Chapter 39
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Elizabeth prepared to retire that night while hearing Darcy in his bedchamber undergoing his own nightly ablutions. She was eager to be in his arms and desperate for the solace she found in him, her mind a tumult of the meaning of all they had learnt.
They had spoken little so far. Darcy had been silent and reserved, and she had been confused and distressed.
Both had gone through the remainder of the day with little feeling or expression, operating by rote.
She had presumed they would speak when they were alone in their chambers for the night, and she was ready to give way to all of the thoughts that surely must haunt them.
He did not come to her.
She lay there, the minutes ticking by, wondering what he was doing and why it was requiring so much time for him to do it. Then she went to the connecting door and knocked gently.
“Come.”
The room was completely dark save for a low-burning fire. “Fitzwilliam?”
“I am in bed.”
“What…why did you not come to me?” She was shocked that he had retired to his own bed. They had not slept apart once since their first night married.
She perched beside him on the edge of the mattress.
He would not look at her, rubbing his face with his hands roughly. “Elizabeth, I love you deeply, but I cannot make you my mistress.”
“Your mistress!” She was shocked, hurt by what he suggested. “I am your wife!”
Softly, he asked, “Are you?”
“Of course, I am!” Elizabeth felt a tear of anger and sadness roll down her cheek. “Am I to pretend I am not your wife? Am I to sleep alone and be denied your love?”
“I do not know what to do.” His tone was quietly frustrated.
“I have tried to persuade myself that all is well using a multitude of reasons and imaginings, yet I am faced with the probability that Henry lives. If so, you are his wife, not mine. I cannot take you, knowing you might well belong to another.”
Elizabeth raised her hand to her face, allowing a sob to come through.
“What if we were to conceive a child?” he asked “A son? This situation is complicated, and a child would make it more so. The risk of a child that I could not rightly claim as my heir is too great.”
Elizabeth began to cry in earnest, the truth of his fears cutting her like a knife. She could understand his feelings all too well, for he did nothing more than give voice to her own fears. How she hated them and hated the unfairness of the entire situation in which they were suddenly mired.
With her face covered by her hands, she felt his arm encircle her waist as a gentle kiss was placed on her hair. “Please try to understand,” he whispered. “I do not know what to do.”
Elizabeth jerked away from Darcy’s grasp. “Then sleep alone!” she cried, rising quickly and nearly running into her bedchamber. She tossed herself onto her bed and wept violently until she could weep no more.
Darcy did not come to her for the entirety of the night.
It was not a restful night for Darcy.
He could feel a cloak of reserve coming over him.
It was too painful to contemplate that his love and his felicity were being taken from him in this way, so he withdrew.
You are indeed a selfish, disdainful man.
She needs you. She is pained as well as you are—more than you are—yet you hide yourself from her.
It was his nature, and as such, it was nearly impossible to deny.
He had learnt it through the loss of his mother and perfected it during the long illness and death of his father.
To appear stoic and inscrutable, to show pain to no one, and to go about his business, tending to the needs of others and disregarding his own—this was the way he survived then and the way he would survive now.
He was angry with her too. It was perhaps irrational, but she had insisted on knowing the truth about George Wickham’s rambles when everyone else was inclined to dismiss him. She wanted the truth, and this was where it had brought them.
Avoiding the truth does not change the truth. If Henry is alive, he would have come to our notice eventually.
Darcy entered the breakfast room the next morning, seeing his wife already at the table. Sadness marked her every feature, and she looked away from him. Her sadness pierced his cloak of reserve. He waited until the servants had gone then went to kneel by her chair.
He took her hands in his and rested his forehead on them. After several moments of silence, he said, “Please know how deeply I love you.”
She pulled her hands away, wrapping them around her teacup and taking a sip. “You love me so much that you turn your back on me?” Her voice was cool, but he heard a tiny quaver in it.
“I do not wish to turn my back on you.”
“Can you possibly understand…” She stopped and drew a deep breath. “I am terrified. You are upset, and I am too, but I wish for us to go through this together, not alone.”
Rising, he sat in the chair next to hers. He stared at the tablecloth a moment before saying, “Yet we cannot do that. You will leave me.”
“I shall not leave you!”
“You will have no choice!” His voice had risen, and he stopped himself. The entire house need not know that he and Elizabeth were shouting at each other in the breakfast room.
He took a deep, calming breath. “Elizabeth, do you not see? We have opened Pandora’s Box, and now everything is beyond our control.”
Elizabeth lowered her face into her hands. “Like Pandora, my curiosity has ruined me.”
“It is not mere curiosity,” he owned. “I know you needed to find the truth just as I would have wished to do. It was right to find him—if indeed it is him—but it does not mean it is easy.”
They sat in silence for several moments until Elizabeth offered, weakly and without conviction, “It is not Henry in Kidsgrove.”
“It is likely,” Darcy replied gently. “We both know that. A man named Henry found in the right place, at the right time, and bearing the surname of Henry’s mother? Mere coincidence is improbable.”
Elizabeth pressed her lips together tightly, turning her head away from him. “So by your estimation, we are not truly married.”
Darcy looked at her, his heart sinking anew as he struggled to remain strong. He could not say it though. He could not utter what he knew in his heart to be true: that she was already lost to him. Weakly, he said, “We must go see this man before we can rightly carry on as we were.”
Elizabeth was on her feet and out of the room before anything else could be said.
Elizabeth thought she might return to her room and have a good cry but found she could not.
Instead, she went to her sitting room window, staring out on a January day that was deceptive in its prettiness and sunshine.
She knew that if she were to walk outside, the bite of the wind and the chill of the air would drive her right back in.
When she allowed herself to consider what might happen, she could feel nothing but confusion and misery.
She deeply regretted that she had undertaken these actions; yet, she knew she could not have done differently.
Mostly, what she wished was that George Wickham had never uttered the fateful words that had led them on their quest.
At dinner, the two of them pushed the food around their plates in a dispirited and quiet manner until it was a suitable time to withdraw.
Then they sat in the drawing room, Darcy engaged in reading and Elizabeth tending to her correspondence.
She considered telling her family what had occurred but reasoned against it and wrote a light-hearted note filled with a generous number of inconsequential topics.
At long last, it was time to retire. When her maid had prepared her for sleep, Elizabeth went to the connecting door between their chambers and leant against it, closing her eyes and resting her cheek against the wood. She heard the sounds associated with her husband’s nighttime rituals.
As she stood there, she felt compelled to confess the truth to Darcy though he likely would not hear it. Indeed, she did not want him to hear it, for it marked her as the cruel creature she was.
“I wish he would remain gone. I do not want him. I want you.”
She stayed for several minutes more, the hard wood cool against her face, listening to him and praying he would come to her.
He did not. She eventually heard him settle into his bed and blow out the candle. She listened for a long time—knowing not what she waited for—then she finally went to bed and stared blankly at the canopy above her until dawn.