Wild Goose Chase

  Wild Goose Chase

  A Pride and Prejudice Variation

  by Sophie Lynbrook

  Copyright © 2018 Sophie Lynbrook

  All Rights Reserved

  Cover art: Shutterstock

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 1

  Mr. Darcy let himself quietly into the house and looked warily down the hall. He had seen the carriage in the drive and guessed that it belonged to some sightseers who had come to view his house and grounds. This was not an uncommon occurrence, and Mrs. Reynolds had general instructions to admit visitors when feasible.

  Knowing how fortunate he was to possess such an estate, Mr. Darcy did not begrudge others the opportunity of viewing them; however, he had no wish to make the acquaintance of any of these tourists. They were welcome to gaze upon his artwork and his views, and to find tranquility in his beautiful grounds, but if they aspired to any conversation with the owner of Pemberley, they would have to be disappointed. He was not one for talking with strangers.

  Perhaps that was the root of his current malaise. If he had befriended Miss Elizabeth Bennet instead of watching her and falling in love from a distance, things might now be different. But it was no use wanting to rewrite the past. A man had to look forward, even when there was a dismal note to his future prospects.

  He crept silently along the hall. There were voices coming from one of the rooms, confirming that Mrs. Reynolds was giving a tour. The door of the room which had been his father’s favourite was standing half open.

  He skirted the doorway widely, heading toward the staircase with the intention of remaining in his private rooms until these people were gone.

  But then his housekeeper’s words came clearly to his ears. “I am afraid he has turned out very wild,” she said inexplicably.

  Mr. Darcy stopped in surprise. Who was wild? She could not possibly mean him. He knew with absolute certainty that Mrs. Reynolds held him in the highest regard, but it was odd for her to be talking of anybody else while conducting a tour. His curiosity roused, he looked toward the open doorway and waited to hear what she would say next.

  “And that is my master – and very like him. It was drawn at the same time as the other – about eight years ago.”

  It made sense now. She must have just been showing them that miniature of Mr. Wickham. He had indeed turned out very wild. It was odd that she had made any reference to his picture, but not a matter of great consequence.

  “I have heard much of your master’s fine person.” This was an unknown lady’s voice.

  Mr. Darcy remained paused, wondering what she could have heard about him and from whom. More importantly, he wondered if these people had come to Pemberley with the hope of encountering him. Unfortunately, he was often an object of interest to fortune-seeking young ladies and their ambitious mothers. A hasty disappearance was certainly advisable.

  He was about to step away when the lady said, “It is a handsome face. But, Lizzy, you can tell us whether it is like or not.”

  Mr. Darcy froze. He had often heard Miss Elizabeth Bennet’s family address her by this name. And he was not aware of knowing any other Lizzy. But she could not possibly be here, could she?

  “Does this young lady know Mr. Darcy?” Mrs. Reynolds asked.

  “A little,” was the reply which flooded Mr. Darcy with emotion.

  It was her voice. Elizabeth Bennet was here at Pemberley. The how and why of this was incomprehensible, but the fact of it was wonderful. He turned and walked slowly toward the room.

  “Do you not think him a very handsome gentleman, ma’am?”

  “Yes, very handsome.”

  Was this just polite agreement? Or did she really think him handsome? He wanted to hope that she did. Of course, she did not think him a gentleman, which was of much greater consequence than her opinion of his appearance. That point had been made very clear in their last conversation at Hunsford Parsonage.

  He stopped again. He longed to see her, but she was not likely to be pleased by seeing him.

  “I am sure I know none so handsome,” Mrs. Reynolds said.

  Despite feeling overwhelmed by regrets, Mr. Darcy smiled. She was a loyal and devoted servant.

  “In the gallery upstairs, you will see a finer, larger picture of him.”

  Or in the hallway, you may see the gentleman in the flesh, Mr. Darcy said to himself. They would be leaving this room in a moment and going on to the next. He needed to decide. Advance or retreat?

  “Is Miss Darcy as handsome as her brother?” a gentleman asked. There was a pleasant tone to this voice, which Mr. Darcy did not recognize as belonging to anybody he had met in Hertfordshire.

  While Mrs. Reynolds answered, he debated his choices. By moving forward, he might lay himself open to humiliation and fresh rejection. Yet walking away and hiding for the duration of her visit would leave him wondering if she might have been civil. If their acquaintance might be reclaimed and mended. The desire to know won out. He took another step forward.

  Then he caught a glimpse of himself in a mirror. His hair was dreadfully untidy and his clothes shockingly dusty. There was even a smear of something upon his cheek. He doubted that anybody would call him handsome in this state.

  “I do not know who is good enough for him,” Mrs. Reynolds said.

  Having been preoccupied with his decision, Mr. Darcy was surprised to comprehend that the conversation had turned to matrimony, but he heard this statement with some amusement. It was certainly a debatable point considering his current appearance.

  “It is very much to his credit, I am sure, that you should say so,” Miss Bennet said.

