“So, you quarreled about something trivial, and then you retaliated against each other,” I said. “And this is why you are still divided.” It seemed strange to me.
“Quite.”
“Well, that seems as if it is not so insurmountable,” I said.
He laughed softly. “Oh, no, well, as I say, it is indecorous, but what do I care about that woman and her reputation. You are my son-in-law now, I suppose you will keep it to yourself. She lost a babe after Elizabeth. A babe that was not mine. A babe she had planted in her womb entirely to make me angry.”
I drew back.
“Yes,” he said. “When I say it went too far, I quite meant it. Of course, I cannot say I behaved better, for I was just as awful. I did a number of quite horrid things as well.”
“Elizabeth is not like her mother,” I said.
He laughed at me. “You married her after she came home having been gone overnight with another man, Mr. Darcy. You knew what you were getting.” He shrugged at me. “Which is not to say that I disapprove of Lizzy, you know. She is the bright star of my sky.”
“No, mine as well,” I said softly.
“Well, I hope it all goes swimmingly for you both,” he said.
And this was when I decided it was likely a good time for Elizabeth and I to get far, far away from her entire family.
Luckily, Elizabeth did not object to the scheme when I explained it to her. She said that she had decided that perhaps a married lady could be settled too near to her family and that we should quite go to Derbyshire for several months instead. I told her that I thought she should take the trip with Bingley and Bennet on her own, and that I should wait until I had a chance to mend things with her brother, and she said that perhaps that would be for the best.
Right before we left, I had a letter from my sister bemoaning how miserable and hot she was in the city, so I proposed we take her along, and Elizabeth had no objections.
We went to London then, to collect Georgiana, and the three of us traveled north to Pemberley.
I think Elizabeth liked it. I asked her if she approved of it, and she laughed as if it was a silly question, as if there wasn’t a way for a person not to approve of Pemberley.
She settled in easily and quickly, though. She and Mrs. Reynolds, my housekeeper, seemed to be happy enough with each other, and Elizabeth and Georgiana got on famously, reading the same novels and chattering over them at tea.
We were less at odds here.
There was nothing to be at odds over.
My life had shifted. I had gone from being a bachelor who was being asked to visit the country with Bingley and to go to country dances to being a married man well settled with the most beautiful of wives. I was content and I was happy and I felt as if everything in my life was exactly as it should be.
It was an idyllic summer.
August approached, however, and so did all of the preparations for the journey Elizabeth would be making. Their first choice had been a trip to the continent, but with the fighting there, this was deemed to be not the time for such journeys, so they had settled on a tour of the Lakes instead, all the way tothe north of the country. Since Derbyshire was on the way, the others would come to stay with us before they all set off.
I was not entirely looking forward to that, but my wife spoke to me about making inroads with her brother often. “I do so wish for the two of you to get along with each other.”
I promised her I would do my best.
They arrived, Bingley, Bennet, and Mrs. Caroline Bennet née Bingley.
They settled in from their journey and had dinner with us, and at dinner, Caroline began talking of how she might stay behind here, that she had missed Georgiana ever so much, and that she would just be in the way with the others in the party. And both her brother and her husband said nothing to contradict her, but instead seemed to think it was a capital idea. So, I was saddled with Caroline Bennet for the next month.
The journey, at least, since it was only to the Lakes, had been cut in half. If I’d been forced to endure the woman for twice as long, I think I might have lost my mind.
Within two days, we were all waving them off as they left us behind, and I settled in for whatever it would be to entertain Caroline for all of August.
Caroline was her usual self. She spoke mostly of her self and her own interests except when she did things like comment upon how even my handwriting was or how quite amazing it was that I should write so many letters for business and how odious she should find such a thing.
She was entirely exhausting, in other words, and I left her to Georgiana when I could, though Georgiana was not good at conversing with anybody at all, and I began to feel guilty for leaving Georgiana to listen to Caroline go on and on while Georgiana’s eyes glazed over.
Caroline began to appear whenever I was taking morning walks, which was her talent, I had to admit. She had done thisback in Hertfordshire as well, appeared when I was walking and come along to talk at me until my ears bled.
