Chapter Nine #2
“Who are those men? The mention of their presence did not seem to alarm you. And what is your father’s involvement? I have come to like Mr. Bennet and consider him a friend and would not bring trouble upon him unless I felt most strongly about it. Do you know, Miss Elizabeth?”
She swallowed. Confessing her suspicions would make them more real, would likely doom her father to the gallows, and herself and her sisters to a lifetime of ostracization and poverty.
They could never marry, never find respectable employment, never face society again, if it were known that their father was in league with the French.
But the secret she held also weighed so heavily upon her that she felt she might break from the bearing of it. She cast her eyes to the floor.
“I cannot tell you, sir. I am sorry.”
There was silence, as thick and impenetrable as the dark night outside. Then, in a whisper, he asked, “Are they Frenchmen?”
Her head snapped up. “How...?”
“Please do not ask me that. I am not at liberty to say. But allow me to tell you that I will do everything I can to help you and your sisters.”
With that sentence, her shock gave way to anger. She had been right; Mr. Wickham had been right. He was the man she had heard in the carriage! She ought never to have trusted him, for he was here on some business of his own and befriended her father only to betray him.
She struggled to keep her voice from breaking as she accused him, “How dare you? How dare you come here and flatter us and woo us and befriend us, and all in the interests of your own self-aggrandisement! I overheard you and your friend, that day that you arrived, when you stopped along the country lane to let him out while you proceeded to Netherfield. You are indeed the enemy! You would happily see us all destroyed if it leads to your one moment of glory with your superiors. That is exactly what Mr. Wickham said you would do, and loath as I was to believe him, you have proven him correct. You will ruin us all!” Tears came hot and unbidden to her eyes, but she refused to let them fall.
She would not allow him to see her as weak.
Now it was his face that grew stony and cold. “And what else does Mr. Wickham have to say? He has told so many mistruths about me, I can no longer keep up with them. What am I supposed to have done this time?”
“Do you deny his accusations?”
“I cannot, Miss Elizabeth, for I do not know what they are. Pray, enlighten me!”
She cast her mind back to the previous afternoon, to the friendly gathering near the village square where Mr. Wickham had laughingly recited the sins of his nemesis after Darcy had left them in such a rude fashion.
“I was not meant for the army,” he had winked at Lydia, “but I should be pleased to take my commission for I hear that young ladies admire a man in a red coat.” And Lydia had tutted and flirted and batted long lashes at him such that he puffed out his chest like a proud bird intent on displaying its plumage.
Lizzy repeated the gist of the tale now. “He claimed that he was intended for the church, but that you denied him the living your father had promised him. That is hardly the action of an honourable man!”
He snorted at her. “You are a fine one to talk about honour, knowing that your father harbours the enemy in his very household!”
“You, sir, are as likely to be the enemy as any of those other men. As I am learning, I know nothing about you, save for what you have chosen to show us.” She glared at him through narrow slits, her jaw thrust out in indignation.
“And you—” he broke off. “And you are correct. I am accusing your father of something unproven.” His voice grew quieter and softer. “Anger does not become me. Will you allow me to beg your forgiveness once again and allow me to explain?”
He had spoken words of apology to her before, but never had she seen such contrition in his eyes.
Why should he care now so much more than earlier that she forgive him?
All of his pretty words over the last several weeks melted away in the face of his desperate face, and she granted him leave to speak.
“I shall hear you out, then decide what to make of your tale.” Her voice was as cold as she could make it, but she knew she would almost certainly grant his wish.
“First, allow me to explain about Wickham,” he begged.
As she sat in silence, he paced the room and spun the tale of his former friend.
He spoke of a lifetime of lies and dangerous pranks and debauchery and vice.
He told of how he had spent the years since university following Wickham around and repaying his debts, both at the gaming table and to local merchants, and then of how he had thought to be rid of the man for good.
“My father intended him for the church,” Mr. Darcy explained at last, “but Wickham never had the first inclination for that profession, nor the temperament. When he requested a sum of money in exchange for the living Father had meant for him, it seemed our association was at an end. He accepted three thousand pounds—” Lizzy gasped at the amount, “—in lieu of the living, and I wished him well. He said he intended to study the law, which would see him to a comfortable existence. But I was mistaken. When the living came open, he knocked on my door once more, demanding what he claimed was due to him, pretending that the three thousand had been a gift and nothing more.” He now stood before her and held her eyes with his own.
“This is but one sample of the man’s character.
If you doubt me, I can direct you to others who know the truth of it.
This, at least, is on public record in Derbyshire. ”
One word caught Lizzy’s attention. “This? Is there more? Are there other events, as dire?”
He looked away. “Aye. But I will not speak of them now; I will not air another’s shame unless it is truly vital that I do so.”
Lizzy rose as well and walked around the table, running her hand along the rounded edges.
“I misjudged you, sir. I was angry and sought to justify my anger with another man’s slander.
If you can apologise, so can I. I called you dishonourable, and I was mistaken.
But my concerns remain. You approached us under false pretences, pretending to form friendships when all you wanted was information with which to destroy all of us. Can you deny that?”
He nodded, then shook his head, then nodded again. “I cannot, and yet I find my duties have become less and less clear to me. I did, at first, pretend to friendship in the hopes of finding the evidence my... colleague desired.”
“The man in the carriage?”
He nodded. “But that feigned friendship has become real, on my part at least. And on yours, I hope. I must carry out my duties to the best of my ability, but I now hope that I fail at them.”
How ought she to respond to this? Before she could formulate a reply, Mr. Darcy asked, “Once again, may I ask what you know of this? The better informed I am, the more able I will be to decide on my course of action.”
Now it was Lizzy’s turn to pace around the room as she told of the night of the storm, the night she first heard activity in the storage room above her head.
She described her habit of surveying the room morning and evening, and of the recent discovery of a machine of some sort upon the table.
“I have seen a man there too, working upon it, but I am unable to determine what he is doing. He seems to be turning something, but his back blocks the view of his arms from my sight.”
Mr. Darcy’s eye lit up, and he asked in an eager voice, “Did he write anything as he worked?”
Lizzy thought back and nodded. “I believe he did.”
“Then this is what I’ve been asked to discover.” In his excitement, he grabbed her hands, and she gasped at the sensation of flesh on flesh. He turned a very serious gaze upon her then and asked, “Do you not think we ought to go and discover for ourselves what is going on?”