  “I say no more than the truth, and what everybody will say that knows him. I have never had a cross word from him in my life, and I have known him since he was four years old.”

  Dear Reynolds! If anybody could be counted upon to deliver an encomium on his behalf, it was she. Was there any chance that her favourable remarks might have any effect upon Miss Bennet’s opinion of him?

  Leaving his loyal housekeeper to commend his character as she saw fit, Mr. Darcy turned about and headed for the stairs as quickly as stealth permitted. This opportunity must not be lost, but it would be better taken in fresh clothing, with combed hair and a clean face. Otherwise, Miss Bennet and her companions, whoever they might be, would be thinking him very wild indeed.

  After reaching the safety of his chamber, he rang the bell and requested water to be brought with all haste. “Cold will suffice,” he instructed. “I have no time to wait for hot water.”

  Fifteen minutes later, clean, tidy, and invigorated by the cold water, Mr. Darcy left his room and went in search of the visitors and his opportunity. He found them in the gallery, where he saw Miss Bennet standing in front of his portrait. Her companions had progressed much further along, giving him cause to wonder how long she had been staring at his image. And why? Even as he stood there, she remained in a contemplative pose.

  It was puzzling. A woman did not look so long at a picture of a man she disliked intensely. Did she?

  There was little reason
to think that she had any other feeling for him. He hoped that his letter had cleared his character, which had been his purpose in writing it, but it was too much to hope that it could have swayed her opinion in his favour. Not even Mrs. Reynolds’ generous praise could have undone her antagonism toward him.

  Nobody had seen him yet. They all had their backs to him. He could walk away and carry on trying to forget his feelings for Elizabeth Bennet. Or he could try to make a fresh impression upon her.

  He stepped forward and went to greet her.

  She was startled by his greeting. A gasp escaped her lips, and embarrassment flooded her cheeks. Her reply was awkwardly stammered, and he inwardly kicked himself for not waiting until she had walked on. There would still have been embarrassment, but perhaps a little less mortification.

  “It is a pleasant surprise to find you in Derbyshire,” he said, trying to put her at ease. “Are you on holiday with some friends?”

  She replied in obvious confusion. “We had not expected you to be here. We were told that you were away from home, or else we would never have presumed.”

  “There is no presumption,” he said. “My housekeeper has instructions to accommodate sightseers, besides which, you are very welcome in my home. Had I known that you were to be in the neighbourhood, I would have invited you myself.”

  This was the truth, even though there were no circumstances under which he could have issued such an invitation. She thanked him, however, and he thought that she now breathed a little more slowly.

  “Have you seen the Gainsborough?” he asked, deliberately looking away from his own image for the benefit of her composure.

  “I do not recall a Gainsborough,” she said. “To be honest, I have been occupied in studying this work. Its subject has not been easy to make out, but perhaps that is because I have never looked at it from the right perspective.”

  The boldness of this remark astonished him, but its implications filled him with hope.

  “Perhaps you have not been given the opportunity to see it in the best light,” he replied, choosing his words to echo the peace offering which had been conveyed in hers. “It is a subject which does not always make the best impression on people.”

  “Impressions can be fallible,” she observed. “One should never be completely guided by them.”

  “One should be more careful in making them,” he contributed. “Now, may I offer myself as guide and show you the rest of the paintings?”

  In her acceptance, there was more cordiality than she had ever directed toward him in the past, and as they walked about the room, he felt a comfortable companionship between them for the first time. He enjoyed showing her around the gallery, not because he was proud of the paintings by famous artists, or of his illustrious ancestors, but because he wanted to share something of himself, even if it was only his possessions.

  While conducting his tour, he noticed that they were drawing some curious looks from the others. Mrs. Reynolds might well be surprised since she had heard Miss Bennet speak only of knowing him a little. As for her friends, he wondered if they had any idea of her dislike for him. She might have shared something of that, but evidently they did not know the whole story, or else they would surely not have brought her here to the house which would have been her home if she had accepted his proposal.

  He wondered who they were. Their appearance was fashionable, and the bits he caught of their conversation indicated that they had good sense and manners. The Bennets had never mentioned any friends belonging to fashionable society, yet he was certain that Mrs. Bennet would have been eager to boast of knowing such a pair. Maybe the friendship was exclusive to Miss Bennet. Some people she had met in London perhaps, although it was hard to imagine how.

  As far as he knew, the only people she knew in London were the aunt and uncle who lived in Cheapside and had their living from trade. It seemed unlikely that they had introduced her to this elegant couple. Miss Bingley had once visited the Gardiner’s home while Jane Bennet had been staying there, and she had returned with a description of people even more shockingly vulgar than Mrs. Bennet.

  The friends waited politely while he finished his circuit, at which time he requested the honour of an introduction. To his astonishment, he then discovered that the pair were the very aunt and uncle whom he had been told were far from respectable.

