On seeing the parson lying prostrate on the floor holding his arm and wailing, Bennet looked to the footman, Biggs, who all agreed was aptly named, asking him what was going on.
“Master, this ‘ere man you instruct’d us to watch start’d wonderin’ the halls just after one this mornin. I seen ‘im go in Master James’s bedchamber and kept watchin, just like you instruct’d, though I admit it ‘twas mighty hard once ‘e opened the door. Then ‘e picked up a pillow and was about to smother our Master James, so I made sure ‘e left the room with great speed,” Biggs stated, glowering as he stood over the caterwauling parson.
“Well done, Biggs. Please have someone get Sir William, and as you do, explain we need him to fulfil his magistrate duties as soon as he can. Ask someone else to go fetch Mr. Darcy and Colonel Fitzwilliam from Netherfield Park.
“And Biggs,” Biggs looked at his master expectantly, “make sure this scum who attempted to murder my son is guarded under lock and key in the coal cellar. There is no need to be gentle with him,” Bennet instructed vindictively. “For your service to me and my family this night, there will be a big bonus for you this month.” Bennet nodded at his loyal footman who was loyal because he was treated with respect. No one was afraid of him due to his size which had often been the case as he had shuffled around from position to position before the Bennets employed him, but they had a healthy respect for his skills.
“I was only doin’ me duty, Master,” Biggs replied gruffly.
“I know you were, but you have our thanks, Biggs, and regardless you will get that bonus,” Bennet stated firmly. Biggs knew better than to argue with his master. Bennet thought for a second and turned back towards Biggs. “Before you lock him in the coal cellar, stand him up so we can talk to this poor excuse of a man, who is as far from a man of the cloth one can be, as we have ample evidence.” Bennet glared at Collins. Biggs and a second footman hauled the blubbering, snivelling Collins to his feet.
“If he does not stop his dramatics you may hit him, Biggs!” Bennet ordered, his anger simmering hotter as he continued to glare at the man that would soon swing from the hangman’s noose, if he had a say in the matter. Biggs pulled his fist back with a purposeful pause, waiting for Collins to make his decision. As if by magic, the noise emanating from Collins ceased and was replaced by fear as he started to fully comprehend his situation, clutching his clearly broken arm in close.
“What in damnation did you think you were doing? You were a guest in my house and tried to murder one of my sons?” Bennet spat at the parson, leaning down and hovering his face inches above that of Collins whose smell was so disgusting he had to pull back three inches as he looked on the uninvited man with disgust. Bennet had been forced to draw back because Collins had also soiled his pants, and the stench was worse than one could imagine.
Knowing he had nothing to lose, Collins spewed his venomous anger. “I wanted to ruin that stuck-up hussy of a daughter of yours so she would not marry the man my patroness chose forherdaughter. I decided to first rid the world of the imposters who had stolen what is rightly mine, and God in His wisdom guided me into one of the rooms of your so-called sons, which we all know are foundlings!” Collins spat out, a deranged look overtaking his countenance as he went on. “I am a member of the clergy, and as such I can do what I want if I decide it is the right thing to do!” he reminded all of his authority as ordained by God.
“Has your foul odour addled your brain?” Tom asked with no less than disgust. “Only a blind man would look at me and not see the likeness to my father. James is the spitting image of Grandfather Gardiner at the same age. You must be the most wilfully blind person I have ever had the displeasure of meeting in my almost sixteen years. Not to mention the most reviled and stupid one to boot. I had not known so much of God’s worst for humanity could be stuffed into the same person,” Tom scoffed. James’s laughter made Tom crack a smile.
“How dare you address a member of the clergy in such a manner, you insolent imposter!” spat out Collins as he tried to raise himself to his full height to intimidate Tom. Once he had gained his goal, he again faced failure since Tom was taller than he.
“I am not sure what will end first, your tenure as a parson or your miserable life. This evening my soon to be son-in-law sent an express to His Excellency, the Archbishop of Canterbury, laying out your many deficiencies as a parson. Adding the attempted murder of one of my sons, your intent to murder the other, and your further intent to despoil my Lizzy makes your defrocking a certainty, not to mention your date with the hangman for the crimes you attempted here tonight,” Bennet warned.
