Book
Description
“At the end of the
day when we are each of us lyin’ flat on our backs, lookin’ at the ceiling, and
the vicar is whisperin’ in our ear, the greatest comfort we shall ’ave is to
know that we loved well and were well loved in return.”
When Fitzwilliam Darcy’s father slides into an early grave,
his son is forced to take on Pemberley’s mantle. Brandy numbs his pain, but Darcy’s
worst inclinations run wild. After tragedy rips everything away, he spends
years finding his way back: a man redeemed by a woman’s loving understanding.
Elizabeth Bennet is afflicted with a common Regency
ailment: observing the world about her but not seeing those beneath her notice.
Then a clarifying act shatters the propriety that has denied her heart the
transcendent love she craves.
In Plain Sight explores Jane Austen’s
eternal love story by flipping social roles on their heads. From their first
encounter, Elizabeth Bennet and the convict known as “Smith” must overcome
their prejudices and break through their pride. Only then can they share the
treasure hidden in plain sight.
From
Chapter 30
At
the Netherfield Ball (Edited for length)
The bleakness bearing down on her was
emphasized by the library’s empty shelves that vanished into the shadows.
Thoughts swirled in disarray in the floodtide of her emotions. These motes only
became clearer as one or another rose to the surface, their hollow eyes and
gaping mouths screaming her dishonor. Then they were dragged back into the
turbulence by even grimmer considerations.
She was ruined!
Her family was destroyed!
Jane, Kitty, and Lydia were condemned to
be spinsters!
By lies!
Elizabeth could not stop crying. The shock of hearing her
name mentioned in ballroom whispers passed along by women she had known her
entire life had shattered her spirit. What hurt most was that these ladies instantly believed that she, Elizabeth Rose Bennet,
was not involved in a compromise, which could involve some measure of
impropriety, but rather outright congress in the most Biblical of senses!
They have tossed aside nearly twenty
years of acquaintance to brand me as low as a taproom doxy!
Mary always waved Fordyce at us,
preaching about the fragility of a woman’s virtue and reputation. How right she
was! Except that the good Reverend should have added that even the most upright
of women could be ruined by vicious gossip.
And I wonder what that fusty old man
would have thought of the ease with which people believe the worst in others.
At some point in her darkness and despair, a breeze swept
through the room as a door opened and then closed. She felt Mary rise from her
left side. Jane remained on the sofa, her thigh pressed against Lizzy’s right,
a protective arm wrapped around the sister’s pitching shoulders. With her hands
pressed into her eyes, Elizabeth could not see who had joined this funereal gathering.
Despite her self-imposed blindness, Elizabeth could sense a
presence moving across the room.
A weight settled upon the divan, filling the void left by
Mary’s departure. The richness of cigar smoke leavened by the scent of tooled
leather and old paper immediately conferred identity.
Papa!
A small child’s instinct took over, and Elizabeth turned
her face into the broad expanse of her father’s chest. His arms, muscular
against her slight frame, wrapped her in a protective embrace. He murmured
those disconnected, nonsensical syllables that humans first heard muffled by
the womb’s walls, but noises that always brought comfort. Mama, brokenhearted
by her daughter’s grief, closed on the pair to gently stroke the rich brown
curls now escaped from their pins.
Seconds extended to minutes, and still not a word was
spoken. The waves of her family’s love eventually poured the balm of Gilead
upon Lizzy’s injuries and brought respite, if not peace, to her gulping
anguish.
She felt a handkerchief being pressed between her clenched
fingers. Pulling back from her father’s waistcoat, she brought the cloth to her
face to wipe away the remaining dampness.
A fresh paroxysm threatened to overwhelm her, but she
tamped it down before it could begin.
“Oh, Papa,” she choked. “You know why we are here. How can
you abide to be in the same room with me, your most foolish offspring? I have
ruined us all. Wretched, wretched mistake! You warned me about the dangers…”
Mr. Bennet gently pushed back. “Dear child, I asked that
you curtail your visits to the Dower House only after Collins came upon you in
the back garden. And you did stay away. You did nothing amiss other than to be
seen by a fool who could not separate the truth of his eyes from the lies of
his prejudice.”
Lizzy shook her head. “What wounds me is that all of my
friends—or those I had counted to be amongst that congregation—and Mama’s, too,
spread those rumors. Even Lady Lucas turned on me.”
“And, Charlotte?” her father asked.
She snorted bitterly. “Oh, Charlotte…she was far too
involved with trying to impress Mr. Collins. I do not believe she is aware that
the object of her affections is responsible for her best friend’s social
destruction.”
