Greetings, fellow Austenians! I’m so excited to be visiting Laughing with Lizzie today to talk about my new book, The Reintroduction of Fitzwilliam Darcy — especially today, because it’s RELEASE DAY! Woohoo!
::does a happy dance and a double-fist pump::
I do hope
you’ll celebrate my new release with me by checking out this book and maybe
even my first two novels (all available at Amazon). Reintroduction is my first standalone Austen variation, and I
really hope you’ll like it as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it.
In this new story, circumstances are vastly different for ODC: Elizabeth and her sisters are the daughters of a baronet, and Darcy has no fortune. But as always, the stars align and one of literature’s most beloved couples unite, determined to take on the world together!
In case you haven’t been following along as I posted the chapters at A Happy Assembly, here’s the opening of chapter 3:
***
Darcy found himself awake at six the next morning.
This was not
an unusual time for him to rise, for there was always something to be done
about the few acres of land he inhabited. Sometimes he would offer his
assistance to a neighboring tenant if there was a need for extra hands for the
building of a fence or repairs to a roof; once, he had spent an entire day on a
neighbor’s farm helping to build a new barn.
Though he
often let his beard grow out to “disguise” himself, since he saw no one of his
old circle of acquaintances, his neighbors knew who he was. They knew what had
happened to his father, his fortune, his dignity. None of this was ever
mentioned. The tenants were grateful to him for ensuring they would not lose
their own homes in the wake of the disaster that had befallen his family, and
they respected him more than ever for being willing to humble himself and live
at their level. It was well known that he could have joined his sister at the
home of his lofty relatives, the Earl and Countess of Disley—the earl now
having management over Pemberley Park—but had chosen to remain close to the
home that had been his from the day of his birth. He had not abandoned the
people who had for so long made a piece of the park their homes.
After
completing his morning ablutions, he dressed in one of the suits that Reynolds
had packed for him, a pair of black breeches and a brown waistcoat and jacket.
He was supposed to go riding with his sister but had no riding breeches or
boots with him, so what he had would have to do.
He was just
tying his cravat when there was a knock at his door. Half expecting his uncle,
he opened it to find not the earl but his valet on the other side. “Does Lord
Disley have need of me?” he asked.
Perkins shook
his head and lifted his hand; Darcy took note of a towel folded over his arm,
with a mug in his hand that held a brush, a razor, and a pair of scissors.
“No, sir,”
said the valet. “Lord Disley thought that perhaps you might like a shave and a
haircut.”
“It’s more
likely His Lordship desired his nephew not go about the grounds looking like a
wolf in sheep’s clothing,” Darcy muttered, though he stepped aside and allowed
the man to enter, wondering how his uncle could possibly have known he would be
awake at this hour.
He wordlessly
took himself to the chair at the dressing table and sat in it as Perkins
arrayed the few instruments he’d brought on the table’s top. He then moved to
the wash stand and poured a draught of water into the mug, which Darcy knew
would have a chunk of soap at the bottom. On his return, Perkins unfolded the
towel and put it about his chest and shoulders. The long-serving valet made
quick work of trimming his hair to a more respectable, shorter length before he
went to work on clearing the beard from his chin.
Afterward,
Darcy was forced to admit that he both looked and felt better—more like his old
self, though he knew it would not last long. Thanking Perkins for his time and
the excellence of his work, he then quit his room to go in search of his uncle.
Surely the earl was up if his valet was already at work.
He found the
older man, not unsurprisingly, in his study. The clock on the mantle over the
fireplace read seven, and he still wore a flannel banyan.
“Ah,
Fitzwilliam… I see that Perkins has done his duty,” Richard Fitzwilliam
remarked on bidding him entrance.
“Indeed. You
need not be embarrassed to be seen with me now,” Darcy remarked.
Lord Disley
frowned. “Fitzwilliam, there’s no need to be unpleasant. I know you haven’t a
man of your own right now—”
“I have
Reynolds,” Darcy rejoined. “He does well enough in lieu of a proper valet,
though given my living situation, I see no need to waste time having him shave
me every morning or trim my hair every month. Those are, at present, luxuries I
can do without.”
“You chose to
stay behind and live as your tenants do,” his uncle reminded him needlessly.
“On the
contrary, Uncle—there was no choice,” said Darcy. “Not for me. Perhaps you
would understand how I feel if our situations were reversed.”
“Perhaps I
would, but that is a moot point, one which we have argued countless times over
the last five years,” said the earl with a sigh. “I did not ask you here to
debate the merits of your choice. I sent Perkins to you because I thought I
might do you a kindness while you were here, not because I was ashamed of your
appearance.”
“You didn’t
ask me here, Uncle. You said you expected me by supper, which I believe
qualifies as a summons,” Darcy pointed out.
Lord Disley
frowned again and sat back in his chair. “Might I ask why you are behaving so
churlishly?”
