“M-mama, h-how is L-Lizzy?” Georgie stammered as she threw herself into her mother’s welcoming arms.
“Yes, Aunt Anne, please tell us; we are so worried,” Anne de Bourgh added.
“Lizzy is sleeping. The surgeon has set her arm and leg, and now we have to watch her carefully, and then she will have a long recovery ahead of her,” Anne explained to the girls.
“Mama, Anne said that George Wickham tried to hurt Lizzy. Why would he try and hurt Lizzy? She is ever so nice to everyone,” Georgie asked in disbelief.
“The truth is that we do not know what motivated him to do something so vile. Until someone catches him, and he is asked why, we will not know,” Anne replied, secretly hoping that the murderer and attempted murderer was already rotting in the depths of hell. Anne had her theories as to why young Wickham had turned into a murderer, but that was not something that she was willing to discuss with her young daughter or even with her older niece.
Back in the parlour near the sickroom, Richard was pacing like a caged tiger.“If I ever get my hands on that, that thing, I will kill him with my bare hands,” he ranted.
“You would have to get in the queue brother,” Andrew spat out.
“It is a mystery,” George Darcy opined.
“What is, father?” William asked.
“Lizzy’s guards inspected the area where the cowardly, murderous boy hid himself. All of Wickham’s possessions, including twenty pounds, were abandoned. They found signs that two others had been close to where Wickham was and that one of the horses was more weighed down when it left than when it arrived.
“I think that someone else was watching us for their own nefarious purposes, and they captured young George and carted him away for some reason. Mayhap George interfered with their own plans. In addition, off and on for some time now, there have been discreet enquiries made about both the Darcy and Fitzwilliam families. They thought that their questions were not raising any suspicion, but they did; apparently they did not count on the loyalty of the people in the area.”
“Now that you mention it George, I meant to tell you that there has been someone sniffing around Snowhaven also asking questions about our families. I wonder…” Reggie stopped speaking in midsentence deciding that his theory was too ludicrous.
“You wonder if Aunt Catherine is behind the watchers?” William asked.
“Yes, but why would my sister, who is being sought by the law, be so foolish?” Reggie wondered aloud.
“Since when had logic and good sense ever dictated Catherine’s choices? As long as she decides it is, then it is!” George pointed out.
“Uncle George has the right of it,” Richard agreed, employing his strategic mind, but he could come up with no plausible reason that his Aunt would have them watched. Then he thought of something,“If the men are in her pay, why did they take that scum that hurt my sister?”
“If we knew that, then we would know what she is planning and why,” Reggie stated.“I will tell you this, if my sister was involved in any way with Lizzy being attacked, then I will hunt her to the ends of the earth.”
“Everything seems to point to young Wickham working on his own, and the blood that Biggs discovered near the blackguard’s valise is proof in my mind that he did not go willingly. If he had been with them, he would have ridden his father’s mount, not been taken with another on his horse.”
“The only way we will know is for one of us get our hands around his scrawny neck,” Reggie said with anger.
Elaine returned from having looked in on her daughter.“She is so very pale. It is so hard to see my vibrant daughter in such a state,” she sobbed. Reggie held his wife to comfort her as the others left and allowed them some privacy.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
Jane had not shared with anyone that she had dreamt about Lizzy being in some sort of trouble for the last few nights. In her dream, she could not make out Lizzy’s face but her distinctive hair and the ruby encrusted cross that belonged to Grandma Elizabeth made her sure that it was Lizzy. In her dreams, Lizzy kept on repeating, over and over and over again:“Help me‘Aney, help me!” Her name was another reason that she was certain that it was Lizzy, as she was the only one who had ever used that particular appellation for her.
The feeling that Bennet felt some days before had not repeated itself, so he pushed it to the recesses of his mind. Both he and Tammy had noticed that Jane did not look her normal serene self. When Tammy asked her oldest daughter what was troubling her, Jane prevaricated and told her mother that she was having trouble sleeping due to nightmares. When her mother asked what they were about, she told her that she did not remember.
Jane hated telling her mother an untruth, but she felt that no one would be able to understand, or they would think that it was all in her imagination. From that first day that Jane had the premonition, she started to beseech God as part of her nightly prayers to please help her younger sister. During the day she was busy with her lessons and spent time with both her siblings and some of the neighbourhood children, especially Mandy and Cara who she had adopted as sisters.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
Martha Bingley felt as if a great weight had been lifted from around her neck. Now that she had dropped her pretentions and superior attitude, life just seemed better. Concentrating on what she had rather than what she coveted made everything seem more enjoyable, and best of all, she was as close to Oscar as she had ever been. They had even resumed sharing a bed, something both had thought was behind them forever.
As much as she knew that her advice and desire had been wrong headed, Martha also knew that there was something inherent in her younger daughter that was driving her behaviour. Louisa had heard the same things from her mother, had behaved in the same manner, but she had mended her ways; Caroline seemed to get more intransigent by the day.
She had been in the small windowless room for over a week now and rather than look at what she needed to do to improve her lot, she just seemed to become more strident. Sadly, Martha was starting to come to the realisation that Caroline might belong in an institution. There was one more chance, the Dark Hollow School for Girls. If, after being at that school, Caroline did not amend her behaviour then they would have to look at a more permanent solution at Bedlam or one of the more humane asylums.
Caroline was feeling alone in the world and betrayed by those who she thought loved her. For her, agreeing with her meant loving her. Each time that some of her voice had returned, she would start trying to scream as soon as she could croak, and it was soon gone. She was angry at her father for locking her up like a servant; no, even worse, a common criminal, but that was nothing to the seething hatred that was building against her mother! Actually, Louisa as well. She had expected her father and Charles to not support her, but for those two to turn on her, they would rue the day!
“At least I will be out of this prison in a few days when we go to see estates for sale,” she told herself.“Once we have our own estate, I will have to bide my time until I am out and then no one will stand in my way; not my mother, father, and certainly not that foundling pretender!”
