Chapter Fourteen
MEANWHILE, IN THE actual study in the east wing, everyone was looking at Caroline Bingley as if she was some kind of demoness, including Georgiana, who—to be fair—had not been included in all of the ins and outs of this scheme, because Caroline had rather thought the other girl might not entirely approve of it.
“This is your plan?” Georgiana was saying to Caroline. She looked at Neithern. “I’m ever so sorry. I had no notion I was part of this. Of course I don’t wish to extort you into marrying me.”
“How do you even know of this, Miss Bingley?” Houseman said.
“Probably, you don’t wish to marry me at all anymore,” said Neithern to Georgiana, “not now that you know what it is that I am, which is not a duke at all, but a bastard.”
“Don’t say that word in front of ladies,” murmured Sulles, who was looking them all over with a strange look on his face. “I must say, I didn’t realize you weren’t of our blood at all, little nephew. This is worse than I could have ever imagined. Has anyone killed that Frenchman?”
“He escaped to Scotland,” said Neithern.
“Grandmother decided not to pursue, as I understand it. Not worth it. Besides, now everyone knows. I can’t believe Elizabeth told Miss Bingley, but then, she did seem wretchedly stupid in that way, telling Miss Bingley about her secret marriage and all of that. ”
“Yes, you can’t trust women, really,” said Houseman. “They don’t know how to keep their mouths shut, unfortunately.”
“Not in their nature,” agreed Sulles.
“Excuse me,” said Georgiana, hands on her hips.
“We could kill them,” said Sulles.
“No, we could not,” said Neithern in shock.
“It’s really much easier to kill a woman than a man,” said Sulles. “They don’t tend to be as strong and their necks are more slender and therefore easier to wring.”
“You’re disgusting,” said Houseman hoarsely.
Caroline rubbed her neck. “No one needs to kill anyone. Just make offers of marriage, as I’ve outlined, and this all goes away.”
“This is how you wish to gain a husband, madam?” said Houseman. “Truly? You can’t think I would ever trust you if you get me to agree by trickery.”
“It’s all trickery in the end,” said Caroline. “We women are forced to try to trick men into thinking there’s some reason to keep us around, to feed and clothe and house us. We must pretend as if we are worth something to you when it is quite obvious you only tolerate us.”
Sulles smirked. “I might like her. It’d be a pity to wring her neck.”
“No neck wringing,” said Neithern sternly.
“You like her, you marry her,” muttered Houseman.
Sulles considered. “Hmm. Well, I could do that, I suppose, but if my wife and I know your secret, Bartholomew, then I think we need a little something to keep us quiet, don’t we?”
Caroline furrowed her brow. “You can’t just pass me about like this!
” However, she was thinking that Sulles was the son of a duke, and that he had better connections than Mr. Houseman, though less money and means, of course.
However, she had always wanted to be married into a respectable family, and this would perhaps be a better choice.
On the other hand, Bishop Sulles had been reported to be violent, and seemed to, in fact, be violent, since he was casually discussing wringing her neck, and that seemed a terrifying sort of man for a husband.
But, in the end, it wasn’t as if Mr. Houseman would have a good opinion of her.
Sulles had said the words that she had never thought would come out of a man’s mouth about her. I might like her.
“Certainly, we can,” said Sulles. “Bingley, Bingley…” He tapped his lower lip. “Is your family in trade?”
Caroline sighed, rolling her eyes, neither confirming nor denying this.
“Well,” said Sulles, “you’d be better off marrying me, don’t you think? You and Houseman are doomed to be wealthy outcasts for the rest of your lives, never truly accepted into the society of proper men like me.”
“You’re a proper man, are you?” muttered Houseman. “What do you want to keep quiet, and to keep your wife quiet?”
“I have not agreed to marry him,” said Caroline, faintly.
“Well, money would do nicely, I suppose,” said Sulles, shrugging at Houseman. “And I think we need to do something about the line of succession, so… I shall need to father the heir, I think.”
“What?” said Neithern, eyeing him in something like horror.
“Oh, don’t make that face. It needn’t be anything untoward. It’s done with animals all the time. Insemination. You can even do the honors if you’re marrying this one, just with my seed—”
“No,” said Neithern.
“I shall speak to the duchess about it,” said Sulles with a shrug. “I think she’ll agree. She didn’t know, I suppose, that you weren’t related to us at all?”
Neithern bowed his head.
“I’m not necessarily agreeing to this,” said Caroline. She felt as if everything had spiralled out of her control, and this was not how she had wished this to go.
“Neither am I,” said Georgiana softly.
