Beginning, Section II

Chapter 10

Posted on 2010-07-16

The other three were waiting as the Bennet sisters entered the music room. "Oh, no," said Jane. "I hope we have not kept you waiting."

"Not at all," said Mr. Darcy. "You are precisely on time, and we ourselves arrived but a few minutes ago. It is in the nature of things that someone must arrive last, and you would not wish to always relegate that responsibility to others, would you?" His glance caught Elizabeth's, and she knew he could discern her amusement over his words, and was enjoying it.

"Let us begin forthwith," he suggested. "I have received a number of inquiries, both overt and indirect, from some of you and from others, about my behaviour in the last few days, particularly regarding my obvious interest in you, Miss Bennet," he nodded at Elizabeth. "What I tell you today I do not intend to share with more than a small circle, and indeed most would simply refuse to believe it. Yet I assure you of its truth, and I believe that you all, and you most especially, Miss Bennet, should know it."

He reached into an inner pocket and withdrew an opened letter, selected a page of it, and passed the page to Elizabeth. "Quite apart from its contents, Miss Bennet, what can you tell me about this letter?"

She gasped as she first looked at it, then took a moment to gather her thoughts. "It is written on good paper," she said, "but with no monogram or identifying marks that I can see. The remarkable thing is the handwriting. I should have said it was my own, although from what I see of the contents, I am certain that it is nothing that I have ever written. Jane," she passed it to her sister, "is it not a very duplicate of my writing?"

"It is," said Jane. "Had anyone shown it to me, I should have told them it was your hand." She passed it back to Elizabeth.

"I know that you asked me to comment on other aspects of the letter, Mr. Darcy," said Elizabeth. "But the name 'Olivia Kittredge' immediately caught my eye, and I note the phrase 'I wrote to our aunt under the guise of a letter from her friend Olivia Kittredge of Lambton.' Perhaps I should tell you that my own Aunt Gardiner told me of, and even showed to me, a letter purporting to be from Mrs. Kittredge, asking, among other things, about me and about my current circumstances. Is the author of this letter the same person as the author of the letter that is in my aunt's possession?"

"She is indeed," replied Mr. Darcy, then drew a deep breath. "Miss Bennet, Bingley, Mrs. Bingley, what I am going to tell you is going to be very hard to believe. I ask that you suspend your disbelief long enough, if it be possible, to let me describe the situation fully; it is certainly beyond me to explain it. Yet, I can swear to you, I am only telling you the truth. The author of the two letters is a lady for whom I have the highest respect and regard. Her physical appearance is as much like yours, Miss Bennet, as it is possible for two people to resemble each other --well, with one salient exception--, and she is the source of all that I knew about you before I arrived here in Hertfordshire four days ago, other than the general fact that my friend Charles Bingley's wife had several sisters. I knew this lady briefly as Mrs. Bennet, and then as Mrs. Kenton, but her real name … Well, we shall come to that later. Excuse me one moment, but I should like to substantiate, as much as I am able, what I have told you thus far." He walked to the door into the corridor and opened it, then a few moments later ushered Ellen Ingram into the room.

"Ellen," he said, "do you recognise this letter?" He took the page from Elizabeth's hand and held it out to her. "I cannot say for sure, sir," she replied. "The paper could well be some that Mrs. Kenton asked me to procure for her about a week before she … left us, and the handwriting looks as if it could well be hers. I cannot say that I know her hand well, but I saw … I saw some things she had written. I remember that she wrote a letter that last evening: might this be it?"

"It is indeed a part of that letter," Mr. Darcy replied, handing the page to Elizabeth once more. "Ellen, what can you tell these people about Mrs. Kenton?"

Ellen's eyes lit up. "Oh, she was the nicest lady! A pleasure to wait on, never one to look down her nose at us servants, ever so ready to laugh at what would anger most other folks, and to take great pleasure from simple things."

"What did she look like?"

"Why, she looked exactly like Miss Bennet here. Well, except for …" she cleared her throat. "No one who saw the two could help but see it. I was that surprised when I first saw you, Miss, as perhaps you remember. I was quite taken aback, I was."

"I do remember," said Elizabeth, "I also remember that you started to address me as Mrs. Kenton at that time, before Mrs. Wickham told you who I was."

"The butler and the gardener and others at Pemberley will confirm the resemblance. We can even now summon my valet, Mr. Enderby, if you care to. Although he did not have much contact with Mrs. Kenton, he can certainly testify that Miss Bennet resembles her closely," said Mr. Darcy. He paused, but then, as no one seemed disposed to request Mr. Enderby's presence, he continued, "Meanwhile, Ellen, would you tell us about the letter Mrs. Kenton asked you to take to the post?"

"You know about that, sir?"

"Yes, Mrs. Kenton herself told me. I am certain she would not object to your sharing it with these good people."

"Well, it is not like she swore me to secrecy, so perhaps it is all right. She told me she needed some information from a lady she knew well in London, a Mrs. Kitchener … no, a Mrs. Gardener, I think it was, but it was important that this Mrs. Gardener not know that it was she who was asking. I never understood … she never told me why that was so important, but she asked me to post the letter and to persuade my Giles, the one who I have been stepping out with, to catch the answering letter when it came, and bring it back to her. Giles works for the postmaster of Lambton, you see. Well, I persuaded him, it wa'n't no trouble at all, and so the evening before Mrs. Kenton left us I was able to lay on her pillow a letter from London. I do not know what happened with it after that. I suppose she read it, of course."

"Did you see her writing the letter that was sent to London, Ellen," asked Elizabeth.

"No, ma'am, I did not, for she wrote at night, after I had left, and I never saw the letter, that is the written part, itself. The direction on the envelope was written rather ill, to tell the truth, though you could read it; quite different from her other writing that I saw. And I did see her write that. She wrote with both her hands together, which quite took my attention as I had never seen it done before. But when she wrote something the last day, the letter you showed me just now I expect, she wrote with just one hand, like normal people do."

"I knew it!" said Elizabeth. "Now I understand why the letter Aunt Gardiner showed me looked so familiar. Years ago I discovered that I could disguise my handwriting but still leave it legible by holding the pen in my left hand and then guiding my left hand with my right. So that letter was in my handwriting as well. How … how amazing, how inexplicable."

"Ellen, can you tell us about what Mrs. Kenton said when you first saw her awake?"

"Sir, she said some things that she would probably prefer I not repeat, about missing her husband as she awoke and things like that. I would rather not. … She was confused, about the time of day, and other things. Of course, I knew she was recovering from a faint."

"Just tell me this, Ellen, did she seem to you to be out of her wits?"

"Not in general, sir. She did seem to think she was the Mistress of Pemberley and married to you, sir."

Elizabeth gulped and swallowed, wide-eyed, upon receiving this piece of news, and Jane looked at her in slight concern.

"I thought she might have dreamt such a thing," Ellen continued, "for she only spoke like that when she first awoke, and then, when I reminded her that she had fainted, she started to ask me all kinds of questions about where we were, who were around us, and what had happened in your life, sir. Well, first she asked if I had ever seen her before that day, which I hadn't. I believe she asked me about you, Mr. and Mrs. Bingley, and whether your name, Mrs. Bingley, was Jane. I told her I thought it was, but was not sure. She also asked after you, Mrs. Wickham, although she called you Miss Darcy. As to whether she was out of her wits, why she asked me herself if I thought she was, and whether you thought she was, Mr. Darcy."

"And what did you answer her?"

"I said that apart from her notion that she was Mrs. Darcy she seemed perfectly sane to me, and that I thought you did, sir. Think that she was mad, I mean."

"One more thing, Ellen. Did Mrs. Kenton seem to know you?"

"She did, sir. It was uncanny. The very first thing she said to me, when she woke up from her sleep, was my name, and as far as I knew, or know now, she had never seen me before. Later she told me, in your presence, sir, the names of all my family, my age and my birthday, and my favourite colour. I had never told her any of these things. She also mentioned several other things to me at different times --she knew where my family lived, for instance, and that my older sister is married, has a daughter, and lives in Lincolnshire. She knew a lot of the others, too, sir, both servants in the house and tenants of Pemberley."

So, thought Elizabeth, Mrs. Kenton knew people at Pemberley, much as Mr. Darcy knows me. How very amazing. It would seem as if … But how nearly identical was her life to mine?

"Thank you, Ellen. You have been very helpful. You may go now, and if you are needed again I will send word."

"Just a moment," Elizabeth interjected. "Ellen, I have another question. I am curious, is all. Did Mrs. Kenton by any chance tell you any stories of her childhood?"

Ellen thought for a moment. "Yes, ma'am, she mentioned a time when she had swung too high, standing up on an old swing, and one of the ropes broke. She made an entertaining tale of it, ma'am, describing how she tumbled along the ground, and what she and her friend, well, I am pretty sure it was the maid, but she spoke of her as a friend, what they did to keep her mother from seeing the torn and dirty spots on her dress until they could be repaired, and to avoid her father ever knowing about it."

"Did she say how old she was when this mishap occurred?"

"I am not sure that she did, ma'am. I have the impression that she was still quite small, perhaps seven or eight years of age. When she fell out of the tree she was considerably older, and that time she sprained her wrist badly enough that her parents found out, and that was the end of her tree climbing."

"Or at least her official tree climbing!"

"Yes, ma'am, that is what she told me herself. 'The end of my tree climbing, at least as far as anyone knew,' was the way she said it."

Jane and Elizabeth looked at each other significantly, then smiled. "Thank you, Ellen," Elizabeth said, and Ellen curtseyed to her and then to the others, and left the room.

After she had left, Darcy looked around at the others, who were in various stages of astonishment and thoughtful contemplation, and suggested, "I think I will now tell you about Mrs. Kenton from my perspective." As they all nodded he took up the story.

"Three weeks ago today, on the morning of the twelfth of December, I was in my home at Pemberley. It was perhaps 10 o'clock in the morning of a cold, snowy day. I had been meditating on matters of the estate, and on the coming of Christmas, lamenting the fact that I was to spend it once again without the presence of my sister Georgiana. In fact we had had no contact for months, even by letter, for complex reasons related to my difficult relationship with Mr. Wickham, which I believe we need not go into."

"Only let me say," Georgiana interrupted, "that this was in no way Fitzwilliam's --pardon me-- in no way my brother's fault. He had not heard from me, rather than the other way around."

"Thank you, my dear," Mr. Darcy said, with a warm smile towards Georgiana. "But I must contest that interpretation of the situation. And I do so on the authority of no less a one than Mrs. Kenton, who later convinced me … well, we shall come to that story. Suffice it to say that she convinced me that I had not done all I could or ought to maintain, or re-initiate, contact with one I love so dearly. She was entirely right in the matter.

"To return to my story, I was meditating on these things, upstairs in the hallway walking towards the staircase, intending to go to the study and deal with some of the paperwork that was awaiting me, when I heard a commotion by the front door. It came to my consciousness that I had heard the doorbell rung some moments earlier. I heard my butler, whose name happens to be Wilkins, say to someone 'How can I help you, madam?', and a woman's voice, a most happy, laughing voice, answered 'You can let me in, Wilkins, and tell me where my husband is.' I saw, from my position upstairs, a slight, graceful-looking woman in the entryway, looking around as if wondering where to place her bonnet and muff, which she eventually retained in her hands. Then she called out --you will understand, of course, that all the speech I report may have been worded a bit differently, but it is more or less what I remember, and I can vouch for its essential accuracy-- 'Fitzwi… Mr. Darcy!' It was as if she had begun calling me by my name, which is Fitzwilliam, before remembering the presence of the butler and becoming more formal. 'The most wonderful thing has happened!' I watched her peek into a couple of rooms. She was so energetic and quick that Wilkins was unable to catch up with her, although he tried. Then she called 'Mr. Darcy, where are you?'

"'I am here, madam,' I replied. I was, as you might suppose, disconcerted by the sight of this woman forcing her way into my house and entering rooms with no invitation, calling for me in such a familiar way, but I endeavoured to be polite. I began to descend the staircase. She smiled at me, an incandescent, radiant smile such as I had never seen, and held her hands out to me. 'Come here,' she said, 'and hear my news! I've had such a wonderful walk!' I assumed she had come from Lambton, and said something to the effect that it was indeed quite a walk, but she ignored it, took my arm with an enthusiasm I could in no way resist, and said, 'Fitzwilliam, the child moved! Today of all days I felt him move for the first time! Is it not a perfect anniversary present?' And then she utterly surprised me by standing on her tiptoes and kissing me full on the mouth. Her cheeks were flushed, and her eyes sparkled at me.

"I was, of course, completely taken aback. I had never been so kissed by a woman, and while it all seemed as artless and natural and joyous as the sun coming out from behind a cloud, I could only imagine that she was an adventuress of some sort, intent upon taking advantage of me. I am sure she sensed my withdrawal, for she sobered and looked puzzled. I asked her to what anniversary she referred, and she replied, 'Of our wedding, a year ago today. On December 12th, 1812, with Jane and Bingley. Mr. Darcy, are you all right?'

"'I am afraid I must ask you the same question,' I responded, and then, before she could reply, I asked, and I fear I sounded rather harsh, 'Who are you, and what are you doing in my house?'

"'I am your wife, Elizabeth Darcy,' she said.

"And so I told her, 'Madam, I have never seen you before in my life.' And she fainted.

"I was unable to catch her or cushion her fall, but fortunately the area was carpeted, so she did not injure herself. As I looked at her beautiful face --for even when unconscious she was beautiful to me, and this despite the way her vivacity, and especially her wonderful eyes, had seemed her chief beauties before-- I felt a deep sorrow at having caused her such distress, and yet at the same time a deep anger at how she had been able to reach past my emotional guard with her deceptions. I did not understand how she had been able to cause herself to faint, but I was in no doubt that it was a real faint and not a pretence. I picked her up myself and carried her up to where I placed her in the bed in one of the guest suites. I called Ellen Ingram and charged her with caring for the woman, asking to be notified when she should awaken. Ellen's account of that awakening you have already heard. The lady had slept until nearly supper time.

"Perhaps this would be a good point at which to pause to assimilate what I have told you so far, or to consider at least some of the many questions that must be arising in your minds?"

Darcy's hearers relaxed, and, suddenly aware that they had been holding their breaths, breathed deeply. "Shall I arrange for tea to be brought?" suggested Jane. All agreed that that would be very good.

"So you had in your house, totally without warning, a woman claiming to be your wife?" asked Charles. Even through this short speech his voice rose noticeably; he was having a hard time speaking calmly about this.

"And looking exactly like our Lizzy," marvelled Jane. "Though both you and Ellen spoke of a difference in their appearances. What was that difference? … Oh!" she said, as what must be the nature of the difference percolated through her mind. If the child was large enough for its kicking to be felt … "Never mind!" Charles looked at her questioningly, and opened his mouth as if to inquire, but she shook her head slightly at him, and he understood from her smile that she would explain the matter to him later.

"You did say a 'salient' exception, did you not, Mr. Darcy?" asked Elizabeth, mischief in her eye.

"Indeed I did," he answered with a fondly appreciative smile. "Both senses of the term apply."

