3

Jane, who had never since her marriage spent a night away from her husband’s side, spent restless hours on the couch by Lydia’s bed, her brief periods of slumber broken by the need to check that Lydia was sleeping. Dr McFee’s sedative had been effective and Lydia slept soundly, but at half-past five stirred into life and demanded that she be taken at once to her husband. For Jane this was a natural and reasonable request, but she felt it wise to warn Lydia gently that Wickham was unlikely to be yet awake. Lydia was not prepared to wait, so Jane helped her to dress – a lengthy process since Lydia insisted on looking her best, and considerable time was taken in rummaging through her trunk and in holding up different gowns to demand Jane’s opinion, discarding others in a heap on the floor and fussing over her hair. Jane wondered whether she would be justified in waking Bingley but, going out to listen, she could hear no sound from the next room and was reluctant to disturb his sleep. Surely being with Lydia when she first saw her husband after his ordeal was women’s work, and she should not presume on Bingley’s unfailing good nature for her own comfort. Eventually Lydia was satisfied with her appearance and, taking their lighted candles, they made their way along dark passages to the room where Wickham was being held.

It was Brownrigg who let them in, and at their entrance Mason, who was asleep in his chair, woke with a start. After that there was chaos. Lydia rushed to the bed where Wickham was still asleep, flung herself over him as if he were dead and began weeping in apparent anguish. It was minutes before Jane could gently draw her from the bed and murmur that it would be better if she came back later when her husband would be awake and able to speak to her. Lydia, after a final burst of crying, allowed herself to be led back to her room where Jane was at last able to calm her and ring for an early breakfast for them both. It was promptly brought in by Mrs Reynolds, not by the usual servant, and Lydia, viewing the carefully chosen delicacies with evident satisfaction, discovered that grief had made her hungry and ate avidly.

Breakfast over, Lydia’s mood fluctuated with outbursts of weeping, self-pity, terror of the future for herself and her dearest Wickham, and resentment against Elizabeth. If she and her husband had been invited to the ball, as they should have been, they would have arrived the next morning by the proper approach. They had only come through the woodland because her arrival had to be a surprise, otherwise Elizabeth would probably never have let her in. It was Elizabeth’s fault that they had to hire a hackney chaise and stay at the Green Man, which was not at all the kind of inn she and dear Wickham liked. If Elizabeth had been more generous in helping them they could have afforded to stay on Friday night at the King’s Arms at Lambton, one of the Pemberley carriages would have been sent the next day to take them to the ball, Denny wouldn’t have travelled with them and none of this trouble would have happened. Jane had to hear it all, and with pain; as was usual, she tried to soothe away resentment, counsel patience and encourage hope, but Lydia was in too full enjoyment of her grievance to listen to reason or to welcome advice.

None of this was surprising. Lydia had disliked Elizabeth from childhood and there could never have been sympathy or close sisterly affection between such disparate characters. Lydia, boisterous and wild, vulgar in speech and behaviour, unresponsive to any attempts to control her, had been a continual embarrassment to the two elder Miss Bennets. She was her mother’s favourite child and they were, in fact, much alike, but there were other reasons for the antagonism between Elizabeth and the younger sister. Lydia suspected, and with reason, that Elizabeth had attempted to persuade her father to forbid her to visit Brighton. Kitty had reported that she had seen Elizabeth knocking at the library door and being admitted to the sanctum, a rare privilege since Mr Bennet was adamant that the library was the one room in which he could hope for solitude and peace. To attempt to deny Lydia any pleasure on which she had set her heart ranked high in the catalogue of sisterly offences and it was a matter of principle for Lydia that it should never be forgiven or forgotten.

And there was another cause for a dislike close to enmity: Lydia knew that her elder sister had been singled out by Wickham as his acknowledged favourite. On one of Lydia’s visits to Highmarten, Jane had heard her talking to the housekeeper. It was the same Lydia, self-serving and indiscreet. “Of course, Mr Wickham and I will never be invited to Pemberley. Mrs Darcy is jealous of me and everyone at Meryton knows why. She was wild for Wickham when he was stationed at Meryton and would have had him if she could. But he chose elsewhere – lucky me! And anyway, Elizabeth would never have taken him, not without money, but if there had been money she would be Mrs Wickham by choice. She only married Darcy – a horrid, conceited, bad-tempered man – because of Pemberley and all his money. Everyone at Meryton knows that too.”

