A few intimate moments between Elizabeth and Fitzwilliam and a discussion between Fitzwilliam and Charles
Fourth day
Chapter 19: Pemberley spring
Pemberley, saturday the eighth
This morning they had escaped at first light.
He had been waiting before her door with a basket of food, her shawl and her bonnet.
Their lips had just brushed and then they had gone into the gardens where Fitzwilliam wanted to show her every brush and every tree which had played a role in his life.
"I want you to know all the places where life played with me, Elizabeth. I want you to see the places where the youth I was made failures and injured himself but I want you also to know those places where I found solace in my most direst moments..."
And so they went.
Going from lawn to brush and from river to pond...
He had stories about so many places that soon Elizabeth had forgotten half of what he had just said.
But it was not important.
They would come again and he would tell her anew.
What was important was that he was telling her everything he believed important about him.
Where he and Wickham had fought for the first time --and where he knew his very first humiliating defeat-- and where he won against his nemesis for the first time. The first of many victories intermingled with a few defeats.
"I loved him, Elizabeth. He was like a brother. We did everything together and it was mostly him who shew me most of the places I now worship. And then, one day, he began to try and push me out of my father's life..."
He looked at her and the old wound was there, no more bleeding but hurting. Hurting so much.
She drew him towards her and he placed his head in her lap.
"It did not came of a sudden. But I refused to see what was happening. How could I fathom that he who I considered as my brother was playing such an ugly role?"
He bit on his lips and his eyes were so full of sorrow that she found no other remedy than to brush her lips against his and give him the most delicate of all kisses...
Soon the delicacy went out of the window and she had to tear herself apart from him or they would have exceeded the limits...
"Wow," said he. "I could have kissed you till the end of time..."
"Two weeks or the day after father's arrival! Wasn't that the agreement?"
"Thirteen days now at the most" answered he. "And I do remember you pleading for tom... Today!"
She nodded with force.
"That I did, Fitzwilliam, but if I remember well, a certain Fitzwilliam Darcy, out of some long outworn excuses, half convinced me that the presence of the only living parents of the couple would be his pleasure and his honor... So I yielded but half hearted, I must admit."
"You could try and convince me that yesterday I was wrong, dearest Elizabeth. I'm finding myself in a mood to be convinced, right now..."
She shook her head and raked her fingers in his hair.
"That won't be possible, Mr. Darcy. We Bennets have a strong tradition of holding to concluded agreements... And teasing our poor mates... You'll have to endure my teasing for the next thirteen days, that will be your chastisement for not relenting to your fiancée's wish."
He breathed out loud and sound.
"I got myself a shrew" cried he. "But luckily we're not yet married! I could..."
She blocked him with both her hands in her lap and if her face was serious, her eyes were sparkling like never before.
He loved it and longed to see her come nearer, nearer...
If, at this very moment, he could kiss her, he knew a new world would open up...
But she did not come nearer.
"I know what you're trying to do, Mr. Darcy. And it won't happen. I'm be as stout as can be a maiden in the presence of a seducer of your format. And do not dare to use your wonderful smile to lure me in the way of your appetites, Mr. Darcy, it..."
Of course, he smiled... Not out of spite but because he could do nothing else.
How could he not smile at her. How could he stop smiling while she was at his side?
"You dared, Mr. Darcy!"
"So I did, Miss Elizabeth. And if I could, I would never stop smiling at you..."
She came nearer but not near enough for him to catch her lips.
"Try and do smile, Mr. Darcy, because, I do love you even more when your face is lightened up with that smile of yours..."
He looked at her.
"If God wills, then I'll smile till the end of all times..."
She put her fingers on his lips and a strange sorrow came upon her.
"Please, don't do it... Let it be a rare gift you bestow on me in those times I'm in need of your love... There will be those times, Fitzwilliam and there will be times where I will be full of sorrow and grief. At those moments, promise me that you will ever have that particular smile in store for me..."
He nodded and kissed her fingers with light thoughtful kisses.
"I promise, Elizabeth..."
He stood up and helped her up.