Darcy
scoffed. “Need you really ask? You demanded I come and then made me wait for an
explanation as to why, then you had your man tend me this morning as though you
could not stand the sight of me. You reminded me that I chose the life I now
live as though I am not reminded of it every single day, and though we have argued the necessity of that choice
‘countless times’, you still fail to understand why I made it. Pemberley is all that I have left, and I don’t even
really have that—you do.”
He emitted a
groan born of exasperation and annoyance. “I just don’t understand how you
cannot see what it means to me, both to remain at the park and to live with the
knowledge that Pemberley is yours and not mine.”
An expression
he could not decipher had fallen over his uncle’s face, and when at last Darcy
had finished speaking, the earl sighed heavily. “I suppose you are right,” he
said at last. “I cannot truly
understand because I have never been put in the position to have to make the
choice you did. But I can imagine, Fitzwilliam. I can imagine the humiliation,
the loss of pride and dignity you suffer. I can imagine how much it hurt you to
lose your father in the manner he left us, to place your only sibling into the
custody of others to care for.”
He sat
forward then, his hands clasped together on the desktop and his gaze now
earnest. “I hope that one day, you will know how very, very proud I am of the man you have chosen to be. I don’t know that
I could be such a man. I’m too used to this life, too old and set in my ways to
so easily give it up for a cottage in a distant corner of my own estate.”
Disley then
gestured to the chair that sat before his desk. Drawing a breath, Darcy moved,
at last, to take it, expelling the breath in a whoosh as he fell back into it.
“Please
believe me when I say that it pains me more than you will ever know to have to
sit by and do almost nothing for you,” his uncle continued. “I have honestly
done all that I can these last five years.”
Feeling
suddenly ashamed of his behavior, Darcy nodded. “I know you have, Uncle.
Forgive me for being such an ungracious oaf. Sometimes the weight of… well,
everything… just crashes down upon me, and I lash out when I should instead be
silent.”
His uncle
nodded. “Given all you have endured—and how you have always tended toward
keeping your emotions under strict regulation—it is only natural that you
should explode once in a while when you have no one with whom you feel
comfortable confiding in to vent upon,” said he. “Shall we say no more about
it?”
“You are very
good, uncle,” Darcy replied. “Now, you said in your note that you wished to
discuss Pemberley, but thought it best to do so in person.”
“Yes, I
suppose it is best we have done with it so that your mood is calmer when your
sister rises,” said Lord Disley. “She has been looking forward to having you
here since I told her you were coming.”
“I am sorry
to have stayed away so long. I simply thought it for the best.”
“I understand
that, and she will as well, in time.” His uncle then shifted some papers on his
desk about, seemingly looking for one or more in particular. When at last he
found what he was looking for, he held the sheets out to Darcy.
“That,” he
said as Darcy took the two pages of parchment in hand, “is a plan for returning
at least some of your fortune to you. It will take some time before the estate
can be solvent again, but it’s doable.”
Darcy frowned
as the full meaning of what he was reading registered. It was a business
plan…for leasing Pemberley.
“You want to let Pemberley? Pemberley—in the hands of other people?” he said, not bothering to
keep the incredulity he felt from his voice.
“Fitzwilliam,
you forget, perhaps, that not only was much of the Darcy fortune lost to those
wretched Wickhams but also that your father spent what they didn’t take trying
to find them—not to mention his desperate attempts to recoup his losses through
gambling and bad investments,” Lord Disley pointed out. “It is a miracle that
your sister’s dowry was saved! The rent from Pemberley’s tenants has not been
enough to pay off all the debt accrued, and it’s been almost five years. We ought to have done this
from the start, but we were both of us so hopeful that those bounders and the
money they took might yet be found. We were, as you are full aware,
unfortunately wrong. And I can no longer justify taking no action at all
regarding the estate. Something must
be done, as I know you’ll never agree to my selling it.”
“You’re damn
right I won’t,” Darcy growled. “You may legally own Pemberley at present,
uncle, but that house, that land, and their history belong to Georgiana and
me.”
“Precisely my
point,” Disley retorted. “Nor would I wish to take it away from you; as you
said, it’s all you have left, and I do
want to be able to place ownership of the estate back into the hands in which
it belongs. I’d have done before now, but with the state of your father’s
affairs, I did not wish to chance his debtors trying to claim it piecemeal.”
“And for
that, uncle, I do thank you. Despite the collateral damage done by my father
giving up the estate, I am content in the knowledge that it will one day be
mine again,” Darcy replied. “You have saved it for me, and I am grateful.”
“I haven’t
the ability to manage Disley as well as Pemberley on my income—I’m rich,
Fitzwilliam, but sadly not that
rich,” his uncle continued. “With a yearly lease in place—asking as much as can
legally be asked and perhaps a little more—we can put that much more of the
tenants’ rents toward the debt. A trifling amount in comparison, but still
something. You’ll at least get your ten thousand a year back, which is a vast
deal better than what I’ve been able to give you.”
