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“For the first 20 years of my life I was a gentlewoman, a lady with a lower case ‘ell’ rather than a Lady with a capital ‘ell’. Was I something of a tomboy until I was 12 years of age? Yes probably, yet at the same time I knew I was a daughter of the estate and went so far but no further, even back then. When I look back on my behaviour as a child I am not embarrassed about the way I acted. As I got older, did I have an intemperate tongue on occasion? Sadly, yes, but it was my worst trait. I was also chaste, quiet, appropriate and well-mannered, both to my family and to the wider neighbourhoods. There was nothing anyone could say about my behaviour with the opposite sex. I was conscious of my reputation and took steps to protect it.

“And yet, for reasons that will always be unknown, Hurst burst into my bedroom, shouldering open a locked door. And immediately I was a jezebel. All the years of evidence, the words of caution to others, it all meant nothing.

“My two youngest sisters, 15 and 16 in the summer of ’11 were out and out flirts. There were rumours that a Militia Regiment was to be stationed outside Meryton. The two of them were beside themselves with excitement. They could not wait to flirt with complete strangers. They said so at the dining table, they said so in the drawing room, they said so in the parlour. And my parents’ reaction? My father called them the silliest girls in the kingdom, and my mother reminisced about a Colonel Millar from her youth. She did not say the words out loud but she seemed happy to reminisce about flirting in her own past.

“When I returned to Longbourn from Netherfield Park they mocked me to my face, delighted to call me a hypocrite for saying one thing and but then acting in another. Another sister endlessly pontificated so much that in the end I grabbed her book of Fordyce’s Sermons and threw it out the window into the garden, anything for some peace and quiet. And my oldest sister, the person I thought I was closest to in the whole world, was more concerned about the impact of her suit with Bingley than what I was facing.

“My mother and aunt immediately believed me capable of behaving in such a way. And the two of them browbeat my father and uncle until they both said that there was no choice but for me to be disowned and banished. Weak men, men that could not be relied upon. You have heard me speculate about the theatre of the vows to love, honour and obey, the words uttered during every wedding ceremony. Their wives definitely did not obey, if anything it was the other way round. These two men did what was easy not what was right.”

She looked over at Peter, letting her frustration go. She smiled and kissed him.

“Unlike you. I do not know whether marrying me was the right thing or not but it definitely was not the easy option.”

She smiled ruefully.

“I did all that society demanded of me, and it was not enough. You know the law, innocent until proved guilty. At first I thought it was the other way round for women but it is worse than that. We are all guilty it is just we have not been found out yet. But that we are guilty is without doubt. When you get that disillusioned with society then breaking out of expected behaviours is so much easier.

“I do not really mean this in the true sense of the words, but I find myself wishing that all these cruel and judgemental people knew how I was behaving here in our bedroom. Not because I want them to know of the acts, but rather that I no longer consider myself bound by them.”

Peter Napier knew better than to interrupt. Plus he could listen and not look at Elizabeth’s face!

“It is all of those things. And there is one more important thing I would like you to hear. I doubt I am ever going to marry again. You are the last Baron Napier, 7th of the line. The title will go extinct upon your passing. But, with luck, Lady Napier will be around for another 50 years. And that is important to me. I was a Bennet for more than 20 years and was thrown away like a piece of broken crockery. We have been married for two months, only known each other for three months, yet I am enormously proud to be Lady Napier.”

It wasn’t deliberate it was just the way they were lying. Elizabeth pulled him into an embrace and almost smothered him with her bosom. She did not care a jot. And Peter Napier thought there were worse ways to die!

--

They always knew they were on borrowed time. There were no sudden pains, no long days of worry and a gradual decline. They had flirted away as usual that morning and were sitting at the breakfast table. Suddenly Lord Napier grabbed his chest and managed.

“Oh, Elizabeth.”

He was dead before he hit the table. Despite all the talk, her private thoughts about this very moment, Elizabeth was a weeping mess. One of the things that allowed her to keep it together was the realisation that his last word on earth was her name. It provided comfort for years.

However, it was the summer, there was a need to bury Lord Napier quickly. Between them Carlyle and Jones kept the whole process moving forward. Getting an express to Lawrence in London and him returning to the estate was not possible before the committal. Carlyle organised three local gentlemen who knew Lord Napier of old to come and view the corpse. It was a gruesome necessity but was done with minimal fuss. They could all attest that it was Peter Napier that lay before them. Any thought of trying to interrogate his widow was still born. The effect of the tall austere one-armed man standing behind Elizabeth meant that no one approached the mark, never mind overstepped it.

Elizabeth arrived at the funeral service with the entire squad of one armed men overtly guarding her. They rode in an older second carriage and formed up outside her own carriage before escorting her into the church. It made a very striking impression. Which was the whole point.

Elizabeth was deliberately bland at the small reception after the burial. Women, even the widow, did not attend interments and all she wanted was to return to the grave so that she could grieve in private. Most of the enquires, whether benign or self-serving were deflected with the comment that she was waiting for Lawrence. In the middle of winter he would have been there, the season giving them a little more latitude in delaying the burial. The height of the summer? Not so much. But eventually they were all gone. She walked to the family plot, discreetly tucked away in a small grove at the side of the house.

She was given privacy, but she was guarded from a distance by Jones.

“You talked about this moment from the first day I met you. I am glad with got these five months together.”

Elizabeth was fighting the tears.

“You saved me. Not from death, but a fate worse than death. And you asked for nothing. I am humbled to have known you. And your generosity? I could work a lifetime and still not match it. I promise you this my husband. The name Napier will live on. I will not squander the lifeline that you threw me.

“It is a strange thing to think of at this moment, but knowing you maybe not. I was petrified of sex when I met you. It was to be my future, lying on my back having to accept any and all comers. And yet within weeks all that fear had gone. We were husband and wife, and yes you were no longer capable of the act of love, but you had two working arms and hands. Yet you did not paw me, you let me lose all my fears at my own pace. And I will always remember the look of veneration whenever you saw my body.”

She stifled a quiet giggle, the tears still flowing.

“I had to persuade you to caress my bottom and bosom. I don’t know what it all means, I really don’t. Actually I think I do know. I loved you. Perhaps my only wish is that you had been 20 years younger. It would have been fun to find out if I could live up to all your dirty dreams.”

She dabbed the tears and stood in silence. Were her thoughts inappropriate for the occasion? On the surface maybe, but it was their relationship. And she would have loved to carry his child.

--

“First of all my condolences Lady Napier.”