Chapter 22 Happy Was The Day

Standing in the parlor of Darcy House, Elizabeth’s stomach clenched with dread. A watercolor landscape of an idyllic hillside at eye-level on the patterned wall refreshed her memories of walking with Mr. Darcy on Oakham Mount. But her insides rolled and twisted as her emotions vexed her conscience. 

That afternoon in Cheapside, her father made another attempt to dissuade her from marrying Mr. Darcy. At first, she had been forced to humor her father in his complaints and vitriol against the gentleman that had done so much for the Bennet family. Mr. Bennet argued the lack of altruism on Mr. Darcy’s part somehow meant the man’s love for her derived from a selfish source: his own happiness. Unwilling to jeopardize her larger aim of using her father’s prejudices against Mr. Darcy to hasten her marriage to him, she held back the defenses she might have made for Fitzwilliam’s character. The exercise left her feeling disloyal to both men.

Aunt Gardiner warned her that upon marriage, she would have to choose her new husband over her family that she had loved and relied upon all of her life. Yet no matter how angry she felt on their behalf against her father, her heart could not breed contempt. She simply could not jettison her entire family for a man she’d known for just a year. She would have to find a middle ground.

Mrs. Gardiner smiled at her niece from the position she had taken across the room. As they had both visited Pemberley, neither expected the townhouse to be small, but Elizabeth would need to make a great shout for her aunt to hear her clearly. The expansively elegant room swallowed sound with the large oriental across the floor, heavy drapes across the windows facing the street, and three separate clusters of furnishings for seating purposes.

Closing her eyes, Elizabeth sighed. Her plan was simple: Aunt Gardiner would sit with her in the parlor. Mr. Bennet and Mr. Gardiner would ask to speak to Mr. Darcy in his study. They would explain that she held apprehensions about the statements she was to sign for a sum of money she was not to understand until after she signed the papers. 

As she waited for Mr. Darcy to be sent in to speak with her, Elizabeth’s commitment to her secret plan wavered. But there was no question in her mind or heart that Fitzwilliam was worthy. She had to take the risk. 

She stood and began to walk the circuit of the room. As she neared her aunt, she realized her courage had risen to the occasion.

“When Mr. Darcy comes in, I need you to leave,” she said.

“Lizzy! That is a very unwise choice. You and Mr. Darcy can sit on the far side and have your discussion,” she began as her niece shook her head.

“We’ve been alone countless times before, walking in the countryside, even at his aunt’s gardens in Kent. I do not seek vengeance, but an understanding with him. The point is for him to realize how he places unnecessary obstacles between us, and I wish to help him see an end to it.”

Mrs. Gardiner groaned. She had been against the plan all along, finding her brother-in-law’s insulted vanity no reason to argue with an ends all benefited from even if the means left much to be desired. 

“Please,” Elizabeth begged her aunt, “let me talk to him plainly, just as I will in a few weeks as his wife.”

“But your reputation,” Mrs. Gardiner began and her niece laughed, just as the door to the parlor opened and the impeccably dressed Mr. Darcy appeared, looking as though someone had told him Elizabeth had died. Both women gasped at the sight, and Mrs. Gardiner wordlessly rose from her seat to approach him. When the couple locked gazes, she didn’t bother to say anything in greeting the man who had invited her and her husband to such a lovely evening. Instead, she dared to place a motherly pat on his shoulder and urged him to approach Elizabeth. 

Dumbstruck, he did so in a few plodding steps as Elizabeth blushed. Confident her niece would seek reconciliation, Mrs. Gardiner closed the door behind her and scampered quickly across the foyer to the butler. Briefly explaining the ruse to give Mr. Darcy and Miss Bennet a few moments to discuss private matters, he aided Mrs. Gardiner to a hiding spot near the dining room that was for ladies’ resting during a ball. 

Inside the parlor, Elizabeth broke the awkwardness between herself and Fitzwilliam by rushing to his arms after the door closed. It had been too many days since they had been afforded any kind of privacy for the physical reassurance they both craved. Her form fit his just as it had so many other times when walking in her father’s woods to hiking together on Oakham Mount.

At first, her husband-to-be remained stiff, but as her hands roamed the back of his coat, an exploration that won over any objection in his mind, he relaxed. Gently, he bent his head as she tipped her face towards his, and they shared a kiss that burned with a more intense passion than the first time they kissed over a month ago. One kiss led to two, and then their tongues meeting for a more fervent expression of ardor, until finally, both breathless from the exercise, they parted. But he held her close as his other yearnings began to stir in his body, focusing his eyes on the art hanging on the wall across from him. To distract himself, Darcy tried to recall the painter, and when he could not, he chuckled.

