"Sneeshurst Abbey"; f and m; Regency. - (4 Parts)

[count tiszula]

This should be my 2000th post, so here is a celebratory story. I can't believe i've posted so much, as I can't remember any very significant apercus amongst them; needless to say, heartfelt thanks to all who make this place possible, as it has certainly changed my life.

Very early on I wrote a paragraph of Austen parody in entirely the wrong place, so it seems appropriate to return to the Regency now; however, this is not supposed to be canonical Austen; it's just that Mr Darcy assumed the guise of a Muse and literally forced his way in to what had been a Heyerish bodiceripper.

[Austen is out of copyright, so I do own all the characters. So there.]

SNEESHURST ABBEY

To dine from home may afford the greatest company, but the best company of all is to be left to dine alone together, with no prospect of a third to cheer a long evening. So thought Lady Laetitia Salusbury , waiting for her new husband to return from hunting. Night was already falling, the servants lighting the hall , when his horse was heard. Lady Letty ran to the door, all eagerness. Three months married, they had but once spent an evening alone when Mr Salusbury had not insisted she withdraw from the hall and leave him and the gentlemen to their wine. This very day they had been bidden to a neighbour's, and had gone, but that she had feigned a cold, tickling her nose three times with her bodkin, so that when she was compelled to sneeze her husband had heard the thrice repeated "TCHOOOH!", and, for her protection insisted the horses be not put to that day.

Mr Salusbury was a young , gentlemanlike man of about fifteen thousand a year, of middle height and reddish hair in long curls, of complexion pale by day and ruddy by night. As he strode in, his trousers and boots wet from the rain, doffing his tall hat, a troubled look overcame his open face, he lifted his head proudly and gave a fine, manly sneeze.

"HARSCHOOOOO! Forgive me, Lady Letty," said he to his wife. "I know how you hate to see a man sneeze, from your constant blushing and turning away whenever the gentlemen do it. But it would come out, you know; there was no denying it."

Lady Letty was about to protest that she had at least no objection to seeing a gentleman sneeze, when...

"Now, milady," said her husband, "let me present a friend found by chance in the field and who consented to dine with us tonight. Come in, Darcy."

A tall, dark man, handsome by the fashion, stood behind, also wet through, his raven locks plastered to his forehead, his tall hat doubtless lost in some covert. He bowed and his hostess curtseyed.

"Your servant, Lady Laetitia."

"Welcome to Sneeshurst, Mr Darcy"

"You are a marvel, Darcy," said Mr Salusbury. "Here you are like a drowned rat, and with both milady and me sneezing our heads off, yet I never saw you sneeze to this day."

A dark flush suffused the other's cheek. "I never sneeze,"he said. "Shall we at least remove our trousers? It is hardly fitting to dine before a lady with trousers on."

" But I shall not be shocked if you keep your trousers on, Mr Darcy, except they be too wet. I am not like your aunt, a stickler for breeches. Dinner is already so late; it must be past four."

"By all means let us to it".

A fine soup of chicken was served. The gentlemen shared a decanter of best sherry. Amid the table sat the greatest heirloom of the Salusburys, the great gold snuffcellar and mill, wrought by Cellini [though claimed by some as a salt-cellar and peppermill]. Whatever the case, it bore much curious decoration. Here was Ptarnustheia, sneezing without control as Zeus descended to her in the guise of a bunch of asphodels. Here the Muses, drinking deep from the Pierian spring, tickled their noses to seek inspiration.

A fat broiled tench now appeared, while the gentlemen drank a bottle of hock, brought in from Simmern's estate by the Duke of Cambridge.

"Have you met my aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh?" enquired Mr Darcy. "Rosings, where I am staying, is not far."

"I fear not, " said Lady Letty. "Each time we are bidden to the same occasion, she seems to have a cold."

"More likely she does not care to have my wife lead her in, " remarked Mr Salusbury.

" It is true that Rosings is a draughty house; and she most susceptible to colds. Even I have sometimes felt..." Mr Darcy brole off, and looked around him as if to challenge them to complete his sentence.

