Chapter 13

Thirteen

I n nearby Kympton, an old lady stirred in her bed. Severe gout afflicted her, and the pain ranged from unpleasant to wholly unbearable. She had once served in the great house until six years prior when her condition had rendered her lame and useless, unable to do anything more than lie in her bed and hope for the day to pass quickly. Her eyes were too blind to read, and her ears heard but little. She was imprisoned by the trappings of a failing body, though her mind and her soul remained spry.

Or so it had been until that afternoon.

During her usual nap, she had dreamt of her former life at Pemberley. She would never overstep her place, never take more than was her due, yet she was proud, possibly excessively so, of her place there. She had taken great pleasure in helping raise the children of the house, though they were not her own, and nothing matched the pleasure she felt while strolling the halls, seeing room after room perfectly clean and ordered, the fine furnishings gleaming.

Ah, but the dream had been so real to her! She had been in the kitchen, checking on the preparations for a party given by Lady Anne and Mr Darcy. Master Fitzwilliam had come in, as was his custom, to steal some biscuits before his dinner, and as was her custom, she had pretended not to see him. He was a growing boy and she knew that, more often than not, he was hungry. Of course, Mr Reynolds saw him and made great sport of chasing him, exclaiming idle threats as he went that made Master Fitzwilliam laugh and run faster to escape him.

The first thing she noticed, when she was fully awake, was how straight and strong her legs appeared. Why, they look as if they could run to Lambton and back , she thought admiringly. She pulled herself into a more upright position, noting that there was no stiffness, no pain as she did so.

Then, she turned to the window, hearing very clearly the birds singing in the trees and a cat meowing at something—likely the same birds—from beneath her window. Time to get out of bed, Agatha , she thought and nearly leapt from the bed. She walked quickly to the window to peer out on a fine summer day. The breeze was lovely on her face, the fragrance of a summer afternoon…

The horror of neglected duty struck her very suddenly. If she was in Kympton in bed , who was seeing to dinner? And why had she been abed in the middle of the day? She was surely not ill? She felt as strong as an ox with nary a sniffle or ache!

"Oh dear," she murmured to herself. "They will think I have gone dotty or worse!"

Quickly going to the armoire, she pulled out all the things she would need: her petticoat, her gown, her stockings. Hastily pinning her hair into a neat arrangement, she then began to dress and was just pulling the gown over her head when someone entered the room.

"Aunt Reynolds!" She emerged from the gown to see her niece, Mrs Walsh, hastening to her side. "What in heaven's name are you doing?"

Mrs Reynolds sat on the bedside chair to put on her boots. "I am dressing myself. I need to get up to the house, they will be wanting dinner soon enough, I think, and who knows what menu Cook has prepared for them? Eugenia, I cannot think what I have been about, lolling about in bed in the middle of the day but in the future, do give me a nudge if you see me behaving so strangely!"

"Dinner?" Mrs Walsh, a plump matron, looked bewildered. "But…but what about…"

"What about what?" Mrs Reynolds asked her.

"I-I hardly know. It just seems…surprising." Her niece's brow was furrowed, but being an easy-natured kind of lady, she was quick to set it aside. "What brought you here? Do you not have your own lodgings at Pemberley?"

"Of course." Mrs Reynolds thought about that a moment but could reach no satisfactory conclusion. She had not been let go, that much was certain. So why was she not at Pemberley?

A question for another time. Right now there are more pressing concerns . "I wonder if there is yet fish to be got? Have you been to the market this morning?"

"How are your hands, Aunt?" Mrs Walsh asked, ignoring the question about fish. "Your rheumatism has been acting up something dreadful of late."

"Has it?" Mrs Reynolds took a look at her hands. Her skin appeared slightly chapped, it was true, but then again she had never been the sort of housekeeper who thought herself above the work. If something needed to be mended or wiped or scrubbed and no one else was around to do it, she got to it herself.

Rheumatism? She made a fist a few times, just to see how it felt. She had no pain.

"I am perfectly well," she said. "My legs are firm and strong, my hands feel capable and sure, and my senses are as sharp as ever they were."

"I recollect times where you nearly sobbed from the pain in your joints, days when you could scarcely stand for it."

Mrs Reynolds was now putting on some old gloves she found in her drawer. They needed mending, but she would do that after she saw to dinner. "That does not sound like me."

