Page 31 of Master of Netherfield
“Georgiana is happy with me in Hertfordshire.”
“But what kind of people are you associating with? The day I was there, it was horrible among such low creatures.”
“Low creatures, aunt?” William asked with contempt in his voice. “The same persons who rescued you from the side of the road! Who provided you with safe transport back to town despite your threats! Who cared for your driver when you struck him down in the road! I understand they are now attempting to save your team that foundered.”
“What’s this?” asked Earl Fitzwilliam stepping closer.
Lady Catherine waved her brother away but in his own home, the Earl of Matlock obeyed no one except occasionally for his wife.
“What has my sister done with her horses?”
“Aunt Catherine drove her horses to exhaustion Tuesday–when her carriage broke down two miles from my home; she blamed her driver and struck the man with her cane, leaving him bleeding on the side of the road. She abandoned her horses and driver when one neighbour offered to transport her to Netherfield where she stormed through my house and threatened my household. My housekeeper rightly had Aunt Catherine and her footmen removed from my house! Another neighbour kindly provided transportation for my aunt and cousin to return to London.”
“Yes, I know all that. Cathy and Anne appeared without trunks or boxes at my door and my stable kept the team and driver overnight before sending them off home the next morning. But what of her horses?” the earl asked.
“The front team foundered, and all four horses were in very poor shape–they were grass fed and not exercised before this sudden trip into Hertfordshire. A local gentleman is stabling the horses, seeing to their treatment and proper feeding.”
“Cathy! That team of bays is particularly fine! You promised me most faithfully to care for them properly when I sold them to you,” the earl fussed. “When horses founder, they end up at the glue factory!”
“They are just horses James,” Lady Catherine fussed. “More horses are for sale every day at the market.”
“But you do not have the funds to buy more horses, let alone the oats to feed the ones you own,” William argued. “Now you will have to pay the expense for the blacksmith saving the horses and the feed to keep them elsewhere while they heal.”
“It is a trifling sum–no more than ten pounds,” Lady Catherine replied. William wondered if his aunt had ten pounds in her accounts. She remained at Matlock house waiting until her sister-in-law would tire of her and send her back to Kent in the Matlock carriage.
“But the horses may never recover fully,” the earl said disgusted with his sister’s negligence.
“What is more important?” Lady Catherine asked. “A team of horses or the future of my niece?”
“Why are you so interested in Georgiana suddenly, sister?” the earl asked.
Lady Catherine leaned forward and whispered, “Since she is not George’s daughter, I thought it was time to move her from his negligent care.”
“What do you mean?” demanded William as he stood and looked down upon his uncle and aunt seated before him. He did not realize how much like his father he appeared when he was angry or how frightening.
“When your mother was increasing with your sister, she told us both that her husband was not the father of her expected child. The father was a friend of our family she had originally hoped to marry before your father’s proposal won our father’s approval,” Lady Catherine reported casually, glancing toward her brother and then toward her brother-in-law who stood silent and furious.
But rather than initiating a heated argument, the young man was merely disgusted with his relatives and laughed bitterly. The Earl of Matlock was unhappy to be the object of anyone’s laughter and Lady Catherine was embarrassed.
“Do you think your gossip matters to me?” he asked. “Do you think your words hurt me? Whatever your words here tonight, I know that my father cares deeply for both me and my sister.”
He walked over to his father’s side to form a united front. “Lady Catherine, my good father has entrusted my sister to my care–I asked forthe opportunity to spend time with my only sister after my years at university. Would you deny me the chance to form a lasting bond with my sister?”
“Your sister will marry and leave you someday...”
“But she will always remain my sister. Would to God I could sever other familial relationships,” William said.
George Darcy smiled at his son and turned back to his brother-in-law. “Matlock, this is my final offer to save the dowries for your daughters, hand over the estate of Gracebridge Manor and give up gambling; then I shall pay your mortgage on Matlock–I shall not hand over the money to anyone, but the bank and I shall require papers that secure the dowries without your ability to tap the funds again.”
“That was not what I asked for!” the earl argued.
George smiled and replied, “But with the great insult to me and my departed wife by her own sister and brother tonight, it is my price nonetheless.”
Now he turned to his son and said, “I believe I prefer supper at my club. Would you care to join me?”
“Certainly Father,” William replied before the two men walked away from the buzzing Fitzwilliam household.
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