Chapter 8
March 1800
Lady Catherine de Bourgh was seriously displeased. She was isolated from her family and five years earlier, her brother, the Earl of Matlock, who was executor of her husband's will and the legal guardian of her daughter Anne had done the unthinkable and removed her daughter from her care.
Lady Catherine de Bourgh, née Fitzwilliam was never happy with what she had, she was always more interested in what she did not have. Growing up she had been jealous of the attention her brother and heir to the Matlock Earldom received. She always wanted more regardless of how much she had.
She had been launched on society when she was eighteen, sure she would capture no less than a Duke—it never happened. She thought that all she needed to attract a man was her dowry of five and twenty thousand pounds and the fact her father was an Earl.
It was quickly evident to the men in society the woman with strident opinions, which were almost never correct, was a harridan and termagant all rolled into one unpleasant package. No first sons would approach her, a few second and third sons made the attempt only to be spurned as not nearly good enough for Lady Catherine Fitzwilliam in her inflated opinion of herself.
By her fifth season, he father had enough and brokered a marriage for his older daughter with Sir Lewis de Bourgh, a baronet. Lady Catherine had harangued her parents about the degradation of marrying so far below her expected station, even if the man was wealthy and had a large estate in Kent.
It was all for naught; she had been married to Sir Lewis and had begrudgingly allowed him into her chambers to claim his marital rights. After their daughter Anne was born Lady Catherine locked her door to her husband permanently.
Sir Lewis did not repine the loss of congress with his shrew of a wife and met his needs in the arms of a mistress. He doted on his daughter and when he drew up his last will and testament he made sure Anne inherited all at her majority and he put the protections in place to make sure if he passed before his wife, she would not be able to drown the estate accounts with her extravagances and penchant for filling their homes with classless, ostentatious, and gaudy décor and uncomfortable furniture.
When Anne was six she had scarlet fever and had recovered. It was not long after that illness that her foolish husband had drowned while on a fishing trip. As Anne would inherit Rosings Park at one and twenty when she attained her majority, Lady Catherine had decided to keep her weak so she would be able to control her.
No manner of ranting, raving, or cajoling had weakened her brother's resolve to remove Anne from her care. To make matters worse, her traitorous younger sister Anne had fully supported her brother's actions. All of her life Lady Catherine was used to getting what she wanted by sheer force of will and when that failed, by vociferous haranguing until she achieved the desired result.
No matter how much she vented her spleen, her brother was not to be moved. Anne had been removed and she was being educated, becoming known away from Rosings Park, and worst of all was perfectly healthy.
At the same time, after her sister and brother-in-law had refused to announce a betrothal between Anne and her nephew Fitzwilliam—she refused to call him William as it was such a common a name—she had started to quietly work on the boy and it had seemed to bear fruit. He had accepted her rectitude on maintaining the distinction of rank.
Her plan was that once she had the boy agreeing with her, she would manipulate him into agreeing to marry Anne. That way he would take Anne away to the north and leave herself at Rosings Park as it should be.
She knew not what, but about five years ago something had changed, even before her brother took Anne from her care. She stopped receiving any positive responses to invitations to Rosings Park from both the Darcys and the Fitzwilliams, while at the same time there were no invitations issued for her to visit them.
How could she continue working on her nephew if she never saw him? On two occasions she had shown up uninvited at Pemberley and both times she had been sent away unceremoniously with not so much as a by your leave. The second wasted journey, she had not been allowed to pass the gates to the estate! Lady Catherine could not understand why she could no longer get what she wanted.
In April of 1796 her sister Anne had delivered a baby girl who they named Georgiana and there had been no invitation to the christening, never mind asked to stand as a godmother.
To rub salt in the wound, her brother had completely closed access to all estate accounts belonging to Rosings Park, going even further in restricting her access to funds that even her late husband's will had given her. All she had for her personal needs was the interest from her dowry which was a little more than one thousand pounds per annum. Her brother had taken away her power to hire or discharge any servants—much to Rosings Park's servants' pleasure—and had vested that power with the steward.
She knew she had to bide her time as her brother had made it clear if she—in his eyes—misbehaved she would be relegated to the small dower house—or worse, a pensioner's cottage.
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Lady Anne Darcy would have loved to have more than two children, but she was more than pleased with the two she had. Since the incident at Pemberley and the subsequent infamous shin kicking incident, all negative influence her sister Catherine had attempted to exert over William was banished.
