Searching for Pemberley

While I had been enjoying the gardens, Pamela had returned to the parking area to have a cigarette. Walking down the long drive, I could hear the sound of the carriage wheels and horses’ hooves as they made their way up the hill, carrying couples to a night’s entertainment. Welcoming them was Elizabeth Darcy, dressed in an elegant but simple ivory-colored Empire dress, while Fitzwilliam Darcy was outfitted in clothing made popular by Beau Brummel: jacket, waistcoat, neckcloth, breeches, and high leather boots.

I found Pamela talking to a man who introduced himself as Donald Caton. “As I have been explaining to your friend, many scholars who have studied Jane Austen’s writings believe her model for Pemberley was Chatsworth, the home of the Dukes of Devonshire, and one of the largest estates in the country. When people look at Montclair, they are disappointed because they are expecting Chatsworth.” I assured Mr. Caton I was not in the least disappointed.

After a long pause, Mr. Caton said, “You’re probably wondering if these stories about the Darcys can possibly be true.” Pointing down the hill in the direction of a nearby town, Mr. Caton continued, “There is a couple who lives in the village of Crofton by the name of Crowell. Mr. Crowell and his family have been associated with this estate for generations. He most firmly believes Montclair is Pemberley. You might want to talk to him.”

Following Mr. Caton’s directions, Pamela and I found where the Crowells lived, just outside the village proper in a lovely home called Crofton Wood, set back from the main road. The front of the house was covered in vines with small yellow flowers, and purple and yellow flowers lined the stone path to their door. A man, whom I assumed to be Mr. Crowell, was standing outside the front door smoking a cigarette.

“Mr. Crowell, you don’t know me. I’m Maggie Joyce, but I was wondering if…” But that was as far as I got.

“You’re here about the Darcys, right? Don Caton rang me to let me know you might be coming ’round. Come through. Any friend of Jane Austen’s is a friend of mine.”

Jack Crowell was a tall man in his mid-fifties with dark graying hair, piercing blue eyes, and the ruddy complexion of someone who enjoyed the outdoors. He explained that coffee was still hard to come by but that he had brewed up some tea.

“I grew up in Stepton,” Pamela said while pouring out, “but I’m living in London now. I’d like to move back home at some point, but there are no jobs to be had. So I’ll stay in London and type, type, type for the crotchety old solicitor I’m working for. I’m not complaining, though. My boyfriend was demobbed out of the Army six months ago, and the only work he can find is the odd construction job. We can’t get married until he finds work, and right now my chances on that score are crap.”

Pamela was definitely not shy, and she quickly proved it when she asked Mr. Crowell if the chicken coops we had seen from the road belonged to him. After he acknowledged that they were, she said, “I haven’t eaten an egg that came out of the arse of a chicken in a year. All we ever get is that powdered stuff.”

After Jack stopped laughing, he told her he would send her home with at least a half dozen eggs. After thanking Mr. Crowell for the eggs, Pamela said she remembered the harvest festivals the Pratts had hosted in late summer.

“That was a tradition of long standing,” Mr. Crowell explained. “My father was the butler up at Montclair, and my mother was the housekeeper. We lived below stairs in the senior servants’  quarters. We loved it. Great place for my brother and me to run around and explore — lots of nooks and crannies. “When I was a lad, every August, the Laceys invited the locals up to the house to celebrate ‘Harvest Home.’ Everyone had a job to do. The two oldest Lacey boys were in charge of games, the daughter told fortunes in one of the smaller marquees, and the youngest son was an artist who would make funny sketches of the children. My brother, Tom, and I would take all the young ones for pony rides around the fountain on a tether. If the wind was blowing, they’d get wet from the spray, and the kiddies would all squeal with delight.

The largest marquee was where all of the food was served, with roast beef and ham, plum puddings, loaves and loaves of bread, fresh fruit, petit fours, and all the lemonade you could drink. There were about a dozen or so tables out on the lawn, all covered with white linen, and Sir Edward and his wife would walk the grounds making sure that everyone had enough to eat and were enjoying themselves.”

After refilling my cup and adding the milk for me, Mr. Crowell asked what I thought of Montclair and if it measured up to Jane Austen’s Pemberley. I said that it did, but I also told him that I doubted Jane Austen had used real people for her novels. Certain people may have influenced her writing, but it seemed impossible to me that there was such a person as Mr. Darcy.

