Hi all, new update for you :) If you are returning to this story, please note that I have rewritten some chapters and changed the structure from the version originally published, it could be that some feels familiar. Thank you for the follows and reviews - I really appreciate them!
It was after six when the last of the staff left, their soft chatter and gentle footsteps echoing through the Bright Gallery and down the back north stairs as they clocked off for the day, eager to get home and enjoy the last bursts of glorious sunshine. The Bright Gallery ran around the house on three sides and had been the perfect place to learn how to roller skate; people forgot when they walked around the house using hushed tones of reverence that Pemberley had always been a family home and countless generations of children had run around screaming, shouting and generally causing chaos in the hallowed halls. Lizzy loved it on busy Summer holiday weekends when dozens of small visitors descended upon the grounds, dressed up in regency costumes borrowed from the dressing room and ran around the gardens laughing and shrieking as they did. Sometimes the gardeners would grab the old croquet set out of the storage cupboard and set up the hoops on the lawn, parents shouting at one or other of their offspring to stop chasing another around the garden with a mallet.
Lizzy stepped outside of the large oak door that was marked 'private' and led the way to the Wyatt tower and up to her flat, usually she didn't use this door, instead climbing her way up the three flights of steps in the north corner of the courtyard, and through corridors and passages that visitors didn't see, places that had allowed the servants of Pemberley to move about the house unnoticed and unseen. She sat on the top step, waiting for Harriet, who was still getting ready for the post-results party at Olivia's, it felt strange to have a child who had left school – she could remember vividly living these days herself and the time had passed by so quickly that it was scary. Her own GCSE results had been overshadowed somewhat by her Dad's wedding to Carol, which had taken place the day after in the small chapel at Pemberley and been photographed for Hello magazine. She had been forced to wear a hideous yellow dress and she compensated for it by getting ridiculously drunk off the Veuve-Cliquot that was being freely handed out, spending the evening throwing up and then being taken to bed early by Maggie, whose boyfriend stood in the corner deep-sighing and wanting to get back to the party.
Lizzy felt the thick, woollen carpet underneath her fingers, it was another thing that had never changed, although it was a lot cleaner now that when she had been younger; the Historic House Society had done a thorough deep-clean of the house when their tenure had begun and, although it had been strange to experience – like someone cleaning out your house after you died, but before you had died – she now appreciated the refurbishments that they had made, the investment they had pumped into the house and the general feeling of love that all members of staff had for her family home.
Lizzy got to her feet and grabbed the small jute bag decorated with bees and containing the bottle of fizz and the two crystal champagne stirrup glasses that had belonged to Millicent Darcy. The great thing about a stirrup glass, she had always thought, was that to the untrained eye it looked like a bell, but was so designed so you had to drink your full toast before you could put the glass down. These particular glasses had been gifted to Millicent by her second cousin Rupert Fitzwilliam, who had been wizard smart, but not clever enough to avoid the bullet that ended his life during the Battle of the Somme.
"Mum," Harriet gave her a gentle hug, "are you ready?"
Lizzy looked up and smiled at her daughter who was nearly the same height and dressed in a red tea dress and stripy shoes that she had borrowed for the party. Harriet looked beautiful, the perfect blend of Darcy and Wickham.
"Yes," she grinned. "Shall we retire to the Saloon, Lady Harriet?"
"Why, yes," Harriet grabbed her mum's hand with as much grace as she could muster, and the two Darcy ladies promenaded down the grand sweep of the oak staircase, taking their time to do the customary salute to General Charles Darcy, whose portrait dominated the hallway and who was the gentleman responsible for rebuilding Pemberley after the English Civil War.
"Do you think he would approve of his house being open to the public," Harriet asked as they paused at the base of the painting, the ornate gilt frame catching the tiny shards of sunlight that were glinting through the protective blinds.
"The other alternative would have been Pemberley being converted into flats or a hotel, I think that would have been worse, don't you?" There had been talk of it and it was what had happened to Derbyshire House, the family's London house in Grosvenor Square, which was now a swanky five-star hotel, although the Darcy's had negotiated ownership of a penthouse suite for their own use.
