A/N: Thank you for your comments for last chapter! To the Guest who has been leaving comments - Thanks so much for enjoying this story! :)
Part VIII
George Knightley – handsome, sensible, and rich, with a very comfortable home and a beautiful family, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly forty-two years in the world with very little (except about four years ago when he thought he had lost his one true love to an 'amiable' young man) to distress or vex him – could not sleep!
He had tossed, he had turned, curled up on his left, curled up on his right, laid on his back, and on his stomach, in spite of how he tried, he could not fall asleep. It was the third consecutive night since his return from the Assize Court that he was thrown into such predicament – where his two-year-old daughter had walked into the Mistress Chamber and whisked (more like pleaded to tell the truth) away his wife from him, and he was left, lying lonelily in the bed which he had not the habit of sleeping in, staring blankly into the darkness, struggling to find the reason for that unrest, listless, discorded feeling in his chest.
This gentleman, the Master of Donwell Abbey, a capable (highly capable if he were not also modest) landlord and a commanding magistrate, a man of sense and self-restrains, and the father of his son and daughter, resisted – with every muscle in his brain, every good sense bestowed upon him by the gracious Almighty, and every reason his intelligence could conceive – the notion that he was jealous of his own children.
It would be Foolishness – extreme Foolishness – to be jealous of his daughter and son, who were the beautiful labour of love between him and Emma, and whom they loved more than their own lives. The sleep-deprived man was adamant of his resistance, particularly – particularly – as a man who had tasted the bitterness of the unbecoming sentiment against a young man whom he once thought had stolen the only woman he loved!
As it was not Jealousy… then… it could only be… Envy…
Yes, he was certain – he was envious of his children, envious of his son who could spend nearly all his waking hours with his beloved wife while he must be off to be faithful to his tenants and citizens and all who depended upon him; envious of his daughter whom had been cradled, every night for over a fortnight, to sleep in his darling wife's sweet bosom while he laid all night – alone – in his bed counting the golden tassels dangling from the blue valances on top of the bedstead where the bed-curtains hung!
But… would not it be the same Foolishness to be envious of his own children?
This man of sense wavered in his own conjecture. Fully aware that his infant son needed his mother, like every beast needed its mother to nurture it to independence whether it was a bull calf, a gosling, a baby duck, a new born kitten, or a bear cub; the bond between a mother and her child was the greatest gift Nature had given to mankind, the beauteous work of the Maker. Besides, this most fortunate man took deep gratification in the way his wife loved their children – his Emma, whom he had called lack of patience and industry when she was a girl, possessed patience and endurance for their son and daughter beyond any mother he knew, had he been able to foretell the beauty of his wife's ultimate nature, he would never have named her such.
And to call himself envious of his daughter seemed unjust to his true feeling. When their beloved daughter came running for her mother with her pleading looks and helpless cries, in spite of the fact that it was the duty of the nursery maid to keep watch of their child at night, the coxing of a thousand maids could not compare to the loving embrace in her mother's arms, how could he not surrender his wife willingly to their two-year-old!
If it could not be Jealousy… and it was not Envy… Why had he been brooding and sulking like a damn Fool for the last three nights?
This most sensible, most fortunate, most ardently-in-love man at length gave up his struggle, sat up, raked his long fingers through his tousled hair, and sighed…
The truth was… he was feeling sorry for himself!
He had been away from home for a fortnight, by day he was faithfully attending his duties as a magistrate, by night, he was missing his family, his children, and most of all – his wife.
The alluringness of the London town life did not move him. Many men, even respectable men with wives and families, fell prey to the glamour of town and to the charms of those ladies, who dressed in their fineries and enticing ways with intentions that were not entirely innocent. But even with the multitude of charming beauties, who had batted at him their coquettish lashes, laughed flirtatiously to him for no apparent amusing reason, or offered their dainty gloved hands for him to kiss when all he ever meant was to bow, in London, or anywhere he went for that matter, his Emma was the only beauty ever to capture his eyes!