“I shall speak with her father. He will counsel her to
think long and hard before accepting an offer from that contemptible worm. Miss
Lucas is far too sensible a woman to align herself with a man so narrow-minded.”
Mr. Bennet cleared his throat. “Mr. Bingley, would you be
so kind as to escort Mrs. Bennet and Misses Bennet, Kitty, and Lydia to the vestibule
to retrieve their outer garments? I shall also presume upon your good nature to
play the role of an outrider and accompany them home to Longbourn. I am aware
that you have a vested interest. Do you possess a pistol?”
At the mention of a firearm, four youthful faces,
illuminated by the red-orange glow of the snapping coal fire, snapped to
attention and focused on the master of Longbourn.
Bennet speared his eldest with a gaze that told Jane:
I am certain that Lizzy has confided in
you. I am depending upon your unqualified support for what I now ask. You know
the words that I cannot speak. Heed them and protect your mama and sisters with
your broad wings. I cannot help others if I must divide my attention.
Jane’s subtle nod, made as she smoothed her gown and rose
from her seat next to Elizabeth, offered him solace.
Mr. Bennet said aloud, “Please rest easy. I was only asking
whether Mr. Bingley had a weapon given that there is still an escaped convict
on the loose.
“Lest you wonder why I am not sending our entire company on
its way, my dears, reflect upon the general outlines of what has been said
about Lizzy. This topic will age well. Rather than wait for four miles of good
road to marinade our tempers, I shall discuss it now with Elizabeth. I require
Mary and Mr. Benton to offer spiritual support.
“I fear that this conversation may occupy more time than I
had previously imagined. Rather than be burdened with a recitation of
uncomfortable details, you should return home.
“If you are unable to sleep, perhaps you could begin
preparations to travel to town for a visit to Gracechurch Street. My
correspondence is woefully disorganized. I forgot to mention that I recently
received a note from my brother Gardiner requesting my presence on a matter of
Canal Company business. I must join him tomorrow midday, so I shall be on my
way before dawn. While he was not explicit, I do believe he would enjoy seeing
all of you…and I imagine that Mrs. Gardiner would endorse it too.
“Perhaps you might visit the warehouses and find material
to be fitted out for new gowns suitable for the festive season. Oh, and the
other fripperies you require, of course. You could follow along once day breaks
and Tom Coachman has made certain that the carriage is safe for travel.”
His declaration caught Mrs. Bennet by surprise. “Gracechurch
Street? Gowns? Dressmakers? Milliners? I had no idea that we were planning a
journey like that! How you vex me!”
Her further exclamations were muffled as Bingley led the
four ladies from the bookroom and closed the door behind them.
“Fitzwilliam”—Bennet glanced up before continuing—“for
appearance’s sake, might you stand post outside the library until your friend
and my family depart? My wife is not necessarily a candidate for the Royal
Academy, but even she would wonder why I would include a stranger in our family
councils. Once the coach is on its way, please rejoin us.”
Thomas now turned to his daughter to deliver a message that
could never be well received. He took her hands in his, gently massaging their
backs with his thumbs.
“You realize, my child, that you cannot stay in Meryton,
not after all that has happened—”
Lizzy pulled back, outrage reshaping her features. “Are you
sending me away? Am I such a soiled dove that even a father’s love cannot
overcome the tarradiddle that says your daughter is a fallen woman?
“How can you possibly care what they say? You know the
truth!”
Bennet shook his head. “I do know the truth, as do you. You
are blameless, my child, but the world cares not for that. And if you pause for
a moment to consider our concerns in a dispassionate light, you will understand
why I specifically divided our family, something that grieves me greatly.”
At this stage of her anger, Elizabeth only saw the nail
sticking up. She pounded at it again. “You have never cared for what our
neighbors say. On the contrary, you have mocked them and taken prodigious
delight in observing their follies.
“Now, you suddenly show concern about what they are saying?
I cannot believe it!”
Bennet sadly shook his head. “No, Lizzy, it is not what our fellows are saying, but rather the fact that they
utter it at all.
“The story of you and Smith being seen together puts you
squarely in the gun sights of Soames and his liegeman.
“Soames already knows that you were seen in the company of
an injured man at the Dower House. How long before your excuse that he was a
footman who had been kicked by a horse cannot withstand scrutiny? Even if we
can get Smith out of Meryton, you would be in unbelievable jeopardy.
“While I doubt that Sir Thaddeus is a man bent on murder, I
think all of us have witnessed the homicidal streak in Wadkins.”
Fitzwilliam had slipped back into the room. “And he does
not operate on the same morality as polite society. He would have no
compunction with throttling a young lady who could have him sent to the gallows
or transported to Botany Bay.”
