“Much as she is now—kind, headstrong, adventurous. In looks, I suppose there has been some little change,” Mr. Gardiner teased with a smile aimed at his blushing niece. “Her dark curls were so delightful—a riot of ringlets that framed her round little face, and I believe it was then that you lost both of your front teeth.”
“Oh no, that is a trial,” Georgiana commiserated.
The rest of the party, gathered in a small circle on the blankets, appeared quite interested in the tales of young Lizzy Bennet.
“I confess to great enjoyment in her attempts to pronounce certain words—particularly her own name,” Mr. Gardiner confessed.
“Uncle!” Elizabeth protested.
“I apologise, my dear, do go on with your story.”
“Very well,” Lizzy conceded, looking quickly at her Mr. Darcy, who sat on the edge of the blanket beside hers, his long legs tucked off to one side, his back straight. His posture was relaxed and yet formal somehow. “I found a wounded furry creature in the barn a few weeks before my birthday. I brought it milk and scraps from the kitchen, and after a few days, it let me tend to its wounded paw. I would sneak off to play with him several times a day, and I became quite attached.”
“Of course you were!” Georgiana sympathised.
“What kind of creature was it?” her Mr. Darcy asked.
“I thought it was a puppy,” she hedged.
“You thought?” Mr. Barlow asked, smiling as he helped himself to one of the ripe strawberries arrayed on a silver platter on the table beside him.
“Yes, I ask you all to remember my age. I was six.”
“And six-year-old Lizzy thought she had found a puppy that turned out to be a . . . “ her Mr. Darcy prompted.
“A fox,” she admitted on a laugh. “He looked remarkably similar to a collie the family at Pulvis Lodge had adopted the previous year.”
“Completely understandable,” Georgiana defended her friend.
“You attempted to bring this fox-dog into your house?” Mr. Barlow asked.
“I did,” Elizabeth admitted, smiling at the memory. “By then he was letting me hold him and eating out of my hand. I was so proud of how I had trained him—he would follow me about the yard. I was sure they would let me keep him.”
“That is impressive,” her Mr. Darcy said. Elizabeth blushed and her stomach lurched. Her strong reactions to anything and everything he said and did were at once thrilling and aggravating.
“I assure you my sister did not think so,” Mr. Gardiner said with a laugh. “I had come to stay with my sister’s family for a time. I had only met Jane and Lizzy twice, years earlier, as I had been overseas. Shortly after my arrival, little Lizzy, all curls and toothless smiles, walked into the living room with King Henry in her arms—”
“King Henry?” Mr. Barlow interrupted.
“Oh yes, she had named him.”
“He was so regal and his fur was light orange. King Henry VIII seemed an appropriate namesake. I also thought giving him a royal name might make my mother more inclined to like him,” Elizabeth admitted before reminding her audience, “I was six!”
“But Mrs. Bennet was not persuaded,” Mrs. Gardiner offered.
“No, neither was my father, though he was somewhat gentler about it.”
“What did you do?”
“After a great deal of crying and begging on my part failed to sway them, I brought my father out to the barn. It was the next day, and tempers had cooled somewhat. I hoped perhaps he would be persuaded by Henry—he was very cute and, I thought, quite well-behaved. When I first approached his little corner, he greeted me as usual, running right to me and waiting to be picked up. But then he saw my father.”
Georgiana’s cry of concern was echoed by most of the others as they waited to hear how King Henry reacted to Mr. Bennet.
“He really was a good boy. He was just trying to protect me,” Elizabeth insisted.
“Did he bite your father?” Mr. Darcy asked.
“No, I reacted quickly enough and got between them.”
