Chapter Twenty-Eight
Netherfield Park
Georgiana was pale when she stepped back from the door to admit her brother and her cousin into her room. When the Colonel opened his arms to her, she did not run into them as she normally would; instead, she shook her head and said, “I do not deserve your affection, Cousin Richard.”
“You have it nonetheless, poppet,” he said, and he took her gently in his arms and held her close. She began to sniffle, and he said, gently, “It is all right, Georgiana. Go ahead and cry.”
She did; but Mr. Darcy did not hear the heartbroken sobs that he had heard at Pemberley. Instead, these were tears of – relief? Yes, perhaps. She is healing, he thought. At least a bit.
She stopped soon enough, and the Colonel asked if they might not all sit down.
He sat beside her, holding her hand, and said, quietly, “Georgiana, I have come all the way from the continent in order to sit with you, hold your hand, assure you that I love you, and ask you to tell me what happened at Ramsgate.”
Mr. Darcy marveled at his cousin. Richard was a military man through and through; he was as accustomed to hardship and violence as Darcy was to excellent meals and fine wines. Yet Richard was as gentle with his wayward ward as if she were a baby lamb.
Georgiana relaxed visibly. Finally – finally!
– she began to tell the story of how she had met George Wickham while walking at Ramsgate, and how Mrs. Younge had encouraged the rekindling of their friendship, had stated as a certainty that if Brother had not cautioned Georgiana against George Wickham then all must be well, and had then told Georgiana that she and her betrothed were permitted liberties. Here she hesitated and then stopped.
“What sort of liberties?” Richard asked, gently, quietly, as if the answer scarcely mattered.
Now Georgiana sobbed in earnest, and she answered, “He stuck his – his – in my – and – oh, it was disgusting!”
Mr. Darcy and the Colonel traded horrified glances as they comforted the sobbing girl.