Chapter 29

O n Tuesday morning Lydia slipped out of the manor house at about a half hour before the hour set for the meeting. She was very confident all would be as it should be as she contemplated seeing the handsome Mr Wickham once again.

She whistled as she walked towards Oakham Mount in anticipation of what the day would bring. She wondered if her mother, Mr Wickham, and the friend to whom her mother alluded would be on time, or would they change their minds and not come as they claimed they would.

The subjects of Lydia’s musing had departed Gardiner House in the rented gig just after nine that morning. It would take almost an hour and one half to arrive in the Meryton area. They would turn off the road before entering the town—no reason to take unnecessary chances—and head towards Oakham Mount. Wickham planned to arrive early, so he could make sure there was no one waiting to arrest him at their meeting place.

Mrs Bennet, or Miss Gardiner—whatever the imbecilic woman’s name was— was the easiest of all of the women he had ever had to dupe. Her hatred for the duchess blinded her to all else, and Wickham was masterful at exploiting such foibles for his own ends.

Fanny, who was sitting on the bench between Mr Wickham and Miss Younge was thinking of all of the money that the wilful girl would be forced to pay her. She could practically smell it, and if Lydia had to be held in a hunting lodge for a few days to attain what Fanny felt was her due, then so be it. It was a small price for Lydia to pay to gain a handsome man like Mr Wickham as her husband.

Karen Younge could not wait until she was finally able to rid herself of George Wickham. If this scheme came to nought like all of his previous schemes, she had the alternate plan of turning him in and gaining the ten thousand pounds. One way or another, she would get paid, and George would be sent to the devil before she allowed him to betray her again. She was only sorry Clay was no longer alive to see George get his well-deserved comeuppance. If the scheme failed, and she had to lead the Prince Regent’s men to her so-called partner, having him die by losing his head like Clay had was apt.

The gig could not reach the base of Oakham Mount so Wickham drove it off the path and halted it behind a few trees which would hide it from anyone who happened along. He unhitched the cob and used a long tether to tie him to a tree so that the horse would be able to munch the grass and drink from a small brook while they waited for Miss Lydia. Wickham wanted the horse well rested for their flight from the area.

“You ladies should wait here in the shade while I make sure the meeting place is secure,” Wickham instructed. Because the two were seated on the small carriage’s bench, it would be no hardship for them to wait for him.

He was wearing his disguise. His hat was pulled low over his eyes just in case he encountered someone as he walked the last few hundred yards to the hill. While he walked, Wickham feigned being very interested in his surroundings. It was not long before he was at the base of the eminence. He followed the ill-formed walking path around the base until he saw the stand of trees Miss Lydia had referenced in her letter.

He approached, taking a few steps and then stopping to listen. He supposed there was something useful he had learnt in the militia after all. As the treeline was only about twenty plus yards from the hill, it did not take many minutes—even with the precautions he was taking—to reach the trees .

As he detected no unseen observers, Wickham’s confidence rose, and he strutted into the clearing. One second he was looking around, and the next there was a pain in his head before his world went black.

When Lydia approached Oakham Mount, she saw no one so she called out for her mother.

Hearing her daughter, Fanny made to leave the gig, climbing off the bench to the ground, and headed towards the sound of Lydia’s voice. Karen Younge followed. She knew Miss Gardiner was of mean understanding, but as George had not bothered to call for them, and the daughter had arrived, she said nothing to stop the silly woman.

Just as Fanny and Miss Younge reached the path one would take to the summit of the hill; they saw the back of a tall young lady as she disappeared into the treeline. As that was the place they were to meet, the two co-conspirators made for the clearing Lydia had said was just past the first line of trees. The light was not as bright in the clearing thanks to the rough circle made by the evergreen trees.

They looked around as their eyes adjusted, and Fanny saw Lydia standing across from them, but there was no Mr Wickham.

