Chapter 25 #3
“Aye, we have our share of fools, but they’re our fools. We don’t take kindly to people using us.” Sally still sounded unbothered, as if she were encountering a neighbor on a walk into the village.
“I would apologize, but it turns out I’m not very sorry,” Agnes said. “After all, it wasn’t as though any of the treasure
was yours to begin with.”
Lizzie lowered herself into the grotto, dropping to the stone floor with a muffled “Oof!” Darcy turned to look at her, his
eyes wide. She held up a finger to her lips.
“Well, it certainly wasn’t yours,” Sally said. “Three generations of my family have given our entire lives to Netherfield
Park. That gives us more of a right to it than you.”
Darcy struggled against his bindings when he saw her. She reached for the gag first. When it fell from his mouth, Darcy gasped.
“Georgie?”
“Outside, with Agnes,” Lizzie whispered, moving on to the knots at his wrists. “Sally is our distraction.”
“I left the silver,” Agnes said, her voice carrying into the grotto. “I had a feeling it wasn’t the extent of the treasure,
and I figured I could rattle you all into revealing it. And wasn’t I right? The wealthy hang diamonds in their unused ballrooms
while the rest of us struggle and starve for a living—and you were complicit!”
The ropes around Darcy’s hands finally began to loosen, and she helped him shed them and sit up.
Darcy tried to work at the knot in the rope around his feet, but his hands were purple, and he was having trouble making his fingers work.
“I’m sorry I lured you here,” he whispered. “They made me write that note.”
“Shh,” she reassured him. She should have known—when in his life had he ever signed a note to her with his given name?
“Don’t talk to me about being complicit,” Sally snapped, and Lizzie heard the first hint of anger in her voice. “I used Mrs.
Bingley’s silver to make life better for the people of Meryton—with her blessing. That’s a far cry from you, who stole what
wasn’t yours out of greed.”
The knot finally loosened, and Lizzie pulled at the ropes, finding enough slack for Darcy to pull his feet free. He got to
his feet but stumbled, and Lizzie clung to his arm, not wanting to draw Agnes’s attention. “She has a knife!” she warned in
a whisper.
But Darcy was wild-eyed, desperate to get to Georgiana. Lizzie picked up a length of discarded rope and pulled it taut in
her hands. “Stay back,” she warned. Lizzie crept across the grotto’s stone floor as quietly as she could, and up the steps.
Agnes’s back was to her, and she held Georgiana tightly. Sally saw Lizzie coming, but her face betrayed nothing.
“You act as though you’re so superior, but you’re your mother’s daughter. You concealed a crime for your own advantage. You
protected a killer, and you have the audacity to lecture me? You’re no better than me.”
“At least she’s not a killer herself!” Clara Jeffries shouted, popping out of the brush and hurling a rock in Agnes’s direction.
Agnes jerked back, and Lizzie bit down on her tongue to hold in her gasp—Georgiana!
But Clara’s interjection was enough to startle Agnes, and Sally charged forward, grabbing at the arm that held the knife and wrestling it away from Georgiana’s neck.
Agnes was unbalanced enough that she let go of Georgiana, who dropped to the ground with a strangled cry.
Agnes stumbled back, but she still held the knife, and she slashed it at Sally, the tip catching her forearm.
The other girl hissed in pain, and Lizzie lurched into motion, throwing her length of rope over Agnes’s head and pulling back with all her weight.
The shock of finding herself suddenly choked caused Agnes to swing around wildly with the hand holding the knife. White-hot
pain seared Lizzie’s hip and side, but still she held on. Georgiana managed to get to her feet, and Lizzie was afraid Agnes
would stab her, but then Georgiana smacked the knife out of Agnes’s hand. Now without a weapon, Agnes’s hands flew to her
neck, trying desperately to pull away at the rope. Lizzie held on long enough for Sally and Clara to rush forward and each
grab one of Agnes’s arms. It was no easy feat, wrestling her to the ground. She kicked and flailed desperately, but when she
began to run out of air, she slumped. Lizzie loosened the rope—she wasn’t keen on being the cause of someone’s death, even
a confessed killer. Between the three of them, they used the rope from Darcy’s bindings to tie her hands and feet tightly.
Lizzie finally turned when the job was done to find Darcy, one arm slung around Georgiana’s shoulders, hobbling toward them.
“Lizzie!” Georgiana cried, and Lizzie ran to them. Darcy’s other arm came around her and he held them both close.
“Thank heavens,” Lizzie murmured. “I was so scared she’d kill you both.”
“You’re bleeding,” Darcy gasped. And then: “Where’s Lady Catherine?”
Just then, the sound of Guy barking furiously reached them. Lizzie tore herself away from Darcy, wincing at the cut on her
hip. Her dress was damp with blood, but she didn’t appear to be seriously injured. “Charlotte!” she cried, and began to run
in her direction.
She was aware of Darcy and Georgiana following after her, but she didn’t wait for them. When she broke into the clearing where
the horse had been, she found Guy standing over Charlotte’s prone form, barking.
Lady Catherine and the horse were gone.