When he was a bachelor, being away from Donwell meant that he would spend his evenings planning the next quarter session, the coming planting season or harvest time, foresee the needs of the home farm, his tenants and the poor, to mitigate the effects of a heavy rainfall or a drought. Many a night, in the solitude of his inn chamber, he might wonder how the whist party at the Crown went without him, but was always able to brush the thoughts aside with ease and turned his mind back to his plans or agricultural journals. Yet, there was one thought, one image in particular, which held the power to keep his mind from all that seemed more important – It was the night scene in the Hartfield drawing room, where Mr Woodhouse and his youngest daughter sitting by the glowing hearth, the old gentleman would ask if he had had a shocking walk from the Abbey, and, with a wide grin, he would lift his foot for Mr Woodhouse to show him that not even a speck of mud had gotten onto his boots; but, somehow, while the exchange was with his family's old friend, the corners of his eyes always wandered to the old gentleman's daughter, and he would be delighted by the quivering quirks on her mouth.
He had spent much of his time wondering what his young friend was thinking when he answered her father – Was she amused by her father's endless solicitudes… or was she laughing at his ridiculous gesture of showing her father his clean boot!
And the twinkles in her brilliant hazel eyes and the arches of her perfectly shaped eyebrows had given him many hours of wonderment as well. There seemed endless mischiefs whirling in her mind. He had known her all her life, there was not an inkling of mean spirit in her, but whatever she was thinking must be machinations or whims to keep her amused in her rather confined and restrictive life. He would have given anything to know the scheme she was contriving when the sparkles in her eyes danced.
He had watched her grow from a fresh face girl to a beautiful young woman seemingly in a blink of an eye. The fact that she was so unaware of her own beauty had made it easy for him to set aside his own awareness of her perfect form. And yet, his young friend's loveliness had become, unconsciously to him at the time, the standard of which he would measure all the women he met against.
There were never a lack of pretty ladies in his acquaintances; John and his university fellows were forever presenting heiresses, daughters of some judges, or young widows of deceased peers to him whenever he was in town. Albeit the ladies whom had been foisted his way were all well-bred gentlewomen, many of them were too haughty to his taste, even his rank-conscientious Hartfield young friend would never look down upon anyone with so much arrogance. Some of the ladies were both pretty and tolerably intelligent, but they seemed insipid when compared to the wit and cleverness and the unassuming beauty of his mischievous young friend. And then there were those who were, he could not deny, ravishing beauties, but unfortunately it seemed to him that their outward appearances were all that those ladies clung onto, none of the liveliness, kind-heartedness, and generosity that Mr Woodhouse's youngest daughter possessed could be spotted in them.
Though at the time he could hardly notice what his unconscious heart had done to him, practically every woman he met had met with the same doomed fate of being compared to his young friend at Hartfield. And when being asked what he thought of those ladies by the well-intended, he automatically gave a polite smile and was quick to turn everyone's attention to the subjects of farm improvements or the war against France.
The way George's heart worked truly had not changed much since he married; the only disparity was that now he was fully conscious of the reason why no woman other than his Emma could delight his heart and bewitch every sense in him. This was why it had been torturous to this husband that he could not even have an uninterrupted night with his wife since his return.
But… a man of sense would never indulge in self-pity… nor fold his arms and wish his situation would resolve itself…
For this very reason, rather than allowing himself to sulk until exhaustion took reins every night, this man of sense resolved to face the matter boldly and decided that – he and his two-year-old daughter needed to talk!
~o~o~E~o~o~M~o~o~M~o~o~A~o~o~
It was a typical morning at Donwell Abbey, where in the parlour next to the flower garden, Mr and Ms Knightley and their beloved daughter, with their son in the arms of the nursery maid standing near them, gathered for breakfast as the family's daily ritual.
"Grace," replacing her tea cup on the saucer, Emma turned to speak to her daughter, "I think it is time to let Mr Larkins go home."
What her mama said had sufficiently distracted the child from stacking the toasts on her plate to form a fortress to protect the strawberries from getting eaten by the kippers.
Little Grace looked up at her mother and said, pouting, "Must Mr Larkins go home so soon, Mama? He seems happy in his basket! I gave him a lotus leaf yesterday as a bed and I think he likes it very much!"