"Let us send for the apothecary," Mrs Walsh urged. "Let him see your improvement, and perhaps once he has given his opinion, we might permit you to?—"

"That old coot?" Mrs Reynolds snorted inelegantly. "I assure you, I do not need the likes of him to tell me what I may or may not do. Now, you may come with me or you may stay here, but I am off to Pemberley. Folks will be wanting their dinner soon, and I intend to make sure it is a good meal."

The buzzing of a bee circling Mrs Gardiner's bonnet roused both her and her husband. She woke feeling dazed, a slight headache pulsing behind her eyes. She gave her head a gentle shake, followed by a wince and a slight moan. She was in the carriage, laid out asleep in what appeared to be the middle of the day. She should have been embarrassed, save for the fact there was no one else about them, just their hired coachman, and he, too, was slumbering. Her husband, across from her, was also stirring.

"Edward? Edward, where are we?"

It appeared her husband, too, felt groggy. He had to clear his throat four times to make the sound emerge, but he did at last make himself heard. "I…I cannot…say."

Both of them gazed about with stupefaction for some time. "Derbyshire," Mrs Gardiner at last concluded triumphantly. "We came to Derbyshire."

"On a tour," Mr Gardiner added, looking relieved. "A tour of the great estates. Is this Chatsworth?"

"No, no," Mrs Gardiner said as she studied the grand house before them. "We were at Chatsworth…some days ago. I know not when, but not today." After a short pause she added, "Maybe it is Blenheim? It does lo ok familiar, but I…I do not know why. Have we been ill?"

"It is as if we have all been under some spell—a sleeping spell." Mr Gardiner looked about him. "We should get out of the carriage. Have a look around to help us recall what it was we were doing here."

The vestiges of confusion and lassitude departed reluctantly. Mrs Gardiner straightened her posture, smoothed her skirts and re-tied the strings of her bonnet. Mr Gardiner removed his handkerchief from his pocket and scrubbed at his face with it, then straightened his hat while observing to his wife—with some dismay—that the time away from his warehouses had resulted in a tightening of his waistcoat.

Stepping out of the carriage, he handed his wife down and then told the coachman, who was yet rubbing his eyes sleepily, that they would only be a few minutes.

"Lambton," Mr Gardiner announced with all the enthusiasm of discovery as Mrs Gardiner took his arm. "We are staying in Lambton. Came out just this morning to see this—" He gestured towards the house. "This place. Fine estate, is it not?"

"Pemberley," the coachman offered. "No place finer."

"Ah yes! Pemberley!" Mrs Gardiner exclaimed happily. "And just as I always remembered it. These gardens! And how lovely the park! The size is considerable, do you not think?"

"Probably eight or ten miles from what I can see," Mr Gardiner said with a firm nod. "You would need a phaeton and a pair of ponies to get the whole way round. "

"Well, does not that sound agreeable?" Mrs Gardiner exclaimed. "I should like that above all things."

"I would myself spend my time in this trout stream," Mr Gardiner proclaimed, gesturing towards a charmingly noisy stream. The fish were visibly cavorting within it, all but begging to be caught.

Mrs Gardiner smiled at him indulgently. "I am sure you would. I suppose I would need another lady to accompany me around the park in my phaeton then. Perhaps one of our nieces would— Oh dear!"

"What is it?"

"Elizabeth! Elizabeth came with us!" Her heart fell as she remembered it. "But where is she now?" She turned back to look at the landau, as if Elizabeth might have been there, and they overlooked her.

"No," Mr Gardiner said, with a firm shake of his head. "She could not have."

"She did! I know it as sure as I stand here." Still looking about her frantically, Mrs Gardiner began to call out, "Elizabeth! Elizabeth, where are you? Lizzy!"

"See here, my love, we sit at the entrance to a grand manor house, on what is unquestionably one of the most beautiful estates I have ever seen. You have said yourself how great is your longing to explore the gardens! I have no doubt that Lizzy has merely succumbed to her own yearning for some exercise while we slept. She will return directly. I have no doubt of it."

"We must go find her," Mrs Gardiner said urgently. "You know how she is—never one to hold back or concern herself with her own safety. "

"I think it best if we remain near the carriage. What if she should return and find us gone?"

"You may stand here if you like, but I intend to find our niece," she said. To the coachman, she called, "You will remain with the carriage, yes? So if Miss Bennet should return, you just tell her to stay put, on her aunt's orders."

The coachman agreed, and Mrs Gardiner set off, her husband trailing behind her muttering false assurances.