Chapter 24

W hen the three men returned to the drawing room, both of her guardians noticed Gigi's absence. Elizabeth saw the way both men were looking around so she stood and approached them. "If you follow the sounds of the pianoforte, you will find Mary and Gigi. They got lost in a discussion about their favourite composers and then your ward requested Mary show her the sheet music she has," Elizabeth reported.

"Seeing that I am more musical than either of you, I will go make sure our young cousin is well, as I am sure she is," Lord Hilldale volunteered. "There are more than enough of us here so giving the companions a half day was not an error." Andrew was aware after his perceived failures regarding Ramsgate, even with the profligate libertine securely in a gaol cell, William was even more overprotective than was his wont when it came to Gigi.

So far, other than the master of the estate, Andrew was quite impressed with the comportment of the Bennets. Contrary to both William's and Bingley's warnings, there had been no fawning or blindly agreeing with what he said. He had expected a display of bad behaviour from the mother and her two youngest daughters. He surmised the great shock received when Wickham's intents had been revealed, was the genesis of the behaviour he had so far observed in the three ladies.

Although it was true he had learnt and still played the pianoforte—though not as often as he would have liked to have done—Lord Andrew Fitzwilliam had an ulterior motive for being the one to make sure Gigi was happy .

He had been searching high and low to find a lady who was compatible with him. He was looking for one who was genuinely God-fearing, who was as committed to the precepts of Christianity as he was. He was not looking for a woman who was putting on a pantomime of her character to catch a viscount without caring a whit for his interests.

With a few innocent questions, he had learnt the lady would be nineteen in May upcoming. He was one and thirty, not ancient, but twelve to thirteen years her senior. If she was mature, as he hoped she was, the difference was meaningless to him, but if he was too old for her, there would be nothing he could, or would do to convince her otherwise. The Viscount knew he was getting far ahead of himself. He knew nothing of her yet, beyond what he had been told of her interests and her age. All he could hope for was His hand had guided His humble servant to this place, and placed Miss Mary Bennet before him for a reason.

When he entered the parlour which housed the upright pianoforte, he was charmed to see Miss Mary and Gigi sitting side by side giggling as they worked on a duet. He cleared his throat.

"Andrew!" Georgiana exclaimed. She turned to her bench mate, "Mary, did I not tell you that Andrew plays the instrument?"

"You did. Will you play for us, my Lord?" Mary requested shyly.

"I could not refuse two such pretty ladies, so I will play," Lord Hilldale bowed dramatically. "I must warn you, no matter what my young cousin has told you, I play rather ill."

"Pish-posh Andrew! You play very well. As a clergyman are you supposed to prevaricate?" Georgiana challenged playfully.

"It is not dissembling when that is what I believe; I do not have nearly as much time to practice as I would like," Lord Hilldale corrected.

"That is almost the same as what Lizzy says about her playing, except she claims it is her choice not to practice as much as she should," Mary smiled. "She plays with so much feeling one does not notice the little fudging over the difficult pieces."

"And you Miss Mary, do you also think you do not practise enough?" Lord Hilldale enquired.

"Not at all my Lord, in fact, quite the opposite. I play as much as I am able," Mary proclaimed.

It impressed Andrew that even though she obviously dedicated many hours to the craft of playing the instrument she still complimented her sister, who by her own admission, hardly practiced at all.

He sat down on the bench which had been vacated by his cousin and the intriguing lady. He began to play some verses from Beethoven'sMoonlight Sonata from memory. Soon, as often occurred when he played the pianoforte, Andrew was lost in the music.

Mary watched in wonder. Like Lizzy, the Viscount infused his playing with much feeling. However, unlike Lizzy he made no errors. She joined Gigi in applauding him when he stopped. It seemed he had been in a trance while he played, but as soon as it wore off, he looked embarrassed by the avid appreciation for his performance.

"If that was playing ill, then I never want to see anyone play well again," Mary enthused. "My Lord, that was very well played, and let us not mention you did so from memory."

"Andrew you play as well as you ever have," Georgiana claimed. "That was wonderful."

