Papa’s London solicitor arrived shortly after noon, with a heavy black briefcase full of papers. Many of these were of personal, and not merely financial, interest to Elizabeth as they included a notarized statement which her mother had made about her before she died, and statements about her manner of death, likewise notarized and made by the doctors and the innkeeper at the house where she’d died.
Her mother’s signature had been written clearly enough, though from what Papa said, it was signed less than three hours before the end.
Papa had been quite thorough at the time in preparing everything to make it as easy as possible to prove her identity for this lawsuit when the time came.
Robert and Darcy both signed statements about Lord Rochester acknowledging her to be his child that night at Lady Catherine’s, and that Lord Rochester had said that from her appearance there was no question that she was his daughter. Then Robert was questioned at some length abouthischildhood memories of Lady Elizabeth, including the time when Lord Rochester had beaten Lady Elizabeth and Lady Rochester.
Hearing this story repeated made the memory flash before her again. The feeling, the terror, the screams.
But the emotions that it usually brought up were muted and changed this time. Whenever she became too frightened, she remembered the way that Lord Rochester had looked in the reddish light of dusk as she pulled the trigger planning to kill him.
That memory, and the sensations it evoked were by no means wholly pleasant.
But her old sensation of being a helpless child could not exist at the same time as a memory of confidently shooting at the man who had once tormented her.
After Mr. Harris finished questioning Robert, he turned to Elizabeth, and she was minutely questioned about her memories of her childhood—bits were coming back. She recalled particular pieces of furniture, particular trees and locations, and two arrangements of things that Robert could confirm hadoncebeen that way, but which had been wholly changed over the last fifteen years.
And she was asked about her memories of being beaten.
The locket was brought forward and shown, and Robert was able to confirm that it was a painting of the second Lady Rochester.
Before the lawyer finished questioning Elizabeth, an arrival occurred which made pursuing a court case to gain Elizabeth’s fortune unnecessary.
“Mary! Mary!” Mrs. Bennet cried out as soon as her daughter stepped from the carriage, followed by Mr. Collins carrying a fine leather document case. “You’ll not believe what a todo we have had here! Mr. Bennet’s Lizzy is actually Lady Elizabeth, the daughter of the Earl of Rochester! And she is to have forty thousand! Can you believe it?”
“I can very well believe it,” Mary said smiling at her mother, her sisters, and Elizabeth. “I was there when she discovered the fact.”
“Oh, yes,” Mrs. Bennet said, clearly chagrined at not being the one to share this most astonishing news first. “And this is her brother! She has a brother. He is Lord Hartley. My Lord, I hope you will not be offended if I introduce my daughter, Mrs. Collins to you.”
“Hello, I am very glad to seeyouagain,” Robert replied. “Thought we’d already been introduced by Darcy. I suppose it is easy enough to mistake these things.”
“Now, now, be nice,” Elizabeth told Robert as she went to embrace Mary. “But please tell me that you have not had any serious difficulties with Lady Catherine? What does Lord Rochester mean to do? Is he organizing a lawsuit, or a raiding party, or—”
Papa laughed. “A raiding party? We are not in one of Walter Scott’s novels.”
Everyone laughed.
Mary cheerfully said, “Quite the opposite. We have been sent as friendly messengers. Ah—” She looked at Papa’s solicitor, not recognizinghim.
“My London solicitor, Mr. Harris. He is here to begin the process of claiming Lizzy’s fortune.”
“Ah, of course.” Mary turned to her husband. “Give him those papers that Lady Catherine and Lord Rochester hadprepared. I believe he shall be the person that Elizabeth will wish to look them over to ensure they are all in order.”
After saying that, Mary handed Elizabeth a folded paper with a very elaborate seal in red wax that Elizabeth imagined to be familiar.
“It is from him,” Mary said, “but the letter is in my hand. He dictated it to me, as he had a mild attack of apoplexy that evening, some two hours after you left. Right hand was too stiff for him to write. There is nothing in it, I think, that shall give you particular unhappiness.” To both Robert and Elizabeth, she said, “I fear that this may be unpleasant news, but the doctor worries that another such attack is not unlikely, and that the next might carry him off. He did not look to be a healthy man.”
Elizabeth also did not know if that was in fact unpleasant news to her.
If Lord Rochester did not intend to abduct her, or bother her in some other way, and Mary’s manner suggested that he did not, it was a matter of indifference to Elizabeth if he lived or died.
Yet, she had some curiosity to know a little more of the man whose child she was.
“It is my honor,” Mr. Collins bowed deeply to the lawyer, “to convey to you papers of some importance which have been entrusted to me by his Lordship, the Earl of Rochester. He gave me such a noble duty, upon the recommendation of my noble patroness, the Lady Catherine de Bourgh, whose fame I am sure you, and all in London, must know.”
The lawyer looked rather askance at Mr. Collins, but he took the fine leather document case with his own small incline of the head. Clearly Mr. Harris was more used to dealing with persons such as Mr. Bennet. Mary showed no signs of consciousness at seeing her husband speak in such a way, which made Elizabeth happy.
Robert looked at Mary suspiciously. “What is my father doing?”