"So then: looking like me, but not only so; writing letters that look like they came from my hand, and disguising her handwriting by the same stratagem as I would have used. Walking outdoors in all weather, as I do, With memories of at least two childhood escapades that match mine. And yet, knowing things that I do not know. About Ellen and her family, I mean, and the other servants and the tenants. I, of course, had never met Ellen until yesterday afternoon, when I arrived here at Netherfield, and although I could make a reasonable guess as to her age, I still have, quite unaccountably, failed to acquire any knowledge of her birthdate." Mr. Darcy's smile renewed itself.

"But … but … How could it be?" asked Jane. "Surely there is some other explanation for these puzzling coincidences than … than …" Despite Jane's natural placidity and self-control, her voice betrayed considerable strain.

"But what other explanation? And until such an explanation can be found, it certainly does look …" Elizabeth began, then trailed off into pensiveness.

"If I may be permitted the observation of another coincidence," said Mr. Darcy, "consider the calmness and rationality with which Mrs. Kenton, according to Ellen's testimony, faced the knowledge that she was not who or where she had thought she was. She had been so shocked by my disavowal of ever so much as knowing her that she had fainted. She awoke thinking it had been a bad dream. Ellen's words let her know it had not. Many a woman would have spent her emotional and mental energy in protestations of disbelief, shock or disgust, or turned her face to the wall to weep and refuse to deal with the situation. Mrs. Kenton's reaction was as far from the hysterical as can be well imagined. She quietly asked such questions as would enable her to establish the facts, and then dealt rationally and calmly with those facts. She repeatedly, on subsequent occasions, impressed me with this aspect of her character. I believe we have just seen something rather similar in the reaction of a person who sits before us at this moment, immediately perceiving the import of the letter, seeing pertinent questions to ask of Ellen and of me, and in general behaving in a very self-possessed and rational way in the face of what is certainly a very disconcerting tale."

"I suppose I should thank you for the compliment," Elizabeth said. "Though perhaps fainting or babbling in shock would not be totally irrational, in this case! You are certainly correct that the implications are disconcerting! Still, it is intriguing as well, and it certainly fits with what Ellen had already told me. And it explains how you could know me before you ever met me."

There was silence for a few minutes as one of the Netherfield maids brought in a tray with the tea things, and Jane prepared to pour out.

"I never met Mrs. Kenton myself," contributed Georgiana, after the maid had left, "but from my interactions with you, Miss Bennet, I would think that Ellen's description of her character would fit you perfectly."

"You put me to the blush, Mrs. Wickham," said Elizabeth, substantiating the sincerity of her comment by turning a rosy color. "You have, after all, not known me long enough to judge well. Beware my moods tomorrow --they may shock you!"

"Don't tease, Lizzy!" replied Jane. "It is true, that was an excellent description of how you are, and how you treat those who serve us." Elizabeth blushed all the more.

"What did you think of the double wedding, Jane?" Elizabeth asked.

"Well, she married me to the right person," Jane replied, "but the timing was all wrong. Why on earth would we have waited eight long months more, Charles? I cannot imagine doing so!"

"But, a double wedding with you, Jane? Had we not always dreamed of that?" Elizabeth's eyes shone at her sister.

"Yes, yes we had, Lizzy. I am glad it happened to someone."

By this time they had all received their teacups and settled into their chairs. The door was shut, and Mr. Darcy, with a smile for Elizabeth, prepared to resume his tale.

Chapter 11

"We return to the afternoon of December 12th," Mr. Darcy continued. "That evening, soon after I had begun my dinner, the woman who had invaded my house came to me in the dining room. I inquired after her health and invited her to join me at the table. She was very calm and polite, and quiet except when I spoke to her. She was dressed as she had been in the morning, in the same simple morning gown, but it was of a dark colour that brought out the darkness of her eyes in the candlelight, and I found it difficult not to stare at her like a tongue-tied schoolboy. I did convey to her the news that I would be unable to return her to Lambton until the morrow, as the weather was deteriorating. She took it very calmly. Later she told me that it had been exactly what she had hoped for --there was no good place for her in Lambton.

"When my servant laid out a place setting for her, she said, apparently without thinking, 'Thank you, James.' He looked as disconcerted as I suppose Ellen had when she called her by name --he also, I fear, felt surprised because he had been unused to being thanked so warmly for his services. I asked her where she had become familiar with my servants' names, and she said she had been in Pemberley before. I asked her when such a visit had occurred, and she replied that she had first been there in July of the previous year, that is in 1812, and that Mrs. Reynolds had conducted them about the house. Mrs. Reynolds is my housekeeper's name, of course. Yet I was sure I had caught her out in a lie, because Pemberley House had remained closed throughout that summer. I tasked her with her mendacity. 'Madam,' I said, 'your appearance and manners suggest you are a lady; but all other evidence, especially your behaviour towards me this morning, indicates the contrary. Tell me and be honest. Who are you, and why are you here?'

"She replied steadfastly, firmly but quietly, 'My name is Elizabeth Darcy, sir. It sounds mad, I know, but I beg you to listen --it will not harm you to hear me out.' She reiterated her claim to have been married to Fitzwilliam Darcy for one year that day, but then surprised me by saying calmly, 'You are not he, as you well know, although you are also Fitzwilliam Darcy. I certainly cannot explain why or how this should be, but apparently, sir, there are two Pemberleys existing parallel to one another. In one I am married to Fitzwilliam Darcy; in the other, this one, you have never heard of me. This morning I crossed between the two.'

Bingley raised his eyebrows and shook his head, almost shuddering, like a dog shaking water off its body; Jane drew in a surprised little breath, and Elizabeth nodded her head with a half-smile on her face. Darcy continued:

"I was appalled that she would expect me to credit such an outlandish, ridiculous tale, but she required me to wait until she finished explaining. Pemberley, you must know, has a noteworthy garden maze, designed by Sir Christopher Wren himself, for Georgiana's and my great-grandmother, and planted with tall and strong hedges."

"I know whereof you speak," Elizabeth interjected. "When I visited Pemberley our guide showed it to us, and even conducted us to the centre to see the fountain there. It was a most magical place."

"You have been to Pemberley?" cried Georgiana. "I did not know that! How wonderful! When did your visit take place?"

"In July of 1812," Elizabeth replied. "Pemberley was perhaps the most beautiful spot we encountered in our travels, Mrs. Wickham, so I remember it well. The house was closed, as you say, Mr. Darcy, and so we did not meet Mrs. Reynolds, but we were given a tour of the garden and park by an under-gardener, a most delightful and helpful man, a Mr. …" then both she and Mr. Darcy simultaneously said "Padgett" and "Joseph Padgett."

"That comes into the story later," Mr. Darcy observed. "You made a deep impression upon Mr. Padgett, Miss Bennet. But meanwhile …

"My guest told me that she had ventured into the maze in Pemberley's garden that morning, and while looking at the fountain in the centre which, as is usual in December, had frozen solid, she had experienced significant dizziness, as if she were falling. Upon recovering, apparently, she was in this Pemberley. It was at that point that she had felt her child kick, and had come running into the house to inform her husband. She thanked me for my hospitality, but expressed a great desire to return to her own home through the maze as soon as it was light.

"It sounded like utter nonsense to me, and I said so. I said I had never experienced such a thing in the maze, and she said that she also had been through the maze countless times and had never experienced it before either. I said, with some sarcasm, that doubtless she knew the maze by heart, and to my surprise she did; she could recite the pattern of left and right turns with no hesitation. It was at that point that I jumped to the conclusion that someone who knew Pemberley quite well had taught her these things so that she could deceive me and (eventually it would come) extort money in one way or another, doubtless through the claim that she was carrying my child. I assumed that my brother-in-law, Mr. Wickham, was behind the scheme, and confronted her with that supposition, speaking most immoderately, I am afraid. I find myself wanting to apologise to you for my behaviour, Miss Bennet, ridiculous as that may seem."

"For my part, you may probably be forgiven, Mr. Darcy," Elizabeth replied, arching her eyebrow. "If Mrs. Kenton has forgiven you, then I may as well. It was a very grave charge, however. How did she respond?"

"The lady admitted, most gently, to knowing Mr. Wickham, and to having a very low opinion of him, given how he had hurt me and my family. She named him as her brother-in-law, but denied being involved with him in any such nefarious business as I had alleged. She assured me that she meant no harm to me or to my house, and only wanted to return to her own Pemberley on the morrow. My fury was unable to withstand her gentleness, and as we parted for the night I could find no anger in my heart towards her. I did ask her what name I should use for her, other than Mrs. Darcy, and she suggested that I call her Mrs. Bennet, as that had been her maiden name."

"Elizabeth Bennet," said Jane, wonderingly.

"Indeed." Darcy paused. "…I never told her this," he continued with an expression of slight surprise at the realisation, "but I went out that night, after she had gone to bed, to check whether her footprints were still visible, in order to see if I could tell whence she had come into the house. It had been blowing, and snowing lightly, with the result that no clearly interpretable footprints could be seen near the house, but when I lit a lamp in the shelter of the hedges in the maze, there was one set, and only one, of footprints. They were evidently some hours old and somewhat drifted over, but they looked as if they might well be hers, and they were heading in the direction of the exit from the maze. It would seem, in hindsight, that this was a rather direct indication of the veracity of at least a part of her claim; after all, someone had come out of the maze without having left footprints going in. Nevertheless I thought at the time that, improbable though it seems in hindsight, she might have walked in before it began to snow, and remained there until the snow was deep enough to show her footprints. And so, I regret to say, I still did not believe her.

"The next morning at 7 o'clock, I accompanied Mrs. Bennet, as I was now to call her, to the maze. I let her enter by herself, thinking to allow her to make a fool of herself, getting lost in the maze, after which I would take her to Lambton and we would attempt to find her people, whoever they were. You would think I would have remembered her knowledge of the pattern of the maze, but there was, and is, something about the experience of looking in her eyes that tends to slow my logical thought patterns down as I wait with bated breath for her to do or say something, hopefully to smile. I was already experiencing some of this, although I did not realise it. She thanked me for my hospitality and said mischievously that she would tell Mr. Darcy of my kind behaviour, as he would be gratified to know he had treated her so well. She then bade me goodbye, and entered the maze with such a look of joy on her face that I felt, though I could not then admit it, a strong sense of jealousy. Never had I prompted such a look on anyone's face in the anticipation of seeing me, as she displayed as she thought of her husband.

"She had not been gone half a minute from the entrance, however, before I heard a loud and rather unladylike 'Blast!' issuing from within --you would never say such a thing, would you, Miss Bennet?" His brow rose as Elizabeth's would have for a similar question, and she grinned at him. "This exclamation was followed by the sound of someone attacking the hedge; and a minute later, Mrs. Bennet appeared, red-faced and with torn gloves, to inform me that the path through the maze had grown over during the course of the night. I of course knew that she had taken a wrong turn, so I set out to show her the correct path. And of course I found that I also ran, face-on, into a well-established piece of hedge, perfectly indistinguishable from the old growth, where I knew perfectly well that the path turned to the right. I in my turn attacked the hedge rather angrily, and intemperately let loose with some profanity. I then became aware that Mrs. Bennet was weeping, so I apologised to her. She turned on me with fury for the first time since I had known her (and yes, Miss Bennet, her eyes flash magnificently when she is furious), and she said fiercely, 'My life and my husband are on the other side of those bushes, and you think I'm upset about your language?' I still refused to accept her story as truth, but through several exchanges on the subject she stuck to it most adamantly, and in the end turned and stamped away towards the house, refusing my offer of assistance."

"That sounds just like you, Lizzy," laughed Jane.

"I am afraid it does," her sister agreed ruefully. "All the same, it is no wonder she was angry. Stubborn man!" She grimaced at Mr. Darcy and once more was disarmed by his fond smile.

"On the way back, as my guest approached the house and I followed well behind her, I heard my gardener, Mr. Joseph Padgett, whom we mentioned a few minutes ago, eagerly calling her name, 'Miss Bennet! Miss Bennet!' I had never seen him so eager to greet any visitor to Pemberley, but he spoke with considerable enthusiasm of how much he had enjoyed showing her and her uncle and aunt about the place." Mr. Darcy cocked an eyebrow at Elizabeth.

"Yes," she responded, "Mr. Padgett was very kind to us when we visited."

"And very clearly you stole his heart, madam, in return for that kindness." His lips formed a slight smile once again, before he continued, "It was during this interview that my guest began to call herself Mrs. Kenton, rightly judging that the name Bennet should be abandoned, given that Padgett knew it as her maiden name, and she was now obviously married. I do not know where she came up with the name, but she brought it into the conversation as if it were the most natural thing in the world."

"I know where she got it from," Elizabeth said, again somewhat ruefully. "When I was a girl of about thirteen, or perhaps I should say, when we were girls of thirteen, I wrote a long and romantic story about the adventures of a heroine who ultimately rejoiced in the alliterative name of Clorinda Corinna Kenton. She had started life as Elizabeth Kenton, however, and I continued to think of her by that name as well. You may have seen bits of the novel once or twice, Jane, though I was rather secretive about it. And wisely so, for it was quite dreadful!"

"I see," said Mr. Darcy, and "Yes, I do remember it," Jane confirmed.

"After she finished her conversation with the enthusiastic Mr. Padgett, I accompanied Mrs. Kenton, as we will now call her, in to breakfast. It was now clear, to her at least --I was slower to perceive the implications, and even slower to accept the reality of things--, that there were two Elizabeth Bennets as well as two Pemberleys and two Fitzwilliam Darcys.

"We breakfasted mostly in silence, though I believe it was during that meal that Mrs. Kenton commented that my Pemberley's apple butter is quite as good as the other Pemberley's, that is to say, extraordinarily good."

"Hence our privilege to sample it this morning," Elizabeth smiled. "Clearly the lady has excellent taste. She also likes her chocolate not to be oversweet." And Mr. Darcy notices such things, and takes them into consideration.

"She does indeed," Darcy responded with a smile. Then he continued:

"After breakfast we repaired to the study. I let her lead the way to see if she would become lost, but she knew exactly where to go. I was no longer very surprised, but I subjected her to a long interrogation about all kinds of things that I would have expected no one to know. It was at that time that she told Ellen about her age and birthday and her family, and she convinced me that she knew many of the others of the Pemberley staff, though not some whose help had been only recently contracted. Yet some things she answered incorrectly, or at least in such a way as to puzzle me.

"She claimed to have met her husband, Fitzwilliam Darcy, in the autumn of 1811, when he came with Charles Bingley into Hertfordshire soon after you, Bingley, had let Netherfield. When I commented on the lengthy engagement they must have had she intimated that they had not fallen in love quickly. In fact, as she later disclosed, I, or rather, the other Fitzwilliam Darcy, had insulted her when we first met, at an assembly ball in Meryton …"

"The night we met, my love!" Charles interrupted, speaking to Jane.