“You laugh, sir?” she asked, leaning back to allow her voice to carry and not be muffled against his chest.

“Only at my own folly. I believed your father and uncle for a moment, that you were unsure of our match,” he said, and Elizabeth laughed, nervously. The different rhythm and tone to her chuckle caught his attention. She pulled gently to break away, and he released her, but she grasped his hand.

“Come, sit with me over here and we should talk,” she said, spying the look of abject horror on his face. “Oh, I am marrying you and no other, sir!” she said, bombastically, and watched as the breath he had been holding escaped with a small gasp. “But there are matters we need to settle between us.”

Mr. Darcy nodded and followed his future wife to the corner of the room where a small door lay.

“Where does this go?” she asked.

“A servant’s hall, then out to the courtyard. But why?”

Elizabeth nibbled upon her lower lip as she thought, her plan suddenly escalating to a much grander overture than merely a few minutes of privacy in the parlor. She needed to confess all to him. 

“Because my aunt is not standing guard outside the door, and we won’t be given the time I wish for a proper discussion,” she said, with a wink.

Suddenly, Mr. Darcy understood. But to be sure, he wished to ask her. “You know what this will do?”

“Do you have the special license?”

“Yes,” he said, pulling her closer to him, this time allowing there to be no mistaking his body’s building desires.

“Then there is no impediment. Tonight’s planned ruse allowed me to extract a promise from my father that you and I will marry with the Bingleys as soon as we return to Hertfordshire.”

“You mean—” he began, but a sound in the foyer reminded him of the more urgent need of their escape. 

He had been such a fool to believe for one moment that Elizabeth would not stand faithful to him! He opened the door, kissed her hand, and then led her down the very tight hall running between rooms from a remodel in his parents’ tenure.

As they raced down the hall, muffled voices behind them sounded angry. Then the door rattled behind them.

“This way,” he urged, and Elizabeth’s tinkling laughter lifted his spirits just it had earlier in their romance. At the end of the corridor, he pulled her to the left, down a set of steps, and out another door. Suddenly, they were in the small alleyway used by servants and merchants alike between the great houses. But the chill meant they needed to find a warmer place to talk.

Dashing across the mews, Fitzwilliam led her to a carriage and pulled open the door. The inside was slightly warmer than outside and afforded them a hiding place for the inevitable search going on inside the house. The stableboy that spied the master hiding with his lady calmly closed the heavy wooden door of the carriage house, obscuring the couple even further from sight.

The sudden darkness frightened Elizabeth until Fitzwilliam’s arms comforted her by placing a lap robe around them both. The excitement of it all and coldness made her shiver and then babble her plan to him as he sought her lips with his own.

“I used my father’s vanity . . .” she managed as his lips found hers for a brief kiss. She remained undeterred to get her message through. “To let him think . . . I wanted to teach you . . .” She gasped for breath as speaking between kisses proved difficult. “So that he would agree for us to marry sooner,” she managed before Mr. Darcy grew impatient with the short kisses and held Elizabeth close to insist upon a longer, deeper exchange of affection.

Their body heat finally began to warm the cool space of the carriage, aided by the thick, wool blanket that ensconced them both. Elizabeth relaxed, no longer fearing a sudden discovery that would interrupt their time together. 

“Must we wed with your sister and Bingley? We could marry tomorrow!” he said, pressing his forehead against hers as they both adjusted to seeing in the low light. He raised his ungloved hand and gently stroked her cheek with his thumb.

“If we are marrying tomorrow, I must sign those papers,” she said, suddenly liking his plan much better than hers.

Mr. Darcy pressed a kiss to her forehead and then pulled back slightly, recalling his curiosities about that matter. “What gave you pause?”

Elizabeth’s stiffened her posture as she had not anticipated reaching that topic so suddenly. She leaned forward and used her beloved’s methods of distraction against him: she kissed him, stunning him until he relaxed into the kiss, relishing her body weight pushing his against the corner of the bench.

He moaned as her kisses deepened and her left hand grasped his thigh to keep steady.

“Elizabeth!” He managed, reaching down to place his hand over hers, directing her further up his leg to an area desperate for pressure. 

