Georgiana nodded and rested her head on her shoulder, and they sat in silent contemplation. A bird with a salmon-coloured breast flew up from the grass and landed in a tree above them.
“Was that a charbob?” Georgiana asked without raising her head.
“The little one with the white upon its wings, the brownish back, and blue cap? It is a chaffinch.”
Georgiana smiled the smile of a memory. “We call them charbobs. I always liked birds. I kept a canary when I was small.”
“My aunt calls chaffinches charbobs as well. Whenever I tease her about it, she reminds me that she is from Derbyshire and says it is a regional name.”
Georgiana was silent for a heartbeat. “My cousin and uncle call it a scobby, and I have heard others call chaffinches spinks. Is it not interesting that one creature is known by so many names?”
This nature chat occupied them until Colonel Fitzwilliam found them, and he insisted on carrying his cousin back to the house. He was not as tall as Mr Darcy, but the colonel easily hoisted Georgiana into his arms, although he complained that she weighed as much as a horse and he pretended to stagger under her heaviness.
She is as thin as a little bird herself, poor creature.
They approached Netherfield Lodge from the lane rather than the garden, and saw near to the house a fashionable carriage overturned, and two shocked-looking gentlemen in conversation with Mr Darcy. The contents of what had been on the luggage-boot were strewn across the lane.
“All your friend is saying is that you ought not to have attempted to go quickly downhill on a rough lane,” she heard Mr Darcy say calmly.
Elizabeth watched her husband mediate their dispute. For a man of modest income and comforts, Mr Darcy’s clothes were as high a quality as theirs, but he lacked their affectations.
The first man bowed his head. “I ordered the driver to cut the horses too sharply, perhaps.”
“Perhaps?” the other gentleman cried to his friend. “We are overturned!”
“Did you not say you wished to be there an hour ago?IfI did tell the postboy to go quickly, it was at your urging!”
“You are the one who refuses to begin morning calls until three, even whilst in the country! And we were not going that quickly.”
Mr Darcy stepped between them. “I saw myself your carriage press against the horses as you descended. You took the hill too quickly, but set your quarrel aside. Call some men in the other field to help you get the carriage upright again.”
Elizabeth was surprised that the men with the post-chaise followed his directives. Mr Darcy spoke steadily and quietly, but something in his manner compelled them to action. They set aside their walking sticks, watch fobs, snuff boxes, hats, and gloves. Colonel Fitzwilliam offered his help if it was still wanted when he finished carrying Georgiana inside. Meanwhile, Mr Darcy advised how to right the carriage, but did not lend any assistance himself, as if it was more natural for him to dictate and be listened to.
These fashionable gentlemen are willingly taking directions from a man beneath them in consequence because his manner is authoritative.
Mr Darcy and the postboy determined that the carriage, being now set up, had received such an injury on the fallen side as to be unfit for present use. He told the men to wheel it to the barn a quarter of a mile away in the next field to clear the roadway and instructed them on where to go in Meryton for assistance in repairing it. The two gentlemen were not only attentive to his every instruction, but grateful for his advice on managing their disaster.
How did a man of no significance in the world, with education but no status, and without fortune, have such a commanding aspect?Mr Darcy gave directions, and without any doubt that he would be listened to. Somehow, he had that kind of worldliness that others recognised as coming from experience and responsibility. It puzzled Elizabeth exceedingly.
Elizabeth cameinto the parlour to work and saw Colonel Fitzwilliam in a chair near to where Georgiana was reclining on the sofa, fast asleep. She would have gone away again, but he asked her to stay. During his time here, she had many lively conversations with him, but he never showed an interest in a serious tête-à-tête. He continued gazing at his cousin for a long moment.
“I was thinking... thinking that when I leave tomorrow that I shall not see my young cousin once more. She will be dead before I can come to Hertfordshire again.”
“You and Georgiana are too morbid and sensational. Mr Lynn does not believe she is in a dying way. I grant you she is very ill and needs considerable care.” She wished to tease and distract him. “I did not realise that regiment army colonels were required to be doctors before their commissions were purchased.”
“Your charmingly mild manner smooths over your sometimes ... impertinent style.”
“If I was offensive, I am sorry for it. We all know she is poorly, that the pain of a lengthy, rattling carriage ride would all but kill her. But, as weak as Georgiana is, if we care for her properly ... the apothecary does not feel that death is imminent.”
“I understand that yours is.”
Elizabeth looked at Georgiana. She wanted to be a woman who came to terms with her own life, and its end, as well as Georgiana had. “I wake up every day knowing that it might be my last. I will be her friend, her confidante, her nurse, her sister until my heart gives out, and that purpose gives me the strength to face the day knowing I will drop dead at any moment.”
“And if Georgiana dies before you, however unlikely you feel that to be? How will you behave then?”
“How do you mean? She is my friend, my sister. Of course I will mourn?—”
“You had best be certain to do nothing to wound Darcy if Georgiana dies before you.” He fixed her with a cold stare. “If you speak against my family’s reputation, if you act in a way that is unbecoming as the wife of Mr Darcy, if you wrong him, I will make your last daysmiserable. The Darcys are dear to me and they have suffered enough, and I will be damned before I let you injure them.”