"I gather that you, Bingley, tried to get me to dance with her, and I, being in a foul mood, said, in her hearing, that she was not handsome enough to tempt me, and that I was in no humour to give consequence to young ladies who were slighted by other men. Miss Bennet, I must apologise again for such appallingly ungentlemanly behaviour. I find it almost impossible to imagine ever saying such a thing --the truth is so completely the opposite of any such assertion. My mood must indeed have been an evil one for me to have said it. I hope that at the New Year's Eve assembly we just celebrated I was able to more adequately convey to you how handsome, and indeed tempting, I find you."

"You are forgiven for my part," Elizabeth said, blushing, as usual, at his words. "These hypothetical offences in another universe strike me as humorous and entertaining from my current vantage point, though I imagine I was furious at the time."

"Actually, your reaction was to laugh at Mr. Darcy, which intrigued him and established the foundation of his fascination with you. But that is another story, which I shall tell you another time. For now, let it suffice that I finally was convinced that Mrs. Kenton really was Mrs. Darcy in another world. Two things that settled the matter conclusively in my mind were that she knew a personal fact about me that no one else knows, not you, Georgiana, not my valet, nor Mrs. Reynolds; and that she had on her finger a ring identical to this one."

He took from an inner pocket a ring box which he handed to Elizabeth for her examination. "This ring was given by several of my ancestors to their brides, and to my mother by my father." With a significant glance at Elizabeth he added quietly, "I hope to see it on my wife's finger as well. This ring was lying in the safe vault at Pemberley at the same moment that its double was on Mrs. Kenton's finger. Thus, finally, I was convinced of the essential truth of her incredible tale.

"Not much more was said before we repaired to our bedchambers that night. We agreed to attempt the maze again in the morning, to see if it continued to be blocked or if we should be able to follow it to the centre. In the meantime I asked her to remain in her rooms, that no more gossip should grow from her presence at Pemberley than might be necessary, and she agreed, though with no great enthusiasm, it would seem."

"I would wager that that was an understatement, Mr. Darcy!"

"To be sure, it was, Miss Bennet. She only accepted, I am sure, because she expected that the maze would open up and she would be able to return home on the morrow. Anticipating my story, I must tell you that Mrs. Kenton's final piece of advice to me, regarding the Princess Elizabeth, when I should meet her, was that I never subject a Miss Bennet to an interrogation or attempt to limit her movements. She explained herself with the words: 'We become quite irritable when confined.'"

"We do indeed," said Elizabeth, with a grin.

Chapter 12

Posted on 2010-07-19

"Friends," Darcy said, "I have made a very long story of this. Should we perhaps adjourn until after luncheon? I shall try to be more brief and to summarise more when we return to the tale."

"That is probably a good idea," Charles agreed. "We have indeed been sitting here long. Nonetheless, I have not been in the least bored, and I'll wager no one else has either."

"No, indeed," several voices agreed.

"You spin quite a tale, Darcy."

"Luncheon is to be served in three-quarters of an hour," Jane informed them. "We look forward to enjoying it with you." She and Charles exited the room, arm in arm.

Georgiana, coming over to her brother, briefly embraced him and said, "I understand even better now, brother; more and more I see why you would come!" She turned to Elizabeth and embraced her as well, saying, "The more I see of you the more sense it all makes. As you will understand later, I am deeply indebted to you, and hope to be granted years of friendship in which to repay that debt." She then turned and, with dignity, followed the Bingleys from the room.

Elizabeth tentatively approached Mr. Darcy. "This is yours, sir," she said, holding out the box containing his mother's ring.

"On the contrary, Miss Bennet, the ring is yours, as soon as you are ready to receive it."

"I am embarrassed to admit that I tried it on my hand, while no one was looking, and it fit very well. But I am not yet ready to accept it, Mr. Darcy."

"Very well. It would please me if you would keep it in your possession, however, even if you do not wear it. In my mind, it is yours, my dear."

"Mr. Darcy, please! How am I to resist … how am I to keep my equilibrium when you speak so tenderly to me? And yet, I too can now understand why you think of me so. You fell in love with her, did you not?"

"I did. Quite thoroughly and irrevocably. How could I not -- she was you, Elizabeth! And now also you can see, can you not, why I am so fully assured that our marriage will be so deeply fulfilling for both of us? For I have never known a woman so entirely satisfied with her life, so delighted with her husband, as Mrs. Kenton was with her Mr. Darcy. She knew I had fallen in love with her, and she clearly enjoyed our interactions and, I know, loves me too with a sincere and pure love, and yet she eagerly abandoned me, when the time came, for the hope of being reunited with her King, as she called him. I can scarcely imagine his joy when she returned to him, as I am confident she was able to do. But she left me with instructions to seek you out. I shall tell you more of that this afternoon, but -- only know, my dear, that in learning to love her I learnt to love you, to the very core of my being."

"Hush, Mr. Darcy. Let us walk outside, in silence, until we are to eat."

And they did. The ring, in its box, remained in Elizabeth's pocket. Her hand was securely tucked in Mr. Darcy's arm, and when his other hand came over to caress it, as it did from time to time, she made no objection.

Georgiana Wickham had spent the time before luncheon with her daughter, and she brought the child with her to the dining room. The baby was in a bit of a fussy mood, but each of the adults enjoyed a turn holding her, bouncing and cajoling her and speaking with her. Elizabeth in particular felt comforted and fulfilled holding her in her arms, despite her squirmings, whispering words of tenderness in her ears, and feeling the child alternately snuggle up to her, embracing her neck, and struggle as if to get away. Only reluctantly did she let her go into the nursemaid's arms when they turned to the table. What would it be like to hold your own child in your arms, or feel it move within you, as Mrs. Kenton had? She was now to the point of accepting with joy the strong likelihood that she herself was to experience this soon.

They did not talk, during their meal, of anything related to the morning's conversation. Their discourse returned to the subject of music, and Elizabeth and Mrs. Wickham spoke of trying some more four-hand work together. Mr. Darcy proposed that they play a piece, for their own and the others' enjoyment, after the meal and before they resumed their conversation. They chose a relatively simple but beautiful Haydn transcription that they had sight-read through when they were at Longbourn together, and both pianists and audience greatly enjoyed the performance.

After a word of appreciation to the fair performers, Mr. Darcy began again to speak.

"Before our luncheon, as I remember, I left the narrative at the point where I had finally accepted the truth of Mrs. Kenton's story, and thus the existence of another world in which she was in fact the wife of another Fitzwilliam Darcy and the mistress of another Pemberley. She was eager to return to that Pemberley, and, when we checked the maze, the blocked place was open to our passage, but at the next turn the way was again blocked. In time we came to realise that the mysterious power that controlled the maze was allowing us access to one more section at a time, unblocking one passageway but blocking the rest. We tried to find a pattern to the openings, and during most of the next week and a half we laboured under the delusion that it was a mathematical pattern, such as the maze opening on one day, then two days off with no new opening, or something of the sort. Sometimes the pattern looked to work out to getting to the centre by Christmas, but sometimes not. Five times the maze opened a new section of the path, sometimes confirming but equally often confounding our predictions, until, in the very end, we came to understand that the openings were tied not to the passage of time but to the occurrence of significant events. The events that triggered the openings were, if I read things correctly, my acceptance of her identity as Elizabeth Darcy, my telling her the story of my sister's marriage, my sending to invite my sister to come to Pemberley, my sister's reply accepting the invitation, and her actual arrival in Pemberley.

"To understand the significance of these events, you should know that Mr. Wickham was … was …"

"He was an evil man," Georgiana interrupted in a calm and chillingly dispassionate voice. "He had defrauded Fitzwilliam and me of tens of thousands of pounds, cynically pretended love in order to steal my innocence, abandoned me when I most needed him, left me with a child to raise virtually on my own, and striven in every way he could to sow discord between me and my brother. I was neither the first nor the last of the deluded females whom he callously used. He never struck me, but he was physically violent to others, and, I am sure, in time he would have abused me in that way as well. He was treacherous --both my father and my brother had treated him with extraordinary generosity and forbearance, and in return, after wasting all they gave him, he blackened their names in many ways and on many occasions. He was successful in achieving such an estrangement between my brother and me that until two weeks ago he had not heard from me in nearly nine months' time, nor I from him in nearly seven months."

"I let my pride get in the way," said Mr. Darcy.

"No more than I did," his sister answered.

"Well, we need not try to justly apportion the blame," Mr. Darcy returned, "and as you have said, the vast bulk of it unequivocally belongs to Mr. Wickham. I was so conflicted over the situation that I resisted even telling Elizabeth about it. --You must forgive me if I occasionally call her by that name, for I did begin to think of her by it from about this time." He looked at Elizabeth, and she nodded slightly at him, knowing that implicit in his appeal and her response was the expectation that he would also continue to call her so at least occasionally.

"We established that a major point of divergence between our worlds was that in her world I, or rather the other Fitzwilliam Darcy, had journeyed to Ramsgate, where Georgiana was staying, just before the time when she had agreed to elope with Mr. Wickham, and she confessed the plan to him, allowing him to put a stop to it. Although she was saddened, her innocence was preserved, and later she lived with her brother and her new sister Elizabeth at Pemberley. For this reason Mrs. Kenton had been surprised not to find her at my Pemberley, and still unmarried, when she arrived there."

"Pardon me," said Elizabeth, "but hadn't Mrs. Kenton said that Mr. Wickham was her brother-in-law?"

"Yes," said Mr. Darcy. "Of course you would be the one to note the discrepancy in my tale! But it has a surprising explanation. In that other world, following the frustration of Mr. Wickham's plan to attach Georgiana and gain access to her dowry, he had joined the militia, and was posted to a small town in Hertfordshire named Meryton; I believe you have heard of it." Elizabeth rewarded him with a little smile. "There he made the acquaintance of the Bennet family among others, and after sowing lies in the ears of many, including Elizabeth Bennet, he eventually eloped with the youngest Bennet sister, Lydia. Thus he was Mrs. Kenton's brother-in-law through her sister, not her husband's."

"Lydia!" gasped Elizabeth, together with Jane. "Thank God she did not fall to the wiles of such a man in our world. But it could indeed have happened, and very easily. She was so very silly at that time of her life, and appallingly prone to fall in love with anything wearing a red coat."

"Mrs. Wickham! We must beg your pardon!" Jane's face had turned pink as she suddenly realized how their comments regarding Lydia would sound. Elizabeth also turned with embarrassment and concern in her eyes towards Mr. Darcy's sister.

Georgiana was indeed experiencing significant discomfort, but she was quick to reassure her friends. "Please do not feel distressed for my sake, over your words. It was indeed beyond silly: it was culpably foolish in me to allow myself to be persuaded to elope, and I am ashamed that I did so. But you need not be ashamed to see my behaviour for what it was."

"You were but fifteen, Georgiana," Mr. Darcy protested. "The blame rests entirely on Wickham's shoulders, and on your companion's, and on mine for not realizing the danger and more adequately protecting you."

"You were not in the least to blame, Fitzwilliam," she answered. "In any case, I hinder you in your tale. Pray continue."

"Very well," Mr. Darcy replied, with a degree of reluctance. "I spoke with Mrs. Kenton of Georgiana's situation, and of the estrangement between us that had resulted. When she realised that I had not written to my sister in over seven months she became furious with me. She excoriated me for taking my sister's silence for rejection of me, for refusing to see that she might well be unable to respond given the suffering she must be enduring. After listening, and listening fully and sympathetically, to my complaints of all the pain the situation had brought upon me, and the expressions of my angry pride that prohibited me from any further intercourse with George Wickham or anyone under his influence, she said --and how her words cut me and then haunted me!-- 'If George Wickham has hurt you, then think how much more he must hurt Georgiana! This is not about you: this is about her, whom you profess to love. Love forgives ignorance and looks beyond shame. When you -- that is, when my Fitzwilliam proposed to me the first time he listed all the objections his love had had to overcome -- my family, my lack of fortune, my low connections. I was insulted by his words, and, being also deceived by Wickham's lies, refused him. Yet though his manners were deplorable, his motive was correct: true love does not defer to -- will not let itself be bound by, considerations of money, society, and pride. If you cannot look past Wickham to see Georgiana, I question how much you love your sister at all.'"

Mr. Darcy's face was white as he continued. "I felt as if I had been flayed to the bone. We were both so angry that we decided to leave each other for a time. She excused herself politely, despite her anger, but turned in the doorway to say, 'Christmas is a time for families. I cannot be with my family this season. I pray God you can get past yourself and be with yours.' Then she ran from the door and I heard her weeping.

"You see, Miss Bennet, I did not speak lightly when I spoke of you correcting my deficiencies. I know that it can be very painful to be rebuked by my Queen. But it was very necessary, and I am beyond grateful that she was brave enough to confront me with my faults and help me to change my ways. Faithful are the wounds of a friend. And the result was, that after a day and a half of wrestling with myself, my pain and my stubborn pride, I admitted that she had been right, and wrote to invite my sister to come to Pemberley. Of course, my admiration for herself grew almost inordinately through the process: she is indeed an absolutely magnificent woman."

'Of course'? thought Elizabeth. Hardly a man in ten thousand would respond so … so nobly to such a rebuke.

"We established a truce after that, and in very truth I knew that she had forgiven me most heartily for my anger and stubbornness. She is not one to hold a grudge. She told me the story of Princess Lizzy and Prince Darcy, who became King and Queen of the Kingdom of Pemberley, and to be sure it is a most entertaining tale, whose details I will hope to share with you on other occasions.

"I remember the night she began to tell me the story, Miss Bennet. I had asked Ellen to bring Mrs. Kenton some of my mother's gowns to see if they could be reworked for her use, and she had chosen one of a dark cranberry wine colour. When I saw you in a gown of the identical shade, this past Friday evening, well, it was as if she stood before me again, and, as you saw, the sight took my breath away.

"In any case, on that and subsequent afternoons and evenings she told me of her childhood and history, and many things about her family. She told me of her dear sister Jane, so that I felt I knew you as well, ma'am," and here he bowed to Mrs. Bingley, "before I had the honour of meeting you. We read together in the library: indeed, she showed me where to find a certain book that my father had hidden there, which I had sought diligently when about seventeen years old, but failed to find. Her father, Mr. Bennet, had discovered it on one of his apparently frequent visits to the other Pemberley. We discussed what we had read, and a hundred and one other topics, always with great pleasure: she brought a liveliness and a teasing good humour to every conversation that I found, and find, irresistible.

"Over and again I was impressed with the clear knowledge that here was the perfect chatelaine for my beloved Pemberley. She was dignified, wise and knowledgeable, and yet, particularly towards me, full of an delightful, bewitching charm: one could be forever fascinated by the liveliness of her mind. … She simply breathed life into the place. She loved Pemberley, it would seem, as much as I do, and cared deeply for its dependants. Little though her contact with them was, given the circumstances, she yet found out, through Ellen mostly I suppose, about several families' needs that I had been unaware of, and was able to discreetly suggest how I might help them. Her kind-heartedness and her merry and cordial ways endeared her to the servants, who would almost fall over themselves in their eagerness to serve her. Against my original desire but to my ultimate intense satisfaction, she made and hung garlands and wreaths of holly and pine, and transformed Pemberley from the sombre place I had let it become --you saw her handiwork, Bingley, do you remember commenting on how festive the place looked when you came by?"

