Chapter Five
Once I was back in London, I decided to put Mr. Bingley entirely from my mind and not to spend any more of my time in his company.
His secret I would keep as I had made a promise that I would do so, and since I did not wish him harm, nor wish harm to those associated with him.
But I did not wish to be associated with him.
I wanted to put the whole of the time in the country that autumn behind me, and to never think on it again.
In this, I was almost entirely successful.
There was only one point in which I failed.
I kept thinking about Miss Elizabeth Bennet.
It had to be only because she was pretty, I supposed, because I did not know her well.
I hadn’t much occasion to converse with her.
I knew that she seemed loyal to her brother and that she was determined not to get married and that she went and read books to an old lady.
It wasn’t an entire picture of a person.
Perhaps that was why I still thought of her. I had no notion of who she was. Perhaps if I had gotten to know her, I wouldn’t have been plagued with such thoughts of her, but I was.
They came unbidden at all manner of times. I would be having tea with my aunt the Countess of Matlock and think, I wonder how Elizabeth Bennet would fit into this room? I would be at a ball in town and think a thought much the same.
But the absolute most dreadful of these thoughts were the ones that came to me at night, when I was alone in my bed.
For, of course, Miss Bennet would not fit into the room at all there, and I was not in a position to know anything about her in that manner. She was not the sort of woman I could marry, and I must put aside all of those sorts of thoughts.
It is an odd thing about unwanted thoughts, however. It seems that the more one scolds oneself and bids such thoughts not to come, the less that they listen.
I spent too much time engaged in trying to understand the pattern: why was I having thoughts about Elizabeth Bennet and what had caused it to happen? If I could determine this, perhaps I could put an end to the whole business.
In this, I had very little luck, however.
I thought that perhaps the business with Bingley, finding out all about his secret, had put me quite out of sorts, and this was why I had latched onto her.
Perhaps I had felt a deep and burning desire to prove to myself that I was, in fact, attracted to women, and so I had become utterly attracted to her.
But this didn’t make any sense, for there had never been any worrying on my own part that I would be attracted to Bingley. I could be quite assured that I did not function in that way.
I briefly considered the idea that perhaps I was really just that attracted to Elizabeth Bennet, but I discarded it. I could not be. What was there about her to attract me?
I wondered if it was because I had insulted her. Perhaps I was trying desperately to make up for that, and this was the result?
But the more that I pondered this, the more the unbidden thoughts came. I thought of her now nearly constantly. It was driving me mad.
Several months had passed away by now, and I had spent them in London in the company of friends and family.
My sister Georgiana was doing much better after the incident with Mr. Wickham in the summer, and she seemed ready for her debut into society, but she had indicated she would rather it be pushed back a year, and I had not objected.
She and I saw each other often, and I was certain that very little lasting damage had been wrought upon her by Mr. Wickham, since I had caught the entire business in time.
Finally, restless, I accepted an invitation to see my aunt Lady Catherine de Bourgh in the country in Kent in late March. I would only go if my cousin Colonel Fitzwilliam accompanied me, though, for my aunt could be quite a lot to handle.
My aunt believed that I was going to marry her daughter, my cousin Anne, but there were no binding obligations to this effect, no betrothals written up, and I had determined quite some time ago that I had no interest in it.
I had spoken to Anne about it, and she had been in agreement, saying that she had no interest in me in that way, and that there was…
Well, it was peculiar, wasn’t it?
When I had spoken to Anne, she had said that she would be an heiress in her own right and she would be the owner of Rosings and that she did not see why she needed to get married at all.
It was odd, because it was almost exactly what Elizabeth Bennet had said.
But since I’d had a great deal of time to think that all through, I knew it did not make sense, because if there was no one to pass the inheritance down to, then it died with you.
These women needed to get married and have children!
If I saw Elizabeth Bennet again, that was what I would tell her.
Of course, there was no reason that I would see her again, however.
The trip to my aunt’s house was dreary. She had taken up with the young parson who lived in the rectory near the grounds of her house, and she had made him into a sort of pet.
He spent all his time singing her praises and she spent all her time telling him whatever it was she wished him to say, and he parroted it back faithfully.