“Lydia, my dear lively Lydia, it is so good to see that you have come and will agree to marry Mr Wickham,” Fanny cooed. Then she remembered the man she had mentioned was not here. He was supposed to be charming Lydia.

“Miss Gardiner, did you for one moment think I would marry a seducer, thief, and attempted kidnapper, among many other crimes? As his attempt was on one close to the crown, it was an act of treason. The criminal is trussed up and will soon be on his way to the Tower where, unless Lizzy intercedes, you will be joining him. Both of you!” Lydia stated with a hard edge to her voice.

Self-preservation was a finely honed sense in Miss Karen Younge. She knew not how, but their caper was known, and if she did not move, she too would be arrested. She had been willing to settle for the lesser reward, not gaol! She turned and attempted to run back the way she had come, but bumped into a very huge and solid man who held her arm.

“Miss Lydia ain’t done talking to you,” Biggs growled next to her ear.

A fear she had never known before gripped Miss Younge. She looked around and realised they were surrounded. Another enormous man stood behind Miss Gardiner. She recognised the former Colonel Fitzwilliam, earl of something, and Mr Darcy. Both men glowered at her. Of all of George’s hairbrained plans to gain funds from others, this was the worst of them all.

“Lydia, how can you betray me in this way? Is it not bad enough that so-called duchess has been so cruel to me…” Fanny closed her mouth when Lydia looked at her in anger and then her daughter’s gaze softened as she glanced to the side. There stood her former husband and the girl who had caused her all of her ills.

“Miss Gardiner, how many times did I beg you to make changes like the rest of us did?” Bennet barked. He looked at Lydia proudly, “Lydia, like all of our daughters have, has willingly made changes in her behaviour. You dare blame Lizzy when she has never done anything other than to seek your love until she realised you are incapable of loving anyone other than yourself.”

“After this day I will never think of you again, but I am sure you will think about me every day,” Elizabeth intoned. “That is for however long that life may be.”

Both Fanny and Karen Younge’s faces turned a sickly white.

“You asked me how I could betray you,” Lydia shook her head. “How have I betrayed you? You are the one who is conspiring with a treasonous criminal to commit further acts of treason. Besides, I did not need to tell anyone about your note, but I did, we knew all about your plans before your ridiculous letter arrived.”

Both Fanny Gardiner and Karen Younge looked astounded. “How?” Fanny squeaked out as she fought to regain some colour.

“Do you not remember it was me who employed the servants for you?” Phillips reminded his sister-in-law. “And by the way, Miss Singleton’s hearing is better than your own. We suspected that in your delusions where all your problems were caused by others, namely Lizzy, and not by your own hand, you would attempt some sort of revenge. We knew we needed to watch you at all times. Yes, she was expecting the kidnapper to make a noise behind her to trip her up, so she did not flinch when he did so. We had daily reports so we were fully aware of the scheme you and your cohorts were cooking up. You should know both Hattie and Gardiner have broken with you.”

“But I loved you, Lydia. You are my favourite,” Fanny claimed, ignoring what Frank said about her loyal servants. She could not think of the way mere nothings had pulled the wool over her eyes so effectively.

“No, Miss Gardiner. All you saw was a younger version of yourself. You tried to turn me into a vapid, flirtatious lightskirt in your own image. I thank God daily that Papa tricked me into seeing my own insignificance,” Lydia smiled warmly at her pater. “When he shared the truth with me, rather than be angry with him, I was grateful he loved me enough to make me see how wrong the path you had set me on was. Since I have been learning from my sisters, Papa, and Mrs Poppins I have learnt no honourable woman would elope. The fact you tried to induce me to do so speaks of your lack of character and morals.

“Furthermore, before you say you loved Jane as well, it was only because she looks like you, which is the only measure you use in judging beauty. Lizzy, Mary, and Kate are no less beautiful because they do not look like you.”