A loud sound startled them both as the mews door opened and the Darcy staff brought in a new horse. The interruption was enough to make Mr. Darcy’s blood run cold.

“My aunt and uncle have arrived,” he stated. Then he remembered his original query. “Why did you not sign the papers with Mr. Lamont?”

“I-I,” Elizabeth stammered, but then took a deep breath and her explanation tumbled out of her mouth. “I am uncomfortable that Mr. Lamont made it clear I would be barred from discussing the particulars of the privilege with anyone, including you.”

A silence fell between them as the Darcy staff continued their duties tending to the horses of the visitor, and in the improved lighting, Elizabeth could see her future husband smiling.

“You worried about not being able to discuss the privilege with me? You can always come to me for any matter that concerns you. What is shared between husband and wife is sacred.”

Elizabeth sighed with relief. “So you are not angry that I wished to discuss the matter with you first?” she asked, testing the boundaries of trust they were slowly shoring up between them.

“Not at all! I should like you to come to me for anything. But also know, that there will be matters, naturally, that we do not discuss with one another.”

“Oh?”

“Yes, I mean, once the mystery of the privilege,” he said, clearing his throat, as he spied the small side door open to the mews. “is revealed, you may find it not so consequential after all,” he finished, as a man entered the mews with a particular swagger Darcy recognized. Quickly, he kissed Elizabeth again, just as a knock on the carriage door sounded.

“But, Mr. Lamont hinted the trust was substantial,” Elizabeth said, with a slight quiver to her voice, suddenly confused about the entire thing. Was the privilege an ill-gotten fortune so vast it required secrecy? Or was it not?

“Yes, yes, the man is the agent for it, I’m sure by his standards, the funds are substantial. But please,” he managed as more knocking came and a muffled demand for Darcy to open the carriage door. Fitzwilliam grasped the inside handle and held fast. “Please do not be disappointed if the fund is less than you expected. As my father said, many generations of Darcy women have spent from it,” Mr. Darcy managed before he could not keep his grip on the door and the portal flew open under the strength of the outside interloper.

Elizabeth leaned forward, blinking a moment before recognizing a familiar face she felt happy to see. 

“Colonel!” She exclaimed.

“Miss Bennet,” he offered, bowing low, and then offering a hand to assist the lady down.

Reluctantly, Mr. Darcy sat back to allow Elizabeth to exit the disabled vehicle first, and adjusted his breeches. With a deep sigh, he listened to the friendly banter between his betrothed and cousin.

“You two have put the house in an uproar. I tip my hat to you,” Colonel Fitzwilliam said, offering a swift nod to the woman he respected greatly.

“I’m surprised it took this long for a search party,” she teased back.

He leaned closer to her, just as Mr. Darcy poked his head out of the disabled carriage. “My cousin’s staff valiantly feigned a few excuses, and I believe a stable hand even made your father believe you two left in a carriage.”

Elizabeth gasped, “Is he cross?”

“Very.”

Mr. Darcy stood at his full height and placed a protective hand on the small of Elizabeth’s back, standing next to her in a clear declaration of his affinity to her.

“Did they leave?” Mr. Darcy asked, and Elizabeth looked up at him in horror as the thought had not entered her mind.

Colonel Fitzwilliam shook his head. “Perhaps there was a consideration of such a maneuver, but I believe the Gardiners convinced him otherwise. Might be a tad shabby to care not a whit for two adventurous daughters,” he said, with a wink.

The comparison to Lydia gave Elizabeth’s stomach a lurch of nausea, though she felt more incensed that her Mr. Darcy could be compared to the dastardly Mr. Wickham that convinced a minor to run off to London with him. “Then I believe my adventure is over, for I have claimed my prize,” she explained, grasping Mr. Darcy’s hand so that they could follow the Colonel’s lead to go back into the house.

While crossing the courtyard, neither Darcy nor Elizabeth looked up to see the stern faces of their elders glaring from the windows. Instead, they laughed at the Colonel’s jokes, scared a poor kitchen maid going up the stairs, and just as they reached the stairs that led up to the dining room, Mr. Darcy held Elizabeth back one extra moment.

“Tomorrow?” he asked, huskily, into her ear.

As the Colonel turned around to see what the delay was, as nearly a crowd waited in the dining room behind him, anxious to upbraid the young couple, Elizabeth grinned and then turned around on the stairs.

“Tomorrow,” she said, and then felt a small pat on her bum as she hurried up the remaining last steps, with Mr. Darcy just behind her.