Chapter 40
CHAPTER FORTY
T he rest of the carriage ride to Bedlam was tense, as Anne had found it great fun to become suddenly reticent. Though Darcy plied her with questions, her joyful silence only intensified with his agitation.
“What did you do to her? Did you kill her? Where is she? Tell me!” Darcy demanded in mournful outrage, his body lunging forwards in the squabs. Elizabeth could understand his reaction, finally perceiving the depth of betrayal Lady Catherine and her daughter had perpetrated against her beloved Fitzwilliam. Even if Lady Catherine did not do the deed, this was confirmation that she knew the truth of what had happened to Lady Anne Darcy and had for many years.
Mr Carrol, the magistrate, was in a perpetual state of shock at the turn of their discourse, and even the constable, so intimidatingly massive, seemed to shrink into himself at the knowledge of just whom he was sitting beside.
Perhaps it had not been such a good idea for Darcy to insist that they accompany Miss de Bourgh to London. Lady Catherine owned several well-sprung carriages, after all. They ought probably to have ridden in caravan, rather than put themselves in such proximity with this villain.
Anne de Bourgh only smiled and wriggled giddily as she tormented him with her mouth tightly closed.
Finally, Elizabeth, seeing the veins pulsing in Darcy’s temples and—worrying that he might become homicidal himself—placed what she hoped was a quelling hand on her beloved’s arm and pressed him to sit back in his seat. He complied with some hesitation, finally forcing himself to relax and breathe, then placing a hand of thanks over Elizabeth’s.
“I have a question, Miss de Bourgh,” Elizabeth offered with a forced expression of fascination, hoping it would encourage her to speak. “How did you hire the men from London to kill Darcy without ever leaving Rosings?”
After a short pause, Miss de Bourgh laughed. A bright, gay laugh that rang through the compartment, as if Elizabeth’s enquiry was utterly ridiculous. “Why should I hire someone to kill Darcy,” she finally answered, leaning towards them with a blithe whisper, “when I would so enjoy doing it myself?”
Elizabeth blinked, appalled by such an admission. If this was true, then there was another mystery at play. There was another murderous mind out there intent on harming her beloved. If indeed Miss de Bourgh had nothing to with the plot against Darcy, then who did? Colonel Fitzwilliam was certainly close enough to Darcy to know the circumstances of his time in Hertfordshire, the details around which the assassins’ accusation had been formed, but could he be so treacherous? Then there was Mr Wickham, who had despised Darcy enough to malign his character, but surely he would not resort to murder, especially when he had not been so ill-treated as he had claimed? She thought about his Matlock relations, Lady Catherine, and even Miss Bingley. She could not see that any of them were truly capable of such vile schemes.
Of course, it could be someone else altogether.
Elizabeth took in the insanity that was embodied before her. Miss de Bourgh only sat back in her squabs and tapped her fingers on her lap, humming a cheery tune as if they were on a Sunday drive through the Cotswolds rather than barrelling towards the most notorious lunatic asylum in England.
Could such a madwoman be believed?
Elizabeth did not know.
At length, they rolled to a stop in front of an impressive brick and stone building several stories high with rotundas on either end and a tower in the middle. It did not look like a lunatic asylum, though Elizabeth was sure that if she stepped inside, she would be met with the shrieks and moans of its occupants, as she had read of in newspapers. Standing at the bottom of the stairs were several men all wearing the same costume. Coming towards the carriage was a bespectacled man leaning heavily on a cane and grasping a conspicuously familiar green bottle in his hand. When Miss de Bourgh was being carried past him, she greeted him by name.
“Oh, Mr Seymour, must we?” she asked with an affected pout. “I am so much more fun without those deplorable draughts!”
“I am sure you are, Miss de Bourgh,” Mr Seymour responded drily, pressing his mouth into a hard line as he watched her pass.
Then, as the constable handed her off to the orderlies, she hollered back to Darcy with a devilish grin, “I suppose all’s well that ends well, eh, Darcy?”
How the woman could think for a moment that anything was well bespoke to Elizabeth just how disconnected she was to reality.
Darcy exchanged a polite bow with Mr Seymour before turning to Elizabeth, letting out a tired sigh, and directing her gaze back to the drive. In front of them was a gleaming black barouche driven by four matching bays. Darcy took her hand and led her towards the lavish carriage. He briefly instructed Lady Catherine’s driver to return the other men to Kent, and the Rosings carriage was off.
As they approached Darcy’s coach, a footman in livery of the finest velvet and brocade opened the crested door, and Darcy lifted his hand to assist her inside. He followed her, the footman shutting the door behind him, and positioned himself on the plush squabs at her left.
Elizabeth tried not to be overwhelmed by the opulence of the conveyance, but truly it was unimaginably grand. Turning to her handsome escort, she could not but laugh at the juxtaposition of his tattered clothing and scruffy beard—for it had become mussed in the course of the morning—with the luxury surrounding them.
Darcy glanced over at her with a quizzical brow. Surely he was wondering what on earth she could find at all amusing in this horrific situation. She smiled up at him with sympathy as she began pulling off her gloves. He watched with interest as she unbuttoned the wrists and tugged on each finger, finally sliding the gloves off one by one. Lifting her bare hands to his face, she set to running her fingers through his beard to tame it. The feel of his skin against hers was like lightning to Elizabeth, but to Darcy, it was evidently relaxing. Indeed, he melted into her ministrations, and so she went on stroking the hairs on his face long after they had reached a tolerable state of order.
Elizabeth relished the closeness as he leant into her palm. To think it had only been just over a month since she had rejected him! Looking into his eyes as she held his beautiful face, Elizabeth sucked in a sharp breath at the humbling realisation that Fitzwilliam Darcy was literally putting himself in her hands.
He who needed nothing…needed her .
Just as she was about to open her mouth and tell him how honoured she was by his trust, his eyes drifted closed and a tear escaped, trailing over his cheekbone and disappearing into the hair covering his jaw.
“What is it?” Elizabeth’s breath caught in her throat as her hands fell to his in his lap.
“She did not leave me,” he said in barely a whisper. “She did not abandon me.”