"That is very kind of you, Grace. But do not you think Mr Larkins would be much happier in the pond where he could sleep in any lotus leaf and splash water whenever he wishes?"
Grace adored her mother, and she knew her mother was right, as she always was. But it was difficult to let go of Mr Larkins whom she had caught with her own hands and who had become a dear little friend to her.
She went silent, through the tall windows she looked out to the part of the garden where she had caught her frog, then to the direction of the pond. As her eyes wandered back inside the parlour, she caught sight of her infant brother fidgeting in the arms of the maid.
Emma saw that Grace's eyes were resting on her baby brother; she took the opening and said...
"Humph… I wonder if Mr Larkins has a brother…"
Grace instantly turned to her mother and asked, "You think Mr Larkins has a brother, Mama?"
"Humph, I do not know, Grace, but surely you have seen other frogs in the garden."
Little Grace nodded. "Do you think he has a baby brother?" the two-year-old asked.
"Perhaps…"
"Do you think he misses his baby brother?"
"I am not certain, Grace. But what do you think? Do you think he would miss his baby brother if he had one?"
"Err…" the child considered seriously, "It would be very sad if Mr Larkins had a baby brother and he had been missing him…" she muttered. "But, Mama," her face brightened, "all the other frogs in the garden are bigger than Mr Larkins – I do not think he has a baby brother!"
"You are probably right, Grace," replied the mother. "Perhaps Mr Larkins does not have a baby brother after all…" she continued gravely, "However… I wonder if his mother and father have been looking for him…"
The two-year-old gasped, "Mr Larkins has mama… and… papa?"
"Why, yes, Grace," her mother said, "all creatures have mothers and fathers!"
"Oh no, oh no!" little Grace cried, "It would not do, Mama! Mr Larkins must go home to his mama and papa!"
Emma felt a glint of guilt for beguiling her child into giving up her frog, although it was not a complete falsehood that she had told; there were indeed other frogs in the garden, only she could not tell whether they were any of Mr Larkins' relations.
Grace slid down from the chair immediately, laid her small hands on her mother's soft arm beckoning with immense urgency, "Mama, Mama, let us set Mr Larkins free so he could find his family!"
Emma set her napkin down on the table, she was happy to oblige Grace, but as she pushed her chair back to stand, William began to cry.
"Oh, Grace…" she said, "William must be hungry, Mama needs to tend your baby brother first…"
"But Mama, Mr Larkins wants to go home! He has not seen his mama and papa for three days! He misses them so very much!" The child's insistent hands would not let go of her mother, "He cannot wait for William to finish his breakfast first!"
"But Grace… your baby brother…" The mother was torn. "If Mr Larkins cannot wait… perhaps Lucy could take you and him to the garden without me…"
"But I want you to come, Mama… would not you come, Mama?"
George, who had been listening with devotion to the discourse at the breakfast table, amused by the way his wife charmed their daughter into willingly setting her frog free, realized the dilemma Emma was in, suddenly saw an opportunity…
"Emma, why do not I take Grace and Mr Larkins to the garden?" he interposed as he left his seat and came near Emma and Grace.
"But you have the parish meeting this morning at the Crown, George…" said Emma.
"I have received a note from Elton this morning, he is stricken with a feverish cold, shall be confined for the rest of the day, and Weston and Cole are still in Oxfordshire for the fight between Cribb and the American*. Otway and I shall be the only ones at the meeting but it would not begin for another two hours as Otway has a meeting with a client this morning."
"Then," Emma felt relieved, speaking to Grace, "your father shall take you and Mr Larkins to the garden, Grace."
"Yay!" the two-year-old clapped her hands in glee, "Papa is coming with us! Come, Lucky, let us go fetch Mr Larkins!"
As soon as their bubbling child left the parlour with her nursemaid, Emma turned back to George.
She studied the dark shadows under his eyes with concerns. "You look fatigued, George…" she touched her soft hand on his cheek, caressing it tenderly, "have you not been sleeping well?"
George covered Emma's hand with his and smiled at her. "I am well, Emma. Just a little fatigued, that is all." He heard their son's cries grew louder, and he gently brought her soft palm to his lips. "Do not worry on my account, my love. Our son needs you, pray, go to him."
