Although Gardiner did not feel like seeing his brother-in-law, he had to do so. On the morrow, at the very least Bennet would be required to walk Mary up the aisle. He steeled himself and knocked on the study’s door. There was no coherent response; no more than a grunt or some such. Gardiner pushed the heavy door open and almost staggered back as the smell of unwashed man and the stink of stale, spilled port assailed his sense of smell.
The man he saw sprawled out on the settee was almost unrecognisable as Bennet. He was haggard, unshaved, unwashed, and his clothing was filthy. To Gardiner it looked like Bennet had lost much of his weight based on the way his soiled clothing was hanging off him. Seeing what was left of the man as he was, there was only one decision Gardiner could take. He stepped back out of the hellhole, which was now Bennet’s study, and pulled the door firmly closed behind him.
Thankfully, it being the evening before the wedding there were no guests or fiancés present, so Gardiner felt like he could speak freely. It was a boon that the two youngest Bennets were upstairs amusing his children. He entered the drawing room and pushed the door closed.
“Bennet is in no state to do his duty and walk Mary to her groom on the morrow…” Gardiner related what he had observed in the study and his opinions of Bennet’s health. “I will do the duty and if people ask where the father of the bride is, we will tell the truth and say he is indisposed. What I saw, I am sorry to say, is a man who is not very long for this world. I am no doctor, but I would be surprised if he is alive for many more months.”
“I know this is the point I should wail and gnashmy teeth that I will be a widow, but with the cruelty and total disdain my husband has displayed towards me and his daughters, I find I am not able to,” Fanny stated stoically.
“As much as I would not wish this end on Mr Bennet, or any other for that matter, I think it will be a relief,” Elizabeth opined. “He has never taken any pleasure from the life God granted him, rather frittering it away to take his amusement by showing contempt for those in the world around him. All I can do is praise Him for opening my eyes to the truth. Had He not, I would not be engaged to the best of men.” Elizabeth saw Mary was about to disclaim her assertion that William was the best man. “Peace Mary, I mean William is the best, and only, man for me.”
“As Andrew is for me, and Charles is for Jane,” Mary stated. “I agree with Lizzy and sadly I will not miss my father as the one to walk me up the aisle on the morrow.” She looked at her uncle lovingly. “You, Uncle Edward have been far more of a father to us than the man wasting away in his study, has ever been.”
With that decided, talk turned to the double wedding on the morrow.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
Anyone who had ever called Charlotte Lucas plain—which to her shame, included Fanny Bennet—had to eat their words when she entered the nave of the church on the arm of a beaming and proud Sir William. They were following a few steps behind Mary on the arm of her uncle.
That it was not Mr Bennet walking his daughter towards her groom raised a few eyebrows, but no one in the community cared enough about the man who had always derided them, to ask why he was absent.
The rector of St Alfred’s had magnanimously agreed Mr Pierce would conduct the ceremony for Miss Mary and her groom, while Mr Chambers would do the same for Miss Lucasand her Colonel. Once Gardiner and then Sir William handed the respective brides to their grooms, Mary and Andrew stood before Mr Pierce. Jane stood behind Mary as her matron of honour and Darcy was standing up for his older cousin. When the first ceremony was completed, he would repeat the duty and stand with the now former Colonel while Miss Maria, soon-to-be Miss Lucas was her sister’s maid of honour.
Even with two couples to be married by two vicars, it was not long before St Alfred’s clergyman intoned the final blessings and announced Mr and Mrs Fitzwilliam as man and wife. For the second time a cheer went up in the congregation while Lord and Lady Hilldale stood off to the side watching indulgently. All that remained was a quick visit to the registry where both couples and the three witnesses signed, one of them signing for both couple.
The invited guests who were not family members had filed out of the church and departed for Netherfield Park as soon as the second ceremony had been completed. The three families of the newlyweds, now one large extended one, all waited to add their personal wishes for felicity until the two couples exited the registry. Included in the family was Anne de Bourgh, who looked as healthy as she ever had, and had become a great friend to her soon-to-be cousins. She had thought how, if she was able to marry and bear children, she would have liked to have found someone who loved her like she saw the love between the two newly-married couples, or Lizzy and William. She saw no less love and felicity between her hosts, Mr and Mrs Bingley.
