GREEN
The next fortnight turned out to be the worst of Elizabeth's life. Twice they thought her husband was not long for this world, as his fever spiked to the level where they were tempted to lower him into the well or the Thames. A half-dozen times he woke up spitting and cursing, sometimes not even recognizing Longman or Bates. Once he even assumed that he was in the schoolroom for lessons and asked for his slate and his old tutor who had been dead for a decade.
It was very exhausting, but Dr. Warren judged that the risk of transmission was very low, so Elizabeth allowed some of the maids and footmen who did not have children to help. That mostly amounted to Molly Hatcher and Noah Hervey. Both Molly and Noah had been diligent in their studies, and Elizabeth even found it occasionally interesting to talk to them about what they had read. They were obviously not educated in just a few months, but Elizabeth found their takes on the books refreshing. She wondered if she would find the same thing with her own children – provided her husband both recovered from Typhus, and that Longman successfully restrained himself from strangling the man. His patience was running thin.
One day, Elizabeth abruptly noticed that she rarely saw Molly or Noah without the other being near, and she had acquired some habits that indicated each of them always knew where the other was. She might say something like. "Molly, take Noah to –" without a second thought, just assuming that if a maid and a footman were required, they were a pair. They never objected, but she wondered if she was somehow projecting her mother's attitude on them.
She was idly thinking about it one day when Noah knocked on the door to her study. When he came in, she saw that Molly was with him, as usual, so she bade them come over and speak.
Both looked somewhat nervous, and finally Molly took the lead. "Mrs. Darcy, we wonder if we could ask you for some advice."
"Of course," Elizabeth said, realizing that there were very few things two people who had known each other for six months might want to ask the mistress of the estate.
Molly looked down shyly. "Noah has asked for my hand in marriage."
Looking back and forth between the couple, she said, "Have you answered?"
"I have accepted him, ma'am," then the young lady found her courage, looked Elizabeth hard in the eye. "I love him. He is a good man. We suit each other, and I love him."
Elizabeth smiled. "And you, Noah."
The man stammered a bit, but then gained his courage and said confidently. "I love her with all my heart, Mrs. Darcy. We are young and have very little, but what we have, we would like to share."
Elizabeth nodded and thought about it for a minute. Molly was somewhat young, but not overly so. She had enjoyed her seventeenth birthday a month earlier. Her parents were both dead, and her brothers scattered around the world in the Navy, so Elizabeth reckoned she was the closest thing to family Molly had.
Elizabeth finally asked, "What are you asking for? Advice or permission?"
"Both, if you are willing, ma'am."
Elizabeth thought about it for a time. Noah was actually six months older than she was, so offering him advice seemed just a trifle silly, but that was the way of the world. A servant would generally go to the master or mistress of an estate for advice. They obviously did not need her permission to marry, but they did need her permission to maintain their employment as a married couple rather than as singles. Such permission was not universally granted, and some couples had to make very difficult choices.
Fortunately, the choice for Elizabeth was not hard. Using what she called the 'Longman Rule', she assumed they were both grown and could make their own decisions.
She said, "You of course have my permission. I will discuss the arrangements with the butler and housekeeper, but I see no reason you cannot be married at your convenience, if that is what you want."
The Mistress thought she may have made the right decision when both of her charges faces lit up like the sun peeking through a cloudy day. She got up from her desk, walked across the gap to where they were standing, and gave Molly a ferocious hug, and then broke propriety entirely by giving Noah one to go along with it.
She said, "Both of you have been keeping my confidence for some time, and for that, I am grateful. Trust is a precious commodity, and you have earned mine."
They both smiled, so Elizabeth continued, "I should like to settle a dowry on you, Molly, and perhaps a trousseau. I can afford it, and I would like the two of you to get a good start. I shall have to work out where you can be quartered. I have been accustomed to having you in the maid's quarters, but we obviously cannot have a married couple there. Let me give it some thought and discuss it with the housekeeper and butler."
"Thank you, Mrs. Darcy. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts," both said speaking over each other without the slightest difficulty.
Elizabeth smiled, and sent them on their way.
"Miss Bennet, what are you doing here?"
The whispered words dragged Elizabeth out of a light sleep. She still spent much of her time with her husband, even though they now had plenty of people to help. She wondered whether she was going to get the angry Fitzwilliam Darcy, the childish Fitzwilliam Darcy or something else this time.
