“Louisa will be the mistress,” Bingley stated calmly. He saw a protest forming and raised his hand. “What do you know of being an estate’s mistress? You do know it is not just being the hostess, do you not?”
“I will be the perfect mistress, even though that finishing school I was sent to tried to teach us that part of the duties is visiting the peasants and getting clothing dirty with the hens and cows, among other things,” Miss Bingley stated, fighting hardto maintain her equanimity. “Had Father done what Mother wanted, I would have studied at the seminary in London and not been taught the nonsense I was in Scarborough.”
“Actually, what they taught was all part of the duties of a mistress. You only missed supervising the vegetable and herb gardens in the home farm. Being a hostess is one of the smallest parts of the duties of an estate’s mistress,” Louisa refuted.
Knowing that it would not do to lose her temper yet, Miss Bingley ignored that which she did not want to hear. “I intend to invite Dear Georgiana…” Again, she was cut off.
“When have you been given permission to address Miss Darcy informally, and when did you meet her?” Hurst demanded.
Miss Bingley spluttered but had no response.
“Miss Darcy may very well be in the neighbourhood when Mr Darcy is present, but it will not be at Netherfield Park. She has actual friends in the area, andifshe is with Darcy, she will be hosted with her friends, who are in fact, her cousins,” Louisa revealed.
“When we meet, we will be the best of friends,” Miss Bingley asserted.
“So, you who are three and twenty want to spend time with a young lady of fifteen?” Hurst enquired.
It was as close as Miss Bingley had come to exploding with a tantrum in the time since she had decided to play the part of a compliant person. With as much dignity as she could summon, she stood and swept out of the room. On gaining her bedchamber, she wanted nothing more than to break everythingpossible, but she controlled the urge. Instead, she snapped at her maid for some made-up reason.
“Now, do you see what I mean?” Hurst asked.
“Yes, I must agree with you. Caroline’s change has been an act. I was worried she was about to have an apoplexy,” Bingley concluded.
“She cannot understand that if she ever made genuine changes, her life would be many times better,” Louisa opined. She looked at her brother. “Are you sure you want me to be the mistress of the estate?”
“Hurst explained that it is not only the fact that you are experienced in all of the duties, but to observe propriety, when you are both in residence, the task should fall to you. Unlike our sister, you really are a gentlewoman due to your marriage,” Bingley explained. “The days of allowing Caroline to rule the roost are very far past. If she thought I would revert to how I used to be, she can wait until after the second coming, and I will still not relent.”
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
“Why could I not go to Gracechurch Street to be with Eddy and Peter? Then, I could have gone to see Arthur,” Tommy Bennet whinged, as boys of six are wont to do. “I could have been playing soldiers with my cousins right now!”
“Thomas Elias Bennet! That is enough,” Fanny commanded. “Jane will deliver your niece or nephew in the next fortnight or so. You are aware, are you not, that once we know Jane and her babe are safe, you will join Papa, Miss Firth, Catherine, and Lydia to travel back to Longbourn. Now, go to your lesson with your governess.”
“Yes, Mamma,” a chastened Tommy responded. He stood and, with shoulders stooped, left the room.
“Were you not hard on him, Mamma?” Lydia enquired.
“I will never repeat the mistake I made in overindulging any of my children again,” Fanny stated as she looked pointedly at her youngest daughter. “It was not your fault, Lyddie; the error was mine, but I know better now.” Fanny looked about the drawing room. Elaine and Mary were with Jane, but she did not see Lizzy.
Catherine guessed who her mother was seeking. “Lizzy went for a walk, and yes, she has a footman with her,” she revealed.
The more she had come to understand her second daughter, the more Fanny had realised that Lizzy needed exercise. There was so much in her head that walking, or riding—Phoebe was back at Longbourn—helped Lizzy calm herself.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
Lydia had been hoping that Jane would give birth on the third day of June, which was her own birthday. It was not to be, as Mamma and Aunt Elaine explained; when a babe was ready, he or she would be born. Even though she had never birthed a child herself, Aunt Hattie agreed.
At about five in the morning on the fifteenth day of June, Jane’s pains intensified and were coming at a much quicker pace. The other five Bennet offspring were in the drawing room with their father, Uncle Reggie, who had arrived three days previously, and a pacing Andrew. Just before nine that morning, Jane’s screams—for her they were screams—ceased and the mewling of a newborn babe was heard.
Without waiting for one of the ladies to summon him, Hilldale sprinted up the stairs to the birthing chamber on the first floor. He entered the room while the midwife was delivering the afterbirth. She was wise enough not to comment.
“We have a son,” Jane reported tiredly, beads of sweat all over her forehead and cheeks, her normally styled hair wild from the moisture and her movements while she had been labouring. “I am tired, a little sore, but otherwise I am well, my love.”
Just then, Hilldale’s mother, smiling from ear to ear, brought his son to him.
Hilldale looked at Jane, who nodded. “Welcome to the world, Robert Thomas Reginald Fitzwilliam.” They had decided to name a son after the late Robert Darcy, as well as Andrew’s late maternal grandfather, who had also been a Robert; the middle names were for the newborn’s grandfathers.
As soon as he was assured that Jane would be well, Hilldale took his sleeping, swaddled son to meet his grandfathers, aunts, and one uncle in the drawing room.
