Page 4 of One Night with Mr. Darcy
Elizabeth was full of fresh horror. What if Mr. Collins were never well enough to marry her at all? What if people didn’t believe he was well enough to have put this babe within her?
During this period of time she wrote and tore to shreds no less than five letters to Mr. Darcy.
Dear sir, you may not remember what happened when you were very drunk, but I am with child now and it is your babe growing inside me.
Dear sir, if you do not marry me, I shall come and stand on your doorstep with our bawling babe until you do something about the existence of it.
Dear sir, when you took my virtue, you promised me a number of things, and the fact that you don’t remember taking my virtue doesn’t mean that you don’t still owe me them.
She did not send these letters because there was no way to feasibly get them to him. She could not write him a letter in the post, an unmarried woman to an unmarried man. That simply wasn’t done.
If he had still been at Netherfield, she might have sent a servant to deliver the missive, but Mr. Darcy and the Bingleys had quit the place sometime after the ball they’d given, no real reasons given. Perhaps they were simply bored with this part of the country.
She did not know where he was anymore, and she could not get a servant to gallivant all over the country delivering her letters, anyway.
No, it was hopeless.
One day, during a conversation with her father, he speculated that Elizabeth might be infected with the same illness that Jane was but not displaying any symptoms. “If that is true, Lizzy, it may be that all of us under this roof are infected. We may be able to infect others, but it seems that onlysomepeople succumb to real illness from it whileothersare only carriers. I have read about such things, in fact, in some medical journals.” Her father was always reading strange things for entertainment. He read scientific journals as well.
“If that is the case, Papa, then it is my fault that Mr. Collins is ill,” she said. “I must go to him and nurse him to health!”
“I don’t know, Lizzy,” said her father. “If you marry Mr. Collins and he dies, as unfortunate as that may be, you will not inherit Longbourn, my darling.”
“Well, not unless we have a child,” said Elizabeth. “A boy child, of course.”
“Elizabeth.” Her father cleared his throat. “If Mr. Collins is as ill as Jane—”
“There must be some way to feasibly make that happen,” Elizabeth said, though her experience had seemed rather, well, athletic for the man and not so much for her. But perhaps, if she were astride the man—oh, Lord, she mustdothat with Mr. Collins, or else he would know that she was carryinganother man’schild.
“Yes, well, perhaps discuss that with your mother,” said her father. “But truly, Lizzy, if we simply allow him to pass on, and then we look into the next branch of the family tree, that might make better sense.”
“But who is that?” said Elizabeth. “Does he have a brother?”
“No,” said her father. “I honestly am not sure. No more of my brothers are still with us, so that would mean we must go up to my father’s brothers and then down the limbs of the—”
“I think I must just go to Mr. Collins,” said Elizabeth. “I can get with child. I’m sure I can.” She gave her father a very wide smile.
Her father cringed. “Do speak to your mother about that. Please.”
Her mother was in immediate agreement. Of course, if Elizabeth wished to be married, they must move mountains to see that the matrimony was carried out. Of course, there was no time to waste, and they must act quickly, especially if Mr. Collins were on death’s door. There was also a maddeningly embarrassing tutorial about how Elizabeth could make certain to get herself with child, including some advice Elizabeth found dubious about ensuring that it was a male one. Mrs. Bennet then bundled Elizabeth off into a carriage with her sister Mary and made Mr. Bennet accompany them to Kent.
Once there, a conversation was held between closed doors between her father and Mr. Collins, who was bedridden, and then it all went quickly after that.
Another parson was brought in to perform the ceremony. Mr. Collins coughed blood into a handkerchief all the time. He was propped up on pillows, unable to leave his bed. But when it was done, they were married.
She came in that night, but Mr. Collins was asleep.
The next night was the same, but she was desperate at this point. She removed her shift and climbed into bed next to him, stark naked, and then steeled herself against the smell of sweat and illness to pass the night next to him.
When Mr. Collins awoke the next morning, he looked her over appraisingly. “Did we…?”
“Oh, yes,” she said, running her hand down his chest. “And you, my husband, pleased me greatly.”
He gave her a smile. “Of course I did,” he said.
So, he took the news of the child easily, then.
The babe was born seven months after the marriage, and not even remotely small or looking the least bit premature. But Elizabeth said that Mr. Collins seed must be overcharged what with the fact that he was dying, and that he must have put a very large child in her, and people either agreed because it sounded plausible or because they were uncomfortable because Elizabeth had spoken of seed.