Towards the end of the visit, she said that she thought that Mr. Collins—that was his name—should think about taking a wife, and I thought that I pitied the poor woman, who would obviously come second in his affections to Lady Catherine.
Eventually, in mid-April, my cousin and I quit Rosings and rode back to London together.
“Do you ever think about women?” I said to him.
He laughed from the other side of the carriage at me. “Darcy, what sort of a question is that? Obviously, I think about women.”
“You are correct, it was poorly thought out,” I said. “Do you ever think about a certain woman.”
“You mean, a woman I am in love with?”
“No, this woman you cannot be in love with. You barely know anything about her, and she has nothing to recommend her except she is exceedingly pretty.”
“Are you asking if it is enough for me to fall in love with a woman because she is pretty? Because I think you know the answer to that. I am frightfully shallow.”
My cousin the colonel was not actually shallow, but I knew that he was likely a bit less serious than I was.
He could afford to be. He was a second son, without responsibilities on his head as I had as the heir to Pemberley.
On the other hand, I suppose, he’d had to join the army and it was the middle of a war, so perhaps that did make things serious for him, risking his life and all of that.
He was still talking. “At any rate, I have discerned that we are not actually speaking of me, that we are speaking of you. Who is this woman that haunts your thoughts, Darcy?”
I sighed. “Well, I told you that I went to the country with Mr. Bingley to see the house he was renting.”
“You met this woman in the country. I see.”
“She is not an appropriate match for me,” I said.
“Ah,” said the colonel. “Too well connected to be a mistress, not well connected enough to be a wife.”
“I do not take mistresses,” I said, sitting up straight. “You well know this of me.”
“I do not take mistresses either,” he said, grinning across the carriage. “But this is primarily because I cannot afford them.” He chortled.
“I do not wish to speak about her in that fashion. Please, get your mind out of the muck, Richard.”
He only laughed more. “So, you think of her. What do you think about when you think of her?”
I felt heat rush to my face.
His laughter echoed against the insides of the carriage.
“I do not understand why I am so obsessed with this woman,” I muttered. “It makes no sense.”
“Well, this has been going on since, what? December?” he said. “That is when you came back to London?”
“About that,” I said.
“I do not think it is going to go away on its own, then, Darcy,” he said. “You’re going to have to do something about it.”
“What do I do?”
“As I see it, there are two courses of action,” he said.
“One is to go and see the object of your obsession, which could—of course—have the effect of making you even more obsessed, but often, when you see the person, you see that you have painted them incorrectly in your mind and that they are not worthy of obsession.”
“Go and see her,” I said softly. “Hmm.”
“The other idea is to move on, Darcy,” he said. “Go meet other women, fall in love with someone else, drive her from your mind. Go and seek out strumpets and—”
“You know I don’t visit strumpets.”
“Yes, I suppose,” he sighed. “Your propriety borders on priggishness sometimes, however, Darcy.”
I supposed I could be considered righteous, and not always in a way in which it endeared me to others.
“You’re going to go back to the country to see her, I suppose,” said the colonel.
“I think so,” I said. “I am only considering how to bring it about. I suppose I can write to Bingley and see if he will allow me to stay there, but I do not wish to reside under the same roof as Bingley if I can help it, I find.”
“Why not?”
I was not going to share Bingley’s secret with him, so I ought not have said anything in the first place. “Oh, it is nothing. It is only that Bingley and I do not get on very well in close quarters.”
“I see,” he said. “Well, there is that house that we have in Redbourn, you know? That’s not so very far away, is it?”
“It’s quite close,” I said. “Do you think your family would mind if I stayed there?”
“I cannot see why they would,” he said. “After all, there is no one staying in it now. I shall speak to my mother about it and let you know what she says. And I have a bit more time left on my leave, so if she agrees, I shall accompany you.”
I shook my head. “Oh, you don’t have to do that.”
“I know I do not have to, but I find I am ever so curious about this girl of yours. You have not even told me her name or anything about her except that she’s pretty.”
“Well, I do not know anything about her,” I said.
“You know her name.”