Page 106 of The Secret Diary of Anne de Bourgh

“I do not wish to live there. I have asked Darcy and Richard to help me sell it.”

Darcy explained that we had been considering the matter for some time, and that nothing would be done without proper attention to my interests.

“I should expect nothing less,” Lord Matlock said.

The fact that he had not immediately expressed disapproval of the plan bolstered my courage to continue. I told him what James had said about fetching Lady Catherine, though my voice was not quite steady by then.

Richard leaned forward.

“This is why I wrote to you asking that she be moved, Father. James ought not to be able to reach her merely because he wishes to interfere.”

“I understand your concern.”

“But moving her will not answer everything,” Richard said. “I hope you shall live to enjoy a ripe old age, Father, but should Lady Catherine outlive you, when the property eventually passes to James, we shall have the same difficulty again, and you would not be there to gainsay him this time.”

Lord Matlock was silent for a little while. Then he looked at me.

“I am sorry that you have been frightened, Anne. You ought not to have been.”

I had been prepared to explain myself further. I did not quite know what to do with an apology.

He went on to say that he had hoped giving James responsibilities would teach him to discharge them properly. He had continued to hope it long after he ought to have recognised that very little had changed.

“I have been too slow to act,” he said. “That delay has left you exposed to threats, Anne, and Richard to being harassed over matters in which his brother has no right to command him. I am sorry for it.”

“Thank you, Father,” Richard said. He looked as surprised as I was: I think neither of us had expected Lord Matlock to agree with us on every point as he just had.

“I have arrangements to make,” Lord Matlock said. “You shall hear more from me soon.”

He did not explain what those arrangements might be. I was so relieved that he had not come to take James’s side that I did not think to ask until Darcy had gone to see him out.

Then I turned to Richard. “What does he mean by arrangements? About Lady Catherine, or something else?”

“I wish I knew.” Richard looked nearly as bewildered as I felt.

We remained in the study for a little while, considering it. Neither of us could supply an answer, but when I went upstairs to Elizabeth I found that I was hungry for the first time in several days.

10 December

Richard came home from Matlock House looking so pleased that I knew at once something extraordinary had happened.

He found me in the library, where I had been attempting to read without attending very much to the book. His father had sent for him this morning, and I had wondered whether James would be there.

“I can now explain my father’s arrangements,” Richard said, sitting down beside me. “Though I am not certain I quite believe them yet.”

Lord Matlock has made over several properties to him. They are not entailed to the earldom, and he is free to dispose of them as he chooses. They include the Scottish property where Lady Catherine is sequestered, and an estate in Leicestershire called Bramley House.

For a moment I could only look at Richard in astonishment.

“They are yours?” I exclaimed finally.

“Yes.” Richard smiled at me. “With a very comfortable income, apparently. My father had all the particulars ready. I believe he expected some difficulty in making me attend to them.”

I could understand that. I was having some difficulty myself.

Richard said that he had scarcely begun to thank his father before James objected. He wished to know why he had not been consulted, and whether Lord Matlock had considered what he was taking from his eldest son.

“My father told him that he was disposing of his own property, and that the papers had already been lodged with his solicitor. James was not being asked for his opinion or consent as neither were required.”