"Like you, my family traveled to Norfolk, to Wymondham, during the festive season in in 1792. Mrs. Bennet and Jane were with me. We were attending the christening of my godchild. It was a cold day, but the nurses bundled the children outside to play in the garden by the rectory during the ceremony. When we went to collect Jane, she had a charming little companion." Mr. Bennet looked fondly at Elizabeth.
"She did not belong to any of the families attending the christening. And the rector did not know or even recognize her. Nobody noticed from where she came. She just seemed to have toddled over from places unknown, perhaps, attracted by the other children.
"We did visit the coaching inn to see if a child had wandered off. They were closely situated. We quite expected to find a frantic mother or nurse, but it was not so. The innkeeper's wife was unable to help. The inn had been so busy she could not say if the child had been there, let alone with whom she might have traveled. While we checked the inn and neighboring establishments, the rector sent for the magistrate."
"Her person was clean, and she was well-dressed though not richly so. She appeared perfectly healthy other than some scrapes and bruises to her palms and knees, like those that occur in a fall on cobblestones." Mr. Bennet was staring off into the distance, calling up the scene in his mind. "She was a pretty little thing. All smiles and braids. She liked shaking her head and making her braids dance or turning her head so quickly they would whip around her face."
Hurst smiled at this. He could well remember Elizabeth doing that. Tessa had always liked a single plait, but Elizabeth had once seen a drawing in a book of fairy tales with a girl with twin braids and insisted on her hair always being done in this fashion.
"Mrs. Bennet took her in hand and cleaned her scrapes while Mrs. Satterfield, the rector's wife, asked her questions about herself. When questioned about her name she said "Ilsabeth". When Mrs. Satterfield said, 'Your name is Elizabeth? That is a pretty name.' Lizzy nodded and very proudly said 'Ilsabeth…ZIBBY!' The Zibby was said with great emphasis and exuberance. She said it in such a way that we all thought Zibby, or some variation of Zibby, was her surname."
At this point, Hurst was struggling and failing to keep his tears in check. Whether the greatest share was tears of joy or regret, he could not say. Mr. Bennet was also struggling. Elizabeth was now stoic and that worried Darcy greatly. He got up and asked the footman stationed outside for another pot of tea. While in the hall, he heard the stirrings of the rest of the household. He distinctly heard Mrs. Bennet's voice.
Mrs. Hill had anticipated him and came bustling forward with another tea tray. Taking it from her, he asked if she could keep the others occupied and away from the study. "Will the presence of a footman outside the door cause any suspicion?
"No, sir. Mr. Bennet does that from time to time. Mostly, it is when he has something important to talk about with his steward or one of the other landowners. Usually, it just concerns estate business. Everybody knows he does not want to be interrupted when Scott is there," she said, nodding to the footman. She looked at the ceiling when she heard more voices upstairs.
"Now, you get back in there. I will take care of Mrs. Bennet and the girls. And you make sure that Mr. Bennet sees to Miss Lizzy."
Having been given his instructions, Darcy slipped back into the room when the footman open the door for him. Without a thought, he prepared tea and a plate of biscuits for each of them, as the others watched. "Is this what they teach at Cambridge?" Elizabeth asked. "I would have thought it more fitting to the finest private seminaries in town."
"Of course, for how can I really be esteemed an accomplished gentleman otherwise? Without such a skill, the word will be but half-deserved. I already have a thorough knowledge of history, fencing, horseflesh, politics, and the ancient languages. Besides all this, you have to admit, I do possess a certain something in my air and manner of walking, the tone of my voice, my address and expressions."
"But to all this you must yet add something more substantial, in the improvement of your mind by extensive reading, Mr. Darcy."
"Ah, so close. I shall never truly be accomplished, then. Tea-making skills notwithstanding," Mr. Darcy teased.
"I realize that stressful situations may cause one to behave in a manner that is somewhat out of character but are you two actually flirting amidst this most serious of matters?" Mr. Bennet chastised, to the embarrassment to the Darcy and Elizabeth.
"That is just Darcy's way. How did you put it? Using humor at your own expense to relieve tension?" Hurst, for one, welcomed the digression. It seemed Elizabeth did as well. Darcy apologized and vowed his silence as Mr. Bennet grunted his acceptance.
"As I was saying, we believed Zibby to Lizzy's surname. When Mrs. Satterfield again tried to make sure, asking if her name was Elizabeth Zibby, Lizzy frowned and said 'Ilsabeth hurts'. We all though she was talking about the wounds my wife was cleaning, that she was in pain. That her hands and knees hurt. We completely dismissed it as she was being tended to. We had no idea.
"Later, with the rector and the magistrate, I canvassed a good portion of the town that afternoon before a storm came in, to no avail. We had to leave the next day for Halesworth in Suffolk, as we were to spend some time with my aunt." He did not begrudge the visit to his widowed aunt. It would be the last visit they had with her. However, if they had returned to Longbourn, they most likely would have been on the same road as the Hursts for a time. They might even have encountered the Hursts as they made their way back to Wymondham.
"The next morning, as we waited for the roads to become more travel worthy, Mr. Satterfield and the magistrate came to see me. They asked for Mrs. Bennet and I to take the child. So many children are abandoned at churches, they were convinced that is what happened with Lizzy. They had already had four such children that year. The parish could not handle the burden.
"Lizzy and Jane had become so close in the span of just one day. And we were no less touched by her. It had been hard to leave her with the Satterfields the night before. It was not a difficult decision to make. The thought of sending that child elsewhere, to an institution or asylum for orphans, was not to be borne. So, we left our direction with both gentlemen and the innkeeper's wife, then we travelled on to Suffolk.
"We went back. We spoke to the innkeeper not his wife, though. He said the only child he knew of was an infant left inside the rectory a few months earlier. I do not remember the name Satterfield, nor do I recall the magistrate. My parents will know more."
"Does it matter?" Elizabeth asked sharply, though not unkindly. "Will it change anything? I can appreciate you and your family will want answers but there is nothing to be done now."
"Lizzy is right. And now, despite the similarities in our stories, I would wish for more definitive evidence. Mr. Hurst, we have saved the items Lizzy was found with. Will you allow me to ask you some questions to verify her identity."
"I remember that day as if it were yesterday. You may ask your questions."