Chapter Seven
“DO YOU THINK it is true?” Georgiana said to Mr. Darcy at breakfast.
“What are you speaking of?” he said absently, clutching his tea and thinking all manner of thoughts that had everything to do with Elizabeth saying that loving her husband had caused her pain.
“I have heard that Richard is married to Miss Bennet,” said Georgiana. “Secretly!”
Mr. Darcy sighed. Oh, yes, he had forgotten that Caroline had this information and had been spreading it about all over.
“I cannot believe he would marry someone like her,” said Georgiana.
“No, no, I suppose I can, for everyone can see that the Bennet sisters drive all men mad.” She rolled her eyes.
“But I don’t see where they are going to live or what they are going to do, and I think our aunt, his mother, is going to lose her mind with the news, if it’s true.
She could do something very rash, and then we shall have to cut Richard. ”
“No, it’s not quite that bad,” said Mr. Darcy. “She is respectable enough. She’s the daughter of a gentleman, after all. You haven’t heard anything otherwise, have you?”
“Is there something otherwise to hear?” said Georgiana, turning on him, very interested.
“No,” he said.
“It is true, though. Richard married her.”
Mr. Darcy sighed.
“It is!” Georgiana exclaimed. “That is extraordinary, is it not?”
He sighed again.
Elizabeth, he noted, was quite absent from breakfast. He told himself not to go looking for her afterwards, to focus on Georgiana.
To this end, he forced himself to make some introductions for his sister, but she seemed to have been introduced to everyone already.
“Yes, Mr. Houseman was good enough to conduct the introductions,” said Georgiana, smiling. “He is ever so kind, truly.”
Hmm. Darcy remembered that he was meant to speak to Houseman, or that he and Elizabeth were meant to do it together, perhaps. He wasn’t sure about the particulars.
He could have sought Houseman out, he supposed, but—not to his credit—he decided he liked having an excuse to do something with Elizabeth, the both of them together.
He told himself that he had done nothing wrong. Yes, perhaps, he and his cousin’s wife had engaged in a few conversations that were not strictly proper in every way, but they had not actually touched or done anything even remotely untoward. Mr. Darcy would never do such a thing, after all.
He resolved he would not even think anything untoward about his cousin’s wife. He would certainly not think about touching her, or kissing her, or… anything else.
Now that he resolved not to think of this, of course, it seemed he could think of nothing else.
Everything was agony, he thought.
When Elizabeth appeared, later in the morning, her face flushed with color, he again thought of the time she had come to Netherfield with muddy skirts, when he had first noticed the woman’s bright eyes.
He scolded himself.
But he also wished to speak to her. However, he did not wish to be noticeable about it.
He waited until he noticed that she was making her way over to one of the tables set up outdoors, where there were glasses of lemonade and more of that wine punch that had felled Caroline the day before. He casually got up and went to the table as well.
He stood on the opposite side, looking at the glasses, not at her. “I am unsure if we are meant to speak to Houseman together today or not.”
She came around the table to stand next to him. “Actually, I have ever so much to share with you. I spoke to the duke this morning. I ran into him on a morning walk.”
“You and your walks,” he said fondly, smiling gently at her. “You are one for walking, are you not?”
“I suppose,” she said, smiling at him. “I suppose you are not one for walks?”
“I could be,” he said. “I could quite be one for walks, especially with good company.” Oh, dear, was he flirting with her?
Stop flirting with your cousin’s wife this instant! he scolded himself.
She gave him a pointed look. “Now, sir, I think it is you who are saying things you oughtn’t say.”
“Apologies,” he said, selecting a glass of lemonade.
She took one, too.
Their fingers brushed.
Both of them recoiled.
They looked out over the gathered area, not at each other.
“Right,” she said. “Well, the upshot of it is that Neithern is going to go look for a marriage license between his mother and his father. He does not even know his mother’s name, but what he does know of her mirrors my mother.”
“Truly? How astonishing,” said Mr. Darcy. “Perhaps you are twins.”
“I can’t think that’s the answer, however,” she said. “But then, it seems that no matter what I find out about all of this, nothing seems to quite fit correctly.”
“I know exactly what you mean,” he said.
