Grinning broadly, Elizabeth said, “I take it as a compliment when I can cause my friends to forget themselves in a moment of genuine joy.”
The conversation was interrupted when a maid came into the room. “Excuse me, Mrs. Hurst, but your husband has awoken and is requesting your presence.”
“Oh!” Louisa exclaimed, quickly rising to her feet. “Elizabeth, do excuse me.”
“A quick request,” Elizabeth said hastily. “Might I send a note to my aunt and uncle Gardiner on Gracechurch Street along with your express? They most likely will be unable to attend the wedding on such short notice, of course, but I would like to inform them of it all the same.”
“Certainly! Just leave the missive with Grantham.”
“Oh, and one last thing,” Elizabeth said seriously. “I believe Mr. Bingley has forgotten the most important matter of the entire affair.”
“What?” Louisa froze, her hand on the doorknob, her brow knit in concern.
“He has yet to actually request my sister’s hand in marriage!”
Louisa gaped at Elizabeth, then burst out laughing. “That is a very excellent point! I know he hasn’t actuallyforgottenit however. He simply hasn’t exactly had the time to do so, having only just arrived and then being caught up in finding Reggie.”
Elizabeth smiled. “Oh, I assumed as much. I couldn’t resist giving you a bit more practice in the art of sisterly teasing. You will be gaining five new sisters, after all.”
“I couldn’t imagine anything more wonderful.”
∞∞∞
Louisa entered her husband’s room, still smiling over her conversation with Elizabeth in the breakfast room. For the last several years, she had dreaded the idea of her brother marrying the type of woman their sister had envisioned. Never in her wildest imaginings did she picture so warm and welcoming a family.
“Louisa.”
She gave a startled shriek as her husband’s voice whispered her name.
“Oh, Reggie! You’re speaking!”
She flew to his bedside and sat in the chair next to him. While he had technically been conscious before, he had been unaware of his surroundings and incapable of forming complete thoughts or recognizing the people who were with him.
He lay propped up with pillows, his appearance markedly altered by the ordeal of the accident. The bandages were wrapped tightly around his head, and deep lines etched his brow. He cleared his throat, the sound frail compared to his typical booming voice.
“Louisa,” he began again, his voice a mere whisper, betraying the turmoil within. “How long… how long have I been asleep?”
“Only a day,” she assured him. “Do you remember what happened?”
His eyes flickered down to her waist, and she unconsciously pressed a hand to her stomach. “Oh, yes,” he said hoarsely. “I remember. The gravity of my sins, the pain I’ve caused you, the reckless abandon with which I’ve courted danger for both you and the child… it weighs heavily upon me.”
Louisa, moved by his words, reached for his hand as her eyes glistened with unshed tears. “It’s never too late to change, my love.”
“I didn’t want to be found, you know,” he said.
“What?”
“When the horse jumped the hedge, and I saw there wasn’t anything on the other side, I threw myself off just in time. The horse kept rolling down, but I got out of the way. I don’t know how, as soused as I was, but it was as if time had slowed. Then as I lay there, partway down the ravine, too dizzy to stand, I thought how it would be better if I just stayed there and died. You and the babe would be safer without me.”
“Oh, Reggie.” Louisa began to weep softly.
“But then I remembered that Caroline is gone for good, either to be married or banished to our aunt. And I remembered the pamphlet by your bed, about abstaining from alcohol. I want to read it, to understand, to change. So I forced myself up and stumbled my way into a cottage of some kind. I must have lost consciousness several times, but during the parts that I was awake, I reflected on who I’ve become… and who I want to be. For you, for our child, I want to be better.”
Louisa’s eyes, brimming with empathy, met his. “It’s a brave thing to confront one’s own reflection and seek to change it,” she offered gently.
“I’ve been ensnared in a web of my own making,” he replied. “The folly of drink, the lure of oblivion… I see now the ruin it brings, and not just to myself. I kept telling myself that I was my own master, but I realize now that it was all a lie.”
“Some men are able to drink for enjoyment,” she said, “but you were doing it to hide from life—to mask the pain of being raised by a cruel mother—rather than dealing with it. I think those are two different things.”
