“Were you aware that your brother maintained a mistress?”
“I suspect he kept a succession of them. Our father harped on him to marry and produce an heir, but Frederick never found a lady who could hold his interest long enough. So he dallied with a woman until one or the other of them grew bored, and then moved on to another. To his credit, at least he did not marry for convenience only to commit adultery for passion, as many gentlemen have done.”
“Some men conduct love affairs openly — indeed, it required little time in Newcastle to link Captain Tilney’s name with Mrs. Stanford’s. Did he ever mention his paramours to you or bring them to N orthanger?”
Henry raised a brow. “Discuss his liaisons with his brother the minister? No. And if he ever brought any of the women to Northanger, I would not know, for he certainly did not introduce them to me. Perhaps, however, the servants might be of assistance.” Henry rang for the butler.
“If Mrs. Stanford had previously accompanied Captain Tilney here, that would explain her familiarity with the house the night Mrs. Darcy and I met her. She could pass herself off as the housekeeper — if not altogether creditably.”
“And that would explain the reports of the servants who took her for a woman they had seen here before.”
The butler arrived, and Mr. Tilney enquired whether a Mrs. Stanford had ever visited Northanger Abbey.
“Once, sir. She accompanied the captain about six months ago. She did not stay long — they had a falling-out one day and she departed in a fit. He never brought her back here.”
“How do you know they quarreled?”
“The argument occurred during dinner, so I was in and out of the room.” The butler cleared his throat. “It was not my intention to eavesdrop, but sometimes people ignore the presence of servants. Mrs. Stanford spoke freely and, by the end, rather loudly. Though she pretended to elegance, she was not the most genteel lady who ever dined at Northanger. I could not help but overhear.” He bowed. “I assure you of my discretion, sir. I have never repeated my employers’ business as gossip.”
“Of course not,” Henry said. “This, however, is a matter of importance involving a wrong done to my brother, so answering my questions does not place your loyalty in doubt. About what did they quarrel?”
“She suggested some improvements she planned to undertake as mistress of Northanger. Captain Tilney informed her that she would never be mistress of Northanger and appeared surprised that she had ever expected more than their present arrangement. She replied that he owed her a great deal more, that she had twice passed up comfortable situations with other gentlemen for him, and that if he would not make an honest woman of her he would have to make her a rich one. Then she threatened to depart that very day if he would not treat her as well as she deserved.”
“How did Frederick respond?”
“He wished her a fair journey.”
Henry asked the butler a few more questions, then dismissed him from the room.
“So,” Henry said, “Mrs. Stanford aspired to become Mrs. Frederick Tilney, and when my brother disillusioned her, they parted ways.”
“Not necessarily. The information I obtained in Newcastle suggests that they reconciled. By all accounts, they were still together when Captain Tilney died. Either Mrs. Stanford accepted the limitations of their relationship, or thought that given more time she could change his mind.”
“But she ran out of time. My brother was killed, and she was left with nothing.”
“So she enlisted an accomplice to pose as Captain Tilney and—” And do what? Here, logic failed for Darcy. How did any of this pertain to him and Elizabeth? “If she believed herself entitled to part of your brother’s fortune, why did she not simply steal the diamonds for herself? Why concoct an elaborate scheme involving me, and what did she accomplish by it?”
“Perhaps you were not meant to be caught with the diamonds. You did not know your walking stick had been replaced, or that the substitute contained them. Perhaps she planned to retrieve the jewels later, with you none the wiser for having transported them.”
“Again, for what reason did she select me — Fitzwilliam Darcy — as their unwitting conductor? I, who had no connection to her, and only the slightest one to your family. How could she even have known our mothers shared a friendship three decades ago?”
“Yet that was the subject of your conversation with Frederick’s imposter, was it not? Did he not enquire about letters between them?”
“Yes — which, by the way, we have discovered.”
“Indeed? Might they bring anything to bear on this puzzle?”
