A Continued Affection

Part 38

A/N - And here we are at the end! Thank you so so much for your support, your comments and for reading along as I shared this story - I hope you've enjoyed it!

I'm working on my Christmas release at the moment (Christmas! Can you believe it?) but will hopefully have something ready to share again here soon.

In the meantime - stay well and keep reading! xxx

"Where is Mary?"

Mrs Bennet was breathless with exertion, having traversed the entirety of the Gracechurch Street house looking for her absent daughter. "I wished to speak to her about Mr Egerton's plans for the wedding!"

"If they are Mr Egerton's plans, Mama, perhaps you ought to speak to him?" Lizzy suggested, from her place in one corner of the parlour.

"Do not tease me, Lizzy. You know I would speak to him if I thought he cared one iota for the presence of flowers at a wedding, but no man alive has ever been capable of expressing an opinion worth having on decorative floral swags."

"That is a cruel criticism to levy against our entire sex, sister," Mr Gardiner remarked, looking up from his book to shoot Elizabeth an amused smile. "Although I do not deny its truth. Leave Mary be. I have scarcely seen her all morning. Doubtless, she is out, or else hiding -"

"Why would she hide?" Mrs Bennet asked sharply and too late her brother realised his error. He stammered some response, and Lizzy, sensing the storm-clouds brewing in her mother's eyes, took the opportunity to absent herself from the parlour and leave him to his fate.

She tripped lightly down the corridor until she reached the small room that Mr Bennet had acquired as his study, knocking lightly before opening the door and stepping inside.

"Mary!"

"Be quiet, Lizzy! Close the door!" Mary pleaded, shrinking down in her chair, and ignoring the amused smile her father shot her.

"We are in hiding, Elizabeth. You may join us, but only if you do not betray our whereabouts to -" A muffled shriek reached them from the parlour and he winced, dropping his voice to a whisper. "Our adversaries."

"Your secret is safe with me," Elizabeth said, with a laugh. She tiptoed further into the room, folding herself into a chair next to Mary and peering across the desk at the mountain of correspondence her father was attending to. "Anything interesting?"

"If you think a letter from my cousin worthy of interest." Mr Bennet remarked, holding the note aloft before pulling a face. "Which I do not." He placed it carefully onto a large pile Lizzy recognised as his to be attended to when I have no better occupation pile. "Ah, here is something from Mr Darcy."

"Oh?"

Lizzy strove to keep her features in place, but could not help but think she had betrayed herself merely by her word. Both Mary and Mr Bennet glanced at her, then at each other, while Lizzy made a careful study of her fingernails.

"He wishes to call this afternoon." Mr Bennet frowned. "Strange he should address the request to me, and not to your aunt." He paused. "Or your mother. Ah, well. I shall expect him at three."

Lizzy let out a breath she had not been aware of holding, and could not keep the lightest of smiles from creeping onto her face. It was not faint enough to escape Mr Bennet's notice, however, and he groaned loudly.

"I suppose I need not linger long in suspense. Do not tell me, Lizzy, for I believe my powers of deduction are equal to the task. Am I to lose yet another daughter to the lure of matrimony?"

"Lizzy!" Mary squealed, forcing her to turn and look at her. "Is it true? Are you and Mr Darcy -"

Elizabeth smiled, unwilling and unable to keep her happiness concealed any longer.

"Oh, I knew you would settle things between you!" Mary threw her arms around her. "It is as if you were never parted at all."

"Parted?" Mr Bennet frowned. "Mary, what do you mean?" He fixed his gaze on Lizzy. "There was nothing between you in Hertfordshire, was there? Animosity, I thought, if anything -"

"No, Papa."

"They met years ago, Papa, did you not know?"

"No." Mr Bennet's frown darkened. "I did not." Laying down his letters, he folded his arms on the desk and leaned over them, staring adroitly at his daughter. Lizzy sank a little under his glare, but was somehow able to find her voice and falteringly confess that, yes, she and Mr Darcy had met some years before, although there had been little more than a fleeting acquaintance between them.

"Which began again upon his arrival in Hertfordshire. Well. I suppose I must be grateful he did not steal you away four years ago, Lizzy. I do not think I could have survived the past few years in Longbourn without my most sensible daughter and ablest ally." He turned, reproachfully, to Mary. "And now I am to lose you both. However am I to manage unprotected against your sisters?" His voice dropped to a low, desperate whisper. "Against your mother?"

"You shall triumph, Papa," Lizzy said, leaning over to clasp her father's hand warmly. He covered her hand with his free one, and the pair looked at each other in silence for a moment, communicating all they needed to in one warm, affectionate gaze.

"And you are not getting rid of me, Papa, not really," Mary piped up, when a long moment had passed. "For Sidney and I plan to make our home at Trenholme."

"Sidney and I," Mr Bennet mimicked, his smile betraying that he rather liked this new, confident Mary. "Well, I shall thank you for that, and warn you that I am well on the way to making it my second home. I shall need some escape from the mad-house, and your home shall be my sanctuary." Letting go of Elizabeth, he reached over to brush Mary's thin cheek with such tender affection that even Elizabeth was touched. Mr Bennet was not effusive in his displays of love for his daughters, but neither she nor Mary could be surer of where his true feelings lay.

"Now, my dears, I am afraid I can shelter you no longer without risking severe damage to the life or property of your uncle. Run along and appease your Mama, won't you?"

Mary and Elizabeth looked at each other guiltily, before Lizzy smiled.

"Let us give her just a moment or two more..."

The End