“By the by, Miss Gardiner, Mary who you called plain at every turn, will be marrying an earl on Friday, and our dearest Janey is marrying a viscount,” Elizabeth related. “Can you not imagine how good your life would have been had you been willing to learn to change?”

Fanny’s mouth dropped open. Miss Lizzy a duchess, plain Mary marrying an earl! Had the whole of the world gone insane? How could it be when the only important thing was beauty, and how one used her arts and allurements? She thought of something and turned to her hated second daughter. “How can you allow your own mother to be executed? The woman who gave you life?” Fanny attempted to manipulate her daughter as a last ditch effort to save her own neck.

“It takes more than just bearing a child to be a mother!” Elizabeth exclaimed hotly. “I may have entered the mortal world via your body, but you were never a mother to me. A mother does not denigrate a daughter. A mother offers love, not disdain! A mother does not do everything she can to destroy a daughter’s self-worth! A mother offers succour, not insults! No, Madam, you were never a mother to me, so do not expect to be treated thusly now!” Elizabeth paused and allowed a measure of her anger to bleed from her. “That being said, the Regent has allowed me to decide what the punishment for you and Miss Younge will be. If I do not decide on another way for you to pay for your crimes, then to the Tower of London you will go.”

As much as she wanted to refute Elizabeth’s words, she knew she could not. All of the times she had mistreated her second daughter flashed before her eyes as Fanny felt the very real fear she would be facing the executioner’s axe in the near future. That combined with the steely glint in the eyes of all those facing her, told her there would be no quarter given to her. Next to her, Miss Younge was no less afraid.

“Why is this treason? You are not a royal,” Miss Younge managed.

“Thanks to a decree by his Highness…” Darcy explained why any action against the Duchess of Hertfordshire rose to the level of treason. “So you chose to ignore all of those who told you the truth about that soon-to-be dead criminal, and believed him. Why? Is it because he is handsome? Not a very wise path.” Darcy paused and looked at Miss Gardiner. “You must be truly ignorant, and never taken the trouble to read a newspaper, because had you done so, the truth of Wickham’s deeds were listed for all to read. In addition, you would have known what attempting to hurt Her Grace would cost you.” He looked at the woman he had hoped never to see again after she had attempted to betray Anna with the soon-to-be executed miscreant. “I would have thought you more intelligent than to follow one of Wickham’s doomed ‘ get wealthy without work ’ schemes. Did you learn nothing from the failure at Ramsgate?”

Miss Younge looked away. She knew what Mr Darcy had said was nothing but the truth. If she was honest with herself, she had to own that avarice had been her undoing. She could have received ten thousand pounds for turning Wickham in to the authorities, but she had been enticed away from doing the safer, sure thing by her ideas of retaining all of the money they were supposed to have received.

For the first time in her life, Fanny began to feel the weight of her own bad decisions and ill-advised actions. A few genuine tears rolled down her cheeks.

“Regardless of what you deserve, you did bring me into the world, and I do not like the idea of a lady being executed, unless she has taken a life herself. As despicable as your actions have been, you have not committed murder.” Elizabeth held her hand up as Fanny began to celebrate prematurely. “You will both be transported to Van Diemen’s Land. Before you become too pleased, if you survive the sea voyage of many months, once you arrive on the other side of the world, you will not be free. You will be convicts, and as such you will be put to work for seven years. When you complete your sentence, you will be free to remain in New Holland, or go anywhere you choose, except any part of the Empire, especially not Great Britain. If either of you ever set foot in the United Kingdom again, the sentence of death will be reinstated and carried out without delay.” Elizabeth looked from woman to woman. “You have a choice. Transportation or the Tower. What shall it be?”

Even with the long and potentially perilous journey over the oceans and seven years of being treated as servants, both women knew it was preferable to losing their heads. Very sullenly first one then the other accepted transportation.

