Chapter 1

April 29, 1812 Gracechurch Street

The four Gardiner children burst into the foyer as a friendly tempest, laughing and windblown, cheeks pink with exertion and delight. Elizabeth and Jane Bennet came behind, tidier than their cousins but no less cheerful, and Miss Maria Lucas, who was a little more disarranged than the other young ladies and a little less than the children. They turned their charges over to the nurse, who ushered them away without a single word on the state of their clothing; this was a happy household wherein children were expected to play like children, rather than miniature adults.

The mistress of the home awaited in the parlour’s open doorway as her nieces and their friend removed their bonnets and gloves. When they turned to her, both smiling and Jane as bright eyed as Elizabeth imagined she must be, Mrs Gardiner smiled broadly in return. They had both come to her out of spirits—Jane several months previous, nursing a battered heart, and Elizabeth herself not a fortnight ago, distracted and troubled for reasons she had not yet shared—but the pleasures of time spent with beloved relations in an orderly and welcoming atmosphere had worked a kind of magic and set her and her sister both to rights.

“Jane, Lizzy,” Mrs Gardiner said, “while you were out, there was a delivery for you.”

Jane appeared gently surprised, but Elizabeth’s imagination was immediately caught. “A delivery, Aunt? And from whom, pray tell?”

“I do not know who sent them,” their aunt replied. “I thought it would be uncouth to open the cards. But I have them in here for you, so perhaps you might relieve both your curiosity and mine?”

“Certainly, Aunt,” Jane replied, smiling at the eagerness of her dear relations. Their aunt gestured them into her parlour, where two resplendent bouquets of hothouse flowers awaited them on the table. The young ladies stopped abruptly inside the doorway, jaws dropping. Neither had expected anything so lavish. Maria gasped and turned wide eyes upon the Bennet girls.

“I took the liberty of placing them both in vases,” Mrs Gardiner said. “It would have been a great shame to allow them to wilt.”

“Indeed,” breathed Elizabeth, drawing closer. Accompanied by a note addressed to Miss J Bennet was a profusion of white and pink camellias interspersed with sprigs of rosemary. Clusters of spiky white asphodel and graceful stems of blooming lavender surrounded a trio of half-open roses the blushing orange of ripe apricots, with a note for Miss E Bennet attached.

After a moment, Jane stepped up to her sister’s side and, exchanging a silent look, they each reached for their notes. Elizabeth broke the wax with great curiosity, to find penned in a strong hand that she recognised immediately:

Please accept this token of my respect and wishes for your happiness,

F Darcy

Elizabeth narrowed her eyes at the page. That told her precisely nothing, she thought. Why should Mr Darcy send her flowers—and such extravagant ones, at that!—after the manner in which they had parted in Kent not three weeks previously?

Jane also stared at her own note for some time before the sisters moved as one to exchange them. In a sprawling, untidy hand, Elizabeth read:

I have only just learnt that you are, and have long been, in London. I shall call tomorrow, and if you wish to instruct the servant to shut the door in my face, it will be no less than I deserve, though I pray you shall not.

C Bingley

Jane folded Mr Darcy’s note and handed it back to Elizabeth, receiving Mr Bingley’s in return. Elizabeth turned to her aunt and Maria with a smile and said, “It seems Mr Bingley is coming back for Jane, and his friend, with whom you will recall I often quarrelled, seeks to make peace with me.”

Their surprise was apparent. “After all this time? Do you intend to receive him, Jane?” Mrs Gardiner enquired.

Jane was silent for a long moment, studying the flowers. Then she smiled widely and said, “Yes, I shall. At least once, to hear his explanation. He has said he will call tomorrow.”

“Well, in that case, I’d best speak with Mrs Twomey and ensure that we have some of her lemon cakes,” Mrs Gardiner replied. From the look on her countenance, it appeared she did regard her niece’s decision with some concern, but Elizabeth knew she would respect it. Mrs Gardiner left the room, intent upon her errand.

The three young ladies remained in the parlour, awed by the flowers. “Oh, Jane,” said Maria, eyes wide. “How strange that Mr Bingley should reappear after all this time! Are you very nervous?”

“I am curious,” Jane allowed, “and perhaps a bit nervous also. We shall see what the morrow brings, I suppose.”

“I could not be half so calm as you at such a time!” the younger lady cried.

Knowing that this line of conversation could continue indefinitely if allowed, Elizabeth gently redirected her. “Maria, were you not concerned that your green muslin had become rather crushed in your trunk? It would be most suitable for the call we now expect, perhaps you might wish to give it over to Nora for pressing?”

“Oh, yes, thank you, Lizzy! I should not have thought of it until the morning, and then it would have been too late, like as not! Excuse me, I shall attend to it immediately.”

Left alone with her dearest sister as the sound of Maria’s rapid footsteps on the stairs faded, Jane allowed real excitement and hope to show in her face and voice. “Oh, Lizzy. He did not know! I am sure of it now! I know you told me that Miss Bingley and Miss Hurst must have concealed my presence here, but I did not wish to believe it. And perhaps it will still turn out to be a misunderstanding. But now he does know, and he is coming, after sending such a beautiful message!”

“It was a properly humble note, to be sure, but?—”

Jane cut her off, crying, “Not the note, the flowers! Rosemary for remembrance, to say that he never forgot me. Pink camellias for longing—” here, Jane’s cheeks went the colour of the blooms in question “—and white for…for adoration,” she concluded, almost on a whisper.

Elizabeth had never had much interest in the language of flowers, her situation in life suggesting that she would rarely receive them, but Jane had studied the subject assiduously from the age of twelve, for it spoke to the deepest romantic yearnings of her tender heart. “I see,” Elizabeth replied with a smile. “That is indeed a lovely message, my dear sister. I am delighted for you, and hope that his reasons for acting as he did will be sufficient to allow you both to be happy again. But,” she added seriously, “I do urge you to make him offer a thorough explanation, and not allow all to be forgot on the strength of an apology and a smile.”

“I shall, Lizzy,” Jane promised. “If I have learnt anything from knowing Mr Bingley, it is that I require both love and trust to be happy, and at present I possess only one of those with regard to him.”

Sad as Elizabeth was for the pain her dearest sister had endured, she was heartened to see that it had at least brought her a clarity of understanding Jane had been too naive to gain without it.

“Now, shall we decipher your flowers?” Jane said with a hint of mischief.

“By all means, interpret them for me,” Elizabeth replied, expecting that the message would be one of friendship, or perhaps apology.

It did not seem as though she would be proved wrong, when Jane turned to study the bouquet and said, “Asphodel for regret. Very fitting, I am sure.” Jane knew of Mr Darcy’s insulting proposal, and of most of the contents of the letter he had given her. All Elizabeth had concealed was his hand in separating Jane from Mr Bingley, not wishing to remind Jane of her failed romance.

But then she continued, “Lavender for constancy. And orange roses…” She made a distracted humming noise as she took a moment to recall the meaning of the unusual blooms. She then looked startled, and said, “Orange roses mean fascination. Regret, constancy, fascination… Oh, Lizzy. I think he still loves you.”