This involvement of her housekeeper in the family’s private concerns, and the mixture of untruths and vulgarity with which Lydia passed on her heedless gossip caused Jane to reconsider the wisdom of accepting so readily her sister’s usually unannounced visits, and she resolved to discourage them in future for Bingley’s and her children’s sakes as well as for her own. But one further visit must be endured. She had promised to convey Lydia to Highmarten when, as arranged, she and Bingley left Pemberley on Sunday afternoon, and she knew how greatly Elizabeth’s difficulties would be eased without Lydia’s constant demands for sympathy and attention and her erratic outbursts of noisy grief and querulous complaining. Jane had felt helpless in the face of the tragedy overshadowing Pemberley but this small service was the least she could do for her beloved Elizabeth. 

4

Elizabeth slept fitfully with brief periods of blessed unconsciousness broken by nightmares which jolted her into wakefulness and to an awareness of the real horror which lay like a pall over Pemberley. Instinctively she reached out for her husband, only to recall that he was spending the night with Colonel Fitzwilliam in the library. The impulse to get out of bed and pace about the room was almost uncontrollable, but she tried again to settle into sleep. The linen sheets, usually so cool and comforting, had been twisted into a confining rope and the pillows, filled with the softest down feathers, seemed hard and hot, requiring constant shaking and turning to make them comfortable.

Her thoughts turned to Darcy and the colonel. It was absurd that they were sleeping, or attempting to sleep, in what must be some discomfort, especially after such an appalling day. And what had Colonel Fitzwilliam had in mind to propose such a scheme? She knew that it had been his idea. Did he have something important to communicate to Darcy and needed a few uninterrupted hours with him? Could he be providing some explanation of that mysterious ride into the night, or had the confidence something to do with Georgiana? Then it occurred to her that his motive might have been to prevent her and Darcy having some time in private together; since the return of the search party with Denny’s body, she and her husband had hardly had a chance for more than a few minutes’ confidential talk. She thrust the idea aside as ridiculous and tried again to settle herself for sleep.

Although she knew that her body was exhausted, her mind had never been more active. She thought of how much had to be done before the arrival of Sir Selwyn Hardcastle. Fifty households would have to be notified of the cancellation of the ball and it would have been pointless to deliver letters last night when most of the recipients would undoubtedly have been in bed; perhaps she should have stayed up even later and at least made a start on the task. But there was a more immediate responsibility which she knew must be the earliest to be faced. Georgiana had gone early to bed and would know nothing of the night’s tragedy. Since his attempted seduction of her eleven years earlier, Wickham had never been received at Pemberley or his name mentioned. The whole incident was treated as if it had never taken place. She knew that Denny’s death would increase the pain of the present while rekindling the unhappiness of the past. Did Georgiana retain any affection for Wickham? How, especially now with two suitors in the house, would she cope with seeing him again and in such circumstances of suspicion and horror? Elizabeth and Darcy planned to see all members of the household together as soon as the servants’ breakfast was over to break the news of the tragedy, but it would be impossible to keep the arrival of Lydia and Wickham secret from the maids who, from five o’clock onwards, would be busy cleaning and tidying the rooms and lighting fires. She knew that Georgiana woke early and that her maid would draw back the curtains and bring in her morning tea promptly at seven. It was she, Elizabeth, who must speak to Georgiana before someone else inadvertently blurted out the news.

She looked at the small gilt clock on her bedside table and saw that the time was fifteen minutes past six. Now, when it was important not to fall asleep, she felt that sleep could at last come, but she needed to be fully awake before seven and, ten minutes before the hour, she lit her candle and made her way quietly along the passageway to Georgiana’s room. Elizabeth had always woken early to the familiar sounds of the house coming alive, greeting each day with the sanguine expectation of happiness, the hours filled with the duties and pleasures of a community at peace with itself. Now she could hear soft distant noises like the scratching of mice, which meant that the housemaids were already busy. She was unlikely to encounter them on this floor, but if she did, they would smile and flatten themselves against the wall as she passed.