"They would never do that to Pemberley, you could easily find some Austen-obsessed foreign trillionaire who would buy it and turn it into-"
"-Turn it into a theme park or transport it brick by brick to Dubai?" Lizzy looked at Harriet with a quizzical look as they walked through the main doors to the Saloon. The room had been designed for Fitzwilliam Darcy and had been his masterpiece at the centre of the house – purposely intended to impress visiting guests and showcase his immense wealth. At the far end of the room was a floor length mirror, which gave the illusion of a never-ending length of rooms, the oak panelling was highly-decorated and ornate, having been completed by the same master who had completed rooms at Blenheim and Chatsworth. In the centre of the ceiling hung a magnificent chandelier, glinting with crystal and illuminated with over fifty bulbs, it was the original light fitting and Lizzy had always wondered how many people it had taken to light all the candles each evening in the days before electricity. She walked over to the window, lifting the sash and locking it in place before opening the bottom half of the door, the smell of early August wafted in, and Lizzy could smell the Magnolia tree from the centre of the lawn, its white flowers looking like popped popcorn from this far away. Harriet had already poured out the fizz and they walked out onto the balcony, looking out on the reflection lake and toasting her success.
Lizzy waved Harriet off at the front gates, they had taken lots of pictures with Summer and Caitlyn on the driveway and then they were off at the start of their new adventures. She grabbed the bag and resigned herself to the M&S Meal Deal that was waiting for her upstairs. Although she had never expected to spend her evenings with Benn Williams, now that he was gone she found that she missed his company. He had made her laugh in a way that she hadn't expected he would do, sharing a similar sense of humour and an ability to laugh at himself now that she had scratched away at his snooty veneer. She had even forgiven him for calling her fat when he explained that wasn't what he had meant at all and he always found that he was much better saying words other people had written, rather than using his own – he had been doing it for so long now that he thought he was now completely ineloquent. Lost in her thoughts, and slightly excited about the mountain of profiteroles waiting for her, Lizzy made her way back inside.
Lizzy was halfway up the stairs when she stopped still. There was music playing, quite faint but still she could hear it…she felt sudden shiver creep down her spine despite the staircase was warm from the August heat. Pemberley had been around for too long to not have at least a few resident ghosts – the White Lady being only one. Through the Long Gallery it was said that the sad spirit of Sophia Darcy's son Frederick stood crying every night in the nursery waiting for his mother to come home, unaware that he would never see her again, dying a few days later of scarlet fever, and his grandmother Mary was said to haunt the woods, howling for the loss of her grandchild. Lizzy followed the sound of the music, any apprehension being removed – was that Mr Beveridge's Maggot? – walking slowly down the stairs, she crept over the velvet ropes, the music seemed to be coming from the Entrance Hall.
To call it an Entrance Hall was unfair, Lizzy thought, it was a large decadent room complete with four huge columns and hung with 17th century tapestries on three of the walls, one of which was dominated by the marble fireplace commissioned by Elizabeth Bennet-Darcy, and the huge portraits of Sir Piers D'Arcy and his wife, Matilda, which were displayed facing each other at opposite ends. The room dated from the day the house was built and used to form part of the medieval banqueting hall – it stood on a level all of its own and was the grandest and most impressive room in the building. Along with the Saloon and dining room, it formed the main entertaining suite of the Darcy family and had been home to numerous celebrations throughout its history. The music was louder now, the unmistakable rhythm and melody from her childhood echoing through the corridor, she was immediately taken back to being twelve years old and performing country dances in the courtyard with Winston and his mish-mash troop of dancers, led by Mrs Cecily Wharton, who he had obviously been in love with. Her pulse was racing slightly though, as the sound system in the Hall – usually programmed to play relaxing harpsichord music – shouldn't be playing right now unless triggered by movement, could ghosts trigger motion sensors? She wasn't sure. Don't be daft Lizzy, she chastised, this is your house. You know every inch of it. Still, she hid behind the post and peeked around it, unsure of what she might see. It was Benn.