“I have not read them all, though I expect Mrs. Darcy has by now. Apparently, the acquaintance between our mothers began when my mother contacted your parents for information regarding an ivory statuette that had belonged to Northanger Abbey before the Dissolution. The figurine entered her family’s possession at that time, though I understand there were nine others.”
Henry rolled his eyes. “Indeed, there were — I cannot tell you how often we heard about them. They were quite valuable, and my father hoped to sell them for a handsome sum. But before he found a buyer, they disappeared from the house.”
“Had your father any notion of their fate?”
“He most certainly did. My mother had opposed the sale, and he accused her of having hidden the statuettes or given them away. If she did, it was the one time she ever defied him. But he never found them, and he resented the loss of those ivories to his dying day. I think he complained about them to my poor brother even more than to my sister or me. He often said that my mother had robbed Frederick of part of his inheritance.”
“Did Frederick share that opinion?”
“I think he doubted her capacity to resist my father’s will. She bore a great deal from him. His presence in this house was so strong that it eclipsed hers. While she lived, the house reflected my father’s taste, not hers, and after she died hardly anything retained her influence. Her apartment went untouched, but her favorite garden gave way to a pinery, and even her portrait was removed from the drawing room. Very few of her effects remain — we have, for instance, no letters written to or from her such as you were so fortunate to discover at Pemberley. I should like to see them, if I might.”
“Of course,” Darcy said. He paused as a thought struck him. “In fact, given the interest Frederick’s imposter had in them, perhaps you would like to read them sooner rather than later. Your better knowledge of their author might enable you to discover something in them that my wife and I cannot. Would you care to come to Pemberley?”
Henry readily accepted, and they fixed upon a date in the near future. Darcy would have invited Mr. Tilney to accompany him back to Pemberley immediately, but when he departed Northanger on the morrow he would head south, not north.
He had one more stop to make.
There was a scarcity of men in general, and a still greater scarcity of any that were good for much.
— Jane Austen, letter to Cassandra
Dr. Severn has arrived, ma’am.”
Elizabeth almost poked herself with her needle. Her lying-in was not anticipated for another several weeks, and she doubted the physician had suddenly developed such interest in her as to journey to Derbyshire early just to lend his support. She would sooner credit him with intending to disrupt the impromptu concert to which Georgiana presently treated her and Lady Catherine in the music room.
“Dr. Severn? I did not send for him.”
Georgiana’s hands stilled on the pianoforte. “I did.”
Elizabeth directed a questioning gaze toward her.
“I wrote to him the day your leg failed.” Georgiana rose and crossed the room to Elizabeth’s side. “Please do not be angry. Had I not, and something unfortunate happened, my brother would never forgive me.”
She could not resent Georgiana for her concern, nor for the love and loyalty to her brother — and to herself — that had motivated the summons. “I am not angry. You acted as Darcy directed.”
Part of Elizabeth was glad for the opportunity to confirm Mrs. Godwin’s assessment with the doctor. The rest of her dreaded the conversation. She always left their exchanges with the sense that Dr. Severn considered her ignorant, incompetent, and insignificant. “Settle him in the guest wing,” she told Mrs. Reynolds. “I will receive him in my dressing room afterward.”
“It is about time someone in this house summoned a doctor,” Lady Catherine declared. “My nephew must be at death’s door. I have not seen him since — I cannot recall. It has been well over a se’nnight. As soon as this Dr. Severn finishes with you, I insist he cure Mr. Darcy’s cold.”
Darcy’s “illness” had lingered so long that the excuse was becoming increasingly difficult to maintain. Lady Catherine grew more suspicious by the hour. Perhaps Elizabeth needed to adjust her strategy.
“Mr. Darcy is much improved today. In fact, he rose early and went shooting.”
Lady Catherine eyed her skeptically. “So I may look forward to seeing him at dinner?”
So much for cleverness. As Darcy still had not found his way back to Pemberley, Elizabeth could not possibly produce him by dinner for his aunt’s benefit. “He declared himself so in want of fresh air and activity that he might not return in time for dinner.”