"Do you mean that Mrs. Kenton was at that time in residence there at Pemberley? I could have met her?"

"It was more than that, my friend. Do you remember laughing at me because I insisted on breakfasting by candle-light, with curtains drawn, even though the sun had risen? Mrs. Kenton was in the breakfast room with us at that moment. She had been breaking her fast with me when you arrived, and when she heard your voice in the corridor she asked me to head you off, since she was sure you would recognise her as your sister. For you to see her there, in her interesting condition, would have given rise to far too many questions to deal with. But you insisted on coming in to the room, scarcely giving her time to hide herself behind the curtains, and there she remained, on the window-seat, until you left. In fact she was wise enough to remain there even after you left, rightly anticipating that you would forget something and have to return for it. Thus she did not quit the window-seat until you had retrieved your gloves and were finally, really on your way."

"So she heard all our conversation?"

"She did indeed. She later inquired most impertinently about the incident with Miss Woodhouse and the mistletoe. And she was so taken with the idea of your sister Caroline marrying Thomas Babbington that she laughed out loud at the thought and vowed to promote the match in her own world. You may remember, Bingley, that at one point I slipped and said that Georgiana was to visit 'us', and you asked whom else I had in mind, and I corrected myself to 'me'. But it was, of course, Elizabeth who was in my thoughts. And you may remember my inquiring particularly after your wife's family, and sending my good wishes to her sisters.

"We already knew that one of your new sisters had married Mr. Collins. In Mrs. Kenton's world, Mr. Collins had first asked for Miss Elizabeth's hand, and when refused by her had transferred his affections to her friend Charlotte Lucas."

"Not Charlotte!" said Elizabeth. "Not Charlotte! And yet …"

"Yes," said Jane, "it might have been possible. And you know, Lizzy, he was paying very particular attentions to you before you managed to deflect his interest onto Mary. It could easily have come to a proposal."

"And thank God it did not! I was never more relieved in my life."

"I must tell you of his proposal to Mrs. Kenton one day, Miss Bennet. The story is quite entertaining, though the reality, I am sure, was most uncomfortable. I should not wish to speak disparagingly of your brother-in-law, but, given the sentiments just expressed, you and Mrs. Bingley may find it entertaining to hear that he figured in Mrs. Kenton's fairy-tale as a toad, a toad who did not become a prince, in contrast with my brother-in-law, Mr. Wickham, who was cast as a prince who turned out to be a toad."

Jane hid her smile behind her hand, but Elizabeth laughed out loud. "I can well imagine my pleasure in relegating him to such a role in my tale! How often I have drawn that particular comparison myself! … I do not know Mr. Wickham, of course, but from what you have told us, it sounds as if that personification were accurate as well."

"Not so much a toad as a snake," Mr. Darcy muttered, and his sister nodded her head slightly but emphatically.

Mr. Darcy then continued: "At any rate, Mrs. Kenton doubted that, in any world, she herself could have married Mr. Collins, yet you, Bingley, had let us know that all but one of your wife's sisters were now married. As I have suggested, however, even before you came I had told her that I had understood that one of your sisters-in-law was Mrs. Collins. It was at that time that she conceived, and carried out, the notion of writing to her aunt --I mean your aunt, Miss Bennet and Mrs. Bingley--, to discover which of the sisters it was. She was, in her gentle concern for me, hoping that things would work out as they have, that the unmarried sister would prove to be Miss Elizabeth, and that I could be encouraged to meet her. She believed that her counterpart was likely to be lonely at times, without her dear sister Jane at home, and … well, she hoped to change both our lives for the better."

"Am I really then such a match-maker?" asked Elizabeth, shaking her head. "Interfering with Caroline's prospects, and then match-making for myself, in some sense."

"Yes," Mr. Darcy replied, looking fondly at her. "In almost the last thing you, or rather she, said to me before returning to her home, she told me, again speaking under the fairy-tale conceit, to remember that 'Elizabeths may be as distinctly different as Fitzwilliams, and though the Princess Elizabeth has a merry disposition, she has been quite lonely as of late, and is therefore much saddened. The Queen knows, through her own considerable experience, that there is no cheer and comfort so good for a Miss Elizabeth Bennet as a Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy'. It was quite clear what she wanted me to do, and it has been my great pleasure to fulfil the quest she laid upon me." Elizabeth's bones melted at the look he gave her.

"My tale is almost over," Mr. Darcy continued. "I believe it is already obvious to all of you that I had, by this point, fallen deeply in love with Mrs. Kenton, or the Queen as I may call her. She knew of my love, and I know that she felt a great fondness and love for me as well, yet she knew that her true love and loyalty lay with her own Fitzwilliam Darcy, the father of her unborn child, the man with whom she had shared 'a history and a passion' that could not be duplicated in her relationship with me. So when she received word from her 'Fairy Gardiner' in London, that her niece, Princess Elizabeth Bennet, was at home at Longbourn and still unmarried, she rejoiced. She wrote me the letter of which you have seen a page --I should like you to see the whole, Miss Elizabeth, and peruse it at leisure-- and she included with it her or rather your aunt's letter, which I have here." He brought the letter forth from his pocket, then handed it, together with the pages he had earlier withheld from Mrs. Kenton's letter, to Elizabeth.

"She also left a gift for you, Princess Elizabeth. She said she thought you would recognise it." And he withdrew from his pocket a small cross, fashioned of red carnelians set in gold, and hung upon a delicate gold chain. "Just as the duplicate wedding ring convinced me of who she was, so she hoped a duplicate necklace might convince you."

"As if I would need convincing, by this point! No, Mr. Darcy, I am in no real doubt of the truth of what you have told us, and I dare say I speak for us all."

"May I fasten it upon your neck?"

"You may," said Elizabeth demurely. "As you might suppose, I have an identical one in my jewellery box at home in Longbourn, which I often wear; it was a gift from my father many years ago. It means a great deal to me, Mr. Darcy, now to wear this royal gift from Queen Darcy, and I pray I may fulfil her hopes for me and prove worthy of them."

"You look right regal wearing it, my l… my lady," Darcy said, his eyes shining with pride and admiration as he looked at her. Only she knew the frisson of mingled anticipation, apprehension and delight that had coursed throughout her body as his fingers brushed over her neck in the process of fastening the necklace in place, but the others saw her skin redden. Jane came over and embraced her, while Charles and Georgiana looked on with approval.

As they retook their seats, Darcy continued. "The penultimate passageway of the maze opened up on Wednesday evening, December 22nd, when we received word from you, Georgiana, that you would be at Pemberley for Christmas. We both expected that the final barrier should open on the 24th, the day you were to arrive from London. And so it proved. It was after you and little Anne Elizabeth had entered Pemberley, but were still in the foyer, that I asked after Mrs. Kenton, and Wilkins told me that she had gone outside, having bidden him farewell. I did not then know that she had left the letter as her farewell to me, but at Wilkins' words I did realise that she must have gone to the maze. I ran thither to find that the way had indeed opened, and Elizabeth had made her way almost to the centre of the maze. I was barely in time to speak with her before her departure.

"I cannot now detail all that happened in the next half hour or so, and much of it is nearly incredible. I will only say that we were accosted and threatened by Mr. Wickham, who had not followed my sister, as we had feared, but in fact preceded her into Derbyshire. We resisted him, Elizabeth most valiantly and effectively; in fact, she so accurately hurled a chunk of ice as to knock his pistol out of his hand."

"A pistol!" Georgiana cried. "Oh, Fitzwilliam, I did not know!" Elizabeth also shuddered, thinking with alarm of Mr. Darcy being thus threatened with death.

"Yes, he had a pistol, but, fortunately, Elizabeth Bennets seem to be possessed of a strong throwing arm and an extraordinarily good aim, as I can testify from my own personal experience." He glanced sideways at Elizabeth and she returned what she was afraid probably looked nearer a besotted half-swoon than the amused or mischievous smile his comment merited.

Mr. Darcy sobered. "In the end, Mr. Wickham perished, and perished most horribly, not at our hand but at the hand of the power that controls the maze --indeed, we tried to rescue him but could not. It is enough that George Wickham is gone from our lives, forever I believe. Mrs. Darcy and I were overwhelmed, but when we regained control over ourselves, we bade each other farewell. As she left she told me of the letter she had left for me, and encouraged me to go to Hertfordshire to seek out the Princess Elizabeth. I returned to the house, deeply saddened, yet, at the same time, exhilarated with hope."

He stopped, momentarily rendered incoherent at the remembrance.

"Perhaps I can take up the tale from there, Miss Bennet," suggested Georgiana. "When my brother returned to the house after his inexplicable absence, I could tell he was shaking with emotion. He immediately began speaking of a plan to travel into Hertfordshire within the next few days. I could not understand it at all: I had just come from a horrible situation in London to the comfort and safety of my home at Pemberley, and now Fitzwilliam wanted to leave? I was beginning to feel somewhat hurt, but he immediately saw my confusion and comforted me, assuring me of his desire to be with me and his conviction that my troubles were in the past. He spoke no more of Hertfordshire, but did give me to know that George Wickham was gone and that I was free of him forever. I do not know if I should be ashamed of this or not, but all I felt, and what I still feel, is an enormity of relief, joy with hardly a hint of sorrow. I am sorry for the loss of what my husband might have been, but I have no regrets that what he had actually become is gone forever.

"I know now that Fitzwilliam wrote a letter to you, Mr. Bingley, and sent it express that night, arranging for us to come visit you here, but he said nothing of that to me; rather he celebrated Christmas with me and my daughter and the Pemberley staff, with great joy. At the divine service that morning, I thanked God not only for my Saviour but for my brother who had loved me enough to look past my offences and bring about my deliverance. It was not until after the festivities we held on the morning of Boxing Day that he began to tell me of the mysterious lady that had been at Pemberley, and brought me to see in what large measure my felicity was due to her. Ellen and Mrs. Reynolds and others spoke to me of Mrs. Kenton as well, of her kindness, and her taking ways, and of how Fitzwilliam was transformed by her presence. Fitzwilliam was determined to come to Hertfordshire as soon as might be, and he rather easily persuaded me to come with him --as much as I love Pemberley it was the company of my brother that was more important to me. In any case, by that point my curiosity to meet and come to know Miss Elizabeth was second only to his. And I am very glad I did so. Rumour did not lie about you, Princess."

Elizabeth blushed deeply. It was getting to be quite a habit, she thought; perhaps she should just paint her face with some of that disreputable colored cosmetic powder (rouge, hadn't Lydia called it? Fancy Lydia speaking French!): then it would not be so apparent whether she was blushing or not.

Chapter 13

"Well, my friends, that is the story," Darcy stated, "There are a number of other details that I would gladly share at some future time, if any of you, and particularly if you, Miss Bennet, wish to hear them. The truth of these matters is, of course, to be kept among ourselves, although I expect that Mr. Bennet and the Gardiners will have to be told some parts of the story. One point I had better mention in particular: as far as the world is aware and must continue to be, my sister is still a married woman rather than a widow. Her husband had told her he expected to go to Bath, and for all we know to the contrary that is where he is; at least we truly do not know where else he is. We will, after an appropriate interval, initiate an investigation as to his whereabouts beginning from that city, but it will be some time before he will be deemed missing and probably years before he is presumed dead. Meanwhile we must continue to speak of him in the present tense, and not allude to any supposed changes in my sister's status."

There was silence for well over a minute, as they all realised that Darcy had truly finished speaking, and they pondered their own reactions to what he had told them. It was Bingley who summed up what was at least part of what they were thinking. "You know, I am finding it difficult to believe that I am not finding this more difficult to believe."

Very good, Charles, thought Elizabeth (and, although she did not know it, Darcy and Jane); you can stop pretending that Fitzwilliam and I are the only clever ones.

"I suppose," Bingley continued, "well, besides that you tell a story very convincingly, Darcy, that it is a matter of the alternatives being even more difficult to believe. You do not lie, Darcy, and although you are very clever, you would not invent such a tale or expect us to believe it if you did. There is Lizzy's handwriting, both unfeigned and disguised, and Ellen's testimony as to how it was disguised. (By the way, that was clever of you, Lizzy.) Did you, Darcy, or someone else, counterfeit that? It seems far too improbable."

"Think of the fact that she called herself Mrs. Kenton, out of all the names she could have invented," Jane contributed. "Only Lizzy knew the significance of that name. Then there is Ellen's testimony, and your confidence that others at Pemberley will also recognise Mrs. Kenton in Lizzy. Ellen's and the other Pemberley servants' description of Mrs. Kenton's character --so like Lizzy. The many things Mrs. Kenton did and said which were just as I would have expected of Lizzy. The fact that you knew so many things about Lizzy that you would have had no other way to find out."

"The fact that Ellen recognized me, and --well, it is not a great thing, but she, from the very start, laid out my things upstairs in my bedroom in just the way that I like. I am sure she was following Mrs. Kenton's preferences."

"My brother's otherwise inexplicable determination to carry me off, scant days from my arrival home, to pursue an acquaintance with you, Eliz … I beg your pardon, … Miss Bennet."

"No, no, please call me Elizabeth, or Lizzy if you choose."

Darcy's raised eyebrow said, So you grant my sister the privilege before you grant it to me?

You already have the privilege, and you know it, her eyebrows and the corner of her mouth responded.

"And I hope you will call me Georgiana," Georgiana responded. "You as well, Mrs. Bingley, or may I call you Jane?"

"Of course you may."

"Do I get in on this?" asked Bingley.

"Of course, Charles."

They all smiled at each other. After all, we are all to be family, was in their minds.

"Returning to the topic, your having my carnelian cross with you here, Fitzwilliam," Elizabeth demurely but deliberately pronounced the name, "when it is also in my room at Longbourn. Although I suppose that if I were properly sceptical I should wait until I saw them side by side and even then consider the possibility that you had stolen the one from my bedroom and had it copied and then returned. Improbability heaped upon improbability. Ellen's testimony, and again, no doubt, the corroboration of others at Pemberley, that Mrs. Kenton knew details about the servants and tenants there that no one had confided to her. Mrs. Kenton's memories of my mishaps on swing and tree. The fact that she knew Aunt Gardiner's address in London, and her relationship with Olivia Kittredge, and the names of Olivia's husband and friends. (Though the names, I suppose, she could have learnt from Ellen or someone else at Pemberley.)"

"Her recognising you by your voice, Charles, and knowing you well enough to surmise that you would leave your gloves behind." Jane's eyes, glowing with affection, rendered innocuous any sting her words might have borne.

"The great happiness I have seen in my brother's eyes since the first time he beheld you, Elizabeth," Georgiana said daringly. Darcy and Elizabeth simply smiled at each other.

There was a pause, then, "I believe I need to read a letter from myself," Elizabeth said. "After that … would you join me on another walk outside, Mr. Darcy?"

"By no means!" exclaimed Jane, sounding for an instant almost like her mother. "It is far too cold outside by this hour. We can give you the privacy you need here."

"Very well. Will you wait for me, then, Fitzwilliam? I shall return within an hour."

