Lady Catherine had told him that I ought to be lying on my back and that any other position was “not Trinitarian.” As my husband was a big, broad man, he was nervous about hurting me, thus he held himself back from me with an expression of the utmost terror in his face. As usual, I felt a mixture of excitement and nervous twisting pressure at the feel of his hands on me. It wasn’t like I did not enjoy Tuesday and Friday nights. It was just that they felt. . .incomplete somehow.
I was well used to it by now, but when he was done I always felt a strange pressure sitting heavy in my core. It felt like an itch I couldn’t scratch all over my skin.
Sometimes I wondered what would happen if he would just slowdown.Maybe things would improve, but he never did. Lady Catherine had warned him that Speed was Of the Essence when it came to fulfilling his husbandly duties.
“Did that seem healthful, my dear?” Mr. Collins asked me anxiously, turning to me as he always did, his face pink with exertion, curls plastered to his forehead.
“Very healthful, my dear,” I lied, as I always did.
He looked at me for another second, still breathing a bit hard, and I flushed as I thought I saw a strange hunger in his eyes.
My core still throbbed with the pressure and I wondered if there was anything that could make the feeling go away besides tossing and turning in bed.
Maybe if he did it again?
But, no, Lady Catherine had said Speed Was Of the Essence and More Than One Time Was Unbecoming. So my husband turned over and went to sleep, and I tried not to toss and turn, the tight pressure in my belly burning and tearing at me.
3
“Clergymen ought to make a sensible match. They should consider hard work and a frugal disposition first. Good looks are rather a liability in a clergyman’s wife although, of course, if those good looks come from an old and well-established family, the match may be permitted.”
-Lady Catherine de Bourgh
Lady Catherine summoned me directly after breakfast and asked what my plans were for solving the mystery.
I had no idea about her acrostic necklace, or where even to begin with it, but at least I knew what the scene of the crime was in regards to Wilberforce and Julia.
“I have already begun,” I said with dignity. “I would like, with your permission, to examine the pigsty.”
“Anything,” Lady Catherine said commandingly. “I give you full permission to go anywhere on these grounds to solve the mystery.”
Accordingly, I walked down through the gardens of Rosings to the pigsty, feeling ridiculous as I did so, but remembering thankfully that as a clergyman’s wife I might be expected to be on an errand of mercy or otherwise doing parish work.
I hadn’t told my husband about the dual crimes. I was afraid his partiality for his patroness would cause him to have an unbearably zealous approach to the mystery. Not to mention he was not particularly subtle. I was afraid he would be rather a liability when I was questioning suspects and in general in the investigation.
The grounds of Rosings were extensive and it took me several minutes to make my way to the pig pens.
The prize-winning animals were cared for by Abel, Sam, and various small boys who collected around the stableyards.
Sam, young and brawny, was of the opinion that ghosts or other supernatural entities had been involved with the disappearance, while Abel, a grizzled septuagenarian, argued for a crime of passion.
I made sympathetic noises and gave assurance that I did not blame either one of them in the slightest. What had happened had clearly been something extraordinary.
“When did you last see Wilberforce?” I asked. “Or Julia.”
“That’s the odd thing, ma’am,” said Abel, shaking his head and stroking his long salt and pepper beard. “I had just seen him that very morning, and I could have sworn that the champion was in no mood for frisks and jollifications.”
I too was acquainted with Wilberforce’s typical behavior, and I had never thought of him as the type of pig who would leg it as soon as he had an opening.
“You would think,” Sam put in, elbowing aside his elder, “that, if someone had stolen him, it would have taken place at midnight. Or some other witching hour. But it was someone who knew that we often go to the village for a pint at that time.”
“Was Lady Catherine very angry?” I asked anxiously.
“Oh no,” said Abel thankfully. “She says a pint around that time is beneficial to the liver.”
I felt like I could use a pint myself but did not say so.
“What have you done to find Wilberforce and Julia?” I asked.