“Her.” Sulles pointed at her. “How do we keep her quiet?” He shrugged. “You’ll have to marry her, I suppose.”
Georgiana looked around the room. “I have not even really come out in society, exactly. I’m only supposed to be here for a very short time. In fact, it’s late, and my brother is probably looking for me!”
“Brother,” muttered Neithern. “He knows, too.”
“What?” said Sulles. “How?”
“Well, Miss Elizabeth Bennet or Mrs. Fitzwilliam or whoever she is has a very big mouth,” said Neithern, glowering.
“I found all this out on my own, thank you very much,” retorted Caroline. “I did not have Elizabeth whispering it in my ear.”
“Found it out how?” said Sulles.
Caroline shrugged. “I listened. Out of sight, but close enough to hear.”
“You mean you eavesdropped,” said Houseman, glaring at her.
“Does this one’s brother know, however?” said Sulles.
“Oh, yes,” said Neithern. “Elizabeth told me he was assisting her in discovering who her parents were. He knows.”
“Darcy,” said Sulles, thoughtful. “That name is known to me. He’s connected to the Matlocks and the de Bourghs, correct?”
Everyone looked to Georgiana, who nodded.
“So, what keeps him quiet?” said Sulles.
No one said anything.
“Let’s get someone to find him, I suppose,” said Sulles. “We’ll bring him here and we’ll sort it all out.”
MR. DARCY WAS too drunk to be locked in a room.
He spent what he thought was a reasonable amount of time at the door, trying to get it open.
He tried the knob a number of times and then drove his shoulder into it and then spent a bit of time looking at the hinges, which were painted over a number of times with ever so many layers of paint, and therefore likely not easily removable.
During all this, Elizabeth seemed to have gone rightly out of her mind.
She laughed about it for too long, saying rather loudly that being stuck together in a room was exactly what would happen to them, that it was just like the sense of humor of fate to have done this to them, and they shouldn’t be surprised.
When he tried to knock the door down with his shoulder, she gently scolded him not to do that. “You’ll only hurt yourself, Fitz.”
Then, as he was examining the hinges, she said, “Oh, look, a drink cart. Would you like something?”
Eventually, he turned away from the door to find her seated on the couch in the room, staring out the window at the distant light on the lawn of the ball, sipping at a glass of something.
He sat down next to her. “What are you drinking?”
“I have no idea,” she said. “It’s dark in here, is it not? I sniffed it and it smelled strong.” She laughed again. “I would have poured you one, but you didn’t say anything.”
He got up and went to the drink cart. He opened the bottles and sniffed them too. He poured himself something he was fairly sure was brandy. “We should not be drinking anything. We’ve both already drunk too much.”
“Yes,” she said. Then she laughed again.
He brought his drink and sat down next to her. “Lizzy, this is not funny,” he said gruffly.
“No, I know,” she said, and she was laughing again.
“I know, it’s tragic and awful, really. The worst is that we don’t know where Georgiana went off to, or why, but I suppose it does bode well for Neithern, in the end, though will she even want Neithern if he’s not a real duke?
Would you let her marry him, knowing what you know? ”
“I only want her happiness,” Darcy said. “After the business with Mr. Wickham, I wish her nothing but ease and goodness where men are concerned.” He paused. “I wish that for you, too.”
“Well, too late for that,” said Elizabeth, laughing again. She drank even more of her drink.
“I am sorry, Lizzy,” he breathed.
She set her drink down on an end table next to the couch and turned to him. “He is dead. We are trapped together. How long before you and I give in to whatever this is between us, do you think? I give us twenty minutes of banter.”
He got up from the couch, bringing his drink with him. He went to the window and put his fingers against the panes of glass.
“Don’t wish to marry me anymore, Fitz, now that you can?”
A lump rose in his throat. “I…”
Her voice was different. “Oh, you really don’t.”
He turned around to look at her. “I loved him. You loved him. Why would you—”
“Ah, yes,” she said, her voice bitter. “Now, it would be wrong, would it, Fitz? And you? You only do righteous things.”
His mouth was dry. “I’ve never wanted you for righteous reasons.”
“No,” she said, “you have not.” She picked her drink up again and looked into it, pensive. “And to be fair, I have never liked you when you were righteous, only when you were not. You have wanted me against your good sense, and I have wanted you only when you went against your nature.”
He went back to the couch and looked down at her. “It would not be wrong now,” he said softly. “Or, anyway, in a year—”
“A year?” she breathed.
“You must be in mourning for—”
“Yes, I know.”
Then it was quiet.
He sat down again. He drank. She drank.