Chapter 10
Cold shivers of fear descended on Darcy as the truth emerged in excruciating plainness. Bingley struggled to discern what had happened in the brief months since his wedding, questioning and countering and insisting upon things in such a way Darcy could not have imagined.
“You have it plain, Bingley,” he said at last, too exhausted to be frustrated. “I presumed to think my wife unfaithful on the testimony of some false gossip. That gossip was substantiated by some prank of your sister, and Elizabeth has gone to Yorkshire. Where I shall go now too.”
Darcy announced the last abruptly, rising from his chair and stumbling immediately towards the door. Grief, fear, and sleeplessness combined to form a sort of stupor over him. “Yorkshire,” he added.
“I shall accompany you,” Fitzwilliam told him.
Darcy shook his head. “No. Going to ride fast.”
“You cannot ride,” Saye protested. “You will kill yourself and your horse for that distance.”
Darcy chuckled darkly. “Would that not be ironic justice?”
“Darcy, go get some sleep,” Fitzwilliam urged. “We shall go at first light tomorrow. She is not going anywhere, and you will be better prepared to manage this…this…”
“Jumble? Catastrophe? Disaster?”
“You need rest to be able to think clearly,” said Fitzwilliam. “Retrieving her will be the least of your concerns—you will need to find a good way to make it up to her.”
The two gentlemen left for Yorkshire the next morning, just as the first light of dawn began to seep over the horizon.
Darcy cursed the tedium of the travel, wishing he could hasten the days and be by Elizabeth’s side immediately.
But the horses, fine as they were, seemed to crawl towards their destination.
“What are your thoughts, Darcy?”
“The enormity of my error,” Darcy replied glumly. “And fears as to what this will mean for my marriage.”
“You should have bought her a present,” Fitzwilliam suggested. “Perhaps we should stop—”
“Present?” Darcy chuckled darkly. “I would have brought ten presents if I thought baubles and fripperies could have any meaning whatsoever to her. She is not that sort…I—”
A choking sob threatened to humiliate him, and he paused a moment. He ran a hand over his face, collecting himself.
“I am a fool.” Darcy pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes, which burnt with exhaustion.
“All I could think of was how quickly we married, and how little we really knew each other. It seemed…not surprising…when I was told she wished to have me only for my wealth. I could easily imagine George Wickham constructing such a scheme, and I could not bear to ask her and hear her tell me it was true, that she loved that scoundrel and not me.”
“And so it was not,” Fitzwilliam assured him in kindly tones, far more kind than was deserved. “She does love you and, let us hope, sufficient enough to forgive you.”
Fitzwilliam had the foresight to send an express to the housekeeper of Gunnersdale, but nevertheless, she was not on hand when they arrived. No one was. It was a rather foreboding place, and Darcy shot his cousin a look. Fitzwilliam understood him immediately.
“It is a grouse moor, Darcy. I never promised Chatsworth. And I thought you intended to accompany her.”
“Add this to my list of failures,” said Darcy glumly. “Smelly, hideous place, no doubt she thought it an unjust punishment.”
With no one to answer the door, eventually they admitted themselves. “Hallo there?” Fitzwilliam called out while Darcy called for his wife. There was no reply to either of them.
They made a quick tour of the sitting areas.
Elizabeth was not in any of the common rooms, nor was she in the park closest to the house.
Darcy supposed she might have either gone on a walk or was as yet unequal to seeing him.
Of course, they had arrived a bit earlier than expected, and a walk was the most likely explanation—or so he hoped.
A quick tour of the grounds nearest the house yielded no clues. A queer sort of frantic feeling had entered into his gut as Darcy stood looking over the vast, inhospitable land. Where was his wife? Where was anyone?
Fitzwilliam seemed to hear his thoughts. “I have not the least notion what came of the housekeeper, but there is a little village to the west. Let us ask around there.”
To call Muker a village was generous; it was something more on the order of a miners’ encampment.
However, it did yield up a Mrs Nelson who was meant to have charge of the house.
Mrs Nelson was quick to aver that she had faithfully attended Mrs Darcy daily…
except perhaps for the last day or so? Mayhap a week since she had seen her?
“She wanted for very little,” Mrs Nelson insisted. “Hardly wished me to be hovering about her all the while.”
“Mrs Nelson, my wife is gone!” Darcy roared causing Mr Nelson, who had just entered the small cottage, to step towards the men.