Lizzy calmed at the brutal simplicity of the two men’s
assertions.
“Then what are we to do?” Elizabeth knew the answer without
hearing it.
Mr. Bennet slowly replied, looking up at the three
observers. “As I said before, we shall need to remove you from Meryton for your
protection. How long you will have to be gone, I do not know. Distance and a
lack of communication will be our friends until the threat is gone. I shall
explain to your mother that we decided it would be best to have you leave town
until the scandal subsides. Something about sending you off to one of your aunt’s
cousins near Glasgow. I regret that the damage to your
reputation may be beyond repair.
“Yet, I see the way Mr. Bingley looks at Jane. Her future
shortly will be secured and, through that, the posterity of your mother and unmarried
sisters. Kitty and Lydia are full young yet. I wager that they will discover a
young man with scarlet across his shoulders who is willing to overlook any
ancient stain.
“However, whether that injury is forgotten or remembered,
our reputation, even the disgrace of my daughters, is not worth your”—he then
looked at Mary and Edward standing behind Lizzy—“any of
my children’s lives.”
As her father subsided into his reverie, Lizzy pondered her
dispatch from town and the reasons behind it before speaking up with a delicate
shrug of one shoulder. “I had hoped otherwise, but try as I might, I cannot see
a way through this thicket. There is nothing for it.
“I must leave…but how to do it…and where to go?”
Don Jacobson has written professionally
for forty years. His output has ranged
from news and features to advertising, television, and radio. His work has been nominated for Emmys and
other awards. He has previously
published five books, all non-fiction.
In 2016, he began publishing The
Bennet Wardrobe Series—
The
Keeper: Mary Bennet’s Extraordinary Journey (2016)
Henry
Fitzwilliam’s War (2016)
The
Exile: Kitty Bennet and the Belle Époque (2017)
Lizzy
Bennet Meets the Countess (2017)
The
Exile: The Countess Visits Longbourn (2018)
The
Avenger: Thomas Bennet and a Father’s Lament (2018)
The
Pilgrim: Lydia Bennet and a Soldier’s Portion (2019)
Jacobson is also part of the collective
effort behind the publication of the upcoming North and South anthology, Falling
for Mr. Thornton: Tales of North and South, released in 2019.
Other Austenesque Variations include the
paired books “Of Fortune’s Reversal”
(2016) and “The Maid and The Footman”
(2016). Lessers and Betters (2018) offers readers the paired novellas in
one volume to allow a better appreciation of the “Upstairs-Downstairs”
mentality that drives the stories.
Jacobson holds an advanced degree in
History with a specialty in American Foreign Relations. As a college instructor, Don teaches United
States History, World History, the History of Western Civilization, and
Research Writing. He is a member of the Austen Authors Collective and JASNA. He
lives in Las Vegas, NV with his wife, Pam.
Connect with Don
Connect with Don
In
Plain Sight is
available to buy now in Paperback, Kindle and Kindle Unlimited.
Giveaway
Time
Meryton
Press is giving away 8 ebooks of In Plain Sight. To enter, please
use the rafflecopter, but make haste! There isn’t much time left.
Note
Regarding Comments: I love to read your comments, but a few blog visitors have
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contact me and I will add your comment for you :)
June 17 Diary of an Eccentric
June 18 Interests of a Jane
Austen Girl
June 19 Austenesque Reviews
June 20 Donadee’s Corner
June 22 From Pemberley to Milton
June 23 My Vices and Weaknesses
June 24 Savvy Verse & Wit
June 25 So Little Time…
June 26 Babblings of a Bookworm
* * *
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Considering how much Mrs Bennet gossips, no one should be surprised that their neighbours take delight in spreading gossip about the Bennets
ReplyDeleteThat's definitely true, Vesper, a gossip can't expect their secrets to be respected.
DeleteYet, the gossip was about Elizabeth...and that made it so much more hurtful.
DeleteHey there...yes, perhaps...but it is the general sport of the matrons in a small country town, no? Mrs. Bennet does flutter about, of that there is no doubt, yet she does shows her maternal colors.
ReplyDeleteThank you for hosting, Ceri. Don has had enjoyable posts and excerpts, and this excerpt is a good way to end the tour. Thanks to both of you. Best wishes, with your release, Don.
ReplyDeleteI echo your sentiments! This is a great stop!
DeleteI was really happy to share this excerpt, Janet, such a dramatic point!
DeleteI love that this is such a different Darcy than I'm used to reading. Congrats on the release!
ReplyDeleteThank you so much. The inverted character does reveal new dimensions in the man we have known for so many years.