  They were nothing of the sort. A few minutes of conversation only served to reinforce the impression he had already received. Miss Bennet’s relatives were intelligent, tasteful, and well-spoken. Their manners left nothing to be desired. Everything about them was as far as possible from what he had imagined. It was hard to believe that this gentleman was Mrs. Bennet’s brother.

  It was also clear that Miss Bingley had lied. Perhaps that had been simply because she enjoyed disparaging the Bennets, or perhaps she had wanted to be certain of maintaining his agreement on the advisability of separating her brother from the eldest Miss Bennet. Whatever the reason, the misrepresentation had been dishonest of her, and he disliked dishonesty.

  In fact, her account of the Gardiners had increased his confidence that protecting Mr. Bingley from foolish choices was the duty of a good friend. Mr. Darcy was disturbed to learn that he had taken conviction from false information.

  He walked back downstairs with the group. The moment was coming when Mrs. Reynolds would usually hand the visitors over to the gardener for a tour of the grounds. He was probably already waiting at the hall door, but now Mr. Darcy decided that he would conduct this tour as well.

  He had once disdained the Gardiners solely from his understanding of their situation, and he now felt the injustice of that. It was unfortunate that they were in trade, but he no longer felt the impossibility of acknowledging them. Indeed, he very much wanted to know Miss Bennet’s relatives better.

  CHAPTER 2

  Elizabeth had been startled to find Mr. Darcy at her elbow.

  Standing in front of his portrait, she had been wondering how well she really knew the man. His housekeeper’s description of him as the sweetest-tempered person was not at all consistent with her former impressions of him, but the smiling face was testament to the good-nature which had been attributed to him that morning.

  There was a familiarity to the expression. If anybody had asked her yesterday, she would have said that Mr. Darcy never looked pleased with anything, but now she remembered having sometimes seen that smile when he looked her way.

  He really had loved her. The revelation of his feelings last spring had been shocking and even repulsive, but now she felt that it was something to have been admired by this man, whose character was evidently so much better than she had once thought.

  His eyes seemed to be looking directly at her. She returned the gaze, wondering if they might ever meet again.

  She did not like how things had been left between them. He must still be thinking her an avid supporter of Mr. Wickham, but that was no longer the case. Learning the truth about that gentleman had changed her opinion of him and given her regret for laying his misfortunes at Mr. Darcy’s door. Now she very much wanted him to know that she had believed his account of all their dealings.

  As far as Jane was concerned, she still felt that he should not have interfered, but she could no longer think that interference completely unjustified. His explanation had increased her own awareness of her family’s faults and given her cause to re-evaluate everything that had happened since she and Mr. Darcy had met.

  Nor was she so hard-hearted as he had likely presumed from the insults which she had hurled at him. Although proclaiming otherwise at the time, she had since felt sorry for his disappointment. Her eyes had been opened to his merits, and for some time, she had been willing to acknowledge that he was not without goodness, which made her more sympathetic toward him.

  The awareness of the figure beside her drew Elizabeth out of her thoughts. Immersed in them, she had forgotten about her aunt and uncle and Mrs. Reynolds, who must be curious about her preoccupation w
ith this picture. Feeling a little embarrassed, she turned, expecting to see one of her companions, but instead the person standing beside her had been Mr. Darcy.

  She was thrown into shock and mortification. What must he think of her effrontery in visiting this place? And how long had he been standing there? He must have observed her intense contemplation of his image.

  But then he treated her with such civility. His efforts to put her at ease were further proof of his goodness. She saw that he was avoiding looking at his own picture and appreciated his thoughtfulness. These things did make her feel more comfortable. Perhaps that was why she spoke so openly. That and the fact that she had been caught staring at his picture. The words were the product of a sudden impulse, but she did not regret them. It was a relief to let him know that she no longer thought so harshly of him..

  Despite receiving such polite attention for herself, she did not expect much for her relatives, but Mr. Darcy further astonished her by being gracious and friendly toward them. As they went into the gardens he was walking beside her uncle, treating him as an equal and conversing with exceptional civility. She hardly knew this man, but she realized that her own treatment of him had prevented that sort of acquaintance between them.

  This was very different from their tour of Chatsworth, where they had heard much about the origin of certain plants and the design of the gardens. The keeper of them had spoken with pride, but today Elizabeth heard no pride in Mr. Darcy’s voice. Instead it was full of love for his home and his family, as he pointed out his favourite places and theirs.

  “I have always loved it here,” he said when they reached the stream. “My father and I used to spend many hours fishing together.”

  That particularly drew Mr. Gardiner’s attention as he was very fond of fishing. While the two gentlemen discussed the subject, Elizabeth walked with her aunt, whose curiosity was now even more obvious.

  She wanted to say something which might explain how Mr. Darcy was so unlike the man she had once described, but this could neither be done easily nor attempted when he might overhear. An explanation would have to wait until after they left, but in the meantime, Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner could see their new acquaintance’s fine qualities for themselves, and perhaps from her own manner, they could comprehend that her former hostility toward him must be forgotten.