"I have a last place to show you, Elizabeth. A place I found myself the day my father died. I don't know how I was able to find it, but I had so much sorrow that I wanted to hide somewhere nobody could find me. It is a place I do believe is unknown to most inhabitants of Pemberley. Perhaps it is known to one or the other Gardener but I doubt it, they would have shewn it to me..."
He took her hand and began to guide her towards the woods that stood on the highest hill of the Estate.
At a moment he stopped and looked at her.
"You'll have to crouch..."
"With you as a guide, I'll crouch to the end of the world..."
She was rewarded with one of what she was beginning to call his sun-smiles.
"God, Fitzwilliam, it's marvelous... Never would I have thought that such a place even existed..."
He was only grinning like a happy schoolboy.
She loved his most secret of places. She loved it and she looked around her with excitement and fire in her eyes.
It was a groove. A group of perhaps fifty very old and very impressing Oak trees. And the Oak-trees formed a circle and in the middle of their circle sprouted a spring. A marvelous and tingling Spring that flowed into a natural little pond the perfect size for two people to lie side by side.
And between the Oaks and the water there was the most extraordinary mossy bed one could imagine.
As he hoped, Elizabeth couldn't resist and passed first a hand over the moss just before sitting down. He came to her and sat at her side...
She looked at him and her eyes were sparkling.
"This is the most beautiful place I ever saw and it is also the most petty attempt I ever witnessed..."
He looked contrived...
She didn't believe a second that he was regretting what he was trying to do.
"You knew, didn't you?"
"Knew what?"
She looked at him with suspicion.
"What this place induces..."
He bent over her and their lips touched.
Soon they kissed and soon his hands were crawling all over her.
Of course he knew, thought she. This place's literally reeking with sensuality. My whole body is asking for him to join me. To...
Her hand touched the surface of the pond and the cold crystal water tore her out of what would have been a very good --very bad?-- idea.
She took a handful of the cold water and sprinkled Fitzwilliam's neck with it.
He was shocked out of his endeavor...
He glanced reproachful eyes at Elizabeth. "Why" was written all over his face.
"We said that we would wait, Fitzwilliam, didn't we?"
"It's torture Elizabeth. I need you..."
"It's no less torture for me, Fitzwilliam, I hope you believe me. But we will have to wait all the same."
He looked around him.
"It's the one place I swore that I would love the woman of my life for the first time, where we would be together in all senses for the very first time."
She smiled at him.
"I'd love it, Fitzwilliam."
They exchanged thoughtful looks.
"It will be difficult to escape the wedding to come here," said he with pleading eyes.
"I agree, but we will be able to find a way, won't we?"
His smile --the very special one-- blossomed again.
"Of course, we will Elizabeth. This is our place and this is were I'll make you my wife..."
He came nearer.
She struggled out from under him.
"But not now, Fitzwilliam, not now..."
"Darcy?"
Fitzwilliam turned around to face Charles Bingley.
His friend's eyes were as dark and unrelenting as the day before. The conversation of the former day was still between them.
"Yes, Charles?"
"I'll be leaving, I can't stay. Not with the image of your happiness with Elizabeth before my very eyes. It hurts too much."
Fitzwilliam paced toward his friend and he reached out with his hand.
Bingley didn't let them touch.
"Don't, Darcy. I don't know if my anger is sufficiently appeased to even believe we could be friends again."
"I'm sorry, Charles... Really sorry..."
"I do believe you, Darcy. I do believe that you did what you did unknowing of your real reasons. But even so I'm still unable to forgive you. You should have spoken to me, Darcy! You should have come to me and spoken about it. We could have found a way out of this dilemma without the hurt, without the betrayals..."
Fitzwilliam made a face.
"I'm not very good at speaking of my feelings..."
"That's what friends are for, Darcy. To speak of difficult topics one do not have the courage to speak about with others. Even family..."
Fitzwilliam reached out and this time Bingley mad no effort to dodge his friend's hand.
"Stay, Charles. Stay till Jane arrives. Let's try and speak with her. I'll apologize and let her know my role in this whole affair. She will know you're faultless."