"What are you doing?" She walked down the steps and directly towards him, he had been so engrossed in trying to remember the steps for the blasted dance that he hadn't even heard Lizzy clomping towards her in polka dot heels. She always clomped everywhere, he thought.
"Hey!" He smiled, happy to see her but confused as to why she was here. "Joyce said that you weren't here this weekend… aren't you and Harriet meant to be in London with Matthew?"
"Oh no," she shook her head, "Harriet had a party so we are going down tomorrow," she said offhand. "Are you dancing?"
He had been in rehearsals for this over the last few weeks and it was taking ages to sink in, even Jenny and Franklin had totally perfected it and he was clonking about like Frankenstein's monster. He had spoken to Joyce yesterday and, as he wasn't due in Shepperton for another two days, she had said that he could spend some time in the house and practice to try and get a feel for Mr Darcy who had been, so the history books stated, very good at dancing. The sweat on his brow and his red face gave it away, he nodded. "This is like a gym workout, y'know."
Lizzy laughed, "yes! This dance is also very complicated and takes forever."
"Do you know it?" He took a swig of water before returning the bottle to his bag on the far side of the room. Joyce had been very specific about not eating or drinking on this side of the rope.
"Know it? Yes!" She grinned again, and he noticed the crinkle above her nose again. She looked bonkers, wearing a dress covered in a cactus print and those mad shoes on her feet. But he liked it, she tended to wear her feelings on her face and even though he hadn't known her for very long, he felt he could trust what she said. In his industry, that was a very rare thing indeed. "Would you like me to teach you?"
For the next hour, Benn listened to Lizzy explain to him the intricacies of Mr Beveridge's Maggot and why it was the go-to dance for Pride and Prejudice as the way it was choreographed meant that Elizabeth and Darcy moved up and down the longways dance and were constantly forced to face each other. From a filming perspective it made lots of sense, but it was also hauntingly beautiful and, in her opinion, deeply romantic. They walked through the dance, moving together and then apart – substituting a card table and a chair as the other couple. Lizzy did not need any extra encouragement to keep dancing this most Regency of dances inside Pemberley House. She might be a bit rusty, she thought, but surely dancing was like riding a bike, something you never forget. Taking Benn's hand, she directed him in rolling back the huge Edwardian rug so that they had a wooden floor to work on. He played the music on his phone as it was easier to control, and she counted him in, for the turns, for the movements, for the coming together and moving apart. And they repeated it, and repeated it…
"I always used to think it was called 'Maggot' because of the way everyone moved up and down the dance," she confided, sitting down on the large yellow settee in the centre of the room.
"I'm guessing it's not because of that," he took a seat next to her and they took a moment to appreciate their surrounding and the enormous room that was now settling into dusk.
"No," she sighed. "It means 'fancy', so really the dance and the song are called Mr Beveridge's Fancy – this is nowhere near as interesting!"
"I disagree, I imagine Mr Beveridge was very fancy and look, here we are still dancing his dance two hundred years later." He stood back up, wanting to perfect the dance, wanting to move in harmony with her in this amazing dance which he had a new appreciation for. "Lady Elizabeth, may I request your hand for the next two dances?"
She held out her hand and he pulled her up from the couch, moving her close to him, so close that he could smell her perfume and that soft scent that was all her own. He could kiss her now, he thought, he could kiss her and then he would know what it felt like to touch those soft pink lips with his own. She breathed him in for moment, before pushing him into his starting position.
"Mr Williams, such a level of impropriety will not suffice. We have at least five years before the Waltz becomes fashionable," she winked at him and set the music playing. They moved together as the dance began, she wasn't sure what she felt as his hand touched hers, but it felt a little bit like lightning.
The entrance hall was unique in that it had an architectural feature known as the 'squint', designed by Wyatt it allowed the family to peer into the entrance hall, shielded by the painting of Piers D'Arcy, which swung out on a hinge. It was from here that Joyce, who had been working late and cataloguing some fabric, saw Benn Williams and Lizzy Darcy dancing beautifully, stepping in time with the music and falling half in love with each other to the tune of Mr Beveridge's Maggot. She smiled softly, wondering if they even knew, before leaving the scene and wandering down to her office.