A vast deal
better, indeed! Ten thousand a year would be a far cry from the five hundred he
now lived under. And having Pemberley as his own once again—though up to half
his income would be spent on maintaining the house and grounds, and seeing to
the needs of the tenants—would be eminently preferable to what he made do with
at present. He could pay Reynolds and his wife a salary again—he could get them
help for carrying out their daily
tasks. They could delegate to maids and footmen as they had done before.
And he just
might go back to shaving more than once a week.
Darcy lifted
the papers in his hands as he asked, “What, pray, is your projection for solvency?”
His uncle sat
back again. “Unless by some miracle the money stolen by your father’s steward
and his son is found…? Three to five years.”
Stunned was
the only word to describe what the earl’s declaration made Darcy feel. No—he
felt cold at having to face another three to five years living barely within
view of his family’s ancestral home whilst another lived inside it. It was one
thing to endure the cottage knowing the estate house was empty, but to be
forced to watch some other man come and go from it as he pleased?
“What…what am
I to do?” he stuttered. “How…how can I possibly remain when my home is given
into the hands of another?”
Lord Disley’s
expression was not unsympathetic. “The way I see it, Fitzwilliam, you have
three options: One, you might finally take me up on the offer to come and live
at Disley Court. Two, you remain as you are on your four acres in a secluded
corner of the Park and continue to hide away from the world. Or…”
“Or what?”
“We could set
you up as Pemberley’s steward,” his uncle replied, then raised his hand as
Darcy opened his mouth to object. “Hear me out, Fitzwilliam. No one knows
Pemberley Park better than you—I daresay not even that scoundrel Albert Wickham
or his worthless offspring could best you in knowledge of the grounds or the
tenantry, especially given you’ve spent the last five years living amongst
them. You could stay in the cottage you have now, or we could move you to a
farm closer to Pemberley; it would be your choice. So long as we are careful in
our selection of the tenant—”
Darcy
scowled. “Pray tell me you do not intend to advertise.”
Lord Disley
scoffed. “Certainly not! I would not blaze your degradation to the world any
more than has already been done. I do, however, intend to make some discreet
inquiries—will have to if we’re even to find anyone to let the place to. I know
you abhor disguise of any sort, especially in light of how your poor father was
duped, but you may have to use an alias if you choose the third option. It may
be wise to remove your most recent portraits from the gallery so that you’re
not recognized as belonging to the Darcy family that owns the house.”
Looking over
the papers in his hand again, Darcy had to admit—albeit reluctantly—that his
uncle’s plan was sound. Thank goodness he’d had a first-class education to help
him understand the minute details as well as the “layman’s terms” his uncle had
just laid out.
“And aside
from locating the stolen money, there is no other way to pay Father’s remaining
debts?” he was compelled to ask.
The earl
shook his head. “I’m afraid not, Fitzwilliam. Not unless you’re willing to
deprive Georgiana of her dowry, and you know how bloody difficult it was to get
your father to part with the thirty thousand, and Pemberley’s deed, before he
lost those as well as himself.”
“No, uncle.
You know I could not bear to strip my sister of the last shred of dignity our
father has left her, even if you practically had to wrestle it from him,” Darcy
said.
“Indeed. So,
nephew… What will you do?”
Darcy drew a
breath and blew it out. “I do not know. I must have some time to think on it.”
His uncle
inclined his head. “I expected as much. I would suggest attempting to put it
from your mind, as I know Georgiana intends to go riding with you this
morning—she spoke of missing your rides together while we awaited your arrival
last evening—but I also know it will be difficult to do. I’ve given you a great
deal to ponder, and deciding on how little or how much you wish to be involved
with Pemberley’s tenant will be a weighty decision indeed.”
“In that
much, at least, we are in agreement, sir,” Darcy quipped, before sighing and
handing the papers back to his uncle; then he stood and took his leave.
***
GIVEAWAY!
I feel like Darcy was channeling Persuasion’s Sir Walter Elliot for a moment there! Tell me what you think in the comments below to enter for a chance to win an ebook copy of The Reintroduction of Fitzwilliam Darcy!
But wait, there’s more! Because today is RELEASE DAY, there’s a bonus prize available. Continental US commenters on today’s blog (must comment by 11:59 p.m.) are not only entered to win the ebook, but also a signed paperback copy in a second drawing!
(International readers, I’m sorry I cannot
offer you a signed paperback at this time. If a non-US resident is drawn for
the paperback, I will send you an ebook.)
Contest open until August 14, 2021. Good
luck!
***
Christine, like many a JAFF author before
her, is a long-time admirer of Jane Austen's work, and she hopes that her
alternate versions are as enjoyable as the originals. She has plans to one day
visit England and take a tour of all the grand country estates which have
featured in film adaptations, and often dreams of owning one. Christine lives
in Ohio and is already at work on her next book.
Thank you so much for stopping by Christine! I wish you all the best with the new release!