A continuarse

[doggo]

Oh! I love this already so much! So witty and entertaining and full of sneezy promises! And of course like probably all women, I adore Mr Darcy. Especially as just about every line of his is calling forth sneezing. I can't wait to read more.

And congratulations for your 2000th post.

[count tiszula]

A haunch of veal was brought in, with a brain and kidney pudding, a toad in the hole and some fries on the side, though these last were not set before the lady lest their globular appearance distress her. She took a glass of claret, of which the gentlemen shared a magnum.

"Why, Darcy, had we some prisoners of war at hand, we might serve them as Zeus did his father; then might we serve ourselves with French fries!"

Darcy frowned , as if to indicate disappproval of this indelicacy; yet could not resist adding, with a brief bow;

"Yet we have no need of the fruit of that divine seed, for we have here our own pocket Venus."

A spotted dick, doubtless furnished from the suet of the kidneys, now appeared, and a fine junket, from the rennet of the veal. The gentlemen started on a decanter of Malmsey.

"When we are left, Darcy, we can sample my collection of snuffs at our leisure. Some are traditional, others I have ordered to my own receipt from London. I fancy there is that there that will tickle that haughty nose of yours."

"I never yet met a snuff could make me sneeze," said Mr Darcy. Lady Laetitia's heart sank. She had stil hoped her husband might allow her to stay with the gentlemen; but it seemed not. The dessert was served; the season forbade much fruit that was not preserved, save apples and a few blood-oranges from the orangery. A Stilton was set next the snuffcelllar.

"Will you taste this wine-biscuit, Darcy? I have bought them in Bath from Dr Oliver." Mr Salusbury knocked his biscuit hard against the table edge, a habit acquired while briefly a midshipman. before his brother's death sent him to Cambridge. Seeing his wife had consumed her sugared fig, he nodded to the footman that he set before him the silver train of coasters which held the decanters of port, madeira and brandy. With a sigh, Lady Laetitia excused herself. While the gentlemen rose and bowed, she went to the drawing-room door.

"I wager, Darcy, if ever they complete a steam-engine which could act as a locomotive, we could have one on this table to pull our train", she heard her husband say. She passed through the thick ancient walls of the hall, whose entrance formed a sort of vestibule to the drawing-room, where all was modernity. Ordering her tea, she sought diversion, and thought again of the gentlemen. Left alone, she tiptoed back through the vestibule to the double-door to the hall, and placed her eye to the crack.

"In this compartment", she heard a voice, "you will find a simple English snuff, produced by grinding alone, flavoured but with the finest attar of roses". Her husband plunged his fingers deep in the golden trough, on which Hephaestus was seen tickling Aphrodite's nose while she lay contained by his net. Scattering the powder on all sides, his practised fingers flew to his nose, and he inhaled lustily. At once his slightly freckled nose flared. He tossed back his red curls, and sighed in deep satisfaction. Lady Letty could not take her eyes off him, knowing what was about to occur and that he could not spy her watching him.

"Now, Darcy, " he said in an oddly strangled voice, "this is a pleasure you Haah- cannot- HAAAAH- forgo- Hah- HARRRASSCCHOOOOOO! HaRRRASSSSCHOOOOOOO! HATCHOOO! Id-deed, I wod-der that you do not HAYCHOOOOO! Heh-HATCHOOOOOH! eb-brace it."

Mr Darcy, all gravity, removed a tiny quantity of red-brown powder from the snuff-engine, and placed it in two little spots within the anatomical snuff-box on the back of his left hand. This he placed beneath his long, thin nostrils. He gave one sharp, precise inhalation.