Now, he should find some reason to excuse himself and part company with her, and he knew it. Instead, he sipped at his lemonade and looked at her. Not long looks, not at all. Short ones, after which he looked elsewhere, but then he came back to look at her afresh. She was lovely to look upon.
She cleared her throat. “Oh! Last night, we spoke, and I allowed this to stand, for I was distracted by other things, but it has weighed upon me, and I must say that I could not allow you to give my husband and myself anything.”
He turned to her in confusion. “What?”
“You said it was your fault that I felt financially unsure? And I joked about how it was your fault that it rained, and then you said—”
“Oh, yes, I remember. Well, it is only that I did promise, after all that mess with Wickham, that I would assist in some way, and then, well, none of that became necessary, but I still wish you to be happy and comfortable, and if it will add to your happiness, I should like to do it. It makes me happy to see you happy, you see. And if my cousin is not making you happy, then—”
“Well, we should likely give him a chance, I suppose.” She made a face. “I have done my part to put pressure on him, though. He shall return home to the knowledge that there is a rumor we kept our marriage secret so that we could do everything properly. So, he must now do it properly, I think.”
“Ah, so this is why you said what you said to Caroline.” He smirked. “It is well done, I must say. I think Richard deserves it, actually.”
She smirked too.
Their gazes caught and snagged on one another.
They looked at each other for too long.
She smoothed at her skirts. “Yes, but I must strenuously object to your doing that, Mr. Darcy. You cannot give me things like that. It… I think it is a bad precedent to set between us.”
“I think Richard would take money from me,” said Darcy. “I shall give it to him, then, not you.”
“No, even so, I don’t think we should have so much of your meddling in our lives!”
“Meddling,” he repeated, looking into his lemonade.
“You have both meddled with me rather a great deal,” she said. “You both have behaved as if you were entitled to elements of me. You spied on me, for heaven’s sake.”
“I suppose we did go too far,” said Darcy. “But our intention was to protect you, Elizabeth, and if you think I shall ever stop trying to protect you, you will find that I shan’t.”
She let out a breath, and she did not look entirely displeased that he had said that. “Yes, but you must let me go, mustn’t you?” She glanced up, questions in her eyes. “Especially with his being gone, fighting, possibly in danger at this precise moment?”
“Don’t do that,” said Mr. Darcy, shaking his head. “He used you ill, and he doesn’t deserve your pity.”
“It is not pity, exactly,” she said. “But he is my husband. I must cease finding fault with him and cleave to him. If I were your wife, you would not be pleased that I am saying these sorts of things about you behind your back. You would wish my loyalty.”
“You are being too hard on yourself. You are being loyal,” he said.
“I am doing my best,” she said. “And I think I should take care not to make it more difficult to be loyal. And I think you should… well, I wish you would not continue to make it more difficult either.” With that, she walked off, leaving him there.
He drained his glass of lemonade, feeling like a cad.
She was good at making him feel awful about himself, though, that was the thing about that woman.
ELIZABETH WISHED SHE had not run away from Mr. Darcy like that, because she didn’t know if they were meant to speak to Mr. Houseman together. She thought it might be easier if they did, rather than needing to relay information back and forth to the other.
But now, she had all but told him to stay clear of her.
She forced herself to stop thinking about Mr. Darcy—after all, she was a married woman—and to stop thinking about who her father was—after all, she had lived all her life without knowing—and to try to focus on something else.
To this end, she sought out her sister Jane, who she found playing at battledore and shuttlecock with a group of others. Elizabeth watched and cheered her sister’s side on until the game was over.
Then she and Jane sat down together on a blanket and Jane looked dolefully into her wine punch and said that Caroline had told her that Mr. Bingley was going to marry Miss Darcy.
Elizabeth spent hours dissecting every thing that Mr. Bingley had done, this way and that, with regards to both Jane and Miss Darcy, and trying to assure her sister that Caroline was a sour person who was willing to say sour things.
Of course, Caroline had been noticeably absent after lying down for that afternoon nap the day before. She had not come down for dinner last night and she had not appeared for breakfast either. Elizabeth thought this likely meant that Caroline regretted her behavior the day before.
Jane, however, could not be cheered, and she fled back to her room at midday, claiming the sun and the wine had given her a headache. When Mr. Bingley found Elizabeth later and inquired after her sister, she could not help but be a bit sharp with him.
This was his fault, really.