Chapter Five #2
“Elizabeth Bennet,” I said. “She has a nice singing voice. Her parents seem to hate each other. Her mother has an even nicer singing voice and she is sort of, well… there is a reason that Miss Bennet is beautiful. She inherited it.”
“Her mother is pretty?”
“For a woman much older than me, yes,” I said. “She has an elder brother. She goes and reads books to a woman named Lady Susannah who is apparently leaving everything to her.”
“To Miss Bennet or to her mother?”
“Miss Bennet, obviously,” I said. “And because of this inheritance, apparently, she does not wish to get married. Ever. At all.”
“Oh, this is why, here it all is,” said the colonel. “She’s a challenge. You wish to get the pretty girl who is dead set against marriage to marry you.”
“I do not actually wish to get married any time soon,” I said. “No, I wish to go to the country and see her and lose this obsession with her by seeing she is nothing to obsess over, as you say.”
“Understood,” said the colonel. “I shall do my very best to make sure that happens.”
Within a week, my cousin and I were settled together in the house in Redbourn, which was not far at all from Meryton, and quite close to Longbourn.
My cousin, whose first name was Richard, was of the opinion that we must simply go to the Bennet household and call.
“There can be no other course of action,” he said.
“You have been introduced to the family, so you may do so, and you can bring me along and introduce me. Then, I shall be able to ascertain what I can about the family itself, the parents who dislike each other, the brother, the singing voices, the beauty, all of it. It is what we must do.”
“We cannot do anything like that,” I said. “We cannot call upon them. I won’t hear of it.”
So, we went to Meryton.
There, we saw members of the regiment, and my cousin saw that Mr. Wickham was there, and he was astonished that I should leave this bit of information out of my narrative.
“Well,” I said, “I suppose that I did stop worrying too much about it when she said that she was against all marriage in general.” Richard and I were standing on the street in Meryton, tying our horses up.
Wickham himself was across the way, far enough off that he had not spotted us.
He was in the company of other officers in the regiment, and they were with a chattering group of young women in their bonnets and gloves.
“I had thought, you see, that she might be taken in by him.”
“Taken in?” cut in Richard. “By Wickham? Has Miss Bennet been associating with Mr. Wickham?”
“Well, yes, I saw them together,” I said. “And she indicated to me that he had told her something about me, something she thought was dreadful, but then I never did find out what.”
“You left this out?” said my cousin, glaring at me.
“Well, it hardly seemed important. She was not going to marry anyone. I had thought she might be taken in by Wickham’s false charm before I knew that.
The rumor I had heard was that she must not marry in order to receive her inheritance, but that everybody was simply waiting about until after Lady Susannah died to make love to Miss Bennet, who would then be quite well off, after inheriting everything that Lady Susannah has. ”
“And what does she have?”
“Well, I don’t rightly know,” I said. “I have driven past the house a few times. It is a stately sort of place, but mostly obscured by trees, so I have not seen it clearly. I understand that Lady Susannah was the daughter of a baron, and that she inherited this from him.”
“Perhaps it was some kind of summer home and he left it to her upon his death?”
“Something like that, yes,” I said.
“And why does she not leave it to someone in her own family?”
“Well, I don’t know,” I said.
“Have you been introduced to Lady Susannah?”
“I saw her,” I said. “But no, I did not speak to her.”
“Well, she is the head of her own household, I suppose, so we can simply alight on her doorstep and introduce ourselves,” said Richard.
“I do not think we can do that,” I said.
“Well, I think we have to. If it were well known that we were new in the neighborhood, the polite thing would be for a male resident to come and present himself to the male resident, yes? But we could hardly expect Lady Susannah, a woman, and elderly woman at that, to be gallivanting about welcoming people. So, it falls to us, then, to go to her.”
I thought this through. “Perhaps,” I said. “But why are we going to see her at all?”
“You say that Miss Bennet is her companion, so it may be likely that she will be there,” said the colonel. “And anyway, this Lady Susannah sounds like the most interesting person here. Furthermore, you are rather a dolt when it comes to Mr. Wickham, I must say.”
“Am I?” I did not like hearing that.
“You’re too soft on him,” said Richard. “He is not your family.”
“I well know that,” I said, offended. I was looking at Wickham across the way now.
“He is not your family and you do not owe him any courtesy. He has attempted to take advantage of you in the grossest of ways, and you know this. You could have killed him for what he did and no one would have faulted you. The fact that you simply let him go, let him wreak havoc where he will, it is a mark against you.”
“You think I should have killed him?” I was astonished. I knew that my cousin had been off to war, but I had not expected it to make him so bloodthirsty.
“Have you ever killed anyone, Darcy?”
“Certainly not,” I said.
