Anne was near to exhaustion, but during the carriage ride to London, while Mrs. Jenkinson and Lord Fitzwilliam were sleeping, she continued to plan her next step to bring Elizabeth and Will together. She had come too far to concede defeat because of the actions of an irresponsible sixteen-year-old girl and a thirty-year-old degenerate. If it had not been for the change in circumstances brought about as a result of Lydia and Wickham’s escapade, she might have accepted Antony’s offer to visit with him for a month or so. She knew she could do some good there. With his daughters constantly in his thoughts, it seemed as if he really did want to begin a program of reform. It was one thing to embarrass one’s spouse, especially Antony’s mean-spirited wife, who put her in mind of Caroline Bingley, and quite another to humiliate two impressionable young girls, whom he loved dearly.
Upon arrival in London, Anne had written to her mother to inform her that she would rest for a few days at the townhouse before returning to Kent. It was while she had been picturing a typical evening meal with Mama dominating the conversation that the idea had come to her. During supper at Rosings, Anne would speak of the likely engagement of Mr. Charles Bingley to Miss Jane Bennet. She would work the conversation around to Jane’s sister, Elizabeth, and would mention that Will and she had been together at Pemberley. That would prompt a cascade of questions, which she would answer truthfully. “Yes, Mama, I do believe Will is quite taken with Miss Elizabeth, so much so that I suspect he is in love with her.” As soon as she learned of a possible alliance between Fitzwilliam Darcy and a farmer’s daughter, she anticipated that her mother would order the carriage to be made ready to leave for London the next day, and it had happened exactly as she had predicted, except for one thing: Her mother had set out for Hertfordshire, not London.
And while her mother was busily interfering in Will’s affairs, Anne had ample time to review the papers her solicitor had given to her while she was in town. In two weeks’ time, she would reach her twenty-fifth birthday, and at that time, she would come into an inheritance left to her by her de Bourgh grandparents that had, up to that time, been controlled by her mother acting as trustee on her behalf. The papers contained many surprises, all of them pleasant. Not only was she now an heiress with a generous yearly allowance, but she also owned the lease on the house in town and rental properties in Tunbridge Wells and Weymouth. Although not a surprise, the crème de la crème was that she was now the mistress of Rosings Park.
As she had been instructed by her father in the last days of his life, Anne had met with the family solicitor, Mr. Markling, on her eighteenth birthday. According to the provisions of the will of the first Lord de Bourgh, only a de Bourgh, by blood, could inherit the estate.
“Apparently, when the original Lord de Bourgh purchased a barony from Charles II,” Mr. Markling explained, “he was coolly received by the English elite, and his response was that no one but a de Bourgh would ever inherit Rosings. If you should die without issue, Miss de Bourgh, the estate will pass to your father’s nephew, Martin Hargrove, who will then adopt the de Bourgh name.”
He further explained that the will provided a life interest for her mother. However, once she had reached her twenty-fifth year, Anne would have the final say in all matters affecting the estate. She had no intention of taking on such responsibilities, but her new situation would provide an opportunity for negotiation between mother and daughter.
Looking at the numbers once again, Anne was amazed by the size of her fortune. Apparently, smuggling generated handsome profits, which had enabled generations of de Bourghs to vastly increase their wealth and to build and expand Rosings Park. But she immediately thought of all the things she could do with that much money. Firstly, she would attempt to recover everything Antony had sold from the Fitzwilliam estate to pay his bills. Secondly, improvements of the cottages would be accelerated. Thirdly, the parsonage would be expanded because Anne believed Charlotte would shortly have some good news to share.
A few days after she returned, she would visit Mr. Rampling, the sexton, who had taken care of the church for decades, and his forty-year-old bachelor son. Albert Rampling had been born with misshapen legs. Because it was so difficult for him to get about, he had been unable to find employment. Instead, he had dedicated his life to recording the traditions and customs of those who lived in southeast England, and one of her greatest pleasures was when he shared his latest historical nuggets with her. Now, she would be able to provide an annuity for the Ramplings. That would allow them to move out of their small, damp house into a larger cottage with a library where Albert could record his stories, and she might possibly assist him with organizing his notes. In any event, she would see to it that his writings were published.
As important as those things were, she was even more excited because now she would be able to provide her cousin, Colonel Fitzwilliam, with an allowance sufficient for him to follow his heart and to marry for love, and she believed the trail would take him right to the home of Miss Pennington, the daughter of the Fitzwilliam solicitor. The money would allow him to sell his commission in the army and to pursue his desire to study the law. There was so much to look forward to, not the least of which was a change in her relationship with her mother. In two years’ time, Mama would be sixty years old, and the infirmities of age were already noticeable. She suffered from arthritis and gout, her hearing and eyesight had diminished, and she could no longer get around without her cane. The new arrangement might possibly bring the two women closer together, as Lady Catherine would look to Anne to provide the necessary care she had once provided to her daughter.
But discussions about their changed circumstances would have to wait until her mother had returned from her crusade to prevent a marriage between Will and Elizabeth. But like the Crusades, she would fail, and sometime in the near future, Lady Catherine de Bourgh would have to acknowledge the marriage of her favorite nephew to a farmer’s daughter from Hertfordshire. And that put a smile on her face.