P. James: Death Comes to Pemberley

Elizabeth missed little of her previous life, but it was to the servants at Longbourn that her thoughts most frequently turned: Hill the housekeeper, who had been privy to all their secrets, including Lydia’s notorious elopement, Wright the cook, who was uncomplaining about Mrs Bennet’s somewhat unreasonable demands, and the two maids who combined their duties with acting as ladies’ maids to Jane and herself, arranging their hair before the assembly balls. They had become part of the family in a way the servants at Pemberley could never be, but she knew that it was Pemberley, the house and the Darcys, which bound family, staff and tenants together in a common loyalty. Many of them were the children and grandchildren of previous servants, and the house and its history were in their blood. And she knew, too, that it was the birth of the two fine and healthy boys upstairs in the nursery – Fitzwilliam, who was nearly five and Charles, who was just two – which had been her final triumph, an assurance that the family and its heritage would endure to provide work for them and for their children and grandchildren and that there would continue to be Darcys at Pemberley.

Nearly six years earlier Mrs Reynolds, conferring over the guest list, menu and flowers for Elizabeth’s first dinner party, had said, “It was a happy day for us all, madam, when Mr Darcy brought home his bride. It was the dearest wish of my mistress that she would live to see her son married. Alas, it was not to be. I knew how anxious she was, both for his own sake and for Pemberley, that he should be happily settled.”

Elizabeth’s curiosity had overcome discretion. She had occupied herself by moving papers on her desk without looking up, saying lightly, “But not perhaps with this wife. Was it not settled by Lady Anne Darcy and her sister that a match should be made between Mr Darcy and Miss de Bourgh?”

“I am not saying, madam, that Lady Catherine might not have had such a plan in mind. She brought Miss de Bourgh to Pemberley often enough when Mr Darcy was known to be here. But it would never have been. Miss de Bourgh, poor lady, was always sickly and Lady Anne placed great store on good health in a bride. We did hear that Lady Catherine was hoping Miss de Bourgh’s other cousin, Colonel Fitzwilliam, would make an offer, but nothing came of it.”

Recalling her mind to the present, Elizabeth slipped Lady Anne’s notebook into a drawer and then, reluctant to leave the peace and solitude which she could not now hope to enjoy until the ball was safely over, walked over to one of the two windows which gave a view of the long curving drive to the house and the river, fringed by the famous Pemberley wood. This had been planted under the direction of a notable landscape gardener some generations earlier. Each tree at the edge, perfect in form and hung with the warm golden flags of autumn, stood a little apart from the others as if to emphasise its singular beauty, and the planting then became denser as the eyes were cunningly drawn towards the rich loam-smelling solitude of the interior. There was a second and larger wood to the north-west in which the trees and bushes had been allowed to grow naturally and which had been a playground and secret refuge from the nursery for Darcy as a boy. His great-grandfather who, on inheriting the estate, became a recluse, had built a cottage there in which he had shot himself, and the wood – referred to as the woodland to distinguish it from the arboretum – had induced a superstitious fear in the servants and tenants of Pemberley and was seldom visited. A narrow lane ran through it to a second entrance to Pemberley, but this was used mainly by tradesmen and the guests to the ball would sweep up the main drive, their vehicles and horses accommodated in the stables and their coachmen entertained in the kitchens while the ball was in progress.

Lingering at the window and putting aside the concerns of the day, Elizabeth let her eyes rest on the familiar and calming but ever-changing beauty. The sun was shining from a sky of translucent blue in which only a few frail clouds dissolved like wisps of smoke. Elizabeth knew from the short walk which she and her husband usually took at the beginning of the day that the winter sunshine was deceptive, and a chilling breeze, for which she was ill prepared, had driven them quickly home. Now she saw that the wind had strengthened. The surface of the river was creased with small waves which spent themselves among the grasses and shrubs bordering the stream, their broken shadows trembling on the agitated water.

She saw that two people were braving the morning chill; Georgiana and Colonel Fitzwilliam had been walking beside the river and now were turning towards the greensward and the stone steps leading to the house. Colonel Fitzwilliam was in uniform, his red tunic a vivid splash of colour against the soft blue of Georgiana’s pelisse. They were walking a little distanced but, she thought, companionably, occasionally pausing as Georgiana clutched at her hat which was in danger of being swept away by the wind. As they approached, Elizabeth drew back from the window, anxious that they should not feel that they were being spied upon, and returned to her desk. There were letters to be written, invitations to be replied to, and decisions to be made on whether any of the cottagers were in poverty or grief and would welcome a visit conveying her sympathy or practical help.

She had hardly taken up her pen when there was a gentle knock on the door and the reappearance of Mrs Reynolds. “I’m sorry to disturb you madam, but Colonel Fitzwilliam has just come in from a walk and has asked whether you can spare him some minutes, if it is not too inconvenient.”

Elizabeth said, “I’m free now, if he would like to come up.”

Elizabeth thought she knew what he might have to communicate and it would be an anxiety which she would have been glad to be spared. Darcy had few close relations and from boyhood his cousin, Colonel Fitzwilliam, had been a frequent visitor to Pemberley. During his early military career he had appeared less often but during the last eighteen months his visits had become shorter but more frequent and Elizabeth had noticed that there had been a difference, subtle but unmistakable, in his behaviour to Georgiana – he smiled more often when she was present and showed a greater readiness than previously to sit by her when he could and engage her in conversation. Since his visit last year for Lady Anne’s ball there had been a material change in his life. His elder brother, who had been heir to the earldom, had died abroad and he had now inherited the title of Viscount Hartlep and was the acknowledged heir. He preferred not to use his present title, particularly when among friends, deciding to wait until he succeeded before assuming his new name and the many responsibilities it would bring, and he was still generally known as Colonel Fitzwilliam.

He would, of course, be looking to marry, especially now when England was at war with France and he might be killed in action without leaving an heir. Although Elizabeth had never concerned herself with the family tree, she knew that there was no close male relative and that if the colonel died without leaving a male child the earldom would lapse. She wondered, and not for the first time, whether he was seeking a wife at Pemberley and, if so, how Darcy would react. It must surely be agreeable to him that his sister should one day become a countess and her husband a member of the House of Lords and a legislator of his country. All that was a reason for justifiable family pride, but would Georgiana share it? She was now a mature woman and no longer subject to guardianship, but Elizabeth knew that it would grieve Georgiana greatly if she contemplated marriage with a man of whom her brother could not approve; and there was the complication of Henry Alveston. Elizabeth had seen enough to make her sure that he was in love, or on the verge of love, but what of Georgiana? Of one thing Elizabeth was certain, Georgiana Darcy would never marry without love, or without that strong attraction, affection and respect which a woman could assure herself would deepen into love. Would not that have been enough for Elizabeth herself if Colonel Fitzwilliam had proposed while he was visiting his aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, at Rosings? The thought that she might unwittingly have lost Darcy and her present happiness to grasp at an offer from his cousin was even more humiliating than the memory of her partiality for the infamous George Wickham and she thrust it resolutely aside.