Lord Hilldale stood and bowed to the two young ladies. "If you two who are true proficients on the instrument think so, then I bow to your superior knowledge and thank you both for the warm compliments. "

Gigi took the seat in front of the ivories while the Viscount and Mary sat on the settee nearby, with an appropriate distance between them. Soon they were discussing, and also debating, some verses from the gospel of Luke. It was not only Miss Mary's understanding of the Bible and her knowledge thereof which impressed Andrew, but even more was her ability to defend her positions and argue them when they did not agree. If he convinced her, she would concede, but just as often she persuaded him to her side.

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

When the Colonel had moved towards sitting near Charlotte, Elizabeth had stood and walked over to where there were a pair of armchairs facing one another across a table which held a chess set on it.

Deciding to test their beginning again, Darcy approached Miss Elizabeth. "May I?" he cocked his head towards the open chair.

"You are welcome to sit. Especially if what I was told by Mr Hurst regarding your prowess in chess is true," Elizabeth responded. Mr Darcy smiled and if she had thought him handsome before, when he smiled, he was much more so. "Mr Hurst mentioned something on the order of your being a champion at Cambridge."

"I suppose that is true," Darcy replied as he sat.

Elizabeth opened the board and then the box containing the pieces. As soon as the board was setup, Darcy took a white pawn in one hand, and a black one in the other. He mixed them behind his back and then brought them to his front, offering them to his opponent so she could make a choice. The hand she selected contained a white piece.

They rotated the board so the colour each was to play was in front of the respective player. In Elizabeth's mind Mr Darcy had just passed one test. Rather than condescendingly attempt to give her an advantage to begin the game, he treated her like any other when he presented his hands for her to choose one. It was just as well he did so, in her much smaller hands, one could see the colour of the pawns. The next test would be to see if he respected her prowess at the game and played to the fullest of his ability, and did not give her quarter because of her sex.

Elizabeth did not know this yet, but due to his competitive nature, when Darcy played, he played to win, regardless of who was across the board from him. From her opening move employing the Queen's gambit, Darcy was aware his challenger was anything but a novice at the game. It seemed to him that she was thinking five moves ahead. Soon enough he realised not only was she not a beginner, but one of the best players he had ever gone up against. Had she been at Cambridge when he was at the university he had a feeling he would not have been the champion.

By the time they had played to about the midway point of the game, Charlotte and the Colonel, and Jane and Bingley were seated around them watching the battle play out.

Fanny had always thought her second daughter's prowess at the game of chess, something she thought reserved for males only, would mark Lizzy as a bluestocking. However, from what she was seeing, the tall man from Derbyshire was attracted to her Lizzy. No matter how many changes she made to her behaviour, Fanny Lydia Gardiner Bennet would be able to sniff out a suitor for one of her daughters from a county away.

She shook her head as she watched. Rather than appreciate the gifts Lizzy had, she had allowed her resentment, engendered by her husband, to cause her to denigrate Lizzy. Yes, her second daughter used to make sport of her as well, but it was what she had been trained to do. As soon as Lizzy's eyes had been opened to the reality of Thomas Bennet, she had stopped following his lead in making sport alongside him. One thing Fanny was sure of was her husband was not sanguine Lizzy no longer participated in his attempts to amuse himself at others' expense.

When Darcy tipped his king, something he hardly ever had to do, all he had remaining was a castle while his opponent still had her queen, a bishop, a knight, and a single pawn which despite all of his efforts was about to reach the row closest to him when Miss Elizabeth could promote it to be any piece, more than likely it would have become a second queen.

For her part, Elizabeth was extremely happy to win. Not because she beat Mr Darcy per se , but that she had taken on, and won against, a Cambridge chess champion.

Bennet had heard some of the exclamations while the game had been fought and had come to see what all the noise was about. As he watched his Lizzy play against Mr Darcy he had felt a surge of jealousy. She should be spending her time with him, not here with everyone else. He was proud of his daughter that she had won against a superior player, but rather than tell her that, he slunk back to his study before anyone noted his presence.

