She had to speak to him tonight. Her former steward knew she was returning at sunset, but would he expect to see her so soon? He was likely planning on meeting with her on his way to London tomorrow. She longed to know what was passing through Mr Willers’s mind, in what manner he thought of her.
Young Henry knocked, and from her seat in the cart she saw candlelight through a window move from the back of the house toward the front. The door opened slowly, and then Mr Willers himself threw it open.
He did not look to the cart, and took in Young Henry’s appearance with surprise. “Roland,” he cried. “Is she back? What happened?”
Young Henry gestured behind him, and Georgiana pushed back her cloak’s hood. Mr Willers’s gaze went over her gamekeeper’s head to where she sat on the bench. Despite her nervousness, she felt such a relief at seeing his dear familiar face. He, however, looked pained upon recognising her.
“Miss Darcy,” he murmured, inclining his head. “What is the matter? Reynolds said you would hide by Hill Close until they could pretend your ship?—”
“I needed to speak with you, and Young Henry said you were leaving in the morning.” An awful realisation occurred to her, and her heart sank. “You were going to leave without seeing me,” she whispered, “without saying goodbye.”
Mr Willers’s face fell as her voice cracked, but the trunks she could see in the hall by the door told her how eager he was to leave. “Of course not, ma’am,” he lied. “I will rise early and speak with you first. You must want to know how Pemberley has been this quarter.”
He did not want to see her, not even to take proper leave. He did not love her. She could walk away now and cry herself to sleep tonight and face him tomorrow. Tomorrow, she could calmly pretend all she wanted to discuss were rents and accounts and investments. But then she would never know that she could be courageous.
She had to tell him what he meant to her for her own sake, for her own strength, even though he felt nothing for her in return.
Georgiana climbed down herself, ignoring Young Henry’s offered hand. “I think not. We will speak now. Thank you,” she said to her gamekeeper. “Please tell Reynolds I am safe. Mr Willers will see me to Hill Close Farm when we are finished.”
She noticed that Young Henry and Mr Willers shared a look, perhaps to say, “No,youtry to stop her,” and she passed them both and entered the house. She had only been inside a handful of times in her life, and certainly not when it looked so spare. There was a low fire in the grate and a lamp and some candles lit, but aside from a few chairs and a table, every ornament and furnishing that made a house a home were gone.
Mr Willers slowly followed her into the parlour while she removed her cloak and placed it over a chair. “You must havequestions about how we have managed since summer,” he said, as though this was their weekly meeting to review accounts. “I left a detailed report in my office in the house.”
He paced in his near-empty room and had not invited her to sit on one of the few chairs remaining. She had noticed that he often paced while working through a problem in his mind, but now he seemed to have a nervous energy. Perhaps it would be best to wait to speak until he was calmer.
“I am afraid I cannot send a messenger to Pemberley or even drive you to Hill Close myself. When we are finished, I must walk to Roland’s cottage for him to drive you,” he went on. “I have let everyone go, and even sold the gig and the horses.”
Georgiana gave a longing look at the chair. Time travelling was as exhausting as being dragged and rattled over the worst roads overnight in a mail coach. Still, she would persevere. But how to find an opening to confess her feelings? It was not as though she routinely told men she loved them and could not imagine a fulfilling life without them.
When he finally looked at her, expecting her to speak, she managed to ask, “You bring no servants with you? Will you live in Lord Gordon’s home?”
“At first. I will eventually find my own rooms, but my housekeeper, manservant, and maid all have ties to Pemberley and Derbyshire. I could not in good conscience ask them to go to London,” he said. “I will hire new ones after I am settled in town.”
“Will, will you be happy working elsewhere?” she rasped. She would never want him to be unhappy, even if it meant she lost his companionship forever.
As he walked back and forth in front of the fire, it occurred to her she had seen neither candles nor fire in months. Although there was less privacy, this world was so much better than the one she left in 2026.
“I, I will always have fond memories of—I prefer the country, but I enjoy the public places in London, as we have talked about.” An alertness came into his eyes, and he finally gestured for her to sit and eagerly joined her. “But how mundane! You must tell me about all you have seen in the future.”
He grinned, and she had to smile back, even though the topic would exhaust her. She did not want to talk about the future. It was overpowering and loud and fast and—while everyone was kind—every tool, technology, and sentence taxed her abilities. Fitzwilliam had been energised by what that time offered; she was drained by it.
But Mr Willers looked so eager, and she must tell him something. “I rode in a self-propelled horseless carriage. Guess how fast it can travel?”
He looked thoughtful. “Over twenty miles per hour?”
She shook her head. “More like seventy!”
“That is incredible,” he whispered. “How does it work? Is it steam-powered? Were you right about the steam engines?”
“I do not know how it operates, nor about anything else I saw. They tried to explain their machines and capabilities to me, but it was all too fantastic. Even a stove is unlike what you now comprehend when you think of heating water or cooking food. My brother, however, thrives there. He manages that world just as masterfully as he did this one. You would think he had been born in that time.”
Mr Willers gave her a sympathetic look. “How is Mr Darcy?”
He knew her well enough after all these years to know how wonderful it would be to see her brother, and yet painful to have to part from him again. “He is never one to show much emotion, but Fitzwilliam is irrepressibly happy there. Mrs Darcy is lively as ever, and they have a little girl who is charming.”
She could not cry now, not over that loss. In time she would, but not when she had to be brave and bold and confess herunrequited love. She had to defy years of instruction that said women did not confess their feelings before the man announced his. How on earth did women go from being like her to being like Elizabeth?
Mr Willers smiled at her, and in his gaze she saw a look more like the fond glances he used to show her. “Your brother was—or ratheris—a good man, and I am glad he is happy. Whatever drove you to see him, I hope you found what you were looking for.”
