Oh well.
She already had admitted to herself that she was a profoundly impractical person. But her impracticality did not require her to obsess over notions of maintaining consequence. The problem was that she needed a place for the children to stay when she hired out.
Dr. Thomas in London had once directly asked her if she could be available for more engagements, but at the time it was impossible.
But now that she admitted to herself that she needed to ask someone for help, the matter became easier.
Papa would be happy enough to have them.
Elizabeth did not fear that he would raise them any worse than she had been raised. The extra food and clothes they would require would hardly be noticed as a charge on the substantial resources of Longbourn. And then, with her children safe, she could hire out every time a suitable engagement was available. Five or six pounds for a month was ordinary for those without a reputation, and she thought that within a few years she could build a sufficient reputation, and the associated skills, to get hired by actual lords and great aristocrats.
If she succeeded to that extent, she might even earn a hundred a year. There would be no room or board that she must pay for, and she could live at Longbourn or with an unmarried friend—she was done with married friends—when she was not employed. If she spent ten or even twenty a year on clothes, travel, and other such matters, she could put aside a respectable sum that would purchase George an apprenticeship as a surgeon ormaybeput him to university.
That would only be paid for if her son proved to have the sort of application that his father utterly lacked. In any case, George could have a life that was wholly respectable, and not much inferior in consequence to that of his paternal grandfather. Though of course it would be far below the position of Elizabeth’s own father.
Beyond purchasing the apprenticeship and necessities for George, there would be something for Emily. Not much, but at least five or six hundred by the time she was the age Elizabeth had been whenshemarried. Notpreciselyenough to live on, but enough to attract partners without grand ambitions and who were of respectable but modest means. A great falling off in consequence, but Elizabeth’s chief goal was to not become a burden. This scheme would ensure her children had the necessities of life, and a little more.
Castles in the sky.
The notion pleased Elizabeth the more she thought of it.
She missed her father.
And this way she would not be a burden upon his resources. The notion that she would then be more in the nature of a servant than even a governess pleased her in an obscure way. She had married where the support of a gentlewoman could not be had, and this was the consequence. The necessity of long work pleased Elizabeth, at least when she imagined it. She enjoyed work, she would be always busy doing something useful, and the profession she meant to choose would be beneficial to the world.
Of course, there might be a difficulty with Papa.Hewould not like it. Of course, he would not wish to have his daughter known to be essentially a servant. But perhaps…oh that would be solved somehow. She would not let him dictate additional difficulties in her quest to not burden him and his.
What made Elizabeth’s throat catch in grief was the thought that she would be barely present with her children.
Tears never help anyone.
It was a joke how many women hovered about their children, badgering them and bothering them. She would be quite the opposite, the mother who never hovered or badgered. She would, in fact, be like the loving father, who came in from his difficult duties amongst the great world, to hug and kiss, and be a solid rock upon whom they could depend, but who would not be there to kiss the little hurts, or to be always overcome with anxiety by every small illness.
Chapter Nine
After Mrs. Wickham returned upstairs, and his cousin returned to snores, Mr. Darcy was unable to sleep, tormented by the pain in his chest. Part of him was certain that both Mrs. Wickham and the doctor were dissimulating, and his situation was far more serious than they claimed. His general sense of weakness and the difficulty breathing and moving was greater than before.
Pain. Pain. Pain.
It seemed like hours had passed. The big pendulum clock in the corner of the room made a sound to indicate that only fifteen minutes had passed.
Pain.
Colonel Fitzwilliam’s low snores provided a counterpoint to the buzzing summer insects.
Jove, it hurt to breathe.
Death would at least end the pain.
A deep breath. Sharp pain shot through him. The world was odd, and wavering before him.
It was going to kill him. He was getting sicker, and it was going to kill him.
Find something useful to do.
That was what Mrs. Wickham always said. What was there for him to do that would be useful? What could he do in the next days before the infection killed him that would be useful?
Throbbing pain.