As pleased as Elizabeth was she had been able to thwart the fiendish plans of Mr Wickham, thereby assisting in saving Lydia from ruin along with her sisters and herself, the glow of the accomplishment was wearing off. Elizabeth felt very confused. The problem was that she knew not who she was any more, and one thing she realised was before she could move forward, she would need to go on a voyage of self-discovery to find out just who she really was.

It was not a journey she could take with her father attempting, as he inevitably would, to manipulate and cajole her to pull her back into his world.

There was no doubt Elizabeth was learning to appreciate Mr Darcy's company, and she felt she could not do their budding friendship justice until she had answered the many questions she needed to ask herself. There was only one place she could think of to go and be able to spend time away from her family, with people who would support her unquestioningly and that was with the Gardiners in Gracechurch Street.

She would never miss Janey's wedding, not for any reason, but she knew her wonderful sister would understand her need to be away from Longbourn for a while. Jane had shared with Elizabeth the previous night that she and Charles—as she called him now—had selected the eleventh day of December for their wedding, a little more than three weeks hence.

If she received permission to go, Elizabeth would be in London when Janey arrived to shop for her trousseau. Thus, as her sister had asked and Elizabeth replied in the affirmative, she would also shop for a gown to be worn as Jane's maid of honour. The first step was to write to Aunt Maddie and Uncle Edward and request permission to come visit

Elizabeth realised Mr Darcy had been saying something to her and she had not heard a word. ‘ I pray he does not think me rude again ,' Elizabeth thought. Aloud she said, "Please pardon my inattentiveness, I was deep in thought." She blushed as she felt somewhat embarrassed.

"I wondered if you would allow me to reclaim my honour with another game," Darcy repeated.

"There is nothing I would like more, but I need to write a letter and it cannot wait. Please excuse me for now. If it were not for that fact, I would have been ready to school you in the game once again," Elizabeth teased.

Darcy was pleased she was being playful with him, so he did not take her need to do something else personally.

It took Elizabeth a little more than a half hour to scribe her letter. Rather than place it in the salver, she sent the groom to the Red Lion Inn to post the missive.

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

Thanks to the letter being dropped off at the inn, it reached the recipients the next day, not long after midday.

That evening Edward Gardiner came home from his warehouses, which were less than a mile from his very comfortable house, and after he had greeted their four children, his wife told him a letter from Lizzy had arrived and was on his desk in his office.

"What does our niece say?" Gardiner asked his wife.

"Read it and then we may discuss what she writes," Madeline suggested.

Gardiner picked up the letter, unfolded the paper and began to read.

13 November 1812

Longbourn

Aunt Maddie and Uncle Edward,

Please give my warmest regards to my four cousins and tell them I look forward to seeing them again soon.

Of late I have come to see much of what my father has taught me regarding how to relate to, and behave towards people, especially as it pertains to the way to see, make sport of, and judge others, is fatally flawed. For the longest time I believed my father infallible and followed him in all things, including, I am ashamed to say, making sport of my mother.

I always consoled myself that Mama did not understand when she was being teased, and sarcasm went over her head. I now know she has always been aware of what has been happening and her nerves have been her way to protect herself from being hurt. I am so very ashamed of my part in this.

What I need more than anything is to be away from Hertfordshire so I can find out who I truly am. I need a good stable home, which you two have always provided, without my father trying to draw me back in for his own amusement.

There is much to speak of; most of which is not fit for a letter to be posted. If you agree I may come visit, then I will tell you all. If that is the case, please write to Papa and invite me to come to you. I will make sure he agrees, he will not want a mullish me here. Of course it will be my pleasure to assist with my cousins as is needed.

Hoping to hear from you soon. Your loving niece,

Elizabeth

"It seems that Lizzy finally sees Bennet for who he is and not who she wants him to be," Gardiner mused.

"Yes, so it seems. Lizzy is too intelligent not to, at some point, have her eyes opened to the truth of who your brother-in-law is. We will invite her to come to us, will we not, Edward?" Madeline asked.

"Of course we will. You write the letter and I will send it express on Monday morning," Gardiner decided.