Chapter 6 #3
Was being robbed at gunpoint worse than marrying a near-stranger to save her good name after she tried to save Georgiana’s? One was temporary, the other forever. Hopefully, only one of them held the threat of terror and death.
“I am merely being honest, Miss Bennet. If she marries him, it looks to the world that you and I ran away to Scotland together.”
“You and I will be determined to convince Georgiana to leave him,” she added, smiling and sounding more like herself. “From what you have said since nearly the moment I met you, you would regret a connexion to a family such as mine.”
How ungentlemanly had he been? Was that the sort of man he wanted to be?
One where a woman knew instantly that he disdained her?
“I regret more the complete loss of your reputation when you only came along to protect my sister’s.
” He supposed that was not reassuring. “I regret offending you and speaking against your family.”
“Do you regret your offensive pride as well?” she asked, sounding sincerely curious about the answer.
“My pride?” he repeated, confused.
“I understand your concern with family reputation, of course, but I think it is time to challenge your improper pride, considering Georgiana’s actions.
You might try being civil to people too.
One may quickly get a reputation for being unpleasant, and family reputations feel precarious to me as of late. ”
“I am perfectly civil,” he insisted. It made good sense to be civil to people, after all. One never knew who might marry whom, who might be well-connected, who might be relied on in the future. But one did not consider the feelings and worth of those outside one’s circle.
“Mr Darcy, your manners are not inviting, no matter what words you use. You have a selfish disdain, I think, of the feelings of others. And toward me, although you have also been generous and obliging, you have even been ungentlemanly.”
She said it plainly, without malice, as though observing the weather. He was affronted, and then he slowly realised that she had his measure. If he denied it, he would make a fool of himself.
Had he acted in pride and conceit, been taught to be selfish and overbearing?
The truth of it struck him forcibly. He had just admitted in his own mind that he cared for none beyond his family circle, to think meanly of all the rest of the world.
He gave offence to Elizabeth within a quarter of an hour of meeting her.
How many others had he undeservingly offended?
Darcy endeavoured to be composed as other passengers boarded inside the coach and on its roof. That was not the sort of man he wanted to be. And Elizabeth deserved better from him, even if she had not risked everything to protect his sister.
He would have to attend to her gentle reproof, but he was not ready to talk to her yet.
He did not care for the way he felt around her.
She made him feel flustered and nervous, and he could not explain why.
There was no relief to that now. Her presence mere inches from him was unavoidable.
They had over twelve hours until they arrived in Carlisle on the Scottish border.
Elizabeth felt like she had spent a week in the mail coach. How many changes of the horses had there been? She had long since stopped checking the card with the distance of each stage and the time of arrival at the same.
At some point in the journey, her mind had drifted and emptied.
It was monotonous, but perhaps that was the only way to endure such hard travel as this.
Sleeping for moments at a time in a corner of the coach, grabbing food quickly and scarcely having time to eat it, and sharing a tight space with the sounds and smells of strangers was more exhausting than she imagined.
She could have cried from both relief and fatigue when they arrived in Carlisle, ten miles from the Scottish border.
It was ten thirty on the second night, and in the coaching inn’s lantern light, Elizabeth got a fair look at Darcy.
How did he still look handsome with a two-day beard, rumpled clothes, and disordered hair?
She was not eager to talk with him since their quarrel, but that did not mean she minded looking at him.
Elizabeth refused to look in a mirror before she had changed her clothes, washed her face, brushed her hair, and slept for eight hours. She did not want to know how bad the damage was.
“The toll collector says no one matching their description has crossed into Scotland from here,” Darcy said, coming up to her in a rush. He seemed energised by their arrival despite the late hour and the weariness of the journey.
Still, she managed a smile. Her scheme had worked. “They are hours behind us. They stopped to sleep, after all. We can intercept them here.”
He frowned. “But, as you said, they likely travelled on side roads to avoid me.”
“You are afraid we will miss them if they avoid Carlisle altogether?” she realised. “You want to go on to Gretna Green?”
Her voice must have fallen, and she even sagged against the coaching inn’s wall. Darcy gave her a pained look. “I know you do not want to get into another coach—I am starving, I promise you, but—”
“I will go for Georgiana,” she said with a sigh, and dragged herself to the post-chaise Darcy pointed to.
There was a house with a tollgate beyond the bridge as they crossed the Sark and a moderate incline into Gretna Green. It was a small village with a few houses, the parish kirk, the minister’s house, and a large inn that they arrived at by half past eleven.
She had a sudden realisation that they would have to present themselves together in public. After Darcy tipped the postilion and retrieved their bags, she asked him quietly, “How do we announce ourselves? Brother and sister?”
He instantly knew what she meant. “Perhaps servant and mistress would be better.”
She barked a dry laugh. “No one will believe you are a servant, even as bedraggled as you are.” He still had a commanding presence although travel-worn, and his wrinkled clothes were incredibly fine.
“We can say we are married and take two rooms. Use the name Gardiner, if you do not want to give your own. It is my mother’s maiden name,” she added at his curious look.
Darcy asked the innkeeper for two rooms with a sitting room, and whatever food could be had at this hour. The proprietor agreed with an amused smirk.
“I can find someone to marry you now, you know,” he said. “No need for the pretence.”
Darcy instantly threw him a haughty look and said he was already married and to not disparage his wife’s reputation. Elizabeth hardly cared at this point so long as she had a bed, but she kept her gloves on to hide that she wore no wedding band.