“‘Scuse me, good sirs, but what’re ye hollerin’ at me missus fer?”
Darcy stepped back while Fitzwilliam took command of the situation. Terror had begun a fierce staccato in his breast, and he wanted to scream and shout and run madly about the countryside. Where was Elizabeth?
“It weren’t too long but we knew what all this was about,” Mr Nelson was saying to Fitzwilliam, rather sternly.
“Only one sort of thing where the mister sends his lady off by herself and that be a fallen woman. Mrs Nelson is a decent church-going lady, and she did her duty, but we has our own reputations too. We dint wanna be too friendly.”
“I beg your pardon,” said Darcy icily, turning around with a glare that should have smote the man where he stood.
But then he realised he could not. After all, he had believed it of her.
Why should not this man—a miner by the looks of him—think the same?
No doubt the entire neighbourhood would turn against her on just such a prejudice.
With her husband at her side, Mrs Nelson gained courage sufficient to be truthful, telling Fitzwilliam, “Begging your pardon, sir, but Mrs Darcy was often…well, more than a little upset. She ate barely nothing I cooked, and the bed was just as oft made as not. Then one day I realised it had been some days since I saw or heard from her and thought I had best attend her. When I went to her rooms, I saw she was not there.”
Darcy began to pace, “It is very likely she had an accident while out walking. Was a search mounted?”
“No, sir.”
“Why not?” Darcy demanded.
Mrs Nelson clasped her hands together to stop their trembling and looked up defiantly. “Because, sir, it appears she took her things.”
“Took her things? Impossible,” Darcy growled. And while he might have wished to say more, Fitzwilliam did not permit it, taking his arm and telling the two Nelsons that they would look into the matter back at Gunnersdale.
Darcy strode to the bedchamber immediately when they returned to the house, intent on showing Fitzwilliam, the Nelsons, and any others who might concern themselves that Elizabeth had not left the house and her belongings were indeed in place. His cousin followed him, going directly to the armoire.
“First permit me…” Darcy’s voice died as he realised that nearly everything was gone.
He knew not precisely what she had brought with her, but of stockings, petticoats, corsets, and chemises, there were none.
One gown remained in its place, a gown that had been a particular favourite of his.
He wondered whether its abandonment was deliberate.
Her trunks were stowed in a corner of the dressing room, and the two gentlemen knelt next to them. The largest contained little more than a few house slippers, and Darcy reached in and pulled out a pair of half-boots.
Fitzwilliam observed, “Shoes require a good deal of space. It is likely she took only the pair she wore. A sturdier boot perhaps?”
“She had a different pair in Derbyshire, more suited for winter conditions or rockier terrain,” Darcy said in a pensive tone. “She could not have walked to Richmond to get the stage. It is above 20 miles!”
“Sixteen, exactly,” said Fitzwilliam. “I have walked that and a bit more in a day.”
“You are a soldier. Elizabeth is a lady.”
“A lady who often walks miles each day. Even the cold of Derbyshire did not stop her, correct?”
Darcy could not reply.
Fitzwilliam continued, “When I train new recruits, the first thing done is to strap a pack on their backs and hike a long distance—ten or fifteen miles or so. They survive.”
“Men. Not ladies.”
“The legs work the same. I would daresay, when motivated, a lady might accomplish what she needed to.”
Darcy ran a hand over the small boot, then closed his eyes for a moment, unwilling to cede to the truth—not yet.
Rather, Darcy responded to his fear in the way that was most familiar to him, that being to leap into action.
They returned to the Nelsons’ cottage and soon gathered a search party comprised of Mr Nelson’s friends, and a survey of the grounds was begun but with little expectation of a good result.
It proved most fortunate that Colonel Fitzwilliam had accompanied him to Yorkshire, for if left to his own devices, Darcy might have proposed to walk every inch of the estate himself, seeking clues as to the location of his wife.
The two gentlemen spoke to the local magistrate regarding Mrs Darcy, and he asked at the nearest post coach stops about any women of her description.
Alas, there was no information forthcoming, and Darcy was reduced to spending hours on horseback, riding around the estate shouting Elizabeth’s name.
After over a week of doing all they could to gain some clue as to Elizabeth’s whereabouts, Fitzwilliam made a discovery—a letter behind the table in the bedchamber where Elizabeth had slept.