Epilogue Chapter 2

Pemberley Chapel

Christmas Day, 1820

Elizabeth Darcy wiggled a trifle closer to her husband, partly to enjoy his warmth and partly because the Darcy church box was full.

Across from Elizabeth sat her seven-year-old niece, Beatrice Russell, who was seated next to her mother, Jane. Beatrice, a calm and phlegmatic child, was gazing in wonder at the stained glass windows high above the box. Elizabeth smiled slightly at the sight of mother and daughter, both with blue eyes and blonde hair, wearing grave expressions as the rector spoke the ancient words from the Holy Book about the nativity.

She was thankful that Beatrice’s twin, Aaron, was back in the nursery at Pemberley with his younger siblings and cousins. Aaron was an extremely active little boy, who would be more likely to leap from one box to the other than listen quietly to a sermon.

The Bingleys were seated next to Jane, with Kitty leaning against her husband. Elizabeth was grateful for that marriage. Kitty, who was quite similar to Jane in temperament, had reaped the benefits of Bingley’s maturation as a man, and now they were the master and mistress of Greymond and parents to two bonny sons.

“ Behold,” the rector declared, “a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us...”

Elizabeth quieted her mind and heart and turned her entire attention on the spiritual significance of the day, the remembrance of the birth of the Christ Child.

/

Mrs. Bennet’s Sitting Room

Christmas Day

Two Hours After Noon

“Oh, Lizzy,” Mrs. Bennet wailed, “it is absolutely too much for me to have lost my husband and my home. To think of Charlotte Collins as mistress of Longbourn. I truly cannot bear it, to be a wanderer without a place to call my own! And why should they be master and mistress? It is not as if the Collinses know what to do with the estate.”

Elizabeth suppressed a sigh as she looked around the spacious sitting room, which was adjacent to an even larger bedchamber. She knew that her mother, widowed for only four months, was still struggling with her new situation in life, but it was irritating to continually hear Mrs. Bennet’s whining when she was living in the very lap of luxury. As for Longbourn, while Mr. Collins was a foolish man, Charlotte was eminently sensible, and the couple and their sons would doubtless be far better overseers than the late Mr. Bennet.

“Mamma,” Lydia suddenly said, lifting her head from her issue of the Ladies’ Monthly Museum , “do you think that I should wear a veil like this at my wedding?”

Elizabeth cast a grateful glance at her youngest sister as Mrs. Bennet’s despondency lifted to be replaced by bulging eyes of horror. “Like that? Oh, my dear Lydia, no! It would cover most of your lovely hair. No, if you must wear a veil, it should be…”

As Mrs. Bennet chattered on, Lydia deliberately met Elizabeth’s gaze and then nodded toward the door, causing the mistress of Pemberley to smile gratefully and slip out of her mother’s room and into the corridor of the guest wing of the house. It was, perhaps, a trifle odd to have her mother settled outside the family wing, but she truly could not bear to listen to her mother’s whining tone drifting through her own bedchamber door.

“Are you well, Lizzy?”

Elizabeth looked up in surprise and then smiled at her sister Mary, who had just attained the top of the main stairway and was looking at her with concern.

“I am well enough,” she replied, though softly. “Mamma is being rather difficult, but Lydia has distracted her by speaking of her attire for the wedding next month.

“I am sorry, Lizzy,” Mary said, her face apologetic in the wavering light of the candles lit in the sconces. “Truly, Gerald and I would be pleased to have Mamma stay with us…”

“Nonsense, my dear,” Elizabeth interrupted. “You and Gerald do not have the room in the Kympton parsonage for Mamma, and you are both busy caring for the children and your parishioners. I am well enough, especially with Jane in residence, and the Bingleys only forty miles away. Indeed, Mamma may well journey to Greymond and stay with Kitty after Lydia’s wedding.”

“Where is Jane?” Mary asked, as the two sisters began making their slow way downstairs.

“I suspect she is in the nursery with her children,” Elizabeth replied. “I have noticed that when she is particularly missing Isaac, she spends time with her little ones. They are a comfort to her.”