~o~o~E~o~o~M~o~o~M~o~o~A~o~o~
With a basket and a frog and a lotus leaf in tow, the father and his bouncy two-year-old had reached the garden and to the side of the pond. He laid the basket on the ground for Grace.
Carefully lifting the lid off the basket, little Grace peered inside and said to her frog very kindly, "Was the journey uncomfortable, Mr Larkins?"
Blink…
"I am glad you did not mind the journey…"
Frown…
"Oh... but you miss the pond?"
Crock…crock...
"I am sorry!" she said shame-facedly, "I should not have kept you from the pond for so long… and from your mama and papa, too!"
Crock…
"Pray, do not be upset, Papa and I are here to set you free!" her face brightened by the thought.
Blink… frown…
"Oh, you shall miss me? Thank you, Mr Larkins! We are good friends, are not we?"
Crock…
"I shall miss you, too! But you and your family should be together. Do not be sad, I shall come visit you every day, I promise!"
Blink… blink…
"You better go home now; your mama and papa must be waiting for you…"
With the help of her father, Grace laid the basket to its side on the ground and removed the lid completely. In two seconds, Mr Larkins leapt out of the basket, but not without turning round to crock at his human friend one last time.
Splash…
"Take care, Mr Larkins!" little Grace called aloud, waving her hands in the air as her friend reappeared from the water, bounced into the flower bushes, and then into the woods.
"You will come back the morrow… will not you?" She had cranked her neck searching for the shadow of her frog to no avail.
Her father, who had been watching her bidding farewell to her frog, said gently, "You have been very kind to Mr Larkins, Grace."
"Mr Larkins is a good frog, Papa!"
"Will you miss him?"
"Hum, hum," she nodded. "But children should not be kept away from their family, Papa. Mr Larkins should be with his mama and papa, like William and I!"
George felt very proud of Grace; at times he could hardly believe that his little girl was not even three years of age.
They watched for signs of Mr Larkins in the flower bushes silently for a moment.
"Grace…" he thought it was time to bring up what had been on his mind since last night, "There is something…"
"Oooooh!" A gasp burst out of little Grace. "Heartsease!" she cooed.
"…that Papa wishes to… speak… with… you…" George's words were lost on his lips as he watched his child dashing away to the flower patches. He had prepared a speech for the occasion, but, now, he had to wait to give her that speech.
Though his two-year-old could run fast for her age, the father had much longer legs, and in a few long strides, he was beside her.
"Mama loves heartsease, Papa!" little Grace said cheerfully, bobbing up and down gathering the beautiful tri-colour flowers.
"I am going to make a posy for Mama…" One by one, she placed the flowers in the palm of her small hand, encircling the green stems to form a nosegay.
"This one is for Mama… and this is for William…" she inserted another stem of heartsease in her palm, then looked up to the sound of the nearby chirpings above her, "Good morning Birdie," merrily, she greeted the sparrow perching on the tree branch, "how are you this morning? Do you like the flowers I have for Mama and William?" showing him the lovely bouquet in her hand.
George was smiling too; he loved watching his children, and he loved seeing how happy his little Grace was.
"Papa," the two-year-old came running to her father with a radiant smile, "do you like my flowers?"
"Of course I like your flowers, Grace! And I am sure your mother will love them as well!"
The child beamed at her father, then darted off to hand the posy to her maid before running to the flower patch on the opposite side.
She gathered a single daisy from the patch and ran back.
"This is for you, Papa!"
The father smiled endearingly, lifting his precious little girl up in his arms. "It is beautiful, Grace!" he glowed, pressing a tender kiss on one of her ruddy cheeks.
"Would you put it on for Papa?" he asked.
"Like the way Mama does?"
"Yes!"
Little Grace carefully threading the stem of the golden daisy through the buttonhole on her father's lapel, she was so focus that her eyes nearly crossed.
As George watched Grace's little fingers work, he began to speak with her.
"Grace…"
"Yes… Pa…pa…" she uttered distractedly.
"You love your mother very much, do not you?"
"Oh yes!" the two-year-old tore her sparkling eyes from the daisy temporarily and grinned at her father. "I love Mama more than anything in the whole world!" And she stretched out her arms to show how big the world was to her father.
