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Elizabeth was not tired but thinking the housekeeper’s solicitude likely on Darcy’s behalf, she duplicitously admitted to it. They walked inside, with Mrs Reynolds explaining she would introduce the staff on the morrow when Mrs Darcy was feeling more rested. Inside the vestibule they were relieved of their outerwear. Mrs Reynolds offered to show the mistress her rooms, which office Darcy claimed for himself. The housekeeper contented herself with negotiating dinnertime, which was agreed for an hour hence, and taking off Trixie to be fed. Georgiana ran up the stairs ahead of them, yelling that the last one to the top was a rotten egg. One might have concluded her homecoming had brought out the childish aspect of her personality, but she was motivated more by a desire to give the newlyweds some privacy and an urgent need to use her chamberpot.

Darcy and Lizzy proceeded upstairs at a statelier pace. Lizzy admired the enormous vestibule with its carpeted stairs spiralling around its periphery, lit by a beautiful chandelier hanging from the centre and matching sconces on the walls. She saw, with admiration, that it was neither gaudy nor uselessly fine, but certainly more palatial than the London townhouse.

Arriving at the top of the stairs, Darcy pointed out the guest wing to the right before taking Elizabeth along the family wing to the left, feeling along the skirting board with his cane. The first door they encountered on the left he announced as his own room, with which he promised to duly acquaint his wife. Two steps on, he gestured in the direction of Georgiana’s door on the right. Thereafter they encountered another door on the left, which he threw open to show the master and mistress’s shared sitting room. As it was lit only by the light from the hall and the moonlight, Lizzy could merely ascertain that it was a spacious room with three tall windows. Darcy closed the door and moved on.

“And this, Mrs Darcy,” he said as they reached the next door on the left, “is your chamber.”

He threw open the door but remained standing in it so that Lizzy was forced to peer round him.

“If I am to see it, my dear, you will have to oblige me by standing aside,” said his wife.

“No, for I intend to carry you across the threshold,” he said, making a lunge for her.

“Oh, Fitzwilliam! Do you think you should?” Elizabeth asked, holding him off by his shoulders.

This only allowed Darcy to find his grip. “We’ll do it slowly,” he coaxed, “so I do not brain you on the doorpost or take off your toes.”

Lizzy found herself scooped up. “Oh, Fitzwilliam! Are you sure you are strong enough?”

“Never been stronger!” he declared. “Now we just have to ensure I do not walk off a fifty-foot cliff!”

Darcy turned her carefully sideways; then they were through. He paused to close the door behind them before asking her for directions to the bed.

“You did that so well,” she mused. “Have you been practising?”

“Yes!” he admitted gleefully. “I never knew before that my valet could giggle!”

Lizzy chuckled and then sighed and stroked his cheek as he placed her carefully on the bed. “I remember when you carried me up the stairs at Netherfield. It was such a wonderful feeling. You smelt so good. I might have been flying.”

“I remember, too!” he sighed soulfully before leaning in for a kiss.

“Oh, no!” protested Lizzy, scrabbling to get away. “Cromwell licked you!”

There was a short scuffle, a giggle, and the marriage bed was christened, all before the footmen managed to get the luggage upstairs. The happy couple arrived downstairs for dinner an hour later looking immaculate, but Darcy had that smile playing about his lips again.

Thus began the final chapter of Darcy’s rehabilitation. Back in the comfort of his own domain, Darcy took to riding again, sometimes with Georgie but otherwise trailed by his groom, and always accompanied by Cromwell. Although he already felt almost as strong as before his illness, Darcy was at first chagrined to find that he needed a leg-up from his groom. Georgie solicitously offered the use of her mounting block, for which he politely thanked her with disdain. Elizabeth mentioned the episode to her aunt in a letter and three weeks later a new machine arrived from her uncle. Darcy was mounting by himself within a fortnight.

Lizzy did worry about her husband going off at full tilt with his groom struggling to keep up on a lesser horse. The issue came to a head when she saw him take a hedge on the fly from one of the upper windows of the manor house. His groom’s horse baulked and sent him to grass while Darcy galloped on ahead, none the wiser. Lizzy raced down the stairs, sent a footman to alert the stables to see to the groom and rounded on Darcy when he returned to the house.

He listened to her in some astonishment. “I may be blind, Lizzy, but the horse is not!” he laughed.

Lizzy fumed and stormed off. Later Darcy admitted it had been a potentially dangerous situation. For her sake and the baby’s, he promised to take it back a notch.

Lizzy never did learn to ride. Instead, she learned to tool a gig, which she initially used to visit the tenants and later to manage the estate in conjunction with Darcy’s steward. The balance of power shifted gradually. At first Lizzy merely sat in on Darcy’s conferences with his steward but managed his correspondence and checked the books due to his blindness. Soon she was driving Darcy out to check crops, fences and bridges, with the steward accompanying them on horseback. Impressed by her knowledge, Pemberley’s steward gradually began to defer to her more frequently. Later, Darcy would often sit in the gig or under a tree scribbling mathematics on his wax tablets while Lizzy and the steward discussed their business. But he kept himself up to date and, with her help, still attended to his duties as master on the rare occasions when his wife was in childbed or otherwise ill. Lizzy was judged by her neighbours to be a very tolerable manager of the estate and by posterity as one of the best mistresses Pemberley ever had.

For Lizzy and Darcy, the most memorable day of that first summer was a hot one when everyone languished inside, fanning themselves, and no one wished to eat. Darcy was restless, more affected by the heat than the ladies, and unable to do any mathematics. He spent most of the day in the library, which was found to be the coolest room in the house. When the evening settled and it remained stubbornly warm, Georgie declared her intention of having a cool bath. Darcy and Lizzy decided to sit on the terrace which they discovered to be much cooler than inside. This provided some relief. The temperature was definitely lower but the air still unbearably still.

In exasperation, Darcy ordered his horse to be saddled. Lizzy begged him not to go out in the dark. Irritated by the heat, Darcy snapped back that he was not a child, but then immediately apologised.

He was trying to assure his wife that he would be all right, when the almost full moon rose and he had another idea. “Come with me.”

“You know I cannot ride.”

“I will double you.”

“Surely that defeats the purpose. You know you get irritated if I cling to your back when you are too warm.”

“Please?”