The Bennet, Darcy, and Fitzwilliam families had become close friends with one another over the five years since that first meeting at Holder Heights. All three families had been close to the Carringtons before that particular visit, but now they all felt like one extended family. After the Prince was notified of his daughter's existence, Paul and Edith Carrington had been brought into the tight circle of those who knew the truth of Elizabeth's heritage.
William was still wary around Elizabeth, as she was with him. There was an uneasy truce between them and the two seemed to tolerate one another, although they always seemed to find points to disagree on in books or other subjects. They would debate rigorously—neither willing to concede to the other.
In April of 1796 Robert and Anne Darcy had been blessed with the safe delivery of Georgiana Imelda Darcy. Her middle name was to honour Anne's late mother. It was not long before she was being called Gigi by all friends and family.
As she grew, the bond between Gigi and the two youngest Bennet sisters became stronger and stronger. Kitty and Lydia Bennet were a little older than Gigi and looked on her almost as a younger sister.
The Darcys and Fitzwilliams would spend time with the Bennets at Netherfield Park on their journeys south for the season and little season as well as a month in the summer, and the Bennets were not infrequent visitors to Pemberley, Snowhaven, and Holder Heights.
Both the Darcy and Fitzwilliam parents had lauded the Bennets' decision to inform Price Frederick of the truth about his daughter. Just like he had to the Bennet children, the Price became known as Uncle Freddy to the Fitzwilliam, Carrington, and Darcy children. At the same time, the adults of the three families had become close friends of the Prince as well.
It had been agreed between all of them not to tell any of the children the truth of Elizabeth's parentage as one could not guarantee one of the younger generation would not let something slip without meaning to do so. If anyone asked about the close relationship between the families and His Royal Highness, they were told the friendship had germinated during the time he was married to his former wife.
The few times the Darcys were in company with the De Melvilles, it was no hardship not mentioning anything to them as they steadfastly refused to mention or ask after their daughter.
Lady Anne had begun to teach her daughter at three years old to play the pianoforte. Gigi had an aptitude for the instrument, not quite as the three older Bennet sisters had, but on par with her friends Kitty and Lydia Bennet. As Signore da Funti would not travel too far out of London, starting with the upcoming visit to Netherfield Park to celebrate Elizabeth's tenth birthday, Gigi would begin lessons with the maestro, having lessons with him whenever the Darcys were in London or at Netherfield Park.
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Prince Frederick, Duke of York and Albany, Earl of Ulster, had not felt so happy in his life since before the King forced the divorce between he and his beloved Priscilla. He still missed her every day, but a large part of the hole on his heart had been filled by their daughter's existence.
He could never refuse Priscilla anything in life, and it turned out in death it was the same. He understood her reasoning for protecting their daughter from the same loveless and lonely existence in which he had been raised.
Frederick performed all of his official duties with aplomb, so if he was absent from London every now and again it did not raise any questions as would have been if he had neglected his duties.
A smallish estate had come up for sale right near where the Bennets' Longbourn estate was located and just over two miles from Netherfield Park. The Purvis family decided to take advantage of the cheap cost of land in the Canadas and placed their estate, Purvis Lodge, up for sale. The Prince had snapped it up in 1796 and had the house renovated completely before he resided there the first time.
For the time being, he decided not to change the name of the estate. When the King and Queen asked what the attraction of Hertfordshire was, he did not lie. He told them it was a good place to relax and close enough to London in case he was needed. More importantly, it was where the love of his life had lived with him and died alone, and he had good friends in the neighbourhood.
The King, who still felt guilt over what he had felt he had to do, asked no further questions and as long as his second son performed all of his duties, he would not interfere in his life again. As parents, the monarchs were much pleased that there son was once again living the kind of life he did before the death of his former wife and his stillborn son.
Over the five years since he had become aware of his and Priscilla's daughter, the Prince had become the much loved Uncle Freddy to all six Bennet children. As he watched his daughter grow older and more accomplished, if it were possible, she looked even more like his beloved Priscilla than she had when he first met her.
Seeing the carefree and loved little girls, reaffirmed his commitment to allow her to be raised as a normal young lady. Frederick made sure he never tried to usurp Fanny and Thomas's roles as parents. All he could pray was when she found out the truth on her eighteenth birthday she would not be angry with those who loved her for not telling her the truth.