Chapter 14

My dear Mr. Darcy,

My heart is overflowing with such strong feelings --distress at the thought of leaving you and of not seeing dear Georgiana, satisfaction at her coming, and joy in the anticipation of being reunited with my own dear Fitzwilliam-- that I am finding this letter difficult to write. I told you that I would not leave without saying farewell; this will have to be my farewell, for I am not sure I could adequately restrain my feelings otherwise. It is time for me to go.

I begin by attempting to express my deep gratitude for the consideration and care you have lavished on me during my time with you. No one could have been better cared for than I have been. Why, you have even let me leave my room regularly, and allowed me to walk outside upon occasion! All teasing aside, sir, you have been very good to me, and I am thankful.

Mr. Darcy, I have come to believe that the power that brought me from my own world to yours did so, at least in part, in order to permit a balancing of accounts, or a repayment of debts. I have told you of how Fitzwilliam saved my sister from a terrible fate and my family from opprobrium. I remain in awe of the deep love that would motivate him to do so, and, what is an even greater thing, having done it, voluntarily to associate himself with us, even to the point of becoming Mr. Wickham's brother-in-law. Perhaps, by helping convince you to rescue your sister, I have been able to redress the balance in some degree. I pray God that she and her precious daughter will be able to remain with you, sheltered in your care and comforted by your love, and that her suffering at her husband's hands will henceforth cease.

Mr. Darcy, what I am about to write of is a delicate matter, but I believe that the respect that holds between us is of such nature that it will remain intact even if I should prove to be mistaken. I speak of the affection that has grown between us. How could it fail to have done so? My Fitzwilliam has convinced me most thoroughly that Providence has formed me in all ways completely to his taste and for his delight, and I believe I have discerned in your looks and actions the growth of a similar regard. I know you are used to being inscrutable, and you have tried so hard, but I can read you so easily, my dear! For of course, as we have so often demonstrated by the confusion of persons in our discourse, you are he. How then could I not know you intimately, and how could my feelings for him not apply to you as well?

And yet, you are not he. His and my love has had opportunity to grow, to be tested and to be expressed in a thousand ways that render it strong as a mighty oak tree in its prime, as compared to the sapling, slight though sturdy and beautiful, that has sprung up between you and me during the past twelve days. It is indelicate in me to mention it; nevertheless for the sake of clarity I will do so: He is the father of the child I am so joyously carrying, Mr. Darcy; you are not. God willing, my child and I return to him tonight, and my heart races with joy at the prospect.

The thought that this will bring pain to you is inexpressibly painful to me, however. Yet I am mindful of another person, who while perhaps not experiencing a similarly acute level of pain, is nevertheless deprived of joy that might be hers. I speak of Miss Elizabeth Bennet. Yes, she is yet unmarried: it is the other four sisters who have found husbands, while Elizabeth still awaits her handsome prince. I enclose a letter from my, or rather her, Aunt Gardiner in confirmation of this fact. Knowing her to be a most diligent and prompt correspondent, some days ago I wrote to our aunt under the guise of a letter from her friend Olivia Kittredge of Lambton, and Ellen arranged to have the reply brought to me. I strongly suspect that, living at Longbourn and being the sole focus of her mother's loving but at times misdirected attentions, lacking the company of her dear sister Jane and the others, wishing a felicity equal to Jane's but acutely aware of having no man with whom she could build such felicity, Miss Elizabeth, despite her disposition to cheerfulness, is at times somewhat melancholy. Knowing, as I do, your compassionate heart, and knowing, as I do, that there is no one so suited as a Fitzwilliam Darcy to dispel the megrims of an Elizabeth Bennet, to bring her comfort and to awaken joy in her heart, I recommend that you seek her out and see if you cannot, between the two of you, compass the happiness of both. Perhaps in sending you to her I can come closer to redressing the balance of payments I alluded to earlier.

I have told you of that first letter my Fitzwilliam wrote to me --improper though it was for him to have done so--, and of how it enabled me to see the situation more clearly and eventually to find the path that brought us to happiness. My hope is that this letter, though also, I know, highly improper by the canons of society, may set a clear path before you, and thus make yet another payment on my debt of love towards him to whom I owe so much, for the benefit of you whom I have also learnt to love, and of my own self whom I have never met and who needs you although she does not yet know it. (It all becomes ridiculously confusing, does it not, Mr. Darcy?)

You would find it difficult, I imagine, and I suspect you will not even want, to avoid telling Miss Bennet of my existence and our history together, if for no other reason because as soon as she comes to Pemberley Ellen, and Wilkins, and Padgett, and Mrs. Reynolds and any number of others will recognise her and will speak of me to her. Therefore with this missive I enclose a necklace which I expect she will recognise; it may help convince her of the truth of your tale. Tell her also from me (or let her read this letter) that Clorinda Corinna's rapture in her union with her beloved was as nothing compared to the real thing. She will know whereof I speak.

God bless you, Mr. Darcy. God bless Georgiana, and little Anne Elizabeth. May He bless Elizabeth Bennet through you, as well.

With sincere and deep love,

Elizabeth Darcy

Elizabeth dried her eyes once more, clasped the thrice-read letter in her hand and then, on second thought, put it in her pocket, that her hands be free, took a deep breath and entered the music room. Mr. Darcy, who had been engaged in earnest contemplation of the blank darkness beyond the large window, turned eagerly towards her. "Elizabeth! … Miss Bennet!"

"'Elizabeth' will do, sir," she replied, the irrepressibly arch tone creeping into her voice.

"What … tell me … Elizabeth, can you give me any hope?"

"I believe there is considerable hope, sir, that were you to petition my father for permission to court me he would give his consent. But I find that I would prefer that you not do so."

"Not?"

"No. I would prefer that your petition be of a different nature."

"Elizabeth! Do not subject my heart to such shocks! But if I am to make a petition of that nature to your father, my love, should I not do so to someone else beforehand?" At her happy nod he moved to kneel before her. As he flexed his knees, however, an expression of amusement, or perhaps bemusement, passed briefly across his face.

"Fitzwilliam, what amused you?"

"Must I tell you?"

"No, this time I shall not insist. But I should very much like to know. Will you not tell me?"

"Embarrassing though it be?"

"Yes. I want to hear it."

Her eyes laughed at him, belying the firmness of her tone, and his laughed back.

"Very well, my dear. What crossed my mind was as unexpected and inappropriate a thought as I can imagine for an occasion such as this. I was feeling grateful for the carpet, thinking what this would have been like in the snow and the darkness if your estimable sister had not persuaded us to remain indoors."

Their shared sense of the ridiculous caught hold of them, and they could not restrain their laughter for some time. They stood happily together, holding each other's hands, basking in each other's mirth.

Then he stepped back from her. "Let me try that again." He sank on one knee before her, and the sincere and tender regard in his gaze was such as to make the tears start in Elizabeth's eyes. "Elizabeth, you know that I adore you. My heart is irrevocably yours. My love, will you allow me the privilege of honouring and loving and caring for and delighting in you all the days of my life? Will you share my life, guide me and entrance me with your wit and wisdom, honour me with your confidence and your loyalty, and reward me with your love? Will you be my wife?"

Elizabeth once more took a deep breath, then let a smile spread across her face as she replied, "Yes, Fitzwilliam. I will."

He sprang to his feet, lifted her bodily in his arms, and whirled her around the room. When he set her on her feet again, she wrapped her arms around his waist and leaned her head against his waistcoat, while he, as he had that morning, placed the gentlest of kisses on her hair. "My lovely Elizabeth," he spoke quietly. "How happy you have made me."

With a sigh, she moved her head, from where she could hear his heart thump to where she could speak. "I am glad for it to be so," she said. "For it is certainly true that I am selfishly securing my own happiness as well. And after all, how could I face myself, or live with myself, were I to reject my own advice to myself and fail to compass our mutual happiness? Indeed I was right, I needed you more than I ever knew."

She laid her head against his breast once more, but after a blissful minute raised it to continue, a mischievous smile growing on her face: "What is more, you must know that the raptures of Clorinda Corinna were of the most powerful and ecstatic kind, and if ours are to be even more rapturous, I dare say we should be very ill-advised to forgo the experience. Indeed, how could we even think of resisting it?" They both laughed.

"… Oh, Fitzwilliam, to read, in my own hand, such dear expressions of love for you and yet even greater ones for the other Mr. Darcy, to realise that, as she said and you have convinced me, Providence has formed me to your taste and for your delight, to read of what the other Mr. Darcy did for his Elizabeth and to know that such is the love of the man who has chosen me and whom I have now chosen; to have the hope that I, Lizzy Bennet, could grow into such a magnificent woman as she is …"

"You are as magnificent, my dear."

"No, not yet, but I shall be! I shall become the Queen of the kingdom of Pemberley of this world, and you shall be my King! The sapling of our love will burgeon and grow into the mighty tree she described. And so, I can even now surrender myself to the bliss of knowing myself loved and of loving unrestrainedly. … Oh, Fitzwilliam!"

She began to sob, and was unable to stop for several minutes. Darcy's waistcoat was beginning to be somewhat damp, and he was almost starting to wonder whether she was distressed rather than happy, but he simply had to reassure himself as to what he had heard. He gently kissed her forehead and raised her face so he could kiss her eyes.

"My love," he asked tentatively, "did I hear you aright? You already begin to love me a little?"

"No," she said, the impertinent smile reasserting itself over her tears. "I believe the word was … 'unrestrainedly'. It is not just a little, Fitzwilliam! A gentleman farmer such as yourself ought to be well aware of the difference between a seedling and a sapling; it was not by accident that I spoke of the latter rather than the former. It is already a most sturdy sapling, my love."

There was nothing he could do but hold her to him again, so vigorously that her feet once more left the ground, while he whispered into her hair words expressing his joy and the strength of his own love to her. She resumed the process of watering his waistcoat, but the radiance of her tear-spangled smile, when she could finally look at him, dispelled any remaining fears on his part. "I am so happy!" she said. "I must tell Jane. And Georgiana."

"Either bring them in here or be back within five minutes," he commanded. "I cannot bear for you to leave me for longer than that."

"Restricting my movements already, Mr. Darcy?"

"I am afraid that, despite my mentor's precept, I will do so regularly," Mr. Darcy responded, suiting his actions to his words by wrapping his arms around her once more.

"I am sure she would not object to your imposing restrictions of that kind, sir, not in the least!" she countered when she could speak. "At least, I do not."

As she left the room she was not surprised to find both the Bingleys and Georgiana waiting in the hallway. They did not seem to have been actually eavesdropping (and she did not really suspect them of it), but they certainly had not wanted to be far away. She signalled to them, and as they entered the room with her, she confidently walked over to Fitzwilliam's side and put her arm around his waist as his came around her shoulders. "Please congratulate us," she said. "We are to be married."

The sincere joy of all three at this news was as a balm to her spirit, soothing a disquiet she had not realized she was experiencing. She had, after all her fine words, acted at least as precipitously as Mr. Darcy, but their reaction reassured her that she had done the right thing.

After the congratulations had died down, someone, perhaps it was again Mrs. Bennet's daughter Jane, asked, "Have you given thought yet to when this happy event will take place?"

Darcy looked questioningly at Elizabeth, who with a glance brimful of mischief announced boldly, "as soon as possible."

Darcy's face lit up. "Why, that means this week end!" he marvelled.

"Can it be done so quickly?" she asked.

"Well, Gretna might be even a little faster," he granted, then gulped and cast an apologetic glance at Georgiana, but she returned his look with a calm smile, "but it would only take a few days to speak to your father, go to town to procure a special licence, deal with settlement papers and changes to my will and other legal matters, notify my relatives and put an announcement in the newspaper, and return. Even so, when I said this week I was speaking in jest, my love."

"I am not," she said. "I think it an excellent plan. Perhaps not this week, but I see no reason why we should wait even a full fortnight. I think we can bring Father around to the idea. Mother will be overset with joy at the thought of a special licence and may not notice --no, I am overly optimistic: she will certainly notice, but she may not object too strenuously to the fact that she will not be able to prepare a trousseau for me," here she noted the smiling glance between her beloved and his sister --she would have to ask him what that was about--, "or indulge in all the other preparations you and our other sisters --well, except Lydia-- had to endure, Jane. You cannot have had time to adequately prepare for leaving Pemberley, Fitzwilliam, and must return before long, and I am both unwilling for any separation and very eager to be there at our Pemberley with you and my new sister and niece."

None of the others seemed to have any inclination to talk them out of it, so it was decided that, on the morrow, Elizabeth and Darcy would go together to speak to Mr. Bennet --"After all, far be it from us to be so conventional as to have you go to him alone, my dear! And seriously, I think between the two of us we can obtain his approval, whereas if I am not there to convince him that I really know and love you, I am in doubt whether you can persuade him to let me marry you, much less do so so quickly. Though I must concede that he is already predisposed to like you; the kind thoughtfulness you displayed by trouncing him at chess has, naturally, resulted in a highly favourable inclination toward you on his part. And it is also certainly true that you can be very persuasive, sir, as I know from my own experience, and to my great benefit."

Chapter 15

Posted on 2010-07-22

"So tell me about Miss Woodhouse and the mistletoe, my love?"

They were walking to Longbourn. Although the carriage could have been summoned, they would have had to take a chaperone on such a journey, and that would have defeated the purpose --or at least one of the main purposes, from their point of view. The beautiful weather of the previous day had been renewed, and when Elizabeth suggested walking and having the carriage come later to take them on the return trip, Darcy had gladly acquiesced.

He laughed. "I will tell you what I told Mrs. Kenton when she asked. Emma Woodhouse was the daughter of a friend of my mother's from Kent; they came to Pemberley every year for the Christmas Ball. Emma rather believed that she knew what was best for everyone, and, under that delusion, decided that I, being overly shy, was in need of a kiss. Wherefore, the mistletoe incident. I was then about fifteen years old, and she was perhaps eight. I understand she was married about a year ago, and is no doubt leading her husband a merry dance."

"It is not yet twelfth night: perhaps there are still some Christmas decorations lurking in doorways, waiting to ensnare the unsuspecting."

"I shall have to keep my eye out for them."

"A man experienced at avoidance."

"You mistake me, my dear."

"Fitzwilliam!" She halted, and there were tears swimming in her eyes, even as she gave him a blinding smile. "Have I told you my news? The most amazing thing has happened!"

He looked at her in mingled puzzlement and bedazzlement, and shook his head.

"My Prince has come. He loves me, and we are to be married. Is it not the most wonderful news?" And she leaned up on her tiptoes and kissed him.

His arms engulfed her and held her against him. He swallowed, so overcome with emotion that he could hardly kiss her back.

"Was it as good as when I kissed you before? If not I shall have to practise."

"Minx! Now I do not know whether to say this was better, which I am afraid is the truth, or prevaricate in the hope of motivating you to practise! No, this was better, because at that time I had not the least idea of how greatly I was favoured and what was the inestimable worth of the gift I was being given. … Elizabeth …"

"Yes, my love?"

"Have you any idea how the trust in your face as you say that affects me? Oh, Elizabeth! I fear … Well, there is nothing for it but to confess all and throw myself on your mercy. I will not have secrets of any sort between us."

