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“So Lizzie is a kind of spy?”

It was nothing like that but if this was what it took for a 13 year old young man to understand then….

“Exactly, that is how you should think of it. Outside the house she is Rose. It is important that you remember that. She is still a cousin but now much more distant. So just call her cousin Rose rather than cousin Lizzie.”

Both Elizabeth and Mr. Gardiner somehow managed not to burst into smiles at the look on young Edward’s face. But it was a much needed moment of (suppressed) laughter.

--

“So how did you spend Christmas, Lizzie?”

It was the middle of January 1808 and Mary Bennet was visiting Gracechurch Street for the first time since the accident the previous summer. She had arrived just after lunch and after freshening up was sitting with her older sister in the parlour.

“It was both quiet and busy.”

“How do you mean?”

“It was quiet in the sense that we do not socialise very much.”

Elizabeth could see that Mary did not understand.

“I am not Uncle Edward’s wife. I run his house for him but it is more complicated than that. His injury is such that he very rarely travels socially. So everyone has to come here. I take the children out, and have escorted Angela and Rebecca to friend’s houses, but again I am the cousin. Maybe as I get a few years older it will start to be more comfortable. But the mothers of the children we visit are at least 10 years older than me, often they are old enough to be my mother. So it is awkward, older than the children but not old enough to have anything in common with the mothers.”

She sighed and fidgeted with her hair.

“The house is running smoothly. The three children still here have a routine, the whole house has a routine, and there is little to cause disruption. Angela has just turned eight but it is too soon to be considering a governess. In two years she will be ten and Rebecca will turn nine in the February. That seems to be the right time for such a move. Until then they have lessons with their nurse, and informal lessons with both their father and myself.”

“That does not sound very quiet Lizzie.”

“That is what I mean by it being busy at the same time. There is not the unnecessary drama and noise of Longbourn but each day seems hectic. I am helping Uncle Gardiner with his business much more than I thought I would. His stumps give him considerable pain and it seems pointless for him to be jostled in the carriage every day. He now only visits his office on a Wednesday, and it often takes him until the end of the week to recover from the pain of that trip.”

“How do you mean?”

“You have read my letters. He suffers pain from the parts of his legs that are no longer there. I think of them as phantom pains.”

“I read that and did not know what to think.”

“It was very odd and I too did not really understand when he first confessed to me. Apparently, it is common with ex- sailors and soldiers who have lost limbs in battle.”

“Really?”

Elizabeth nodded.

“What causes it?”

“Nobody knows for sure. The one that I personally believe is that when uncle’s legs were amputated the ends of the nerves did not heal properly. Or at least completely. When he moves or his stumps are jostled then these nerve endings are pressed. His body is confused and he thinks there is a pain in the missing limb. I do not know for sure but it fits the facts and symptoms. The phantom pains are much worse in his missing left leg than the right one. And the pain is as if a hot poker is being jabbed at his ankle.”

“How odd, and at the same time strangely fascinating. It is terrible that Uncle Gardiner still has to deal with the pain from the accident. Imagine feeling a pain in your ankle and looking down and seeing nothing there.”

“I know. So as a result he does not travel much anymore and I am out and about most days in his stead.”

“How has that been?”

Elizabeth thought about the last four months.

“On the same trip I can feel so many different emotions. It is always rewarding for me, I am helping Uncle Gardiner and his family. Yet at the same time I can be frustrated and annoyed at the attitude I encounter. I do not understand how all men can be so universal in their contempt and disdain for women. Oh they are perfectly polite yet dismissive in the same breath. I am a messenger, a courier, the member of the family entrusted with the documents. But honestly, they treat me like I was Angela, or at least her age. I swear one man attempted to pat me on the head and told me in a condescending and patronising tone that ‘I should not stop at the shops but take these straight to Mr. Gardiner’.”

Elizabeth’s huffy sigh could be heard out in the street. Mary suppressed a smile.