Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
Darcy did not wait for the house to stir before he rose the following morning.
Sleep had come to him only in fragments, interrupted at irregular intervals by thoughts that refused to settle into any kind of rest. Each time he closed his eyes, he found himself returned to the same moment—the same strained look in Elizabeth Bennet’s countenance, the same sharp insistence in her voice as she rejected what she believed his regard to be.
The words she had spoken had not been excessive, nor had they been unmeasured, but they had carried a conviction that left no room for easy dismissal.
I do not want your pity.
The accusation lingered with uncomfortable directness.
He had not intended to give her cause to think it.
Indeed, the very notion ran counter to everything he felt.
Yet intention, he had learned, was not always sufficient to prevent misinterpretation.
He had spoken of her endurance, her strength, her ability to meet circumstance without surrender, believing that in doing so he acknowledged what was most worthy in her.
Instead, he had revealed precisely the ground upon which her defenses were built.
He had not offended her by cruelty. He had offended her by misunderstanding.
Darcy stood for some moments beside the window of his chamber, the faint gray of morning stretching across the lawns below.
The rain had passed in the night, leaving the world washed and still, the air holding that particular freshness that followed a storm.
The sky remained overcast, though there was light enough to mark the shape of the day.
He did not hesitate long.
There are moments, he thought, when hesitation becomes its own form of failure. To leave matters as they stood—to allow her to continue in the belief that his regard was founded upon pity—would be to confirm the very thing he most wished to refute.
He prepared himself meticulously yet without undue haste, foregoing the assistance of his valet, and departed his residence prior to the full commencement of the household staff's morning duties.
The corridors were still, the quiet of the early hour unbroken by movement or conversation.
When he stepped outside, the cool air met him at once, and he drew it in deeply, welcoming its clarity.
The path toward Longbourn had become familiar in recent weeks, though he had seldom walked it alone.
The fields stretched before him, softened by the rain, though not so much as to hinder his progress.
Each step carried him further from the ordered comfort of Netherfield and nearer to something far less certain.
He did not question where he was going. Not truly.
There was a place she favored and had spoken of in passing. A rise of ground not far from Longbourn, marked by a low stone wall and open enough to catch the fullest measure of the morning light when it appeared.
Oakham Mount. It was a reasonable supposition. It proved a correct one. She stood near the crest, just beyond the low stone wall, her figure turned toward the pale brightness that filtered through the clouded sky.
Darcy slowed as he approached, not wishing to startle her, though something in her stillness suggested she was already aware of her surroundings in a way that required no abrupt movement to disturb.
For a moment, he did not speak.
He allowed himself the brief indulgence of observing her as she stood, the light falling unevenly across her features, softening the contrast he had once found difficult to reconcile and now scarcely noticed as anything other than part of her.
There was a sort of composure in her posture, though it did not possess the ease he had seen in her on other mornings.
One of her hands rested lightly at her side.
The other held a handkerchief, the fabric drawn slightly taut between her fingers.
She had not come merely to enjoy the air, that much was evident.
Darcy stepped forward. “Miss Bennet.”
She turned then, not abruptly, but with the measured awareness he had come to recognize. Her head inclined just enough to bring him into clearer view, her expression composed, though not entirely at ease.
“Mr. Darcy.” Her voice held its usual steadiness, though he thought he detected something beneath it—something guarded, not unkind, but cautious.
He inclined his head in return, then moved closer, coming to rest beside the low stone wall. After a moment’s hesitation, he seated himself upon it, leaving a small space between them, sufficient for propriety, though not so much as to suggest distance.
The stone retained a faint chill from the night, though it would warm quickly once the sun broke through.
Neither spoke at once.
The silence that settled between them was not empty. It carried the weight of the previous day, of words spoken in haste and those left unsaid, of an understanding that had faltered at the very moment it might have begun to form.
Darcy drew a breath. “I was wrong.”
Elizabeth’s fingers tightened slightly upon the handkerchief. “In what respect?” she asked.
“In believing that I had made myself understood.”
