Chapter Four
But two days later, Mr. Bingley came down with a frightful illness and could not get out of bed, because he was so poorly.
With his being so sick, I did not think I should leave right away. We sent for the apothecary, who looked him over and supplied a few tonics but said that primarily we were to simply allow him to rest until the worst of it was over.
“Seems to be going around,” he said. “Mr. James Bennet is down with the exact same thing.”
I supposed that sharing a bed with someone did tend to mean you caught their sickness.
That afternoon, we had a visitor, Miss Elizabeth Bennet, who had walked all the way from Longbourn with a letter from her brother to Mr. Bingley. “I am here to convey his apologies. He is certain that he is the reason why Mr. Bingley has fallen ill.”
She left the letter and her message with me and I delivered it to Bingley, who insisted upon scratching out a very hasty reply and said I must make sure that someone had stopped Miss Bennet from leaving the house before he was finished, so I had to leave his room in search of a servant to prevent her from leaving.
But I couldn’t find any servants, so I ended up at the front door of Netherfield, calling for her to come back, and she turned round and came back over to me.
“Mr. Bingley wishes you to deliver a return note to his brother,” I said.
“Oh, does he.” She looked me up and down. “How do you feel about that?”
“Me?” I touched my chest.
“I know when we spoke that I said that my brother was not the sort to entangle himself wherein he wasn’t wanted, so I suppose I feel a bit of a fool in that respect,” she said.
“James is too ill to explain to me what he is about here, so I do not understand any of it, but I do love my brother, no matter what he does entangle himself in, so I suppose all I shall say is that I would hope that you and Mr. Bingley would both consider his feelings.”
I only stared at her. What was she saying? Why was she saying it?
“You are clearly quite happy for Mr. Bingley to be writing letters to my brother.”
“Why should I not be?” I said.
“And for them to be close enough to catch each other’s illnesses.”
“Well, I suppose that doesn’t make me happy,” I said.
“No, of course, you see, it would not.”
“Yes, for it’s awful for anyone to be ill,” I said.
“But what of their closeness?”
“What do you know of their closeness?” I said.
“Oh, my brother tells me everything,” she said.
“He is my dearest friend and confidante, and I his. So, you needn’t worry.
I am quite trustworthy in that respect, and I shall remain so, even though I am worried about the two of you toying with my brother.
He has never really done anything like this before, not with gentlemen, not with—”
“Wait a moment,” I interrupted. “You think that I—”
But I broke off, because a servant was there, bearing a folded-up letter.
“Ah, there you both are,” said the servant.
“I am bringing this from the master. He wished me to give it to you, sir, Mr. Darcy, to give to Miss Bennet, but I suppose I can put it directly into her hands now, can I not?” He gave her the letter.
“Yes, I shall take this to my brother,” said Elizabeth, shaking her head at me. “I do not understand what game you are playing at here, Mr. Darcy.”
I let out a little noise of dismay. She thought that I was like Mr. Bingley, that I was interested in men in that way.
She must have thought that because I now realized that conversation I’d had with James Bennet had been because he had thought that.
He had thought that Mr. Bingley and I were involved.
Then Bingley had come to speak to me to try to ascertain whether or not I was, in fact, interested in men, and he had concluded I wasn’t, and that was why he’d said all of those strange things to me.
And now, Bingley had either done nothing to disabuse Mr. Bennet of the truth about me, or Mr. Bennet had not disabused his sister, I did not know which. At any rate, I could not tell her that I was not some lilied sodomite in front of the servant, could I?
“Not at all what you think, madam,” was all I said in response to her.
“I hope not,” she said. “I shall take my leave.”
I watched her go, disliking this quite a lot. I did not wish Miss Bennet to think of me in that way. I absolutely did not.
Bingley was better enough within a week to be up and out of bed, and he told me I could be on my way at any point, though I said that he and Bennet were going to have to be careful if they were going to be sharing each other’s colds in that way and he said that I was right, and that it was a bit odd that no one else had come down with the sickness and he did wonder if Mr. Bennet should be coming and going from Netherfield at all hours after we left.
“I had thought it would be fine,” said Bingley. “We could simply claim to be friendly, but now, if you are all gone, I am unsure that it won’t look suspicious. Perhaps I should have a ball.”