"I'll be leaving with Mr. Gardiner," said Bingley. "He proposed to help me sort my businesses while in London. He worked with my father, he still has a good grasp of what my businesses are made of. So I will wait till the arrival of the Bennets and Gardiner children. And I will speak with Jane but it will be with very little hope. What woman could forgive a man who seemed to scorn her?"
"Elizabeth could, Charles. And she agrees that between them, Jane is the most compassionate of the Bennet sisters. She will not hold a grudge. It's not how she is..."
Charles could only nod.
"I know she won't hold a grudge, Darcy. But what about the rest? What about Charles Bingley being a fool? What about being an idiot easily manipulated by friend and family? Why would she want a man who began with his own feelings and ended with those of others?"
Fitzwilliam tried and sooth his friend.
"It's not so, Charles, it's..."
"Yes it is, Darcy! Yes it is! What man could accept that he could be led to think the exact opposite of what he wanted to think? What kind of man is that?"
He raked his hair with his hand.
"I'm a sham, Darcy! An overgrown boy who believed in fairy tales. Who believed that the world was like his nursery: full of marvelous innocuous things and people."
He shook his head.
"A sham, Darcy!"
He calmed himself and took a long steady breath.
"I'll stay and I'll apologize to her. But I will not renew my courting, Darcy. Not yet. I'm unable to think of myself without anger and shame. As of today I'm not a good husband stuff. I hope she will forgive me and if, when I'm whole again --or finally--, she's still free, I'll come back to her."
Fitzwilliam could only accept his friend's decision.
He tried a last approach.
"Would you have a few more minutes to spend in my company? I have a few precisions to give you about the demesnes you bought..."
"Of course, Darcy!"
They were in Darcy's study and he was opening a great book.
A book with maps and layers of papers over the maps.
"This is the result of a study made by the leading geologists of the university of Heidelberg."
Fitzwilliam saw the question in Bingley's eyes.
"I didn't ask professor Nathan Bayley, our Cambridge teacher, because I wanted this affair to stay a secret. The German came, made their researches and published a book about the research I financed but who, here in England, is going to read a German Study about Northern England? Nobody! They are all so arrogant about what they believe to know..."
He shook his head. Old story, that. He would never overcome it...
"They stayed three years and..." He showed the big book. "This is the result..."
He opened the book at the county of Lancastershire.
He covered the physical map with a first layer of translucent paper covered with geometric forms, lines and dots. Bingley recognized roads and villages. Some squares were colored lightly.
Darcy showed a rough little square to Bingley.
"This is your Lancaster Estate, Charles. The other geographical figures represent other demesnes. Those in yellow are mine or Georgiana's. There were quite a great number of yellow dots around Bingley's Estate.
Fitzwilliam covered the first two layers with another one.
This one showed various lined zones.
"The squarred zones indicate that the underground contains Iron ore. The gray zones indicate coal deposits. As you can see, your demesne lies over a rather interesting iron ore deposit."
"As are most of your estates there..."
"I"m buying what I can, Charles. And were I cannot buy the Estate, I buy the mining rights. As a matter of fact, I own the mining rights of the whole of Derbyshire and a good chunk of the iron ore deposits of Lancastershire."
He placed his hand over the map.
"This is the economic future of the Kingdom, Charles. And I wanted you to have a part of these riches. Because you are my friend and because I owe you more than I will ever be able to give you back..."
Charles said nothing and only looked at the maps.
Darcy was right. Here was the economic future of the Kingdom.
If the Kingdom did not become a part of the French Republic.
Darcy recognized what he was thinking about.
"Even if the French win, they do not know about the underground. They won't steal real estate forlorn in the northern counties at hundreds of miles of Town. We will be able to save our fortunes and even to increase them. Be it in a Kingdom or a Republic..."
Bingley looked at Darcy, a part of his old admiration back.
"You are really thinking of everything, aren't you?"
"Everything economic, Charles. But in matter feelings and friendship I'm quite the ass..."
That brought a smile on Bingley's lips.
Perhaps not everything was lost.
Next chapter: War heroes