She turned her face a fraction more toward him. “You were understood,” she said. “I simply did not accept what you meant to convey.”
“That is precisely my point.”
She gave no answer.
Darcy leaned forward slightly, resting his hands loosely upon his knees, his gaze dropping for a moment before returning to her.
“You believe that I pity you.” It was not a question.
Elizabeth’s expression shifted, though only slightly. “I believe,” she said, “that you admire what you think I have endured.”
“And you equate that with pity.”
“I have seen no reason to distinguish between them.”
Darcy studied her for a long moment. “I must ask your patience,” he said at last, “for what I am about to say may not, at first, appear to answer your concern. But I believe it necessary.”
She inclined her head. “Very well.”
He did not speak immediately. The matter he meant to relate was not one he had shared lightly in the past, nor without cause. Yet something in her manner, in the insistence of her need to understand, compelled him forward.
“There was a gentleman,” he began, “who was raised in my father’s household. George Wickham.”
He saw the faint narrowing of her attention at the unfamiliar name.
“His father had long been in my father’s employ,” Darcy continued, “and from an early age, Wickham was treated with a degree of kindness that extended well beyond obligation. He was educated alongside me. We were companions in every sense that circumstance allowed.”
Elizabeth listened without interruption, her gaze fixed steadily in his direction.
“I considered him my friend,” Darcy said. “More than that. There was a time when I believed him as dear to me as a brother might have been.”
He paused, the memory not painful exactly, but not without weight.
“My father held him in high regard. He intended to provide for him, to secure his future in a manner that reflected that regard. There was, in his plans, a living—one that would have afforded Wickham a respectable and comfortable position.”
Elizabeth’s fingers eased their hold upon the handkerchief.
“What became of it?” she asked.
Darcy’s expression did not change. “Wickham chose to sell it.”
She drew a breath. “Why?”
“Because it did not satisfy him.” Darcy turned his gaze briefly toward the horizon before continuing.
“During our schooling, his character altered. What I had once considered charm revealed itself, over time, to be something less reliable. He became… inclined toward excess. Disinclined toward discipline. I did not, at the time, believe it significant. Youth allows for a certain latitude.”
“And later?”
“Later,” Darcy said, “it became clear that I had been mistaken in that as well.” He returned his gaze to her.
“After my father’s death, Wickham expressed his dissatisfaction with what had been left to him.
He believed he had been promised more. That he had been treated unjustly in not being regarded as a second son. ”
Elizabeth’s expression tightened slightly. “That seems… presumptuous.”
“It was,” Darcy replied. “And yet I did not immediately see it so. I believed his resentment to be temporary. That time and reason would correct it.” He shook his head faintly. “It did not.”
“What happened?” she asked.
“He chose to take the money offered in place of the living and departed for the Americas,” Darcy said. “I have neither seen nor heard from him since.”
The quiet between them shifted.
Elizabeth considered this. “And you tell me this,” she said slowly, “because…?”
“Because I once believed myself an excellent judge of character,” Darcy said.
“I trusted my own interpretations without question. Wickham proved me entirely wrong.” He leaned forward slightly.
“I misjudged him completely. I trusted where I ought to have been cautious. I believed where I ought to have questioned.”
Elizabeth’s gaze remained upon him. “And now?”
“Now,” Darcy said, “I do not speak without having first examined my own motives.”
The meaning settled between them.
Elizabeth did not immediately respond. “You think you have not misjudged me, then?” she asked at last.
“I know that I have not misjudged what I feel,” he said.
Her breath caught. It was slight, but he heard it.
“I do not pity you,” he continued. “I could not, even if I wished to.”
She did not look away.
“How can I pity someone who has shaped her life with such determination?” he asked. “Who has taken what might have diminished her and made of it something that commands respect?”
Her grip upon the handkerchief loosened entirely.
“I do not see you as diminished,” he said. “I see you as… formidable.” The word seemed to settle more deeply than the others.
Elizabeth turned her face slightly away, though not in rejection. “That is not how the world sees me.”