"What is it, Fitzwilliam? What distresses you to remember?"

"My love, that was not the only time my lips touched Mrs. Kenton's."

He could hardly believe it, but the look on her face seemed to be one of relief. "Tell me about it," she said comfortably. "I also wish for there to be no secrets between us, and I am not afraid of what you will disclose. In fact, I am quite eager to hear about it."

"It was … at least the first time was … it was two nights before Georgiana came and you … she, left us. We had sat together in the parlour late after dinner, while she told me the latter part of her story of Prince Darcy, and Princess Elizabeth, and how the Princess Lydia was rescued and Princess Elizabeth defeated the Dragon de Bourgh."

"Was that your aunt, Lady Catherine?"

"Yes, it was. I shall tell you that story at another time. However that may be, as Mrs. Kenton regaled me with the tale, we became so comfortable together that we did not note the passing of time. It was two in the morning when we arose to go to our rooms, and everyone else was asleep. As we walked down the dark hallway, I forgot myself, and leaned over and kissed her."

"I'll wager she forgot herself and kissed you back," said Elizabeth, with a roguish smile. "Did she not?"

"I will not answer that question, and in fact I am not sure what the answer is. But I do know that it was, most unquestionably, my fault, and not hers."

"And that was all?"

"Yes, we immediately parted and went to our beds. And I wrote her a note asking her to forgive me. Which she did, though we did not speak of it until the last day, when I had the opportunity to apologise more clearly and fully, and she accepted my apology. But then, that day …"

"Yes?"

"When I found her in the maze, ready to go to her husband, I called her back to say farewell. I could not bear to see her go. And it was at that point that that scoundrel Wickham accosted us, and threatened us with blackmail over our dalliance. In truth I had acted improperly: besides the kiss, which of course Wickham had not witnessed, I had reached out and touched a curl of her hair just as he discovered us." (Naturally, Mr. Darcy, as he spoke, was gently caressing the corresponding lock of Elizabeth's hair, where it lay on her forehead.) "Of course he assumed, and insinuated, much worse behaviour, but as I told you before, with Elizabeth's valour and the aid of … of Providence or whatever or whomever else we should acknowledge as controlling the maze, we were able to thwart him and to defeat him."

"What did happen to him, Fitzwilliam?"

"The maze swallowed him. Literally, that is what happened. I have no explanation for it. I had struck Wickham, with all my force, and was holding him by the throat against the hedge when Elizabeth told me to let go of him. The bushes against which I had held him had already immobilised him, wrapping branches around his limbs, and were rapidly sending tendrils all over his body. He could not pull himself loose from them, nor could Elizabeth and I pull him loose, though we did try, most strenuously. In the end he was pulled into a sort of mouth of black nothingness that I have no way to describe. He disappeared into it entirely, and the hedge healed itself as if nothing had happened."

"How horrible!" Elizabeth's head was drawn back, with her chin tucked in and a tight frown on her face.

"Yes, it was. The two of us were, of course, overcome, and Elizabeth most naturally turned to my arms for comfort. As I held her and she attempted to quiet her sobs, I myself was filled, despite the horror, with the most amazing peace, and even with exhilaration. George Wickham, the bane of so many years of my life, was gone, and you … Mrs. Kenton … my beloved Elizabeth was in my arms at last. I knew it was a very improper feeling, and yet I revelled in it.

"She walked with me, still holding tightly to my arm, back to the entrance to the maze. But there, she would go no further. It became clear to me, though I had allowed myself to be persuaded differently, that she still meant to go to her own husband, through the maze. I … I am ashamed of myself. I begged her, I pled with her, to stay with me. I tried to convince her to come inside at least to warm up, and to see Georgiana, and I spoke of the danger of the maze, for we had just seen what it had done to Wickham. I told her she could have home and husband and family on this side of the maze as well, if she would just stay with me. I felt desperate at the thought of her leaving.

"It was then that she told me of Queen Darcy's concern for the Princess Elizabeth, covering the same ground as in her letter, which you have read. Then we embraced each other for several long moments. I am sure I kissed her hair --I love your hair, my Elizabeth--, and I believe I kissed her face as well. Finally she released herself, touched my face with her hand, said 'God bless you,' and disappeared into the maze. I have not seen her again.

"So, my dear, can you find it in your heart still to accept, still to love a man so lacking in self-control, or indeed in love, as to subject the woman he loves to such behaviour? I am shocked at myself, and tremble to think of how I must have sunk myself in your estimation by this narrative, but, as I have said, I wish there to be no secrets between us."

"If those are your worst secrets, I have no fears at all!" said Elizabeth, with a merry laugh. "On the contrary, I am quite improperly proud of myself, to be so tempting to you as to make you forget propriety in such egregious ways. And I am touched yet again by your kindness, so to comfort my alter ego when, I am sure, she was in need of it as much as you were. It is not that I want you to behave improperly, but it is very gratifying to know that I can affect you so strongly, and I look forward very much to doing so in the future. Oh, Fitzwilliam, I know you feel guilty about it, but it is such a great compliment to me, that you should love me so much. And even when I am five months advanced! I shall not fear the loss of my husband's affection in those months, as so many women do. And as Queen Darcy's other self, I most gladly accept your invitation to stay with you and find home and husband and family with you."

She suited her words with a short run into his arms, and from that sanctuary turned her impudent smile towards him. "I cannot blame Mrs. Kenton in the least for coming to your embrace and staying there, my dear. How she must have missed her husband's love during the two weeks they were apart, and your arms are so comforting! I know I cannot resist them."

Sensing a slight continuing reticence communicated through his touch, she stopped, held him at arms' length and looked into his eyes. "My love, let me assure you, I feel no jealousy for what you have told me, only greater security than ever in knowing the depth of your love. Please do not ever feel guilty or disquieted over the incidents you have related to me, and know that my love is growing to be as deep and strong as hers. I love you, Fitzwilliam. Never doubt it."

Such a declaration, of course, required further embraces and even a quiet kiss or two. The second kiss, to say truth, was not quite so calm and quiet as the first, and the third was even less so. After a considerable pause to regain her breath, Elizabeth said, "Fitzwilliam, we spoke a few minutes ago of temptation and propriety. I rejoice that we are to wait less than a fortnight to be married. I already find it difficult to restrain myself when we come to kissing, but of course we must. Restrain ourselves, I mean. But please know that I sense your desire for me, and I want you to know that my desire is towards you as well. Clorinda Corinna's ingenuous expectations notwithstanding, I now have happily married sisters, and have some understanding of that whereof we speak. I shall not find it easy to wait even these few days to be yours."

This confession of course necessitated another embrace, but Darcy made the ensuing kiss a short one. "My love," he said, "you are certainly correct that my desire for you is very strong. Frankly, I want you in my bed, as soon, and as often, and for as long, as possible. But, fortunately, my love is strong too, and God helping me I will rein in those brute passions, or reign over them or whatever one is supposed to do with brute passions."

Elizabeth smiled at his wording, and replied in kind, before turning serious. "Just do not rain on them, Fitzwilliam! By which I mean, of course, please do not quench them, do not stifle or destroy them! I find I rather like being the object of your passions!"

"I am very glad of that. And I am sure I could not do away with them --I know that I will continue to desire you, and I hope you will continue to desire me, and that shall be a most powerful and hopeful strand of our love. So let us agree to behave with decorum, and to be thankful that we were wise enough not to settle on a long engagement."

"Oh, but please hold me at least occasionally," begged Elizabeth. "Having tasted of that bliss so often, even in the past few minutes, I do not think I could survive without the comfort of your arms." Which declaration, of course, necessitated yet another episode of comforting. This time Elizabeth ended it with a kiss, on Darcy's cheek, and the saucy request, "Now, then, what is this about a book your father had hid from you, and my father found? What book was this? Tom Jones or something of the sort, I suppose? I have never read it, properly speaking, but I look forward to perusing your copy. Assuming, my love, that you do not intend to restrict me in this?"

"I should hate to see you become irritated, Miss Elizabeth. Yes, it was Tom Jones, and your father, or rather Mrs. Kenton's father, found it, in a secret drawer under one of the library tables. I know how much you will enjoy reading it, as Mrs. Kenton did, and I look forward to sharing it with you."

And so they continued the remaining distance to Longbourn.

Chapter 16

They had left from Netherfield quite early, so Mrs. Bennet was still abed when they arrived at Longbourn. Elizabeth let them in through the family entrance, and, holding Mr. Darcy's hand, managed to bring him to the hallway outside Mr. Bennet's sanctuary without any of the servants being aware of their coming. She kissed him on the cheek and whispered in his ear, then ran up to her bedroom, returning not a minute later.

Together they knocked on the library door, and after they had gained admittance, Messrs. Bennet and Darcy greeted each other with appropriate formality. Mr. Bennet then turned to his daughter. "What is this, Lizzy?" he asked, his expression somewhere between quizzical, amused, and affronted. "As I look out the window from my desk, I see my favourite daughter emerging from the woods, three miles from where I expect her to be, alone in the company of a young man. I appreciate your seeking me out to give me an accounting for this exceptional behaviour."

"Oh, Papa!" said Elizabeth. "Don't be difficult! You know me --I am not overly concerned about conformity for conformity's sake, but I do not behave improperly. We have so very much to tell you! And I wanted to be here with you alone. If we were to have arrived in the carriage, with proper chaperonage and all, Mother and everyone else would be aware that we were here talking with you. This is ever so much more comfortable!"

Mr. Bennet could not deny the good sense of this application.

"You have much to tell me, do you? I suppose, given that you have brought Mr. Darcy here with you, that these revelations have to do with him?"

"Yes, they do, of course. Papa, do you remember when we talked about how it seemed as if Mr. Darcy knew me before we met?" Mr. Bennet inclined his head. "We would like to talk to you about that, and what has come of it. It is a very strange story, but I believe it will be entertaining to you. Your suggestion about Irish rats was far nearer the mark than either of us had any idea of."

Mr. Bennet's countenance assumed an expression of totally reserved judgement at this sally, but he noted how his Lizzy looked at Mr. Darcy and smiled as she said it.

"Papa, tell me what you think of this."

He looked at what was in Elizabeth's outstretched hand. "It is your carnelian cross, that I gave you five, no, seven years ago, it would be now, wouldn't it? It …" he stopped, and held his breath, as he suddenly realised that she was wearing an identical cross, on an identical gold chain, around her neck. "How odd. There are two of them."

"Yes," Elizabeth responded. "How odd. There are two of them. That might be a good summary for much of what we have to tell you. Now, Papa, tell me what you think of this letter." She proffered the same page from Mrs. Kenton's letter that Darcy had shown to her and the others in the music room at Netherfield.

"It is certainly your hand," said Mr. Bennet, beginning to take in the contents.

"I assure you I never wrote it."

"What? Was it someone copying your hand, then? He, or she, counterfeited your writing very well, if that is the case. Frighteningly well, in fact, unless it is a trustworthy person."

"It is. However, to my knowledge she had never, nor has she since, seen anything I have written. She is someone I have never met, but whom I would trust with my life. Her name, or one of her names, is Elizabeth Kenton."

"I have never heard of her."

"I should never have expected you to. I hid her existence well, when she was but a figment of my imagination. No, I am jesting, Papa. 'Elizabeth Kenton' is the name of the heroine of an abortive novel I tried to write when I was thirteen. The author of this letter, who by the way was writing in her own normal hand, chose to be called Elizabeth Kenton while she was in Derbyshire, at Pemberley in fact. But she made it clear this was not her real name. Her Christian name was Elizabeth, however, and her maiden name, she claimed, had been Bennet."

"Spelt with one 't', I suppose?"

"Indeed." It was Mr. Darcy who answered Mr. Bennet's query.

"And she was a married woman?"

"Yes, sir."

"What was the name of her husband?"

"Fitzwilliam Darcy, or so she claimed. She claimed to have married this Fitzwilliam Darcy in a double ceremony, on the 12th of December of 1812, in which her sister Jane was also married to one Charles Bingley. My own Christian name, as it happens, is Fitzwilliam. You should also know, sir, that in her looks, in her carriage, in her voice and in her laughter, this woman was the very double of your daughter, with the sole exception that she was expecting a child."

"Amazing! …" He turned to his daughter with more than a little anger in his voice. "And you expect me to believe this farrago of nonsense, Elizabeth?"

"Not nonsense, sir. Improbability, certainly. Your son Charles surprised me by his acute summation: he came to believe this because the improbabilities attached to disbelieving it were even greater. Father; Charles, and Jane, and Georgiana Wickham heard this story at the same time I did, and were convinced of its truth, as I was. The reason Mr. Darcy knew me before he came here was because he knew Mrs. Elizabeth Darcy, or Elizabeth Kenton as they agreed to call her in order to avoid complications. Here, Father, read this top part from the letter you were examining a while ago." She folded over the lower part of the page, with the explanation, "This bottom part is not relevant right now, and is in any case rather private. Read it out loud, to refresh Fitzw … Mr. Darcy's and my memories."

Mr. Bennet noted the non-use of Mr. Darcy's first name, and drew the appropriate conclusion, but nevertheless consented to read out loud without comment:

I speak of Miss Elizabeth Bennet. Yes, she is yet unmarried: it is the other four sisters who have found husbands, while Elizabeth still awaits her handsome prince. I enclose a letter from my, or rather her, Aunt Gardiner in confirmation of this fact. Knowing her to be a most diligent and prompt correspondent, some days ago I wrote to our aunt under the guise of a letter from her friend Olivia Kittredge of Lambton, and Ellen arranged to have the reply brought to me. I strongly suspect that, living at Longbourn and being the sole focus of her mother's loving but at times misdirected attentions, lacking the company of her dear sister Jane and the others, wishing a felicity equal to Jane's but acutely aware of having no man with whom she could build such felicity, Miss Elizabeth, despite her disposition to cheerfulness, is at times somewhat melancholy. Knowing, as I do, your compassionate heart, and knowing, as I do, …

"That's enough, Papa. … Oh, let me show you this too." She proffered the last page of the letter, folded so as to show the bottom of the writing. "See, Papa, the signature says 'Elizabeth Darcy', but is still written in my hand. And you noted, I am sure, how she writes about me as someone else, and her ambivalence as to whose aunt Aunt Gardiner is, whether hers, mine or ours. Strange, is it not?"

She retrieved the signature page, and again took up the other page. "Papa, I had not spoken of this to you, but … well, no doubt you remember Aunt Gardiner speaking to Mr. Darcy about Olivia Kittredge on Saturday? And saying that she had talked to me about her some days before? Well, Aunt Gardiner did receive a letter from Olivia Kittredge, like that Mrs. Kenton, or Mrs. Darcy, speaks of having sent, asking among other things whether I was still unmarried. Aunt Gardiner showed me the letter, and, although I did not realise it at the time, I recognised the handwriting. It was the handwriting I myself produce if I hold the pen in my left hand but guide it with my right. I devised that method of disguising my handwriting many years ago. I will not tell you, at least now, of the times I have had reason to have recourse to this stratagem, although I can reassure you they have been few." She smiled at her father, and he, though troubled in his thoughts, was not able to resist the urge to smile back.

