Chapter 27 #2
Elizabeth felt the carriage begin to turn on the road and leaned over to stare eagerly out the window.
She was sitting on the rear facing squabs of the vehicle and thus enjoyed occasional glimpses of Mr. Darcy perched atop the great stallion Phoenix.
Yes, there he was now, his posture both easy and elegant, his face turned toward Colonel Fitzwilliam.
She leaned back as the road straightened out and felt her lips curl upwards.
There could be no question about Mr. Darcy’s meaning only yesterday; he was interested in her as a possible wife, and she found herself looking forward to spending more time with the fascinating master of Pemberley.
/
“You should marry Miss Bennet,” Richard Fitzwilliam said decidedly.
Although he was somewhat taken aback by the straight forward statement, Darcy’s expression transformed from worried to joyful. “You truly think so?”
“I do,” Richard answered, obviously amused.
“Really, Cousin, it is so patently obvious that I cannot imagine why you are even asking! She is charming, beautiful, lively, honorable, intelligent, and obviously not a fortune hunter. She and Georgiana are on the very best of terms. She is a woman in a million, and if I were wealthy, I might try to cut you out!”
“You met her mother and youngest sister last night,” Darcy reminded him anxiously. “Mrs. Bennet is rather vulgar and Miss Lydia is overly noisy…”
Richard waved an impatient hand, cutting him off. “It matters not, Darcy, not in the least. They will not be living with you, after all.”
“What of Georgiana’s coming out into society? Elizabeth does not have connections among the haut ton. Will Lady Matlock still sponsor my sister if I marry the daughter of a country gentleman?”
Fitzwilliam cast his eyes forward at the carriage and then looked over at his cousin. “Darcy?”
“Yes?”
“How is Georgiana? She seems happy, but has she changed substantially in the last year in terms of her … more unusual character traits?”
Darcy also looked ahead and then turned back toward his sister’s other guardian.
“She is, I think, a bit easier in company, at least when Miss Bennet or I is with her. She is also able to bear tight clothing more often, though there are days when she still insists on baggy garments. She still adores her music and her peacocks, but she struggles to understand the conventions of society.”
The two men rode silently for a full five minutes, and then Richard said, “Darcy, I know this is difficult for you to accept, but I think it quite likely that Georgiana will never be able to enter society in a traditional manner.”
Darcy swallowed hard and felt his eyes grow wet. “That is what I am afraid of.”
Another silence fell, a shorter one, before the colonel said, “Why does that distress you so much? You have never had much use for high society, after all.”
Darcy sighed heavily and said, “It is true I do not, but Georgiana is a Darcy, and if she is never presented and never does her bow to the queen, people will talk about her. I hate the thought of that. She is already fragile; how will she bear it if people gossip about her in such a way. I also wonder...”
He trailed off and Richard, after waiting a minute, prompted, “Wonder what?”
Darcy turned a sorrowful countenance toward his cousin, hesitated, and then said, “I wonder if this is all my fault. Georgiana was only nine years old when our father died, leaving me as her primary guardian. Your parents urged me to send her away to school, but I refused. I thought that after such a shattering loss, she would be absolutely miserable away from Pemberley and me.”
“If you remember, I agreed with you entirely,” the military man said.
“More than that, as her other guardian, I argued that she absolutely should not be sent away. You know that boarding school can be a difficult transition for even a typical child. But Georgiana, with her love of birds and her hatred of tight clothing – Darcy, she would have been entirely wretched!”
“I agreed then and I agree now, but when she was twelve, you were away on the Continent and your parents urged me again to send her away to boarding school. Again I refused, as Georgiana was devastated at the thought of leaving me and Pemberley, but now I wonder if she would have grown more able to manage society if I had forced her to face up to her fears by sending her away.”
“I do not think so,” Richard said without hesitation. “You were very unhappy in boarding school, were you not?”
Darcy grimaced and nodded. “I was, but I did feel better able to manage societal expectations after my years at Eton.”
“And perhaps if you had been privately educated at Pemberley, with periodic trips to London, you would have learned similar lessons entirely due to maturity,” his cousin retorted. “You know that I have no great love of boarding schools, Darcy.”
Darcy winced and nodded. “I know, but what happened to Anthony might have happened anywhere.”
Richard Fitzwilliam gritted his teeth and said, “Boarding schools are notorious for just the kind of epidemic which nearly killed my older brother, not to mention the often foul interactions amongst the children. You know that even now, Anthony is somewhat delicate after his bout with smallpox. If I ever marry, I assure you that I will not send my children into such an environment. No, Darcy, Georgiana would never have thrived at boarding school. She is a delightful, gifted, very unusual young woman who may well never marry, and if she does not, the best thing in the world is for you to wed a woman whom she loves, like Miss Elizabeth Bennet.”
/
London
“You must be mad!” Mrs. Younge cried out, jerking to a sitting position. She had been delighted to welcome George Wickham into her house and her bed, but this plan of his was insane!
Wickham reached out a long arm and pulled her down to nestle in his embrace.
She resisted briefly before succumbing and curling up next to him.
Her companion, with his handsome figure and charming face, was quite the most remarkable man to ever enter her life, and she could no more resist him than a compass needle could resist turning to the north.
“Henrietta,” Wickham murmured into her ear.
“Do you not understand? Georgiana Darcy is an unsophisticated girl, and in spite of last year’s …
difficulties, she is certainly still attached to me from all those hours I spent amusing her when she was young.
I will not pretend that it will be easy, but we do have this in our favor; we know the usual haunts where she likes to look for her ridiculous birds. If we can find her alone, we can…”
“She will scream the moment she catches sight of you, or me for that matter,” Mrs. Younge said irritably. “Darcy is no fool. He will have warned her against us both.”
“Warned her, yes, but he will not expect us at Ramsgate, nor will she. As for screaming – I am confident she will be too stunned by my sudden appearance to so much as squeak, or at least not before I can cover her mouth with my hand.”
Mrs. Younge rolled over and stared at her lover incredulously. “Are you speaking of abduction?”
“And if I am?” Wickham asked, running an affectionate hand through her red ringlets. “The Darcys owe me, and they owe you. I will not physically harm Georgiana, but I intend to obtain her dowry by fair means or foul.”
“Abduction is a hanging matter, George! If we are caught…”
“If we are caught, Darcy will do everything in his power to hush it up, and you know it! Do you imagine he will allow polite society to know his dear sister nearly ran off with a steward’s son last year, and then was supposedly abducted by the same man when she returned to Ramsgate a year later?
Everyone in society will assume that she deliberately arranged to meet me at Ramsgate.
It is quite safe, my love. Either I will marry the girl and gain control over her dowry, or I will blackmail Darcy into paying us off so that we do not spread rumors about his sister throughout society.
Either way, you and I can finally be happy. ”
Mrs. Younge stared intently into Wickham’s winsome face, her heart thumping wildly within her.
He was so attractive, and her life here as mistress of a boarding house was dull and difficult.
She would need to ask her cousin Martha to take over her duties for a few days, but if they succeeded at Ramsgate, she could run away with Wickham and leave this foul existence forever.
“Very well,” she said.