Chapter 28 #2
“I must confess I have a concern,” Elizabeth said slowly. “Does Lady Catherine not have a daughter? If Mrs. Younge has once turned a young heiress’s head, I would not wish to see it attempted again on your cousin.”
“My cousin Anne is a lady of twenty-seven and has been her mother’s creature since the cradle,” Fitz said. “She takes direction from one person in the world—everyone else must dance to her tune. Mrs. Younge may wheedle all she likes; there is no one in that house who will listen.”
Elizabeth paused, then shook her head. “Forgive me, but it still seems a rather easy punishment.”
Both men laughed.
“Why is that amusing?” she inquired.
“Once you have met Lady Catherine and my cousin Anne,” Darcy told her, “you will understand.”
Fitz gave a soft sigh of gratification. “It is deeply satisfying work, to finally have done with Wickham, and I must say, placing Mrs. Younge with our aunt was a stroke of brilliance on my part.”
“You mean vindictiveness,” Darcy said.
“Let us say imagination in the service of justice.”
“You are too modest,” Elizabeth told him.
“My finest quality.”
Darcy looked at the fire again. Wickham in India—not dashing, not admired, not in a position to charm his way about drawing rooms and card tables.
No, instead he would be spending his days working harder than he would ever have been required to had he simply used his many opportunities wisely.
It had a practical sort of elegance. And Mrs. Younge being present when he made his annual Easter visit to his aunt and cousin would not make the visit any worse.
It was already about as torturous as possible.
Although he had not heard from Lady Catherine since his marriage. Perhaps he would not be invited to Kent again. That would be yet another boon Elizabeth had brought him.
Fitz laughed, accepted the brandy a footman had appeared as if by conjuration to provide, then delivered every detail of Wickham’s sailing and Mrs. Younge’s departure for Kent.
Tracy paused at the door on his evening rounds, surveyed the room, and seemed to conclude that three occupants where he had last left two was irregular but not insupportable. Behind him was Mrs. Aldworth, though she displayed a good deal more urgency.
“Tracy!” Fitz sat forward eagerly, as though he had been waiting for exactly this moment. “I must tell you that was the finest piece of work I have heard of since Salamanca. Who would have thought you could stop an intruder with an umbrella?”
Tracy inclined his head. “The mahogany ones are heavier,” he said. “More reliable in wet weather.”
Fitz looked at Darcy with delight. “Now I understand why you keep him on.”
“That is not the reason,” Darcy replied with a sigh.
His cousin continued to assess him with some scepticism.
“Very well, it is not the only reason.”
“Mr. Darcy,” Mrs. Aldworth said, “I am very relieved to see you safely returned.”
“Thank you.”
The housekeeper straightened and turned her attention to Elizabeth. “Had I been present, madam, that man would not have reached the second room.”
Tracy gave her a sidelong look.
“I am sure of it,” Elizabeth replied.
Mrs. Aldworth’s hand moved to the keys at her waist. “I have been the housekeeper at Bereford House for twenty-five years. I will not abide being burgled in it.”
Darcy had seen those keys all his life. Iron, worn smooth with decades of use, entirely domestic until one imagined them in motion.
Fitz eyed the keys with professional interest.
“Then I am very glad you were not here,” Elizabeth said.
Mrs. Aldworth’s eyes narrowed. “Are you, madam?”
“Yes. For Mr. Wickham’s sake.”
Mrs. Aldworth lifted her chin, appearing pleased her position had been understood. She nodded once, decisively, before withdrawing. Tracy followed and closed the door behind them.
Fitz watched the door close. “Your housekeeper,” he said to Darcy, “is terrifying. And your wife very nearly so.” He set down his glass and rose. “I mean that as the highest possible compliment.” He bowed to Elizabeth, clapped Darcy on the shoulder, and left.
“Terrifying?” Elizabeth asked with a little laugh. “Where do the men in your family learn to compliment women?”
They were still chuckling over that when Georgiana appeared at the door in her wrapper, pale and wakeful and plainly determined not to go to bed with something left unsaid.
“Come in, Georgiana,” he said.
She did. She crossed to the chair opposite and sat with her hands folded in her lap. She had their mother’s hands.
Darcy sat forward. “I think you are becoming a young woman of good sense and good character. With some things still to learn.”
“Yes.” She accepted this without flinching.
“I knew eloping was wrong. I knew it before Mrs. Younge had finished suggesting it. But she was very insistent that I had encouraged Mr. Wickham, that I owed him something for having raised his hopes. And he was very charming, very kind.” A pause.
“It was difficult to hold to my course when two people I trusted kept telling me I was the one in the wrong.”
“You held to it nonetheless.”
“Eventually.” She looked at her hands. “When I met Elizabeth, I saw that she had doubts too. Well, I did not see it immediately.” She looked up. “I know better now. I will not be moved from what I know is right, not again.”
Darcy regarded his sister for a moment. “I am glad to hear it,” he said. “And I will be honest with you in return, since you have been honest with me. Your situation exacted a price. From me.” He paused. “More significantly, from Elizabeth.”
Georgiana glanced at Elizabeth.
“It has turned out well,” Darcy continued. “But it very easily might not have, and the risk fell most heavily on her.”
The room was quiet.
Georgiana considered this, then turned to Elizabeth. “I am sorry.”
“You are forgiven,” Elizabeth said. “You have been forgiven for some time. I simply did not want to say so before your brother had finished being stern.”
Darcy looked at her. “I was not being stern.”
“You were a little stern.”
“I was being honest.”
“You can be both,” Elizabeth said pleasantly. “You frequently are.”
Darcy looked at his sister then. Properly looked, in the way he had not quite allowed himself to do since Ramsgate, when looking too directly at her had meant confronting how close they had all come to losing her.
She was not the child he had been protecting.
She was still becoming whatever she would be, but his sister was already possessed of a steadiness he recognised. She was becoming her own woman.
Georgiana looked between them and, to Darcy’s amazement, smiled and rose. She came to him first, allowed him to kiss her forehead as he had done since she was a child, and then turned to Elizabeth.
“Thank you,” she said softly. “For coming to my aid. For coming into this house. And for staying.”
Elizabeth answered in a tone too low for Darcy to catch, but he would always remember Georgiana’s joyful expression. And then his sister was gone.
He listened to her footsteps recede until he could no longer hear them.
The house had been full all evening, but now it was simply quiet in the way it was quiet on ordinary nights, when nothing much had happened and there was nothing to resolve.
The room was now very still. No Fitz. No servants.
No sister. No one left but him and his wife and the things he had not yet said to her.
With a curious mixture of dread and relief, Darcy thought that the night had finally removed every obstacle—except himself.