Elizabeth nodded to the former sergeant-majors. Each one took a woman by the arm and led her away. Each woman, in her own way, was rueing the day she had ever met George Wickham. If they ever saw him themselves, they would issue a setdown for the ages. They were lifted into the back of a cart, where lying in the bed of the cart, bound, gagged, and seemingly unconscious was none other than the last man either wished to see. If both of them accidently kicked his prostrate form in a rather sensitive area as they passed him to take their seats in the bed of the cart, with their backs to the man who would drive it, No one commented on their actions.

~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~

Thanks to the ‘ partially deaf ’ Miss Singleton, along with the two maids and man servant who were all employed at Gardiner House, but owed their allegiance to Mr Phillips, the plan to try enticing Lydia into an elopement and to use it as leverage to demand a ransom was known before the note ever arrived for Lydia.

As soon as the name of the man wanted for treason was heard, a note had been dispatched from the servants to Mr Phillips who had gone directly to see Bennet. Within minutes of Phillips’s report, a rider was on his way to Buckingham House in London with a request for the Regent. The reply had been received before the sun set that day. Permission was given to allow things to play out so that all conspirators would be caught in the act.

Some of the former royal guardsmen had been dispatched to Hatfield to keep an eye on the miscreants. Hence, when the man servant delivered the note, Lydia had known her mother would attempt to contact her. She had played her part well, just in case one of the maids at Longbourn spoke out of turn and word reached those in Hatfield.

By the morning of the meeting between Lydia, her mother, and her two friends , Biggs and Johns had completely reconnoitred the stand of trees and surrounding area. They had placed themselves and twelve other men around, all well hidden from sight. A few had been in the trees, so had Wickham looked up, he may have spotted them before Johns silently crept up behind him and coshed him.

As soon as the fugitive had been securely bound, shackled, and gagged, he was removed to a waiting cart. Then Lydia was told to call out while at the same time Bennet, Elizabeth, Phillips, Darcy, and the Fitzwilliam brothers positioned themselves behind trees on the opposite side of the clearing to where Lydia, her mother, and Miss Younge would enter. So, when they followed Lydia into the clearing, the pincers of the trap had been closed and their fates sealed.

~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~

Wickham woke up as he was being jostled around the bed of the cart. He had a throbbing pain at the back of his head, and for some reason his lower area was painful as well.

He tried shifting his position. It did not take him long to realise he could move no part of his body. When he focused his eyes on his hands, he did not miss the shackles, or the chain running from them to a ring in the wood on which he was lying. Nor did it take long, thanks in part to the movement, to determine he was very securely restrained in the back of a cart.

The events before he lost consciousness played through his mind: He entered the clearing and then the pain, and now the next thing he remembered was waking up in the dire straits in which he currently found himself. He realised that someone with great strength must have struck him on his head. How his male parts had been injured, he could not fathom. It was then the panic began to set in. If he had been arrested, did that mean he was on the way to the Tower to lose his head?

Wickham lifted his head and there were men in the uniform of the Royal Guard riding next to the cart on the side he could see. His whole body shook with fear. His only option was to talk his way out of his troubles, but he could not make a sound. It was then he realised he was gagged as well. The terror of his impending end overwhelmed him, and he vacated his bowels.

“You always were a coward, George Wickham,” Karen Younge said derisively. She was pleased she was not sitting at the other end of the cart due to the direction of the wind coming from behind her. “You must have just realised you are to lose your head.”

After moving his head, Wickham swivelled his eyes and saw Karen and Miss Gardiner, both shackled as well. They were all caught, but why was there no agitation like he felt in Karen and Miss Gardiner’s looks?

“We are to be transported, so we will not be keeping you company. By the way, how does your private area feel? Fanny and I used it to practise some kicks!” Karen cackled. “At least I will never have to see you again once we reach London. Enjoy hell!”

His heart was beating so fast, Wickham could hear it in his ears. How could it be that it had all come to this. His talent was avoiding consequences. It seemed this time it would not be so.