"It is very fine," he said, his dark eyes glistening with unborn tears; "but I cannot see why a gentleman should express his appreciation with a sneeze. Besides, I naver sneeze." Lady Laetitia's disappointment was suddenly overcome by an access of apprehension; perchance through the dispersion of the snuff so liberally scattered about by her husband, or through the piercing draught that bore it from the airy hall into the warm drawing room, a sharp, prickling sensation had suddenly beagun to tickle her nose. She wondered if she could retreat to the drawing -room, but seemed roooted to the spot. In any case her sneezes were not of the long build-up variety; usualllly they arrived long before she could get her hankie out of her reticule. And so it was now. A single huge breath was drwan, and AAAAAH-TCHOOOOOMPF! An enormous high-pitched sneeze, all girliness despite her efforts to stifle it, burst out of her. She heard it echo round the beams of the hall. So startling was it that the gentlemen shot up from their chairs, and Mr Salusbury even began to draw his sword.

[vignette]

Eeeek! How exciting! This is so perfect, especially Mr Darcy's cameo. Count, I have enjoyed all of your 2,000 posts, but this time you have outdone yourself. I may only hope it continues for a long time to come!

[shygreeneyes]

Perfect!

[doggo]

"Brain and kidney pudding and a toad"? I nearly choked in my tea while reading that. Well isn't this lovely! What a sight, two charming men trying to make themselves sneeze. Oh, I wonder what kind of occurence would weaken the resistance of Mr Darcy's nose so he could lose his sneeze-virginity...

[count tiszula]

Thanks, everyone. Vignette, the feeling is mutual and I hope we shall get more stories from you soon.

It;s a toad in the hole, of course, not a real toad; why, that would be silly...

Fit the third

"Nay, I recognize that sneeze, " laughed Mr Salusbury, striding to the door. " No one but my excellent wife can give a sneeze of such beauty." He flung open the door, discovering Lady Laetitia, all sniffly and pinkish about the nostrils, still fumbling in her reticule.

"How now, my dear, are you spying on us like a child that wants more dessert instead of his bed?"

"Shall she not have it, Salusbury? " put in Darcy. "Must we confine her to a lonely drawing-room ?"

"Well, come in, then, if Darcy will it; but he must swear not to tell Lady Catherine of your unladylike conduct."

"I swear it" said Darcy with a bow to the blushing lady. With mumbled thanks and shows of reluctance she resumed her seat.

"Now help yourself from the train of drinks. " Her husband pushed the decanters towards her. " Take some port; 'tis Graham's late bottled '72, a fine year indeed, when Britons never were slaves." She poured out a small measure of rich, scarlet liquid.

"Some Stilton, and do not mind the worms." She took spoon, and, trying to avoid organic content, set a decaying lump on her plate.

"And at last, your ladyship must experience the joy of the snuff-cellar. Dip those dainty white fingers in this first compartment, and just set their tips against your little nose." She did so with much hesitation, and almost trembling, so that a large part of the powder spilt on the table and on her lacy cuffs. Though little remained on them, she eagerly brought her index and third finger ends to her nostrils. Barely touching the gentle skin, an almost ecstatic sensation invaded her parts. The intoxicating scent of roses hit her senses, and excitingly. the grains penetrated her secret places, producing a tickle the like of which she had never felt before. She had imagined this moment for three months, but the reality was far more arousing than she could have thought. At once she knew that a sneezing fit of the utmost violence and inevitability was on the way.

"Come, my dear, you need not be like Darcy, denying himself all pleasure; ladies may sneeze as well as gentlemen." Her pale and freckled nose, she felt, flared to its first position; her normally ivory brow flushed beneath the golden curls which artifice allowed to bedeck it. Her bosom, forced up by a fashioned bodice, heaved with desire.

"Haah!" she breathed, "I am glad you ad-bit it, sir. For ladies have noses more tickly than... Haah-TSCHOOOOH! than...HAH-TSCHOOOOOOH! I...HAH-TISHOOOOOOO! We... HAH-CHISHAAAAAAA! And...HUH_CHUUUUUUUUH!" Feeling the wetness on her delicate nostril-edges she gave a huge sniff.

"Bravely sneezed, my lady!" guffawed her husband. "She can outsneeze you, eh, Darcy?"

"I never sneeze."

" But you have only tried one snuff; there are a dozen or more in the secret recesses of the snuffcellar, and some I wager no nose can resist. This one is brought from Brandenburg, the electoral snuff favoured by Frederick the Great, but with an added element from the blossoms and zest from my orangery."

