Louisa asked aghast.
"I am sure it was a misunderstanding," Caroline waved her sister's concerns away. "Have some more biscuits sister dearest," Caroline added spitefully.
"Mama!" Louisa appealed.
"Now, now girls, you need to get along, remember we are the ones who are being ill-used. One day we will get our due, I promise you that!" Martha insisted.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
"Welcome Papa," Tommy threw his arms around his father. The nine year-old boy missed his father greatly but understood why he lived with Uncle James. He was vastly pleased that his two older sisters had been with him at Holder Heights, and for a stint at Holder House in Town, for the last six months. Even better, Jane told him she would be remaining with him and not returning to Longbourn.
"My Tommy. You are getting so big my Son. Have you been attentive to all of your lessons?" Bennet asked after he hugged his son.
"I have Papa, Phillip and I learn together. It is less fun when Jamie is at Cambridge, and I do not mind my girl cousins too much. Marie and Cassy are often with Jane while Ally and Lizzy are always together," Tommy reported.
"What else have you been up to?" Bennet asked.
"The Fitzwilliams were here a few days before your arrival Papa. Ewww, you should see the way the Viscount looks at Marie and she at him!" Tommy still thought that girls were very strange creatures.
"Marie came out in October as she is eighteen already and they are courting," Bennet explained. "One day you will understand my Son."
"I will never court a girl!" Tommy exclaimed emphatically. "I forgot; Richard Fitzwilliam is a Lieutenant in the Dragoons! I want to be an officer when I am big!"
"He has a profession because he is a second son. You will inherit Longbourn one day my Son so you will not need a profession," Bennet clarified.
"I would rather be in the army!" Tommy stuck his bottom lip out with an exaggerated pout.
"Where are Lizzy and Jane?" Bennet asked after he stopped laughing at his son's antics.
"They are with our cousins in Marie's sitting room, Papa," Tommy informed his father. "May I go play with Phillip now?"
"You may my Son, after you collect your sisters for me and ask them to join me in my sitting room." Bennet sent his son on his way with a light playful tap on the posterior.
Not more than fifteen minutes later Bennet was accosted by his daughters who seemed most pleased to see him. "Papa, you always like to surprise us!" Jane chastised. "If we had known when you were to arrive, we would have waited for you in the entrance hall."
"Did I not achieve my goal? Are you not surprised?" Bennet grinned.
"You had Tommy send for us Papa?" Elizabeth asked after she received a warm hug from her father.
"Lizzy, you remember when I brought you girls here in June, I told you that you and I needed have a discussion. Jane has accepted that her place will be here until I find a way to rid us of that woman and her daughters. The son is forbidden to return but given his obsession with Jane, I feel it is safer for her to be here," Bennet told his daughter.
"Papa, are you ordering me to remain here with Jane and Tommy?" Elizabeth asked her eyes downcast.
"No Lizzy, I am not ordering you. However I would feel better should you remain with Aunt Amy and Uncle James. You are a highly intelligent young lady, and I am sure that you understand the reasoning behind my request." Bennet sat back and allowed his daughter to cogitate.
"I do understand Papa," Elizabeth said carefully after a minute or two. "Unless you order me to stay here, I would like to return home. You cannot do everything yourself, Papa. That woman has not a clue how to be the mistress of an estate or how to help the tenants when needed. I know I will only be twelve in March, but I also know that I am willing and able to help you. Those interlopers will not chase me from my house!"
"As I promised, I will not order you to stay with my cousins Lizzy. Your willingness to help me warms my heart. You may return to your cousin's daughters and I will see you at dinner," Bennet released the girls.
Not long after, Bennet was sitting with his cousin in the latter's study. "Port Cousin?" the Earl offered.
"You know I will never refuse good port James, thank you," Bennet responded.
"So Lizzy responded as you believed that you would?"
"She did. The truth is that she made some valid points, I will need a certain amount of help, and she is a most capable girl." Bennet raised his glass in toast to his younger daughter.
