Chapter 15 #3
“It is most definitely not because of you, Miss Darcy,” Elizabeth reassured her, standing and taking the girl’s hands in her own.
“It is partly because I cannot stand to see you being made so unhappy. Your brother will not explain himself to me, and is not obliged to do so. However, it is hard for me to watch his conduct in this matter.”
“His conduct?” queried Miss Darcy with apparent mystification. “What can you mean?”
“Has Mr Darcy not forbidden you from any contact with Mr Wickham, due to whatever personal enmity exists between the two of them? It seems to me unlikely that you can understand the reasons any better than I, and yet your brother seems determined to impose his will upon you.”
Georgiana Darcy looked utterly baffled now, as well as distressed.
“In the matter of Mr Wickham, my brother has been nothing but kind and good,” she insisted most seriously. “I cannot have you think otherwise, Miss Bennet, although you cannot possibly know…”
As her speech trailed off, the girl sat down heavily in the chair Elizabeth had vacated and took her head in her hands as though the weight of whatever Elizabeth did not know was too much.
“You know what happened between them, don’t you?” asked Elizabeth, placing a gentle hand on Miss Darcy’s shoulder.
Nodding, Miss Darcy raised her dark head and met Elizabeth’s eyes with a woeful countenance.
“It was my fault,” she said quietly, “although Fitzwilliam will not have it so.”
“How can it have been your fault?” Elizabeth asked. “I am sure your brother is right on that point.”
“Oh, but it was. I believed him, you see, Miss Bennet. When Mr Wickham told me that he loved me more than any woman in the world and wanted to marry me, I believed that it was true and that we would marry and be happy forever.” Miss Darcy made her confession earnestly and with tears in her eyes.
“Mr Wickham proposed marriage to you?” Elizabeth repeated incredulously, half-wondering whether Miss Darcy had imagined or misunderstood what she was relating.
“We were to run away together from Ramsgate last summer and be married in Scotland. Mr Wickham had planned everything while I was staying there with Miss Younge, whom he knew well. She made arrangements for us to fly to Gretna Green. Then Fitzwilliam arrived and found out everything. He sent them both away. After all, they only wanted my dowry. Mr Wickham never loved me at all.”
Miss Darcy’s voice was small and sad as she told this story, and Elizabeth was astounded. More than astounded, she was appalled.
Could this really be the same George Wickham who had charmed Hertfordshire society and his fellow militia officers so roundly?
Had the same man who danced so well, conversed so engagingly and made friends so easily, also callously and dishonourably deceived an innocent young girl in the hope of obtaining her fortune?
Yes, it was the same man. Elizabeth saw it all now, with open eyes.
George Wickham found it all too easy to be charming and pleasing to all, because honesty and truth did not matter to him.
Whatever principles or morals he possessed were weak or flexible enough that he could both pretend to want a career in the church and attempt to seduce a fifteen-year-old child.
Elizabeth cursed her own short-sightedness and naivety in falling for his stories. Of course Mr Darcy had told her nothing of the real reasons for his contempt towards his former playmate. He was an honourable man who had been protecting his sister.
“My dear Miss Darcy, the fault was entirely Mr Wickham’s,” Elizabeth told the girl.
“You were only fifteen and under the influence of older and ill-intended acquaintances. I cannot call them friends after hearing of their offences. How could you have known any better? Thank God your brother arrived when he did.”
“Yes, as soon as I saw Fitzwilliam, it was as though an evil spell had been broken. I told him everything at once, and he put things right again. So, now that you know, you will not think badly of him, will you?”
Elizabeth slowly shook her head.
“Mr Darcy and I may disagree sometimes, Miss Darcy,” she replied, “but no, I do not think badly of your brother. He is a very good man, even if he takes no care that people should know it.”
“Then you will not go?” Georgiana Darcy followed up immediately.
“I will not go, for now,” Elizabeth agreed, taking a paper knife to cut off the portion of the notepaper where she had begun her letter and tossing it into the hearth to be burned with the next fire. “Come, let us go down to the drawing room for tea.”
With a smile, she put her arm through Miss Darcy’s and they descended the stairs together. As they passed Mr Darcy’s study, Elizabeth impulsively stopped and rapped on the door.
“Mr Darcy, we will be taking tea shortly. Would you care to join us?”
He opened his study door with an expression that was surprised but not hostile.
This was the first friendly overture either of them had made to the other since their angry exchange in the library.
As Elizabeth smiled at him, his look softened further into something almost amiable.
Mr Darcy was indeed rather handsome when there were no traces of arrogance or stiffness in his features.
“Yes, I shall,” he answered briefly, to the pleasure of his sister, who reached across to take his hand and draw him with her. “Thank you.”
Foolish man, Elizabeth thought to herself, still smiling as she walked ahead of them both.
With a very few words, he could have made his hostility to George Wickham both reasonable and justified, even some months ago.
Yet his pride had prevented that and roused Elizabeth’s ire against him unnecessarily.
With the knowledge of the scotched elopement, Elizabeth’s promise to keep Mr Wickham at a distance would be supremely easy to keep.
Understanding Mr Darcy better now, it was also easier to forgive his manner of extracting that promise, although he would doubtless still be capable of infuriating her on other grounds soon enough.
Never mind. Elizabeth would deal with that as it came. She had promised Miss Darcy only that she would not leave now.
“Have you a busy afternoon ahead, Mr Darcy?” she asked him with a smile. “If you have time, perhaps we might all take a stroll after tea. We have been too long indoors this week.”