"Elizabeth Darcy, or Elizabeth Kenton, whichever we call her, wrote that letter, using the same technique I have just described. The 'Ellen' whom she mentions is Ellen Ingram, who was Mrs. Kenton's maid at Pemberley. She is even now at Netherfield, attending Mrs. Wickham. She saw Mrs. Kenton writing the direction to the letter in the manner I have described, and can testify to that and to other facts about her. She herself posted the letter to Aunt Gardiner, and brought the reply to Mrs. Kenton. Here it is."

She placed her aunt's letter on the desk, and Mr. Bennet looked at it, acknowledging, "Yes, that is your aunt's hand."

"Aunt Gardiner was puzzled by Mrs. Kittredge's letter, she told me. First by the fact that she had gotten a letter at all, for Mrs. Kittredge is no more famed for frequent and prompt correspondence than is Mrs. Gardiner's brother-in-law." Darcy's eyes widened at this sally, but Mr. Bennet only laughed at it. "Secondly, because the handwriting was unfamiliar. Mrs. Kittredge is left-handed and her writing slants to the left. Mrs. Kenton unfortunately did not know this, and thus failed to make the writing on her letter slope in that direction. Thus Mrs. Kenton's excuse, of an inflammation of the joints making writing difficult, did not entirely convince our aunt. But in any case, despite her doubts, Aunt Gardiner saw no harm in writing back, and did so, sending the letter which you have before you.

"I am sure that you see where this is going, Papa. Just as there are two necklaces, there are two Elizabeth Bennets. It is not Irish rats in the time of Pythagoras, but it is another world, a parallel existence, in our own time, annīs Dominī 1811, '12, '13 and '14. It is as you yourself said: there are two of them; how odd. Two Elizabeth Bennets, one of whom has been married --very happily married, in fact-- to Mr. Darcy --the other Mr. Darcy, not this one-- for over a year. Two Pemberleys, two Charles Bingleys, and two Jane Bingleys. There is even another Thomas Bennet, who while visiting his daughter and son in the other Derbyshire discovered a secret drawer in the wonderful library of Pemberley …"

"Which as you know you are very welcome to visit at any time, sir," Darcy interjected.

"… and found therein a copy of Tom Jones, which Mr. Darcy's father had hidden when his son was seventeen years old, and which he had never found."

Mr. Bennet could not but laugh at this revelation. But his scepticism remained. "You spin an entertaining tale, to be sure, but it still sounds remarkably like nonsense to me. Why should I believe it?"

"Because to do otherwise turns loose too many other, equally nonsensical facts, which will then need some other explanation. Why did Ellen Ingram call me 'Mrs. Kenton' the moment she saw me? And check me over most impertinently (and then blush for having done so) to see what had happened to the baby I was carrying two weeks ago? Who forged my handwriting on this letter, and where did he or she get the knowledge with which to do so? What could ever have motivated anyone to do so, to try to perpetrate such an elaborate hoax? Who wrote to Aunt Gardiner, knowing who she was and what is her direction in London, disguising this hand which looks so much like mine, by the method I personally devised for disguising handwriting, to produce a letter in handwriting which looks like mine, disguised? Why would a person from this world, who knew so much about me, need to write that letter; how could she not know that I am unmarried? How does Mr. Darcy come to have in his possession a letter from Aunt Gardiner to her friend Olivia Kittredge? Is he, whose character so many vouch for, lying about how it came into his possession, and a thousand other things? Where did he learn enough to lie so convincingly? How did he come to know so inexplicably many things about me --how did he know me before coming to Hertfordshire to meet me? Where did Mrs. Kenton learn about the secret drawer in the Pemberley library, of which the Master of Pemberley himself knew nothing? Where did this second necklace come from? Jane and Charles and Georgiana Wickham and I spent all of twenty minutes listing incongruities that this tale, difficult to believe though it is itself, explains. A single incredible premise can be easily believed when it thus neatly explains a hundred incredible facts. Is it not the same reasoning you used years ago to convince me that the world must be round, rather than flat as I insisted it was?"

The expression of reserved judgement did not leave Mr. Bennet's face, but his favourite daughter could tell that her argument had struck home --he was considering it.

"It is a long story, Papa, and a convoluted one, but the gist of it is that Elizabeth Darcy, who by the way is, as we have implied, expecting Thomas and Fanny Bennet's first grandchild in that world, had blundered, or wandered, or fallen from that world into this, via a great hundred-year-old maze that lies on the grounds of Pemberley, which I myself have seen. I think I will let you tell the rest, Fitzwilliam, as you were there."

She didn't even stop herself from using her young man's Christian name, this time, Mr. Bennet noted.

Mr. Darcy told Mr. Bennet of Mrs. Kenton's arrival at Pemberley, of her convincing him of her true identity, of the gradual opening of the maze, of Mrs. Kenton's persuading him of the need to be reconciled to his sister (omitting many details of the estrangement, notably including any information about her husband other than that he had been the cause of the separation), of Georgiana's response to his invitation and her coming to Pemberley, of his growing awareness of Mrs. Kenton's perfect fitness to be Mistress of Pemberley and (less directly stated) to be his own wife, and of her departure for her own Pemberley on Christmas Eve. "She told me face-to-face before she left, sir, and she had already written it in the letter of which you have seen a couple of pages, that the one thing she would ask of me was that I come to Hertfordshire and seek out the Princess Elizabeth Bennet. Her words …"

"Here are her words, Papa," said Elizabeth, holding out the two pages from the letter, but not placing them in her father's hands. Let me read them for you. As they are in my handwriting, so it is fitting that you hear them spoken with my voice. Think of them as written by my self, my happily married self, to the man I have learnt to love because he is so exactly like my husband, regarding my more solitary self and his relation to her:

I strongly suspect that … Miss Elizabeth, despite her disposition to cheerfulness, is at times somewhat melancholy. Knowing, as I do, your compassionate heart, and knowing, as I do, that there is no one so suited as a Fitzwilliam Darcy to dispel the megrims of an Elizabeth Bennet, to bring her comfort and to awake joy in her heart, I recommend that you seek her out and see if you cannot, between the two of you, compass the happiness of both. Perhaps in sending you to her I can come closer to redressing the balance of payments I alluded to earlier.

Tears were brimming in Elizabeth's eyes, yet her voice was strong and happy. She paused as she scanned ahead on the next page, then read several parts of it:

… My hope is that this letter … may … make yet another payment on my debt of love towards him to whom I owe so much, for the benefit of you whom I have also learnt to love, and of my own self whom I have never met and who needs you although she does not yet know it. (It all becomes ridiculously confusing, does it not, Mr. Darcy?)

The mischievous smile on her face and in her voice as she read these words undoubtedly matched that on Mrs. Darcy's face as she wrote them.

… with this missive I enclose a necklace which I expect she will recognise;

Elizabeth's fingers caressed the necklace around her neck: the other lay on the table before Mr. Bennet;

it may help convince her of the truth of your tale. …

God bless you, Mr. Darcy. God bless Georgiana, and little Anne Elizabeth. May He bless Elizabeth Bennet through you, as well.

With sincere and deep love,

Elizabeth Darcy

Two tears spilled over and rolled down Elizabeth's cheeks as she finished reading. Mr. Darcy, without thinking, put his arm around her and offered her his handkerchief, which she accepted with a sniff and a grateful smile up at him.

"One further matter, Mr. Bennet. Just as Mrs. Darcy left a necklace to help convince Elizabeth Bennet of her story, she had arrived at Pemberley wearing a ring, which was instrumental in convincing me of her trustworthiness and the veracity of her story. It was an exact duplicate of an ancient and very precious ring that was at that moment lying in the vaults of my home. This is that ring." He took Elizabeth's hand and brought it up onto the table before Mr. Bennet. "It was given by several of my ancestors to their wives, my great-great-great grandmothers, and to my mother by my father. I also determined that my wife, and only my wife, would wear it. Miss Elizabeth has, to my everlasting joy, consented to be my wife, and I have given her the ring as my pledge to her." The two of them looked at each other's eyes once more, and Mr. Bennet could sense the flow of felicity and love between them.

"So, Papa, we are here to ask your blessing on us."

"And were I to withhold my blessing?"

"You would never, Papa!" cried Elizabeth, at the same moment that Darcy, holding her hand and soothing her, said, "Sir, with all respect, in that case we would marry without it. Elizabeth is of age, and I am well able to support her; we have each determined that our happiness lies in the other, and are determined to reach for that happiness. But I do not believe that you would deny us your blessing. Will you not grant it, sir?"

"No, children, I would not deny you this. Come," and he reached out his hands over the desk, and took both of theirs between them. "You have succeeded; I am sufficiently convinced. I will need to mull on the story you have told me for some time before I can accept that there is no other explanation, but of your sincerity, and of your sincere attachment I am not in doubt. I am certain that we shall see settlement papers and such fol-de-rol later, but I can see enough that I am ready to grant my blessing. I can see, Mr. Darcy, that you love my Lizzy, and that," here Mr. Bennet swallowed a lump in his throat, "she has given her heart to you. Only see to it that you guard and care for her always. She is my greatest treasure, and not even access to Pemberley's library, with its first-edition books and chess-set collections, can make up for my missing her here with me."

"Sir, rest assured, nothing in my life will take higher priority than protecting, and providing for, and loving your daughter. I fully agree with you concerning her worth: nothing that I own, not Pemberley itself, counts on the balance with the prize you are giving me. I will treasure you forever, Elizabeth."

"Well, well, enough, then." Mr. Bennet's dry voice interrupted their gaze at each other, but they knew he was laughing fondly at them. "You are to marry. We had best settle on a date before your mother hears of this, Elizabeth."

"Yes, Papa, we thought the same, and this was partly why we came here on foot. We would like a very short engagement. I would gladly marry this week, but Fitzwilliam has convinced me that the week following would be a little more practical. Yet he does have to return to Pemberley before long, and I am of no mind to remain here without him."

"Sir, I know it will seem soon, but I also am eager to wed your daughter, and cannot abide the thought of returning to Pemberley without her. I had thought to go to London this afternoon or tomorrow morning, to procure a special licence …"

"That will make your new mother-in-law happy!"

"Yes, so Elizabeth intimated to me … I will also pick up the settlement papers --I beg your pardon, my love, for my presumption, but I wrote from Pemberley, before I had even met you, and asked my solicitors in London to begin preparing them. I believe you will find the provisions adequate, sir, but I would be happy to discuss them with you even now."

"Those details can wait until you have returned with the prepared documents," Mr. Bennet said. "I am already trusting my Lizzy into your hands; I can trust you that far --I have no doubt that you will do right by her."

"With your blessing, then, sir, I will also insert a notice of our engagement into the London papers, and speak to my family and a few close friends, and invite them to the wedding. I would be pleased to take word to the Gardiners, or anyone else you might wish to notify in London."

"Do you have a good idea who among your family and friends, and how many of them, are likely to come? Well, you can go over that sort of issue with Mrs. Bennet, when she arises. She will give it all due attention, I am sure. Shall we set a date then? What say you to Friday, the 14th?"

"That should do excellently, sir!"

"Oh, Papa! Wish me joy, Papa! I am so happy!"

"I do wish you joy, my love, and I do believe you are like to have it. I could not let you go did I doubt it." His daughter embraced him, and then kissed him on the forehead and cheek. "You're a good girl, Lizzy. Get along with you now, and take your young man with you, and liven up your mother's day."

As they went out the door, he commented, "I shall miss this. What shall I do for entertainment, with no more daughters to give away to worthy young men? I had quite gotten used to it."

"I suppose you will have to content yourself with contemplation of the antics of your grandchildren, Papa. It should not be difficult to make a habit of that as well."

When they had gone, he sat there, shaking his head, for some time. There are two of them. How odd. How odd indeed. But, she will be happy. That at least I cannot doubt.

It was some twenty minutes later that he heard sounds indicating his wife was leaving her room at last. During the interval, as Mr. Bennet might not have been terribly surprised to learn, Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy had, most happily, discovered a Christmas decoration lurking above a doorway, and undertaken to act accordingly. There must remain some degree of doubt, however, as to whether the absence of such a decoration would have greatly affected their choice regarding the manner of occupying their time until her mother's descent. It was about five minutes after that event that Mr. Bennet heard a shriek, followed by the overwhelming expressions of felicity that he had been anticipating. Again he shook his head, smiled and poured himself a small glass of port.

Chapter 17

When Fitzwilliam Darcy rode to London the next morning (for he had, unsurprisingly, found it quite impossible to tear himself away from his Elizabeth the previous afternoon) he bore with him a letter from his fiancée to her aunt, with instructions to ensure that it arrived at the Gardiners' house in Gracechurch Street before he called there himself.

Thus Mrs. Gardiner was surprised to have a servant bring her, about midday, a letter, delivered by private messenger rather than by the regular post, and then to discover that it was from her niece, whom she had seen but four days before. Fearing lest it contain unwelcome news, she opened it to read:

Dear Aunt Gardiner,

I trust that you and my uncle and cousins are all well, and enjoying the new year.

I fear that I must begin by discharging the unpleasant office of conveying to you my regrets that I will be unable to visit you in March as we had planned with such great anticipation and high hopes, and I am afraid that our plans for travel together in the summertime must also be modified if not abandoned. This alteration of our plans must be laid to my account as it has been occasioned by other commitments I have undertaken. My time will be too fully occupied with my new responsibilities for me to dedicate it to you as I had wished. It is a sadness to me that this must be so, but I must also confess that this is the only negative emotion that I seem to be able to admit at the moment, and in comparison with other things it seems to me a very minor one.

How can I begin to thank you for your wise counsel to me while at Longbourn, my dear Aunt. I had allowed myself to become somewhat despondent and your words renewed my hope. It was not the Professor, however,

Elizabeth had so planned her words and spaced her handwriting that the obverse of the first page of her letter should be filled at this point, requiring Mrs. Gardiner to turn to the reverse to read what followed:

it was the Prince, after all. I hereby invite you --all of you, I hope-- to my wedding to Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy, to be celebrated on the 14th day of January in this year of our Lord 1814, in the Longbourn parish church.

Mrs. Gardiner's hand flew to her mouth to cover the unrestrainable gasp of her surprise. She read the sentence once more, looked out the window with a big smile yet some concern in her expression, and then returned her eyes to her letter.

Oh, Aunt, I am so happy! It passes belief how much he loves me, and how dearly I have learnt to love him in so brief a span. Please do not be in any apprehension that I have taken leave of my senses or abandoned my good judgement. Circumstances which I cannot describe in this letter have made this a very different situation from the usual --we have, in a very real sense, not just days but many months of confirmation that ours will be a most blessed and happy union. I know that sounds mysterious and may itself give you to question my sanity, but I am most completely in my right mind. Jane, who knows the whole, agrees emphatically with the rightness of my choice, and Papa has willingly given us his blessing as well. Fitzwilliam (who will be calling on you soon --I asked him to contrive that this letter arrive first, however) and I hope to share our tale with you and my Uncle when you come. Your taking me to Pemberley in July of last year was a more important event than we dreamed.

