Chapter 30 #2
The year one. Her aunt had used those very words to her once, months ago. Lambton was very anxious for her in the year one, she had said, and Elizabeth had not known what she meant.
“It began as a sore throat,” Mr. Darcy went on. “The physician called it an ordinary inflammation and insisted that his draughts would bring the swelling down. She did not improve, and his advice did not change. Another few days under the physician’s care, and my mother would have died.”
“But she did not.”
“She did not. She lived. Because of George Wickham.”
Elizabeth had not expected this, and her face must have shown it.
“You know him now as an easy, laughing man who carries every scrap of news in London to my mother,” Mr. Darcy said.
“But at seventeen he was a steward’s son who had buried his own mother of the very same complaint three years before.
He knew what the illness looked like and how it progressed.
He heard a report about my mother somehow, probably through his father.
He inquired every day, as concerned as the rest of us.
” He paused. “He told his father that we ought to call a surgeon, but he discouraged George from bothering the master. When the next report came and she was no better, he ignored his father and came to mine.” He paused, and Elizabeth could see in his eyes that he was far away.
“A steward’s son does not tell the master that the physician treating his wife is wrong in his diagnosis.
George told him anyway. When my father would not listen, George Wickham raised his voice in my father’s study, which no one had ever done, and insisted that they either call a surgeon or the pastor, because if it was the same illness as his mother’s, they might soon be preparing for a funeral. ” Mr. Darcy gazed down at his hands.
“And your father listened.”
“It was not easy for him. Calling in a surgeon against a physician’s advice meant declaring the physician incompetent, which is not something easily forgiven.
” He looked up. “My father did it anyway. The surgeon saw at once that the inflammation had suppurated. He opened the abscess, and my mother was scolding us all again two weeks later.”
Elizabeth found she had set down her cup without knowing it. “That is why,” she said slowly. “That is why he is treated like another cousin in your house. Why your mother was so determined to find him his match.”
“He saved her life when he was still a boy, although speaking up could have meant his father losing his position and the both of them losing their home. It quite changed everyone’s life, for he had been making friends I could not approve of, and he had been growing bitter over the difference in our stations.
But he was truly alarmed for my mother, and there, he acted selflessly. ”
He took a deep breath. “My family has never forgotten, and George has never used my family’s affection to his advantage.” He shook his head. “He has never had to.”
Elizabeth took one of his hands in both of hers. “He saved her life—and in a way, she saved his.”
Mr. Darcy nodded. He was silent for a time, but when he spoke, his voice remained steady.
“People wonder why we trust Wickham with everything. We trust him because when silence would have been safer, he insisted on speaking. My mother never mentions what she owes him. She simply shows it in how she treats him every day.”
Elizabeth thought of George Wickham handing round cake and gossip in Lady Anne’s drawing room, and of the whole warm, strange, over-managing family that had taken her in this winter. “I am glad you told me,” she said.
“I wanted you to know what kind of family you are being asked into.” He heard himself and coloured. “Will be asked into. When I have done it properly.”
Here was an opportunity to lighten the moment, and Elizabeth took it. “Mr. Darcy,” she said, “you have been threatening to do something properly for a fortnight. I begin to fear that you never shall.”
“I will,” he said. “I am just waiting for the right day.”
The right day, as it happened, was Easter.
They attended church that morning at St. Peter upon Cornhill. The Gardiners and Elizabeth sat together, next to Jane and Mr. Aldridge, who had accompanied them. Mr. Darcy, Lady Anne, and Miss Darcy occupied the pew directly behind.
Afterwards, they all dined at her uncle’s house. Lady Anne had accepted the invitation with sincere pleasure, and Elizabeth almost laughed to see London’s most fashionable hostess delighted to be served lamb in the City.
Mr. Aldridge proved himself the easiest man at the table.
He talked drainage and Berkshire weather with her uncle, more Fielding with Jane and Elizabeth, and drew Miss Darcy out upon her music when no one else had contrived to.