“A ball?” I asid.
“Yes, here, at Netherfield,” he said. “And James could help me plan it. He knows everyone in town and all the people who need to be invited, that sort of thing. Of course, if I’m giving a ball, then I shouldn’t send my sisters away. But you could go, I suppose.”
“Well, how am I to go now?” I said. “Too much time has passed since the time we were walking together, and I cannot claim that is when I got news that I needed to go back to town. I suppose I could say that someone came to me just now. I could go on a walk, I mean, and claim it happened.”
“I suppose,” said Bingley.
I went on a ride instead. I ended up riding into town.
On the ride into town, I saw that Miss Bennet was there, walking with Miss Lucas, and I observed her being introduced to Mr. Wickham.
She smiled at him in a way that I did not like.
I did not think that Miss Bennet should be left to the wiles of Mr. Wickham.
If the story I’d heard about her was true, she was being left alone by all the eligible men until she had that inheritance from Lady Susannah, and Mr. Wickham would easily latch onto her and happily wait until she had the money.
Mr. Wickham might hasten Lady Susannah’s death, for all I knew. He was not a man of scruples.
I thought that Miss Bennet ought to know what sort of man he was. Of course, I probably could not give too many specifics if I wished to preserve my sister’s reputation, but I could say enough to give Miss Bennet pause when next she spoke to Mr. Wickham.
I went to possibly speak to her then, but as I advanced upon Mr. Wickham, he looked up and saw me and we simply glared at each other for several moments, whilst I became, by degrees, more and more angry with the man.
I knew then that I would not be able to speak to Miss Bennet with any level of calmness or clarity, so I retreated. Mr. Wickham seemed similarly affected, for he took his leave of Miss Bennet and Miss Lucas and went on his way.
I went back to Netherfield and said I would stay until the ball.
Look, I did not know why I decided to stay, and it certainly couldn’t have been only because I must find some time to speak to Miss Bennet and to clear up the fact that I was not at all attracted to men, only women, and to warn her off Mr. Wickham.
That was a stupid reason to stay. I’m certain I had a better one. Positive of it, in fact.
As to what it was…
Well.
The ball was soon set for a week hence, and I had little to do with myself for that week besides to try to stay clear of Miss Bingley, who was angry with me for not having left for London, as I had declared that I was going to do, and who took every opportunity to ask me why I had decided not to go.
It hardly mattered that she should have remained in any case, for I could not have taken her to London myself.
I could not have traveled with an unmarried woman unchaperoned, and Mrs. Hurst and her husband were staying here for the ball.
Bingley wanted Miss Bingley to stay for the ball, so she must.
And Mr. Bennet occupied Bingley entirely. They were always in each other’s company, claiming they were planning the ball, but likely doing all manner of absolutely appalling things to each other.
I spent too much time contemplating what abominations passed between men and wondering how they could bear it, how it could be anything other than unpleasant and painful.
Finally, the day of the ball came, however, and I claimed Miss Bennet’s first two dances.
It wasn’t easy, because she was clearly shocked. “Both of them, sir?”
“Well, we have things to speak of,” I said. “It may take longer than one dance.”
“Yes, but everybody is going to think that you have some sort of attachment to me, and you and I both know that you do not attach to people like me in that way.”
“Well, that is one of the areas in which you are mistaken,” I said. “Come now, will you dance or not?” I knew she had little choice. She could agree to dance with me or deny that she wished to dance at all.
But she seemed to hesitate for a very long time, as if she was considering doing exactly that.
“Fine,” she said. “My first two dances are yours.” She sounded incredibly dejected.
But as we took to the dance floor together, I began to wonder if this really was the venue for this conversation, for there were a number of delicate elements to it that I did not wish for others to overhear.
And, of course, the dance itself required us to change partners and move up and down the row of dancers from time to time, so there were all sorts of breaks in the conversation we were going to have to have, and I realized I may have made quite an error.
I spent the first five or six minutes saying nothing at all.
She was exasperated. “Mr. Darcy, you indicated you wished to speak to me about something, but you say nothing.”
“Yes, well, I am trying to think of how to put it,” I said to her.