But her attention was soon given back to the daisy and the buttonhole.
"And do you know who else loves your mother more than anything in the world?" asked the father.
"E-r-r…" she muttered absently, and winced as she nearly broke the stem.
"Grace…" he prompted.
The two-year-old was silent, completely absorbed in her own world.
But when the daisy was securely fastened on her father's lapel, there was a burst of joy from little Grace.
"You look handsome, Papa!" she declared, smiling grandly at her father.
The father raised an amused eyebrow, his eyes twinkling, "What do you know about handsome, Grace? You are only a little girl!"
"Of course I know handsome, Papa!" the two-year-old said a-matter-of-factly. "Mama always tells me and William that you are the handsomest gentleman in the world!"
George broke into chuckles – Emma knew how embarrassed he felt when she commended on his appearance, which was why she had refrained from giving him the compliment in front of him. But little did he know that she had been quite liberal with such compliment in front of their children!
Little Grace watched her father's merriment with an innocent smile.
George soon composed himself, and now that he had Grace's attention, he thought it was time to return to his question.
"Speaking of your mother, who else besides you loves your mother more than anything in the world, Grace?"
"You – Papa!" Grace replied instantly. "You love Mama more than anything in the world!"
That was the perfect answer! – George thought, without a doubt.
"Now, Grace," he said, "when you love someone as much as you love your mother, you must wish to be with the person, would not you?"
"I wish to be with Mama all the time!"
"And do you think Papa, who loves your mother just as much, would wish to be with your mother the way you do?"
"Of course!"
"But if we both wish to be with your mother all the time, what are we to do, Grace?"
"We share, Papa!"
"Precisely!" the father could not be more pleased, "We could share your mother!" he thought the idea was brilliant.
"Like the way I share Mama with William!"
"Not quite, Grace. You share your mother with William during the day, but Papa is often out tending our tenants or the home-farm or having meetings with Mr Larkins or on parish matters in those hours." George saw that Grace was listening to him intently, "Papa is thinking more of the nights, Grace. Since you are with your mother during the day, perhaps…"
"We could share Mama at night!" suggested the two-year-old enthusiastically.
George could not believe his ears – how extraordinary to hear his two-year-old make such remarkable suggestion!
"Does it mean that you would let your mother stay with Papa at night?" he asked, with high hopes.
The two-year-old thought for a brief moment, "Hum, hum!" she nodded with shinning hazel eyes.
"Is that a promise?" He wished to be certain.
"Yes, a promise!" Little Grace smiled as brightly as the sun in the sky. But something behind her father suddenly caught her attention, she froze...
"Rabbit!" she gasped, "Rabbit… Papa… rabbit!" The ebullient child was shrilling and squirming in her papa's arms.
As soon as her father lowered her to the ground, the two-year-old darted off after the rabbit, and her maid Lucy darted off after her.
George watched Grace dashing through the flower bushes with a contented sigh of relief. He had not thought that it would be so simple, almost effortless, to persuade his daughter into giving up her mother at night. He was prepared to spend a considerable amount of time to help her understand that she was old enough to sleep through the night without her mother, or that she needed to comfort herself to sleep after she awakened at night, without having to explain that her father and mother needed their time together alone. He thought his child was exceptional as he needed not say more than it was necessary and she was already of the same mind as his. How wrong he was to have doubted the ability of his two-year-old to subject to reasons, how presumptuous of him to think that Grace would have a difficult time understanding his meaning!
* Tom Cribb was a famous English bare-knuckle boxer and champion in early 19th century. His first match with American Tom Molineaux took place on December 1810 at Shenington Oxfordshire, second match was a year later, and he won in both. Even though both fights took place much earlier than this story, it was either using the match with the American in Oxfordshire in 1810 or the exhibition matches in Wales with another boxing champion Tom Spring in 1819, which was the right time frame for my story but TOO far for Weston and Cole to travel to, I didn't think Mrs Weston and Mrs Cole would have llked their husbands to be gone so long :D, so I took the liberty to alter the year of the match between Cribb and Molineaux to suit my story.