With attempted false bravado, Collins gathered himself and stood up straight as he looked up and met Bennet’s eyes. “You are the ones that will answer to the law when my beneficent and all-knowing patroness hears about this. She will make sure you will pay for the crimes you have perpetrated against me. You are trying to fob off foundlings as your sons in order to steal what should be mine! I should have dispatched you first. I did nothing wrong since my patroness told me I could remove the interlopers any way I saw fit which would just be righting a wrong,” Collins announced with growing confidence.
“You are utterly and completely delusional, Collins, just as your father before you. Besides the fact they bear a striking resemblance to me and their late grandfather, we have documented proof of and witnesses to, their birth.
“You were in the courtroom when the verdict was rendered, so please enlighten me on how you are able to wilfully ignore the facts? Attempted murder, no matter the imagined justification, is a hanging offence. Nothing you or your patroness can do or say will ever change that! Do you realise you just implicated your dear patroness in a conspiracy to commit murder?” he smirked. “I wonder how she will feel when she is arrested and placed in a gaol cell right next to you. That way you can pray to your false god until you are dispatched to be judged by our real God on High!” Bennet challenged.
Collins, who was now petrified he may have put his patroness in peril, was about to answer when Darcy and the Colonel came bounding up the stairs at breakneck speed. After hearing what the parson had tried to do, and also planned to do to his beloved Lizzy, Darcy spun around towards the snivelling man and with all of his considerable might planted his fist in Collins’s face.
Everyone heard the sickening but satisfying sound of a nose shattering. Blood was streaming from Collins’s nose, and he was howling loudly again. In fact, he was crying at a volume that would wake the dead, so Biggs sent his fist crashing into Collins’s stomach to restore some quiet.
The parson was gasping for breath while blood streamed out of his nose as he attempted to hold onto his broken arm while covering his nose to stem the bleeding when Sir William came up the stairs with the constable and his men.
It did not take long for Bennet, Biggs, and the rest of the party to impart all that the conniving, criminal parson had attempted to Sir William, as well as what he further intended. Sir William, who was usually an affable and jolly man, was livid for the first time in his life, and it did not bode well for the parson that it was directed at him.
Collins did not even have the sense to deny the charges, so Sir William ordered Constable Paul Crossman to take the useless example of a man to the town gaol. At least then he would not bleed on the Bennet’s stores of coal.
The soon-to-be ex-parson was now quaking in his shoes and relieved his bladder once again as the full folly of his actions started to come into focus. Once he realised all being levied against him, he knew then and there that in his need to be heard, he had effectively ended his own life.
Constable Crossman and his men clapped the now blubbering Collins in irons, regardless of his broken arm, and dragged him kicking and screaming out of Longbourn. It was to the relief of all that Collins would never darken their doorstep again.
The next day he was transported to the Old Bailey in Town and then onto Newgate Prison for holding until all the charges against him were determined and the trial date could be set. Two days after arriving at the gaol in London he was defrocked by the Archbishop of Canterbury after the great man received the express from Darcy and the follow-up express that detailed the attempted murder.
The Archbishop also stated no appointment to Hunsford would be allowed by Lady Catherine de Bourgh again. He sent a letter of apology on behalf of the church for the actions of the, at the time, representative of the Church of England. In the same letter, he sent his heartfelt congratulations on his cousin’s engagement and offered his services to perform the wedding ceremony.
The day after his defrocking, the very short trial commenced for the ex-parson at the Old Bailey. He had no funds to retain a barrister for his defence, and in vain he waited for his exulted patroness to intercede and his behalf.
All notes begging for her to send him funds for a barrister were ignored, so in the end he had to defend himself. The trial was quick, with Bennet and Biggs as the key witnesses. The jury returned after but a moment’s conference and remitted a verdict of guilty. Even after his verdict, Lady Catherine ignored all of his written entreaties for help.
Collins finally realised all of her relatives had been right about her, and he had been wrong. In the end, as he was sitting by himself locked away, he finally found the courage to wonder why he had ever listened to her and gone to Longbourn to offer hisolive branchas he had been instructed to do by her.
Some days after his guilty verdict had been handed down, just after dawn on a blustery morning as the sun started to rise in the east, the snivelling ex-parson was led, actually dragged kicking and screaming, to the gallows and the hangman’s noose was placed around his neck.
The hangman pulled the lever to open the trapdoor, and the last of the Collins line ended at the end of a short drop and a sudden stop. Collins had ended his life as he came into it, wailing like a baby.
Chapter 11