He spoke fondly of his mother, held well-reasoned opinions, and was never once dull.
After the cloth was drawn, her uncle proposed a turn in the garden to anyone wanting air, then engaged the rest of the party so thoroughly upon the merits of the lamb that no one else was free to accompany them.
Elizabeth was beginning to suspect her family of a conspiracy far better organised than any of Lady Anne’s.
Mr. Darcy offered his arm. She took it.
The garden was not much, being a City garden. It was only a square of grass with a wall, a plum and a pear tree, and one stubborn crocus.
Mr. Darcy strolled out into the centre and stopped. “I have spoken to your uncle,” he said.
Her heart soared. “Have you? And what did my uncle say?”
“He said I was not to make a hash of it this time. That if I did, he would not lift a finger to help me. And that I might consider waiting until tomorrow.” Mr. Darcy paused. “I did not understand that last part.”
Elizabeth did not either and told him so.
Mr. Darcy took a breath. “The first time I asked you,” he said, “it was because I was afraid. I thought another man would have you if I did not speak, and I could not accept it. You were right to refuse me then.”
Elizabeth’s heart was beating very hard and she did not know how to slow it.
“I am not asking again now.” He looked at her directly, which he had not always been able to do.
The disappointment was acute. “You are not?”
He shook his head. “I am, but . . .” He laughed and ran a hand through his hair. “I ought to have known at once that you were only overwhelmed when I made my previous offer, for you have overwhelmed me from the first.”
“So you have said, but I am not certain I believe it.”
“Why do you think I was so insufferable?”
She opened her mouth to respond, but he shook his head at her and laughed a little. “Peace, woman. Will you allow me to continue?”
Elizabeth pressed her lips together and nodded.
“I have called on you every day for three weeks. I know you a good deal better than I did, and I love you a great deal more, which I had not thought possible. I am choosing you because there is no one else I could ever want as much, and there never has been since the evening you laughed at me across an assembly room and spoiled me for every other woman in England.”
Elizabeth discovered that even when she was expecting his offer, Mr. Darcy could still render her speechless.
“You are my match, Miss Elizabeth.” He took a deep breath. “Am I yours? Because I love you, and I should like to spend a very long time proving how much.”
They had changed places. Mr. Darcy was now the gregarious one, and Elizabeth the person who simply spoke directly.
She said the word without a single flourish. “Yes.”
“Elizabeth,” he said, sighing with what she thought was relief and raising her hand to his lips. “Thank you.”
She swallowed, allowing the sensation of his lips against her skin to course through her entire body. “Why did you say you were not asking me to marry you?” she whispered.
He smiled and lowered his forehead to hers. “Because I have already asked.”
She scoffed at him. “Five weeks ago.”
“Five and a half.” He smiled. “I have simply been waiting for you to finish answering.”
For a moment neither of them moved. Then he pulled back a little so that he could lift his hand and touch her cheek. It was a careful movement, as though he was half afraid she would disappear. Elizabeth, who had anticipated this moment longer than she would ever admit, closed the distance herself.
He kissed her right there in the centre of the small imperfect garden, with two trees, one crocus, and a bit of London soot to stand witness. It was brief and inexpert and it undid her completely.
When they drew apart, she kept hold of his coat, because her knees had once again proved unreliable in his presence, and she did not wish to be carried back inside.
“There,” she said unsteadily. “Now you have done it properly.”
After another kiss, they came in from the garden together, and Elizabeth could see that they had deceived no one.
Her aunt looked at her face and sent her husband a smug look. Jane, from the seat near the fire where Mr. Aldridge had scarcely left her side all afternoon, made a small glad sound. Uncle Gardiner looked from his niece to Mr. Darcy. “I see you could not wait,” he said, and reached for the bell.
“Mr. Darcy has asked me to marry him,” Elizabeth told the room, “and I have said yes. I am aware this surprises no one present, which I consider very unkind of you all.”