“Well, this is why you should simply allow me to kill him.”
“What? Now?”
“Well, not on the street like this, no. I would do it more stealthily, easily, quietly, and I would get rid of whatever remained. I would not give him a confrontation or any last words or any of that. Some men are worms and there is nothing to be done with them except crush them under one’s heel.”
I furrowed my brow. “He did not touch Georgiana.”
“So she says,” said the colonel. “And yet, she is reticent to come out in society. We truly do not know what he did.”
I squared my shoulders.
“Furthermore,” said the colonel, “I seriously doubt that Miss Bennet is not going to marry anyone at all, ever. I think she simply doesn’t wish to marry you, and it is likely because Wickham has told her some dreadful stories about you, and you have simply allowed this to go on.
Why, she could be, even now, already engaged to be married to that man. ”
I swallowed. “That cannot be.”
Someone called my name.
I turned around, and there was James Bennet, coming down the street, leading his horse. He waved at me. “It is you. I had thought you were back in London, but here you are.”
“Here I am,” I said. I nodded at the colonel. “This is my cousin, Colonel Richard Fitzwilliam. Colonel Fitzwilliam, may I present Mr. James Bennet.”
“Oh, so this is Mr. Bennet,” said Richard.
“You’ve been talking about me?” said Mr. Bennet, looking a bit concerned.
“Not really about you,” I said. “It has been more about your sister, actually.” I did not wish him to worry that I was spilling his secrets, after all.
“Oh,” said Mr. Bennet, rather surprised by that. “I did not think you thought much of my sister.”
I cleared my throat.
“My cousin is not skilled at conversation or at knowing what to reveal and what not to reveal,” said Richard, glaring at me. “I hesitate to understand how it is he functions in society when I am not present.”
“I do not need you to function, Richard,” I muttered.
“At any rate,” said the colonel to Mr. Bennet, “it is good to make your acquaintance, sir, and I assure you everything I have heard about you has been quite positive.”
Mr. Bennet regarded both of us with a wary gaze. He opened his mouth to say something and then stopped, letting out a breath of annoyance. “Oh, it’s Wickham,” he muttered.
We all turned to see that Mr. Wickham was coming across the street.
All of us stiffened, and I was appalled, truly horrified, that he would have the gall to approach both myself and my cousin.
“Well, now, this is a surprise,” said Mr. Wickham.
“It’s Mr. Darcy and Colonel Fitzwilliam on the streets of Meryton of all places.
I cannot expect the purpose of your visit is anything to do with me, can I?
Surely, you have some other business here.
Surely, I am too insignificant to be of any notice to men like yourselves. ”
Oh, so the wretch was worried about his own skin, then. He was frightened of the colonel, was he not? Me, no, I posed no risk to him, but the colonel gave him pause. A sour feeling rose in the pit of my stomach.
“Our business here is our own,” said the colonel in a very clipped voice. “I shall thank you to mind yours.”
“Well, I see,” said Mr. Wickham, “it is as difficult as ever for the colonel to have anything even resembling courtesy. Well, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.
Never fear, since you find my company so repugnant, I shall remove myself from your presence.
” He tipped his hat to Mr. Bennet. “Mr. Bennet, always a pleasure. Pray excuse me.”
“Mr. Wickham,” said Mr. Bennet, furrowing his brow.
Mr. Wickham walked back across the street, shaking his head.
Mr. Bennet spoke, “He is not the least bit complimentary about you, Mr. Darcy, but I have heard almost all of it secondhand, through my sister. Wickham keeps his womanish gossip amongst the women, you see.”
I turned to him. “But you do not seem to have the same good opinion of him as your sister does?”
Mr. Bennet shrugged. “I don’t know. Perhaps I should not share with you anything at all. I have a feeling you know more of my private business than I should like you to know.”
“What private business?” said the colonel.
Mr. Bennet looked me over. “If you will excuse me.”
“Certainly, Mr. Bennet,” I said, shaking my head.
He paused. “Where are you staying? You are not at Netherfield, of course.”
I told him and he nodded. He knew the house, and had not realized it was owned by the Matlock family. He took his leave of us and went off.
“That man is odd,” said Richard. “What private business, Darcy?”
“I would be breaking a vow I made to give that information to you,” I said.
“But I must say, he brings it on himself, the way he speaks. He has little notion how to keep a secret. That man is too trusting, too naive. He could stand someone looking after him. I shall have to speak to Bingley about it, I think.”
“I am ever so confused,” said Richard. “I shall start guessing, shall I? If I am right, you will only need to blink twice. This way you will not have broken your vow.”
“Richard,” I said, shaking my head at him.
“Oh, Darcy, your propriety borders on priggishness, have I told you this before?”
“No,” I said sarcastically. “Never.”