“Is there any word on when Isaac will be returning from America?” Mary asked.

Elizabeth nodded as they stepped onto the main floor and said, “Yes. Jane received a letter from him only this week, and he hopes to return by early March. It is obviously a long separation for them, but I cannot blame our brother for pursuing such an excellent possibility for trading wool with the former colonies.”

At this moment, two gentlemen appeared from the direction of the library, one tall and handsome and one short and cheerful, both very much loved by their wives.

“Elizabeth, my dear,” Darcy said. “Haskell and I were just enjoying a visit to the library.”

“Yes, and it was difficult for me to drag myself away from such lavish treasure,” Gerald Haskell replied with a grin. “Mary, my dear, would you be willing to escort me to the nursery? You know how easily I get lost in this great house, and I have some sweets for the children.”

Mary looked a trifle surprised, but immediately nodded and, after a quick goodbye to the Darcys, guided her husband back up the stairs toward the expansive nursery.

Elizabeth turned a curious look on her husband, who was gazing down on her fondly.

“Yes,” he said. “I asked Haskell to leave us alone. Would my lady be interested in a walk outside in the snow?”

Elizabeth brightened immediately. “It is snowing now? Oh, I would like that very much, Fitzwilliam. Let me fetch my warm clothing!”

/

The Rose Garden

Pemberley

A Few Minutes Later

Soft snow flurries drifted through the air, whispering down like a baby’s dreams. The wind had died entirely, leaving large lazy flakes to fall without any interference. Already the ground had patches of slowly growing white collecting on it, dusting the brown earth with a pleasing coverlet, even though fallen leaves still crunched on the path beneath their feet. Water burbled close at hand, the flowing stream not yet iced over, as Darcy led his wife to the small stone bridge that arched over the stream. The railing and stone pillars at each end wore little woolly caps of snow, and Darcy mused that he perhaps ought to order the sleigh to be readied for the morrow.

He thought, fondly, of the family tradition that Boxing Day had turned into. Before he had met Elizabeth, it had been merely a duty, and one in which his sole contribution had been to provide the monies to Mrs. Reynolds as she worked to prepare boxes for the tenants and servants.

Then he had met the lady who would become his wife, and he had witnessed firsthand her enthusiasm in purchasing exactly the right gifts for the farmers and their families and her special joy in collecting toys for the children. She had shown him just how wonderful it could be to serve the people of Pemberley in a hands-on way, and after they had married – and after they had started having children – it had become a family tradition that all the Darcys shared together.

He glanced lovingly at his beautiful wife. She looked very fetching today, the pale fur lining her cap, which was the same blue as her pelisse, stark against her dark hair, her lovely hands tucked away inside matching gloves. He took a moment to admire her, a handful of snowflakes adorning the crown of her head and her shoulders.

“Oh,” Elizabeth said suddenly, turning to face her husband, “I received a letter from Georgiana yesterday, but with all the hustle and bustle of the last day, I forgot to tell you about it.”

“How is she?” he asked in what he hoped was a calm tone. In truth, he was concerned about his sister, married more than a year previously to the eldest son of the Earl of Forsyth and expected to deliver her first child within the month.

“She is well,” Elizabeth replied, patting his arm reassuringly. “I know you are anxious and I am as well, but she has an excellent accoucheur, and the countess is, she says, extremely compassionate.”

“I do worry,” he admitted, stopping in his tracks and turning to gaze blankly toward the distant hills to the north. “My mother always struggled with birthing her children, and I fear Georgiana will be the same.”

“All we can do is pray,” Elizabeth replied, “but keep in mind that care for pregnant ladies has improved in the past years. Moreover, while I never met Lady Anne, I am confident that Georgiana is very strong and healthy and will do well.”

Darcy smiled down at his darling and nodded. “You are correct, of course, that worrying does no good. We will pray, and I look forward to a message of her safe delivery soon.”

“Amen to that,” Elizabeth agreed fervently.