Without a word Darcy took a small pinch; it seemed only a few grains touched his hand, and a very tentative sniff scarcely moved them.

[count tiszula]

" The aroma is exquisite, " said Mr Darcy, a tear rolling down his right cheek, his finely chiselled nostrils locked into a geometrical flare. "And I avow, it is a tickly enough confection to prove sneezy to the common nose. But as for me, I never..." His mouth remained open, his muscular chest began to expand. With a huge effort, he forced his mouth shut and brought his hand to his face, covering his hugely distended nostrils with his index finger. "Huh..." he inhaled, then let out his breath again.

"I dever snee...huh..." He lapsed into silence again, eyes closed, face frozen in a rictus of ecstasy.

"Hgnk!" An almost silent stifle forced its way through his fingers, then "Huuuuuuuh..." he let out his breath in a sigh almost of infinite regret for a lost pleasure. Lady Letty, whose eyes had been glued to his nose, felt a dreadful sense of anticlimax, and glancing at her husband , caught an answering glance of merriment.

"Bless you , Darcy."

"Yes, bless you, Mr Darcy"

"I didn't..... Hknt! Doe, I didn't!"

"Perhaps I may essay that blend," said Lady Letty, and again dipped her fingers.

"I fear I bust leave you," said Mr Darcy thickly. " I recall that I bust call at the apothecary's in Tunbridge Wells to pick up some cold rebedies for Lady Catherine." Lady Letty scarcely heard him. She had most carefully brought her fingers again to her nose, barely sprinkled as they were with the second snuff. Though surely only a few grains were borne on the air, oncce again her whole nose seemed filled with the savour of the warm South, and every membrane seemed to vibrate to the tickle of a marvellous sneeziness. She lost track of Mr Darcy's discourse, confined to a world where her only purpose was to sneeze and sneeze again. She was surprised to see Mr Darcy stand up from the table, and endeavoured to emulate him. But her breast leapt in deep thick pants "Hah-...Hah" . She moved so convulsively that she had to set a hand on the table to steady herself. " Hah-HAAAH!".

"Come, Darcy, "said her husband, "you cannot go yet. You will not sneeze for us, but Lady Letty is going to sneeze for you!"

"I ab id-deed, Mr...HUH ....HAH-HERCHOOOOO! Hah-HARSHAAAAAAAH! Hah-HERCHEW! I will Hah-Hah-TCHOOOOOOH!"

Darcy bowed. "I ab resolved, Lady Laetitia." He turned and made for the front door, followed by the others.

"Stay but a TISHOOOOO! I ASHOOOOO...assure you, we did not see-EEEESHOOOOO! you sneeze..HAGH- Hagh..... HERRRASHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAH!" This last sneeze was so violent that she was thrown forward, bent almost double, as they moved to the entrance. Mr Darcy took his whip from the hallboy and said, looking even more flushed,

"I did not sneeze." He brought the whip up to his nose. "HGNK! Good evening!" He stalked out. Mr Salusbury, red in the face, gave a roar of laughter.

"Come, Lady letty, is it not perhaps the hour of 'Lovers, to bed'? You will look very fine in your nightdress."

She gave him her hand. "Nay, Mr ISHOOOOOOO! We have all the evening before us; HAISHAAAAH! And besides, I have only yet ESHOOOOH! essayed two of your snuffs!"

THE END

[Vetinari]

Oh look at that my dear Marquess, I come back from a few days furlough and here you are all promoted and full membery! And a completed story in which Mr Darcy proved to be entirely a spoilsport. How wicked you are!

However the Salusburys are not so lily livered. I expect they will have more fun without him. And I would love to see the snuffcellar and mill, not to mention trying its contents!

So congratulations on both your impressive postingness and upon your wonderful work of art.

[Candy]

Oh my goodness....this is a work of art! This is amazing! I've read it over three times so far, and will continue to do so. I've found my new favorite story!

There's only one part I dislike....two words, in fact.... "The End"