Page 87 of The Widower of Pemberley

“I did know that.”

Emily giggled.

Darcy took her hand and kissed it, then he banged on the carriage roof to tell the coachman to move forward again.

There were several servants waiting outside when they pulled up, including a grey-haired woman who Elizabeth knew must be the housekeeper, Mrs. Reynolds. She had figured in a great many stories that Georgiana and Emily had told about their home.

A footman immediately pulled the door open, and Darcy stepped out, then turned back to offer his hand to Elizabeth.

After Elizabeth was down, Emily demanded that her father catch her as she jumped out of the carriage, and with a laugh he did so before putting her down on the cold ground and taking Elizabeth’s arm.

He bowed to the housekeeper and made the introductions.

The two women curtsied.

“I know we shall work together well, Mrs. Darcy,” Mrs. Reynolds said before turning to her master. “I decided that it would be best to have the new mistress introduced to the household in the gallery, as standing about in this weather could not be pleasant.”

Although the housekeeper was speaking to Darcy, Elizabeth had a sense thatshewas being watched by the woman.

Darcy nodded and agreed that was wise before he led Elizabeth up the many steps of the house, eagerly telling her about its history. “The marble of the stairs cost my great-grandfather a great deal as I understand it. The house was built to a scale rather greater than what our income supported at the time, and we were burdened with mortgages for a generation. I believe that is an important part of why my grandfather placed an entail upon the property—so that if one of his descendants decided totear it down and have a grander one put up in its place, that spendthrift fellow would need to do so from present incomes and not by selling the future.”

“And I thought that you were richer than a lord.”

“Richer than many lords,” Darcy agreed cheerfully as they went in.

He was talkative as they walked into his home. Cheerful.

Emily ran about, though she soon came to Elizabeth and asked to be carried byher. And then she added her own explanations of the areas of the house—specifically the spot on the paper lining the wall that she had destroyed with jam but that had been cleverly patched over.

“And you have promised to not ever do that again,” Darcy said in a smiling voice to his daughter.

She giggled. “No, I won’t, I promised. That was silly of me! Wasn’t it silly?”

“I am sure you will do a great many other silly things in time,” Elizabeth said.

“I won’t! I’m not silly. You know, it is big people who are silly. Not little children.”

“Ah,” Darcy said. “I am now enlightened. I wish I had known before.”

Emily giggled as they entered the gallery.

There were several dozen servants in the room.

Elizabeth put Emily down and resisted a sudden impulse to hide behind the door like the little girl sometimes did. Instead, she listened carefully as Darcy introduced the servants to her in order of their rank: the butler, the man-cook, the head gamekeeper, the gardeners, the coachman, the footmen, thegrooms, the upper floor maids, the kitchen maids, the laundry maids, the still-room maid, and all the assistants of all these people.

What astonished her was that Darcy knew each of them by name, and something about their family background, even the scullion, whom, Mrs. Reynolds had informed Darcy, they had taken on since the preceding occupant of the role had been promoted to a kitchen maid on account of a chain of such promotions due to the marriage of one of the upper maids.

“I hope,” Darcy said to the housekeeper, “that a suitable gift was given to Mrs. South upon her marriage?”

“Yes, sir.”

When the whole group had been introduced to Elizabeth, Mrs. Reynolds gave her the large ring of keys for the house with some ceremony.

Elizabeth felt, more and more, that to be the mistress of Pemberley was something indeed.

Over the next few days, she settled into her life as the mistress of a grand estate with a household made up of dozens of servants and a park that was many miles round.

Her awe of her new home only slowly faded away.