Lord and Lady Matlock, who had not been sure either of their sons would ever find a woman who captured their interest, felt an inordinate amount of pleasure at both of their sons being married. Now they could look forward to William and Lizzy’s wedding early in March. Neither objected that Becca was two years from coming out, and hopefully more than that before she accepted a man as a suitor. There had beentalk about delaying her coming out by a year so she could be presented with Gigi. The Earl and Countess had no opposition to that possibility.
Similar to what Jane and Bingley had done at their wedding breakfast, the two sets of Fitzwilliams circulated and thanked all of the guests, the local ones as well as some of the leading members of theTon, like the Duke and Duchess of Bedford, and Earl and Countess of Jersey and their families. The newly married couples, of course, spent time sitting with their families and even managed to eat some of the bountiful comestibles being served to celebrate their nuptials.
About two hours after arriving at Netherfield Park, as cold as it was, their family members were standing on the veranda waving to the two couples as their coaches pulled away.
“What a capital day, capital indeed,” Sir William summed up the feelings of all.
Depending on one’s point of view, either sadly or expectedly, not a person asked where the father of the one bride was and why he had been missing.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
Longbourn 1 March 1813
Elizabeth sat on her favourite boulder atop of Oakham Mount which allowed her to look to the rising sun in the east. She was wearing a green day dress, her bonnet was on the rock next to her, and her hair was loose, being pushed to one side by the soft breeze. There were clouds, but they were not the heavy grey ones which portended rain, and they reflected the reds, golds, and silvers of the rising sun.
She was happy to see the oak tree with the benches beneath it was fully verdant once again, as all the leaves which had begun to bud towards the end of February, were now proudly open. As if it knew she needed it for her wedding, spring had sprung a little earlier than normal that year thanksto abnormally warm temperatures in February. The leaves looked golden to her as the sun began to rise above the distant horizon. All of the familiar fields were laid out before her, which would soon be full of the crops which had been planted.
Spring planting brought her thoughts to her beloved William—he was never far from her consciousness. He had departed for Pemberley in early February, to plan for the coming year’s crops with his steward, leaving Gigi, who was being hosted at Longbourn. How she missed him, but she knew he was a man of duty and he would not forsake what he needed to do to make sure his estate’s and the tenants’ welfare was taken care of as it should be. It was one of the many things she loved about him. In her opinion, he was the best landlord and master. Thankfully, quite the opposite of Mr Bennet; she refused to waste her time thinking about that man any longer.
The last time Elizabeth saw her father was months ago, the day of her older sister’s wedding. While she knew from what the Hills reported that he was wasting away, she had no intention of entering the study until the day of her birthday, another four days hence. Regardless of his ability to hear or understand her, she intended her last words to him to be those telling him how all of his plans for her had been for nought.
As she had that thought, she sensed a presence near her and without having to see him, she knew who it was. She stood, turned, and there William was, standing next to the boulder. For once they were the same height, so she launched herself into her fiancé’s arms, almost knocking him over.
Their lips hungrily searched and found what they were seeking as kiss after kiss was given and received. The weather was no longer so cold as to shorten their time of pleasure, as it had been when they became engaged. Elizabeth’s arms were wound tightly around Darcy’s shoulders as her half-booted feet hung at least a foot above the ground. Eventually, before their passions passed the point of no return, they separated and Darcy lowered his fiancée gently to the ground.
“How I missed you, William!” Elizabeth exclaimed.
“No less than I you,” Darcy responded as he kissed her pert nose. He could not help himself. Not many days more, and she would never leave his side. “My dearest, loveliest, impertinent Lizzy, it was too hard being away from you. Praise be we marry in five days.” Darcy paused, as much as he did not want to raise a distasteful subject, he felt he must. “Are you still determined to say to Mr Bennet what you desire to on Friday?”
“Yes, William, I most certainly do.”