"We are both blessed with a surfeit of intelligent children. In that we are fortunate." The Earl took long swallow of his port. "I know that we cannot change the past Thomas, but you know my opinion, you should never have married the woman, even had she been found naked and riding you astride in your bed! Biggest mistake you ever made! You never consummated the wedding, did you?" Bennet shook his head. "Why not an annulment for goodness sake?"
"She is a widow, so not a maid. It would be my word against hers. My honour will not allow me to do that, I have set out certain lines in the sand, should she cross one of them, I will divorce the woman!" Bennet related with some anger. Allowing his honour to rule in this case had been the biggest mistake of his life.
Bennet's cousin changed the subject to one more palatable. "I received a notice some days ago that we have inherited a rather extensive estate, or plantation I believe they call it, near Kingstown in Jamaica. Who would have thought I would have property in the British West Indies?"
"I was not aware we had a relative in that part of the word," Bennet stated.
"We do not. It was a branch of Amy's family and we are the only remaining cousins, so it fell to us by default. I understand from the information that there is an effective overseer who has held the post for going on ten years."
"Does the plantation keep slaves?"
"I do not know, but I am writing to the man in charge to tell him that if there are slaves they are to be freed immediately and I will pay them as servants going forward. In addition, I am authorising five and twenty pounds a year in back pay for all former slaves if they are being used at the plantation. I abhor the practice and will not have it attached to my name," the Earl stated emphatically.
"You are to be lauded for your principled stance. If only all members of the empire practiced the same. Even though the practice is outlawed in England, I am disgusted at those who bring in indentured servants, which is just slavery by another name. How sad when making money trumps humanity," Bennet opined.
"I suppose I will have to go see the place at some point," the Earl stated as he refilled both glasses.
"Do you have an idea when?" Bennet asked.
"Jamie has two more years to complete Cambridge and then his Grand Tour. After the terror in France, I am not sure the son of a peer should visit that country, so I suppose I will have to negotiate with Jamie. In short, it will be about three years. It will be before Phillip and Tommy are to attend university, so it will be the ideal time," the Earl laid out.
"I assume by then Marie will be Viscountess Hilldale? While relaying his aversion to girls, Tommy shared that Marie and the Fitzwilliam heir are courting," Bennet cleared up for his cousin.
"Tommy's information is correct. As much as we like the Fitzwilliams, we did not push the two together; they came to it on their own," the Earl explained. "Cassie will be too young to be courting yet so one of my daughters will be with Jane. If we go at that point, we will time it to return in time for your eldest's coming out."
"The Darcys, the Duke of Derbyshire and his family are to join us in two days, have you met Lord Robert yet?" the Earl asked.
"No I have not, but I remember Lizzy telling about them some years ago," Bennet replied. The two talked for a while longer until retiring to change for dinner.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
The Duke of Derbyshire was about to follow his children into his travelling coach when a most unwelcome visitor pulled into the internal courtyard. There was no missing his sister-in-law's carriage and four.
"Why are you here Lady Catherine?" Lord Robert demanded when the uninvited woman descended from her conveyance.
"Is that the way to greet your nearest relation Robert?" Lady Catherine smiled sweetly.
"Firstly you are not even close to being my nearest relation and I am your Grace to you Lady Catherine!" the Duke stated icily. "I ask again what are you going here Lady Catherine?"
"It is time for Fitzwilliam to do his duty…" The indignant lady got no further.
"Did you not get the message after me consigning your lying drivel to the fire all these years? I must thank you for helping to warm my house. Do you remember what I threatened if you spewed your lies about William being betrothed to my niece in public?" the Duke demanded.
Lady Catherine was taken back by his visceral reaction and vitriolic response. Mayhap it was time to change tactics. "Why Ro—your Grace, I thought you were jesting."
"You know very well that I was not. Mention this phantom engagement one more time and I will make good on that threat!" The Duke stepped toward Lady Catherine towering over, using his size to intimidate her, hopefully for the last time. "Now climb in your coach and return from whence you came!"
