Understanding that he had never looked upon her to find fault, she could easily see that he looked at her with love and approbation. She understood his seemingly hot and cold behaviour at Netherfield Park and in Kent. He had been fighting a battle between his head and his heart and the heart eventually won, even if his head tried to intervene by delivering the most insulting proposal in the history of proposals. With such thoughts running through her head, she shook herself out of her introspection and met the eyes of the man that was patiently waiting for her to reply.
“Yes, Mr Darcy, the evening is more than enjoyable, and I find my dinner companion’s company far better than just tolerable,” she teased to win a smile she was proud to claim when it appeared. Darcy correctly interpreted the meaning of her quip to be that she had forgiven him and was ready to advance their relationship.
“May I humbly request a private audience with you on the morrow at eleven o’clock in the morning Lady Elizabeth?” he dared to ask.
“You may, Mr Darcy,” his beloved replied with an arched eyebrow.
‘I must offer the option of betrothal or courtship; I do not want to presume too much. My life’s happiness is within my grasp after I nearly destroyed my chances with that awful proposal and equally bad, hypocritical behaviour. This time I will do things as they should be done!” Darcy pledged, berating himself for his past arrogance and unwarranted pride.
Lord Hugh, as much as he would have wanted to, did not request the final set from Lady Mary. He was not confident that she had any warm or tender feelings for him as of yet. He did not want to push her too hard and possibly scare her away. After dinner a number of the ladies exhibited, and for the first time, members of theTonwere introduced to the Bennet sisters’ musical prowess and the exquisite singing voices of the eldest two. The rest of the ball passed with no further incident, and it was the early hours of the morning when the joyful attendees finally found their beds and happily slipped into the arms of Morpheus.
Chapter 18
A very gleeful complement of servants received a note from their master that all three Bingleys were to be gone from his home prior to his return from the ball. It was noted that he did not refer to his wife as Mrs Hurst, but as a Bingley, noted but not commented on. Once they saw the back of the hated Miss Bingley, they would rejoice. Louisa’s lady’s maid was paid by Hurst, so she informed her former mistress that she would be staying at the master’s house and would no longer serve her after helping the lady pack.
Miss Bingley’s maid and Mr Bingley’s valet resigned effective the completion of their own packing. No one blamed the maid given the abuse she had suffered at the shrew’s hand. Caroline’s belongings were packed, and footmen took her trunks down, not even allowing for a change of clothes as she would then have no reason to go upstairs and cause more damage. As soon as they were informed of the reason that the Bingleys were being expelled from the house, the valet was far from surprised that his former master and older sister had allowed the younger one to ruin the family. The writing had been on the wall for a long time. It had not been a question of if, but rather when.
Less than two hours later the three Bingleys departed Hurst’s townhouse for the final time. With his younger sister spewing expletives and invectives at all, especially one Eliza Bennet, blaming all except herself for causing the family’s ruin, Bingley was forced to hire a hackney as his footman, grooms, and driver also quit their employment. Tuning out his sister as he had perfected over the years, Bingley ruminated on what had happened that evening as they headed toward the newly opened Mivart’s Hotel, which was on the most exclusive street in London. ‘Could I have regulated Caroline? It was not my fault, was it? I did the right thing letting her have her preferences did I not? How could we have come to this ruin?’ After the disaster that had befallen his family, the weak, determinedly irresolute man still refused to accept reality.
If he had known that Mivart’s, Grenier’s, Grillon’s, and Steven’s hotels had all been wholly owned, or a majority stake held by Gardiner and Associates, he and his sisters would not have wasted their time being turned away from them as well as all of the other fashionable London hotels. No one wanted to cross any of the powerful people who had made it known that the Bingleys werepersona non grata.
Eventually, in the early hours of the morning, the three very frustrated and despondent siblings found a set of rooms in a rather run-down hotel in the very place Miss Bingley loved most to sneer at, Cheapside. Just when they were certain things could not get worse, they had. Their sister was still assigning blame to everyone else for their predicament. She frequently highlighted the Bennets in her diatribe. In what all others would understand as another proof of her insanity, Caroline started to plot revenge. ‘This is all that slut Eliza’s fault,I know that the baggage likes to walk early, even after a ball. I will be ready when she leaves that townhouse her family purloined and I will know how to act. Neither my Fitzwilliam nor any man will want her when I am through with her. Lady Elizabeth, what a joke.’
Through all her raging and after all that had transpired, her siblings still had not said a word to her about her own culpability.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
Caroline Bingley had one thing right, Lady Elizabeth was up early, and after she collected her footman Biggs, she left her house for a walk in Hyde Park. As she stepped onto the pavement, she heard a maniacal scream.