She said, "I am not Miss Bennet anymore, Fitzwilliam. I am your wife. We have been married five months, although you have been ill most of that time."
He looked at her in confusion, so while he was digesting that, she helped him to sit up as usual, and tried to get him to take some water.
He said, "I supposed I have lost some memories, then?"
"Yes, you have. You have Typhus, and that happens sometimes."
He seemed to think about it for a while, giving her sly little glances every few seconds.
She said, "I have a letter for you to read. You wrote it to yourself before the fever hit."
He nodded. "I would rather you tell me. Are we happily married?"
Elizabeth stared at him for a moment, trying to judge his condition, but decided the easiest thing to do was to answer the question.
"Yes, I believe we are. We had a bad beginning, but we are well past that."
While she was thinking of how to put it, he said, "I think I remember that. I said you were not handsome enough to dance with."
Elizabeth closed her eyes in remembered pain. "I believe you came to a different conclusion later."
He chuckled, much to her surprise. "How long has it been. I cannot recall anything after that night, aside from my thoughts."
Curiously, Elizabeth said, "What were your thoughts?"
He thought about it for a moment, and she used the time to hand him a boiled egg that she had been planning to eat for a snack. He took it without qualms, ate it in a few bites, and asked for more, much to her relief.
"I wonder if I apologized to you – probably not. I can assure you that what I said was a lie. You practically knocked me over with your beauty. I was in fear of babbling like Bingley – but …"
He stared pensively. "… I was never affected like that before. It was – frightening."
Elizabeth smiled. "You did eventually apologize, but you never told me that before."
Darcy's eyes started to fade, but he snapped back awake. "We must have courted then. Perhaps I came to my senses."
Even though it broke her heart to do so, Elizabeth said, "We promised ourselves to always have unflinching, uncompromising honesty, Fitzwilliam. Our marriage was forced by a fake compromise engineered by my mother. We resolved our differences, but it was a very near thing, and it was quite ugly in the beginning. It is all covered in the letter."
Expecting another stream of invective like in some of his earlier bouts, but he looked at her with an expression she could not decipher. "Do we trust each other?"
She smiled, reached over to take both of his hands. "Yes, we do. We trust each other implicitly. You gave me your trust almost immediately, and I gave you mine not long after."
Darcy smiled and looked down at their joined hands. She had wrapped her hands around his fists, but he gently broke apart first one and then the other so they could grip hands mutually.
He very sheepishly asked, "What else should I know?"
Elizabeth thought about it for a moment, and something occurred to her that quite surprised her. She had no idea where it came from, but it arrived in her breast whole and complete.
She leaned down a foot from her husband. "I love you, Fitzwilliam Darcy. I love you with all my heart. The feeling is quite new, so it is not something you forgot, but that does not make it any less true."
He looked at her carefully. "How is that possible? I remember nothing but that assembly, and I cannot fathom a woman falling in love with a man who said that."
Elizabeth shrugged. "I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look, or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun."
He nodded. "I will have to take your word for it."
He thought about it for a time. "Do I love you?"
Elizabeth smiled. "I believe you probably do, but it was too soon to declare it before you became ill. I am not worried. We are bound to be the happiest couple in the world. Others smile but we will laugh."
Darcy laughed, which turned into a small cough, but nothing like he had experienced earlier. "That does not sound very much like me, but something tells me that with you, anything is possible."
Elizabeth sighed in happiness. She knew it was possible that he might wake up in a few more hours as the disagreeable Darcy, or that he might never recover his memories, but just for that moment, she wanted to savor the experience of being in love for the very first time.
Throwing all caution to the winds, she pulled aside his blankets. "Move over".
She of course had to help him slide to the side of the bed, but soon enough the maneuver was done. She was happy she dressed in her simple maid's dress, as she took it off down to her shift in a trice, and then climbed into bed with her husband. It was not time for the 'wedding night', but she just wanted to be happy and asleep for the first time in months.
With shaking hands, she laid on her side, and faced her husband, who was also on his side, facing her. They were a foot or so apart, so she scooched in to where their knees touched, reached over to kiss him on the forehead. "Good night, my love."
He probably would have replied with the exact same words if he was not already snoring.