Oh, Aunt, please do come a day or two early if at all possible, so that we may have time to talk comfortably of these matters.

As compensation for the inconvenience of your having to return to Hertfordshire not two weeks after your departure from said county, I hereby confirm the invitation to visit Pemberley when you pass through Derbyshire during the summer. Perhaps we can schedule it as a prelude to us all journeying together to the Lakes. You shall now be able to enjoy the visit to the house which was denied you on the previous occasion --I fully expect that the mistress of the house herself will deign to conduct you on the tour --now won't that be an honour and a condescension for you to tell Aunt Phillips about? She also intends to procure a small conveyance --a low phaeton, with a nice little pair of ponies, would be just the thing--, so that she may take you and the children on a fuller tour of the park than last time, without unduly wearying you. Despite the fact that you are only slightly ancient, and the inflammation of your joints has not yet progressed very far, I am sure you will not object to the convenience. After all, I, as the Princess Elizabeth, am happy to do everything possible for the comfort and pleasure of my Fairy Gardiner (as Prince Darcy has called you.)

Please bring with you when you come to Hertfordshire the letter from Olivia Kittredge, which I am sure you still retain, as it has had a minor but crucial role in my happiness. I shall titillate your imagination unbearably (and again provoke doubts as to my sanity) by anticipating one piece of the story and telling you that I now know whence it came and why the handwriting seemed familiar to me: it is my own!

The last sentence, of course, Elizabeth had written using her two-handed writing technique, then signed it with her normal flourish:

Elizabeth Bennet
(soon to be, most amazingly:
Elizabeth Darcy!)

When Mr. Darcy did appear on the Gardiners' doorstep later that afternoon, and sent in his card, he was greeted most warmly by Mrs. Gardiner, who offered him her delighted congratulations, mentioned that her husband was still at his place of business but should be home within the hour, and asked if it would be possible for him to remain for supper as she and Mr. Gardiner would very much appreciate his company and the opportunity to speak with him. He gladly accepted the invitation. He inquired after the children, and Alicia and Robert were summoned to see him. He ascertained that Alicia was using her spyglass to advantage, observing (besides the neighbours themselves) some starlings that had taken up their abode beside the chimney on their neighbours' house. Robert vouchsafed the information that he had nearly beaten his sister in a game of chess, which she rather fervently denied. The two younger Gardiners were also introduced to Mr. Darcy, but he did not have time to do more than greet them before the sound of Mr. Gardiner's arrival was heard at the front door.

"My dear," Mrs. Gardiner turned to him after proper greetings had been exchanged with Mr. Darcy, and all the young Gardiners had had a chance to embrace their Papa, "I received a letter with most unwelcome news today, from our niece Elizabeth. It seems she will not be joining us in March, as we had arranged, and she is also altering the arrangement for our travel this summer. She was most apologetic for oversetting our plans in such a way."

"Why, what has happened?" he asked, concerned.

"Perhaps you should sit down, my love, lest the news overcome you. Elizabeth informs us that she has agreed to take on other responsibilities which will conflict with those arrangements. What is more, she is asking us to return to Hertfordshire within the next few days, by next weekend at the latest. The fact is, she is to be married on next Friday, to a gentleman from the best of all counties, to wit, the Master of Pemberley."

The expressions of concern, consternation, surprise and delight that sequentially crossed Mr. Gardiner's countenance were of great satisfaction to his wife, and would have been to his niece as well. "Mr. Darcy!" he cried, springing to his feet and shaking Darcy's hand. "My congratulations, sir! I think you know well enough our opinion of our niece Elizabeth to know that, as we see it, you are carrying off the prize of the family, the most wonderful wife you could possibly have chosen."

"You will certainly hear no argument from me on that point!"

"Papa, is Mr. Darcy to marry Cousin Lizzy?"

"Yes, Alicia, he is to marry your cousin and so will himself be your cousin!"

"I shall like to have him for a cousin, I think. Will you teach me to play chess, sir? I need to keep ahead of my brother, and Cousin Lizzy was teaching him tricks to surprise me with."

"I think both your cousin Lizzy and I will be glad to help both of you improve your games. I am hoping your parents will bring you to Derbyshire this summer, and if you can tear yourselves away from the horses and the fishing pond and the streams, and the swings and the tree house, perhaps we can have some chess lessons at that time."

Robert thought the horses, the fishing pond and the tree house sounded even better than chess lessons.

After the children had left them, Mrs. Gardiner said, "Mr. Darcy, this is a very great surprise to us, albeit a very welcome one. Yours has been a rather unusual courtship, as Lizzy admits in her letter, though she waxes mysterious as to how it all came about. She wants us to come early to the wedding and promises to share the whole story with us, but I do not know if I can wait that long. Can you tell us at least some of it? What caused you to so immediately fix on our Lizzy as the woman you wanted for your wife?"

"It is a complex story, and a very surprising one --some parts of it so much so that they will be difficult to believe--, but I truly think it best to defer telling you the story until we are together with Elizabeth. I will only say that I learned to know her very well before I met her, before I came into Hertfordshire, through interaction with a mutual friend. I came to Meryton and Longbourn with very high hopes, and Elizabeth proved to be all I had, or could have, hoped for. I have never been more sure of anything in my life, than that she is the woman for me. I love her, and have asked her to marry me, and she has accepted me."

"We certainly look forward to hearing your story, Mr. Darcy. The details Elizabeth has let slip to us, obviously to torment and tease us, are indeed intriguing, and even mystifying."

"Yes, she took pleasure in the thought of tantalizing your curiosity, but rest assured, we both look forward very much to satisfying that curiosity, and exploring the story with you at length."

"Please pardon the direct and possibly offensive personal question, sir," said Mr. Gardiner, "but it is my concern for my niece that moves me to inquire. Is there any reason why the wedding must take place so quickly?" He eyed Mr. Darcy keenly to observe his reaction, and Darcy reflected that his new uncle had the instincts of a formidable businessman.

"It is only because we both wish to wed as soon as may be. I left Pemberley on short notice, and cannot stay away for a long period of time, and neither Elizabeth nor I wish to be separated by my return thither. Elizabeth also is content for the commotion of wedding preparations to be restricted to only a few days. We settled on the date in consultation with Mr. Bennet, and the three of us are very happy with it. I, indeed, find myself almost unable to believe my good fortune. To answer the question you may have implied and many will wonder about, it is not that there has been any untoward behaviour on our parts that might require us to wed early; we simply have no reason to wait, and find ourselves with no desire to do so; quite the contrary. I am glad to be perfectly frank with you, knowing you to be so beloved and respected by my Elizabeth, and, accordingly, I value your caring to inquire. I hope we will always be able to speak to each other so directly, sir. And madam.

"Given the short time at our disposal, perhaps I should best give you the letters I bring you from Mr. and Mrs. Bennet, and then, after you have read them, we can discuss how best to proceed. I expect to finish my business here in town by tomorrow. I should be glad, if it were possible, ma'am, to escort you into Hertfordshire on the day following, that Elizabeth might have your company for the whole week before we wed. I understand, Mr. Gardiner, that your business will probably make it difficult for you to come at the same time, though I know that Elizabeth is eager for your company as well."

"Well, we shall see. Let us read what my brother and sister have to say to us."

Mr. Bennet's missive was short and to the point; Mrs. Bennet's was more enthusiastic but accordingly more verbose, and less easy to follow and distil into useful form. After they had read them, and Mr. Gardiner had seen Lizzy's letter as well, the three resumed their conversation. It seemed that Mrs. Bennet had requested her sister's aid in procuring any number of items for the wedding breakfast, but also especially for Elizabeth's wedding dress. In the end it was decided that Mrs. Gardiner would ride to Hertfordshire on Friday, in one of Mr. Darcy's coaches, which would be coming from his town house, and accompanied by himself on horseback, weather permitting. She would bring a selection of the best fabrics from Mr. Gardiner's warehouses, along with a number of patterns that she would select, and there would go with them, besides various servants, a team of modiste and seamstresses whom Mr. Darcy would engage to travel to Meryton to make Elizabeth's dress and a dress for Mrs. Wickham. Mrs. Gardiner also engaged herself to procure other necessary or desirable items for Elizabeth's trousseau, and for the breakfast. Mr. Gardiner would follow mid-week, with the children.

The next morning, Darcy collected the documents that had been prepared for him, submitted the engagement notice for publication in the newspapers, and met with his uncle and aunt, the Earl of Marbury and his Countess, and his cousins, Viscount Winterford and Brigadier-General Roger Fitzwilliam,⁵ to inform them of his impending marriage. They were astounded, but recognising that Darcy had made up his mind, knowing that his position in society was already diminished through his sister's disastrous marriage, so much so that this alliance would not affect it unduly, and perceiving further how content, nay, how delighted he was, they resigned themselves to being happy about the news, and expressed their willingness to be present at the wedding and their anticipation of meeting their new niece and cousin.

Darcy's aunt Lady Catherine DeBourgh and her daughter were informed by letter (sent the previous day, so they knew as soon as their relatives), but as matters developed, preferred not to attend. Lady Catherine was indeed quite upset, as she had once harboured hopes of Darcy's offering for her daughter, but as time passed and her daughter's health deteriorated, those hopes had receded as well, and she had become resigned to the likelihood of his marrying elsewhere. Thus she was considerably less livid over the news than she would have been a few years earlier, and so her return missive, while not couched in complimentary terms (she spoke disparagingly of Darcy's demeaning himself by allying himself with the family of her parson, even while admitting that Mr. Collins' wife at least had a bit more sense than Mr. Collins himself, so perhaps her sister was not as bad as she might otherwise be), expressed acknowledgement of the fact that the marriage would take place, however ill-advised she thought it; and overall contained so little vitriol that no permanent rupture in the relationship between herself and her nephew was occasioned. Eventually she met the new Mrs. Darcy and after several years even came to like her more than the wives of her other nephews, as did Anne, insofar as her limited energy allowed her to.

Note:

⁵ No, his name was not Richard --where did you ever get the idea that it was? And the Matlock family were not the Fitzwilliams, but the Smythe-Joneses.

Chapter 18

The marriage of Elizabeth Bennet to Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy was the talk of all of Meryton, and much of Hertfordshire and even of certain circles in London, for many months. Taking place, as it did, a mere fortnight after the couple had met, there was, as Mr. Gardiner had surmised there would be, a surfeit of commentary, though not quite scandal, about the timing. Various uncomplimentary conjectures were, inevitably, circulated by those who did not know the principals, but those who had seen them together were almost unanimous in affirming that it was a love match. They did not entirely fit the normal pattern for besotted lovers: they remained, at least much of the time, aware of conversations around them and indeed somewhat attentive to them, and capable of catching nuances that others missed. Yet if they were in the same room their gazes never strayed long from each other, and they seemed to conduct whole conversations, ending with a smile or a raised eyebrow or a chuckle, without saying a word. Miss Bennet continued to be her merry, kind-hearted, playful self in her interactions with everyone; she just seemed even merrier and happier than before. Those who had known Mr. Darcy previously were more impressed by how he had changed: while still correct in all his interactions he was much more open about his feelings --his dimples sometimes appeared even when he was not with his fiancée, and his teeth were occasionally visible, when they were together, for they both seemed to be always either laughing or about to.

The novelty of a Special Licence was kept at the forefront of the attention of the populace of Meryton, if by nothing else, by the constant references of the bride's mother to it. Mrs. Bennet's greatest triumph, however, was the presence, at the wedding ceremony and the breakfast afterwards, of the groom's family: not only a Viscount and a Brigadier-General (the latter lately promoted in rank and distinguished by favourable mention in the dispatches from Vittoria and Bayonne), but also an Earl and a Countess. General Fitzwilliam was overheard, by Mrs. Phillips, lamenting to his cousin that there were no Bennet sisters left. He had at that time met only his cousin's fiancée and Mrs. Bingley, but the compliment was savoured by their mother and aunt on behalf of the whole bevy.

All five of the Bennet sisters were present at the wedding. Mr. Darcy had arranged for coaches to bring Mrs. Larch from Bath and Mrs. Collins from Kent; Mr. and Mrs. Haverford arrived from London in their own equipage. Charlotte Stanley also was enabled, by Mr. Darcy's provision, to journey from Lincoln so as to be present at her friend's wedding. Perhaps the most surprising visitors were Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Kittredge who, to Mrs. Gardiner's great delight, not only arrived in time for the wedding but subsequently passed several weeks with the Gardiners in London before returning to their home in Derbyshire. Having their expenses paid for such a journey might be considered a disproportionate reward for the trifling service of not having written a particular letter, but as Mary Collins has grown up and her husband is not present, we may perhaps leave the troubled moral to take care of itself.

The bride's dress, created as it was under the direction of a modiste from one of the finest dressmaking establishments in London, was a confection such as had never been seen in Meryton and thus must command respect, but Miss Overton's shop had the cachet of providing the bride's mother with her new dress, which was even finer, the mother far outshining the daughter in terms of the ribbons, eyelets, feathers, flounces, frills and furbelows, and even the jewels, which adorned her person.⁶ The bride's aunt, Mrs. Gardiner, although she was treated with almost as much deference as the bride's mother, was, rather unfortunately, dressed very simply, much like the bride herself.

There were so few other items, besides the dress, that had been new-made or bought for the bride's use that, as Mrs. Phillips remarked to Mrs. Long, provoking a smiling glance between Mrs. Wickham and her brother, who happened to overhear, such a simple collection hardly merited being called a trousseau. But the bride seemed blissfully unaware of the slight to her consequence constituted by this omission; indeed, she was heard to rejoice to her friend Charlotte that the wedding was accomplished with so little fuss.

Among the unconventional aspects of the wedding was the fact that the attendants of both bride and groom were married, as Mr. Bingley stood up for his friend and Mrs. Bingley for her sister. There was also a bit of confusion when the ring to be used in the ceremony had to be removed from the bride's finger, where it had been doing service as an engagement ring, before it could be replaced on her other hand as a wedding ring. The bride and groom seemed to be either gazing raptly at each other, during the whole ceremony from the moment the bride came down the aisle on her father's arm, or else exchanging looks or whispering things to each other that made each other smile and at least twice swallow their laughter lest it become irreverent. But none of these matters interfered with the legality of the proceedings, or detracted from the sincerity with which the vows were said, and when the couple were pronounced duly wedded and the documents attesting thereto were signed, there was no doubt that the deed was done, and many, including her mother, followed Miss Anne Elizabeth Wickham in clapping their hands and fairly crowing in delight.

The couple also broke with convention in taking the groom's sister and niece with them on their honeymoon, which, despite the groom's ample financial resources, consisted in nothing more than travel to their home in Derbyshire. But Mrs. Wickham was very considerate, so the nursemaid reported to the other servants once the party had arrived at Pemberley, and made no objections to staying in at the four inns where they stopped along the way, almost until noon on two of the days and till one o'clock on another.

And so, for the second time, Mrs. Elizabeth Darcy arrived at Pemberley.

Note:

⁶ In deference to the sensibilities of the father of the bride, there is here, be it noted, no mention made of lace.

This story is continued in the sequel: Intertwined Paths