“You slut! I will kill you!” The threat was screeched from their left and both Elizabeth and Biggs tensed with alert. Before Biggs could order Lady Elizabeth back inside, a dishevelled Caroline Bingley appeared from behind some shrubbery and Elizabeth froze. In but another second, she saw Caroline was brandishing a knife in one hand and the other was poised to use her nails, the most likely intent being to scratch Elizabeth’s eyes out.
Before she had taken two steps toward her intended victim, the insane woman was flat on her back. Biggs had mitigated the threat with a single blow that he put all of his strength behind, and unfortunately for Caroline, it happened to connect with her nose and mouth. Footmen from Bennet House and all surrounding houses were sprinting toward the location where Lady Elizabeth stood frozen. While appreciated, they were not really needed as the would-be assassin had been rendered unconscious. As Elizabeth snapped out of her shock-induced stupor, she would have dropped to her knees if Darcy had not sprinted across the square to her side just in time.
As she held onto Darcy, Elizabeth assessed Caroline, whose nose was now shattered and all of her front teeth were either missing or broken. In order to minimize the scene for the gossips, as they would surely wake with all of the commotion, the perpetrator was roughly lifted and carried into Bennet House by Biggs as Darcy and the lady he loved followed closely behind escorted by three more Bennet footmen.
The Darcy House footmen and all others who had come to assist returned to their houses with Darcy’s thanks for their quick response. Darcy requested that a Matlock House footman inform his master what had occurred.
As they entered, the Earl of Longbourn who had been in his study, looked at the scene and demanded an explanation. His Lizzy who had quickly calmed and could talk, gave a brief description of the event.
Darcy had never seen Bennet upset before, but furious was something he never hoped to see again. “Biggs,” he barked, “place thatthingin a room in the cellar, make sure that it is bound and gagged and then come to my study. I will have a note ready to deliver to that hotel in Cheapside where the Bingleys finally found rooms.” Somehow Darcy was not at all surprised that the Earl knew exactly where the Bingleys were, and the mystery was further illuminated when he heard Bennet mumble: “Rather than follow them to see where they would end up, I should have ordered some men to stay there and watch them. If that harridan had hurt my Lizzy…”
“Lord Longbourn, unless you think that you are God who knows all, you could not have done more. Thanks to that huge footman of hers your daughter was never close to being in actual danger.” Darcy spoke before the man could berate himself for not knowing the future.
“Thank you, Darcy, I needed to hear that,” a grateful Bennet admitted quietly. Biggs returned and reported thatthe baggagewas secured per the master’s orders, and even though the door was locked and there were no windows, there were two footmen on guard just in case. The Earl wrote a quick note and dispatched a groom and one of his large footmen to go ‘invite’ Bingley for a chat. Biggs took the note and bowed to his master as he left to swiftly deliver the master’s orders.
Just after Biggs’ exit, Lord Matlock and his sons rushed enmasse into Bennet’s study, all of them demanding to know that their Lizzy was not hurt. They relaxed a little as they found her sitting calmly next to Darcy, all of them raked their eyes over her more than once to verify she was unharmed, even more relieved after hearing what had occurred.
“After all she has cost his family, he still did not restrain her. What will you do, Bennet?” Richard summed it up. The Earl told them about the ultimatum that he intended to deliver to Bingley when he arrived, willingly or not.
‘Remind me never to cross my soon to be father-in-law,’ Jane’s betrothed told himself.
Bingley woke with a start when he was roughly shaken by a huge footman in livery he did not recognise. The footman grunted when he handed him a note. As Bingley read the short but explicit missive, he went white and felt like he was about to cast up his accounts. The door from the bedchamber alongside opened to reveal a very fearful Louisa. She had noticed that Caroline was not in her bed, and when she read the missive that fell from her brother’s hand, she fell to the floor as sobs racked her body.
“What have we allowed to happen, Charles?” Louisa managed between sobs. She then crawled back up to standing and returned to her room to allow her mute brother to dress.
Once dressed, Bingley was escorted to the waiting conveyance. It was not too long before he stood in front of the Earl of Longbourn’s desk while three Fitzwilliams, one Darcy, and Lady Elizabeth all looked at him with disgust.
“I will not beat around the bush, Mr Bingley. You have allowed your sister to believe her delusions as fact without you ever taking the hard actions or responsibility required as the head of the Bingley family and, in her madness, she attempted to harm, nomurdermy second daughter,” the furious Earl stated with forced and focused control. “You have two choices before you, and two only. This is not a negotiation, you will choose one or the other, or I will choose for you and believe me when I say that you will not like that. Choice one is I have your sister arrested for attempted murder and you for aiding and abetting her. That would end with her at the end of a hangman’s noose and you being transported and all of your assets forfeit.”