"How can you be so cruel your Grace, my Anne is in no shape to travel once again so soon, you can see for yourself," Lady Catherine indicated her daughter wrapped with many thick blankets against the freezing temperatures.
The Duke knew that his sister-in-law would not hesitate in using Anne as a pawn in her schemes, but he could not punish his beloved late wife's namesake for the sins of her mother. "You have a maximum of two days for my niece to recover. At that point I care not if you go to the inn in Lambton, and Lady Catherine," the red-faced lady turned to look at him with hate filled eyes. "If you dare arrive at my estate or one of my homes without an invitation written my me, you will be turned away regardless of who is in the carriage with you."
"The lady spluttered but did not dare gainsay her high ranking brother-in-law. "If that is your decree your Grace!"
"It is," he turned to his son. "William, I think you should take Gigi and go visit your aunt and Uncle at Snowhaven until our guests have departed. I will send a note when you may return," the Duke instructed. Lady Catherine started to protest, but one quelling look from the Duke silenced her.
"What about the Holders, Father?" Lord William asked.
"I will send a note forthwith," the Duke assured his son.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
Within an hour one of the Derbyshire carriages departed for Snowhaven, a mere fifteen miles distant. Lady Catherine and her none too happy daughter were shown to their suite on a guest floor!
"Mother," Anne screeched as they gained the shared sitting room. "You promised that I would soon be a Marchioness and a duchess one day! Why did my uncle deny that I am betrothed to my cousin when you continually tell me I am?"
"It is a misunderstanding Anne, one that I will clear up tonight!" Lady Catherine promised her daughter.
After midnight, Lady Catherine slipped out of her chambers and made for the family floor and more importantly, the master suite. She had failed to compromise Robert Darcy before, but she would not fail again!
As she opened the door to her brother-in-law's chambers, she failed to notice that the Duke was standing in an alcove in the dark opposite with his valet at his side. With the aid of the moonlight she stole into the master's chambers and after blowing out the candle she had used to get there, she climbed into the bed with the male form she could make out.
"Robert we were meant for one another, do not fight it," Lady Catherine snaked her hands around the man's chest. "It is time to make me your duchess."
"Sorry misses, if ya marry me, ya will no be any duchess, but a footman's wife," a smiling man still in his livery look back at the dismayed woman.
"Why are you in my brother's bed!" Lady Catherine blustered.
Suddenly the chamber was bathed in light as candles were lit. "That is my exact question for you Catherine! Had you succeeded to compromise me all those years ago, the result would have been the same as it would have been on the off chance your misguided scheme had succeeded tonight. I would not marry you if you were the only woman on this earth! Thompson, Hampstead," the Duke looked to two burley footmen, "Escort this lady to her chambers. Post a guard there, more than one in fact. She is to be in her coach and departing Pemberley by ten this morning. The gatehouse is to be informed that she is not allowed back onto my lands no matter what she tells them!" The two men nodded, and before she could protest, each took and arm, lifted her off her feet and marched her to her chambers.
As the Duke instructed, the de Bourgh carriage departed Pemberley on time.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
"It is good to see Longbourn again Lizzy," Bennet told his daughter as they rolled down the drive. It was Saturday the eighth day of January 1803. Bennet and his second daughter had departed Holder Heights the day after Twelfth Night with his cousins who turned off towards Town some hours earlier.
"It is Papa. I understand why Jane and Tommy are not here, but I do miss them so," Elizabeth stated wistfully.
"I too miss them all the time Lizzy, but we will see them in three short months at Easter time. As happy as I am you are with me, I wonder if I did the right thing by not ordering you to stay with Jane and Tommy," Bennet questioned himself.
"Well, I for one think you made the correct decision!" Elizabeth insisted.
"I hope so my Lizzy," Bennet kissed her forehead as the carriage halted under the portico. Neither missed the sour looks on either Mrs. Bennet's or her daughters' faces.