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"Girls where is Tommy?" Fanny Bennet asked. It was Saturday morning the first day of March. The Darcys, Carringtons, and Fitzwilliams would arrive that afternoon from Town for a sennight which would encompass Elizabeth's tenth birthday. The Prince had been in residence at Purvis Lodge since Wednesday of that week. He had not missed any of the Bennet children's birthdays since he had found out about his daughter.
On the second day of December 1796 the Bennets had been blessed with a son and heir, Thomas Henry Bennet Junior, called Tommy by all. Fanny had opined to her husband that as she no longer was concerned with the entail she had relaxed and been gifted their son.
Tommy was a little imp with sandy blond wavy hair and blue-green eyes. For his third birthday, Uncle Freddy had gifted him a pony. So his sisters would not feel left out, the Prince had gifted the younger three with their own ponies and cobs for Jane and Elizabeth.
Miss Jones was teaching Kitty, Lydia, and Tommy. When he got a little older, his father planned to hire tutors for his heir.
When notice of Tommy's birth had been sent to Ned Collins he had gone into a rage once he had his own son read the missive to him. Until this birth, he had been the heir presumptive. He had gone so far to try and engage a solicitor to challenge the parentage of the Bennet son, but he found no one that daft as to take his case.
From that day on, he drummed into his son's head that his inheritance had been stolen from him by those artful Bennets and promised his son they would find a way to right the wrong one day. His son William could at least read but had no more sense than the father.
As much of a miser as the father was, he had sent money aside for his son to attend school and William Collins at sixteen was at a local school for boys in Wiltshire. He was in his final year and his father planned to send the boy to a seminary to receive a degree in divinity and then hopefully take his orders.
"Tommy is at the stables talking to Scottie," Lydia, five, informed her mother. "Papa is with him Mama."
Fanny was relieved, as hard as it was with a boy of that age who loved to run free, he was not allowed out of the house alone ever since they had received the abusive letter Ned Collins had posted to them after having his son act as scribe for him. They hoped the man was not that insane, but they would not take any chance with the security of Tommy or any of the children.
Once he was shown the letter, the Prince had sent some of his men to Wiltshire to keep an eye on Collins. When Bennet had objected and said it was his responsibility the Prince had trumped him by telling him he was just making sure that the man was never able to approach his daughter.
"Mary, Kitty, and Lydia have you finished with all of your lessons and chores?" Fanny asked her three youngest daughters. Mary was eight and Kitty almost seven.
"Yes Mama," they chorused. Fanny looked to Miss Jones who nodded.
The Bennets' wealth had grown over the last five years. Each of their four daughters by blood had dowries approaching twenty thousand pounds. Nevertheless, Fanny and Thomas did not want their children to take things for granted so they were assigned certain chores each week and they were indulged, but far from spoilt.
Kitty and Lydia were learning their French and Italian well, but they did not seem to have the same ear for languages as their older sisters. Kitty had an eye for art and even before she started to work with an art master she could sketch well indeed. Lydia was also intelligent and well behaved like her sisters but as yet she did not excel in one particular discipline. She was however well rounded and was getting stronger on the pianoforte and with her singing. Given her age, Fanny and Bennet did not want to push too much.
The Bennet children were looking forward to the guests' arrival that afternoon. The girls were excited to welcome Cassie and Gigi. Charlotte and Mariah Lucas, who were seventeen and almost six respectively had been invited to spend a fortnight at Netherfield Park with their friends.
The four teenaged boys would all be at school. William, who Elizabeth was not sorry would not be present, was in his final year at Eton, while Andrew, Richard, and Jamie were at Cambridge.
Tommy was not happy there would be no boys coming but at least Nick Lucas, who was four, would be with them for most of the time. Lady Lucas had not yet decided if Nick would be allowed to stay for the full fortnight with his sisters. What Tommy did not know was that Uncle and Aunt Gardiner were coming and bringing Eddie with them, who was three too, born but a month after Tommy. Lilly, who was almost one, would accompany her family for the first time.
Bennet was in the study meeting with the stewards of both Longbourn and Netherfield Park. The yields of both had increased under his management. When the income from leasing the house, park, and home farm was added in, Longbourn profited a little over four thousand pounds per annum.
Finding Jane and Elizabeth practicing in the music room, Jane on the harp and Elizabeth on the pianoforte, Fanny was satisfied all her daughters were occupied. She sought out Mrs. Nichols to make sure all the required chambers were prepared for the arriving guests. Being her usual efficient self, Mrs. Nichols has everything well in hand.
It was a little after two that afternoon when the Bennets were notified the first coach had entered the park.