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“Donavan has departed. Shall we go at once?”
The other girl scrambled out of bed, pulled on her slippers, glanced at her dishevelled appearance in the glass, and shrugged; neither of them was presentable enough for Lady Catherine’s critical eye. It mattered not at all.
They hurried up the stairs to the nursery, not speaking. Lizzy stopped, turning to Georgiana.
“Are you certain you wish to enter, dear?” she asked gently. “We do not know what state he is in. I am happy to go first, that you might be prepared.”
“I have been a coward long enough, Lizzy,” Georgiana said.
Lizzy put a hand upon her shoulder. “We must only think of your brother,” she said quietly. “We cannot give way to tears if—if he has worsened.”
Georgiana nodded grimly, and they entered.
The room was dark; there was a vile odour—not of bile, as before. Something else. Something bad.
Lizzy strode to the window, pulling aside the curtains so the dull morning light entered. Georgiana gasped, and Lizzy turned.
Donavan’s large medical case lay open at the bedside. Upon a nearby table rested various implements, needles, and other unknown apparatus, many of them bloody. Mr Darcy had no blanket. He lay on his side, his feet bound together and tied to the foot of the bed. He wore some sort of contraption…a tight waistcoat with long sleeves extending over his hands and strings attached, binding them behind his back. He was gagged with a leather strap, and there was a swelling bruise over his eye. He appeared to be quite unconscious. Or…was he even alive?
Lizzy hurried to his bedside, placing her fingers beneath his nose. He breathed, but that was the most she could say. She placed a hand upon his forehead; it felt hot and dry.
“Dash it, we must get this off him.” She picked at the leather gag, finding it tightly knotted.
A singular noise echoed beyond the door from the direction of the stairwell. Thump. Thump. Thump.
Lizzy looked up from her task as Georgiana froze in fear, her eyes wide.
Lady Catherine,she mouthed.
Lizzy did not hesitate, grabbing Georgiana’s hand and dragging her to the little room where Stimple had previously napped during his shift. There was no time to close the door behind them—they could only wait just beyond it, hoping she did not enter, hoping she did not seek any attendant. Lizzy glanced around; the settee would not provide adequate cover for even one of them. She pulled Georgiana against the wall to the right of the door and leant against it. Her ladyship would have to walk in and turn to spot them. It was the best she could do.
Lady Catherine’s voice suddenly rang out, hideously nearby. “Fitzwilliam Sébastien Montgomery Darcy,” the old lady declared in stentorian tones. “How dare you resort to violence, to madness! It is deplorable! We are Fitzwilliams, however polluted your own blood. We do not give way.”
She waited a beat, as if the gagged, unconscious man on the bed could possibly answer.
“A report equally unacceptable reached me early this morning from Mr Donavan. He says you are declining, despite all his strenuous efforts to rescue you from your weakness. From your infancy, Nephew, you were intended for Anne. It was the favourite wish of your parents as well as my own. I suppose I must be thankful those plans never came to fruition. Honour, decorum, prudence, nay, interest, forbid it. I never would have agreed to such a union had I known the shades in your character. Madness. Weakness. And now it is to be presumed, death? How could you have failed us so?
“The earl believes I should return you to him. Hah! Impossible that the earl should possess you in my place, especially at the cost of the entire family’s good name. Why, news of your insanity will be all over London in no time if he goes about marrying you off to some gossipy bride he controls, never mind his other threats of legal guardianship, all to support his rape of the great Darcy estates! Anne, especially, would be a victim. Her dowry will not help much if madness is thought to exist in the family lines. Is this, then, your gratitude for my attentions to you?
“No. Your death will be a disgrace; your name will never even be mentioned by any of us.”
There was a long pause. Lizzy stared, aghast, at Georgiana, who had a fist stuffed into her mouth and held a matching look of horror upon her face.
When Lady Catherine spoke again, her voice was different, soft…almost tender. “I do not submit to the earl’s whims. I have not been in the habit of brooking disappointment. You were always so good to my Anne, my precious Anne. Obstinate…headstrong boy.”
They heard a sniff then another. The woman was…crying?
Then, finally, came the thump, thump, thump of her cane as she retreated, making her slow way down the stairs.