DeleteThanks for commenting, Darcybennett
DeleteI do love this Mr Bennet! Also I know they kept the truth from Mrs Bennet but it’s still obvious that she loves Elizabeth!
ReplyDeleteMr Collins is a totally despicable little man and it’s just unfortunate that he found such a willing ear for his nasty spite! The least said about that person the better!
Luckily Elizabeth and Smith are so definitely attracted to each other so in actual fact the gossip did them a favour. Also luckily they had an expert tactician in Fitzwilliam, a true friend in this story. Love this!
Collins is a smary creature. I had him wafting through IPS much like an unpleasant odor, eventually dispatched when the plot brings fresh air onto the scene. While Mrs. B is kept in the dark for obvious reasons (as are Lydia and Kitty), she acts with equanimity at the end of the book when she spirits the Countess of Matlock away to an anteroom after asking "And how will we manage this." She knows what must be the adults's tasks.
DeleteThanks so much for commenting, Glynis. I love that you've highlighted Mrs Bennet's affection for her children. I have always felt Mrs Bennet's fondness for her children, even if some of them she found harder to understand and get along with than others.
DeleteThanks Ceri & Don! I echo Glynis's sentiments. With a silly mother, Lizzy dearly needs a father with a good head on his shoulders. A great excerpt, Don!
ReplyDeleteYes, Mrs. B. is silly, yet even in it, she has a tenderness that shows how much she loves each of her daughters. To see a more complete picture of how I understand Mrs. Bennet, please see "The Avenger: Thomas Bennet and a Father's Lament.
DeleteIt's nice to see Mr B being a bit more actively involved with his daughters isn't it.
DeleteWow! Elizabeth is ruined and has to go somewhere and Smith is to avoid transportation? This is terrible. Thanks, Don, for an exciting excerpt. Thanks, Ceri, for hosting!
ReplyDeleteTrying to keep you on your toes! Thanks for following the wagon train!
DeleteIt's a bit of a pickle isn't it!
DeleteThis was an amazing scene where Mr. Bennet directs his family. Wow, I loved him right then. Such care... it nearly broke my heart. I am surprised I survived this story. LOL! I wish you all manner of success with this launch.
ReplyDeleteThroughout this book (and earlier in "The Avenger: Thomas Bennet and a Father's Lament," Mr. Bennnet shakes off the classic indolence and becomes more of the man who could have shaped both Elizabeth and Lizzy Bennet! Thank you for your kind comments throughout the process. I look forward to your reviews.
DeleteThanks so much Jeanne. Good to know this book gave you all the feels <3
DeleteMy sister and mother in law loved this book, i'm looking forward to reading it! Congratulations on the release.
ReplyDeleteOhhhh! I am happy that IPS has become family reading! Look forward to your thoughts. Thank you for joining in.
DeleteThat's so great to get a personal recommendation! I don't have friends who share my reading tastes but I am lucky to have found people who share my reading :)
DeleteI read this book and enjoyed it tremendously. Best of luck with the release.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate your well-rounded thoughts (published in your review) about IPS. It was an effort to create a different book than what we usually expect.
DeleteGlad to hear your endorsement, Sheila :)
DeleteYes, that excerpt just draws one into the heart of things. I can't wait to read this one.
ReplyDeleteI am looking forward to your reviews. I wanted to cast all of our characters into three-diemnsions. In the "just for you" category...Amanda Berry is in the process of laying down the tracks for the #Audible performance of "In Plain Sight."
DeleteGlad you enjoyed the excerpt, Sophia!
DeleteOne last time to wish you well on the success of this work. Blessings to you and good luck to all in the drawing.
ReplyDeleteYou have been such a strong voice in guiding me toward a successful conclusion. Remember, you are responsible for Caroline getting her just desserts (or maybe just soup?).
DeleteBTW...thank you for the beautiful review on Amazon. Tried to track it down on Goodreads...no joy.
DeleteThanks for coming here to give your support Jeanne!
DeleteThamk you for the excerpt. I feel the impending dread they are all facing. I feel theirstrength too. Interesting, ooking forward to Caroline's "just soup"
ReplyDeleteGlad you enjoyed it! Don gave me a fantastic excerpt to share.
DeleteAh...the story entices with beguiling fingers! All will be revealed!
ReplyDeleteI was getting teary eyed with this exceprt. this is going to go to the top on my tbr pile!
ReplyDeleteI am pleased that this fraught (you should read what went before) excerpt has whetted you appetite for something rather different. look forward to your thoughts on the book! Check out a few readings I have posted on YouTube at AustenesqueAuthors.
DeleteSo glad you enjoyed it, Bookluver!
Delete