Half an hour later, in a nightshift and dressing gown and having bathed with a towel, a basin, and a bar of soap, she felt, if not better, then at least more like herself.
She looked at her journal, but was in no state of mind to reflect on the exhausting past two days.
The sitting room on the other side of her door was quiet.
Deciding that Darcy must have eaten and then gone to sleep, she opened the door.
To her surprise, Darcy was in his shirtsleeves, staring into the fire. He had changed his clothes and shaved, and his hair was still wet. He started at the sight of her, jumping from the mantel and averting his eyes as he went for his own door with a hasty good evening.
“Have you eaten?” she asked before he could sneak away. From the looks of the table, he had not.
“No, I—I meant to eat before you came in, but I am afraid my mind wandered.”
Two days alone in a coach did not warrant seeing one another in undress, but hunger won out over propriety.
She fell into a chair and gestured to another.
“I may be impulsive and you may be proud, but we must eat before we fall over. Sit down, Mr Darcy,” she insisted when he still looked ready to go into his own room.
He hesitated before conceding and sitting across from her.
“I am not intractable and oblivious, Miss Bennet,” he said after he had filled his plate. When she gave him a questioning look, he added, “I heard your criticisms, and my manners need correcting. But I am not incapable of proper feeling, you know.”
“I did not think you were,” she said. He threw her a sceptical look, and she conceded.
“Not entirely, anyway. No one who went to such lengths to save his sister could be unfeeling.” With a pointed look, she added softly, “No one who would rescue his sister’s reckless friend whom he does not respect could be unfeeling. ”
“It is nothing compared to you. You are the most generous person I know.”
She scoffed and took a long drink before piling more food onto her plate. “I did not act well last night when we argued.”
Darcy put his elbows on the table and leant toward her. “You have acted for the good of others this entire time, and whilst I want to preserve Georgiana from a lifetime of misery, I know I have acted pridefully. I was selfish, while you have been entirely selfless.”
He held her gaze for a long moment before returning to his food. Darcy had a good heart, was an honourable man, in spite of his pride. She would always be grateful he had instantly offered to find Lydia, and he kept her safe on the mail coach.
“Thank you for last evening,” she said, realising she had never told him. “You threw out those awful men and prevented any further offence against my person.”
“Do not thank me for that,” he said. “It should never have happened. Your safety is my responsibility, and I thought too much of my own cares. Besides, anyone with a conscience, a sense of decency, would have intervened.”
She did not correct him. Many would have ignored it, thinking it was not their concern, and plenty of men would have thought an unattended woman deserved what happened to her.
He looked distressed to remember anything about their journey to Gretna Green, and she could not blame him. To show that she bore him no ill will, she teased him. “I see you managed to change your clothes and even shave. What wonders for a rich man with no valet to attend to him.”
He gave her a dark look before he realised she was joking. He must not be used to anyone sporting with him. “My valet is for keeping care of my clothes, for coordinating my luggage, and settling my bills. A man who cannot dress himself does not deserve to leave his house.”
“And you shaved, as well.”
“Well, the shaving stand in my room baffled me for a long while, but I persevered.”
She laughed, and he smiled before asking, “Can we forgive one another for our loss of temper and unkindness of the past two days?” Elizabeth readily agreed, and then Darcy grew pensive. “Tomorrow will be challenging.”
“We will persuade her,” she insisted. “His lies, his tricking Lydia, his past with prostitutes and its repercussions? Who would stay with such a man?”
“I fear a determined but lovesick girl will not be easily swayed,” he said in a small voice. “I thought I knew her, but I never anticipated this. If I haul Georgiana away by force, I risk her running away again to find him. I think she must be persuaded.”
“If their travel was anything like ours, she might not want to marry him anymore,” she said. “Even if they stopped to sleep and ate meals at a table, they surely argued during such stressful travel.”
“And after being in such close quarters for days, jolted together in a carriage and fearful of being caught, her patience for him must have waned.”
Elizabeth grinned. “She might hate him already. You will promise her an easier journey home than the one she took here.”
“She will be glad for your company and consolation on the drive to Pemberley.” He spoke in a tone that sounded as though he wanted to be convinced.
“Certainly. But after we get to your home, I won’t want to get into a carriage again for a long while, so prepare yourself for having a guest until Christmas.”
He still looked serious. “If Georgiana will not leave him…” He exhaled and pierced her with a heavy look. “Both of our good names are lost if we remain single.”
It did not bear thinking about.
Deprived of having a husband of her own choice and forced to commit her chance at domestic happiness, her very person, to a near-stranger?
It was intolerable. This plan only worked if the world thought she and Georgiana left Ramsgate with Darcy to visit her home.
If Georgiana married Wickham, then everyone would know Elizabeth spent days alone overnight with a man.
The only way Elizabeth could show her face in society again was if she returned as Mrs Darcy. Otherwise, she and her sisters’ reputations were forfeit.
“I will marry you if I have to,” he said with all the bravery of a man facing execution.
She felt a small bit of gratitude for his honourable intentions, but no woman wanted to hear a proposal that included the words “if I have to.”
Elizabeth stood from the table, no longer feeling hungry.
“It will not be necessary,” she said. From the look on Darcy’s face, she must have said this firmly.
Perhaps she had shouted it. “I am going to bed. Shall we wait in the innyard? They will appear sometime tomorrow. We must be ready to speak with her before she finds a blacksmith.”
He agreed, and she ran off to her room, where she fell into a deep sleep despite the disquiet filling her heart.