Mr. Crowell, who insisted that I call him Jack, said, “It’s not my job to convince you, Maggie, but I have a feeling you want to be convinced.”

“I would think that if people believed Montclair was actually Pemberley, they would be beating a path to its door.”

“You’d be wrong, my dear. Here’s what I think,” he said, settling back into his chair. “Jane Austen didn’t want her identity known. When Pride and Prejudice was published, she identified herself only as ‘the author of Sense and Sensibility.’ Originally, her writings were for the entertainment of her family, but they convinced Jane that her stories should be published. She had a decent-sized following before Queen Victoria’s reign. However, most Victorians didn’t take to her. Silly mother, a lazy father, a fallen sister who wasn’t punished. The Victorians would have had the deflowered Lydia dying in the snow on the road to Longbourn. No, they were too serious for someone as lighthearted as Jane.”

“People started to rediscover her in the 1900s, but then came The Great War. Ten men from Crofton were killed outright. There’s a memorial dedicated to them on the village green.” After Jack mentioned the war, there was a long pause before he continued, and I had no doubt that someone he cared about was on that memorial. “The walking wounded, widows, and orphans were everywhere. No one was thinking about Jane’s tale of two lovers. Then it was the Depression, and right after that, we were again at war. Not much time for Jane.”

“Is there anything to support your idea that the Laceys and Darcys are one and the same?”

“It’s more than an idea, Maggie. My family has worked at Montclair longer than anyone can remember. My father’s father worked for the Laceys. He had met the Binghams, or the Bingleys, as Jane Austen called them. These stories were all passed down.”

But would Jane Austen have written a novel that often ridiculed people who could possibly be identified by their neighbors, for example, Mrs. Bennet, with her fragile nerves and poor judgment?

“Do you know when Jane first wrote the novel?” he asked.

“When she was twenty, so that would be about 1795.”

“But it wasn’t published until 1813,” Jack said, jumping in quickly. “By that time, the Laceys had been married for twenty years! If anyone was trying to figure out if these characters were real, they would have been looking at people in their twenties in 1813. Some of the characters in that book were already dead and buried by the time Pride and Prejudice was published.”

I was enjoying our conversation so much that I almost forgot about Pamela. She had sat there quietly for a while, but once Jack and I started talking about Pride and Prejudice, she started to walk around the room, looking at family pictures. I hoped she wouldn’t start opening drawers which, with Pamela, was a possibility. There was so much I wanted to ask Mr. Crowell, but Pamela had promised her brother she would have the car back to him by 7:00.

“Not to worry. If Pamela wants to go on ahead, I can drive you over to Stepton myself. Besides, I’d like you to meet my wife. She’s very keen on people who are interested in Elizabeth Bennet’s story.” After some discussion, I accepted Mr. Crowell’s offer, and Pamela left with her six eggs.

Shortly after Pamela drove off, Mrs. Crowell came in carrying groceries. Following a brief conversation with her husband and after handing him her shopping bags, Mrs. Crowell introduced herself. She was a very attractive woman with light brown hair, cut in a short, simple style, which accentuated beautiful dark eyes. She was wearing black slacks and an ivory turtleneck sweater, and after she sat down in a chair across from me, she pulled her long legs back so that she was almost sitting sideways. Obviously, this was someone who had been taught that a lady never crossed her legs.

“On its face, it seems difficult to believe. But I grew up very near to this village, and it has been a part of my family lore for generations.” Mrs. Crowell was even more sincere than her husband.

I realized how late it was only when Mrs. Crowell said she was going to start dinner. I was sure I had overstayed my welcome, and I had to get back to Pamela’s house.

“You are welcome to stay the night,” Mrs. Crowell offered. “We have a guest bedroom with its own bath, and please call me Beth.”

Jack jumped in. “I’ll ring over to Stepton. You can tell your friend that I’ll have you back at her house in time for the evening train to London. No worries.”

“I can hardly believe I’m saying this, but I accept.”

After dinner, the Crowells and I returned to the living room for tea. The remainder of the evening was spent discussing how it was that Jane Austen’s Fitzwilliam Darcy, a member of the privileged landed gentry, came to know Charles Bingley, the son of a man who had made his fortune in trade. Jack related the events that led to the lifelong friendship of the real William Lacey and Charles Bingham.