Chapter Twenty-One #3
Mr. Darcy took a step closer. “Perhaps he has more to offer, but I cannot think such things would influence you – I refuse to believe you would be swayed by such interests – but he is a good man, his manner is more open and engaging. He would not require your instruction in teasing and mischief to be agreeable, but neither would he worship you, venerate your flaws and your perfections alike. What he has belatedly become aware of has tormented me from the earliest moments of our acquaintance. I have loved you since Hertfordshire, Elizabeth, and since your coming to London I have been of the immutable conviction that I cannot live without you.”
Elizabeth hugged herself and swayed a little, feeling as if her head had floated up off her neck.
She had never heard him make such a lengthy speech, and certainly never with such passion.
But something felt horribly wrong – and then she began to laugh, wild and unfettered laughter that scarcely sounded recognizable to her.
She held her sides as she sank down onto the sofa, tears pouring down her cheeks.
“The viscount had better realize he is perfect for my aunt, you darling, raving madman,” she cried, extending her hand and beckoning for him to sit beside her.
She began to lean back against the sofa, against the soft, plush cushions, but as her eyes slid shut she instantly jerked forward, blinking rapidly.
Mr. Darcy took her hand in his as he sat beside her. “Your aunt – of course. Gads, they speak of nothing but their children!”
Elizabeth burst into another fit of feral laughter.
“They really do! But it is sweet, and they have both suffered.” Still she chortled, unable to settle herself.
“As if I should make such a choice based solely on who proposed to me first. It is too absurd! But – wait – Mr. Darcy, are you proposing to me?”
Mr. Darcy sat up straighter, looking almost offended. “Elizabeth, are you quite well?”
Her laughter only intensified; she was entirely hysterical. She considered his question and shook her head. “No, not at all.”
Her eyes landed on the letter from Longbourn, which lay open on the table before them.
Mr. Darcy looked at it, and actually picked it up, his expression hardening.
She reached for it, and then stopped herself.
Perhaps he ought to know – she would be tainted by Lydia’s folly, and the desperation Mr. Wickham had been driven to.
Her laughter ebbed away, and fury took its place.
“I heard the colonel tell you to hunt Mr. Wickham down, as if you had not distressed his circumstances enough when you deprived him of the living that was promised to him. I supposed the colonel drove him out of the regiment in Meryton, and so he pursued my sister to the Forsters’ home, thinking to have her share of my family’s fortune.
Perhaps you will not want me, if it means you shall be his brother. ”
Mr. Darcy looked up from the letter, pain glistening in his eyes. “This is your opinion of me?”
Elizabeth despised herself for wounding him, but the anger that she had already failed once to control now again took hold of her.
“My opinion of you! You have insulted me, separated Jane from Mr. Bingley, and then in the face of my awful reprimand you behaved in a way I could scarcely account for. You were so gallant in that, and yet so despicably rigid in your newfound scruples when it came to Edward Ferrars. My opinion – what is my opinion of you? I hardly know! I have loathed you then loved you, yet I blame you as much as I blame that wretched man for making my sister ill. Two days and nights I have not slept or eaten for fear she would perish! And now another of my sisters is in peril and you come to me fearing I should be so fickle in my affections….”
Elizabeth was shouting and then whimpering by the end of her speech, and she covered her face as she burst into tears.
She felt his hand rest on her shoulder, comforting her with slow, tentative strokes.
She wept harder, wept for all the misery her sisters and cousins had endured, and may yet still, until she lost all sense of herself and what had provoked her.
Mr. Darcy moved closer, and she made no argument as he encircled his arms about her. Her cries were hideous, foreign to her own ears, and her body heaved from the force of her outburst, but she clung to him as if his embrace was her very salvation.
“Good God, Lizzy, what has happened?”
Elizabeth looked up and swiftly drew away from Mr. Darcy as her aunt hurried into the room. He stood, and Elizabeth did the same, but with such haste that she felt dizzy, her footing fumbled, and she shambled backward to recover herself.
“Elizabeth!” Mr. Darcy reached out to steady her, but she had staggered beyond his reach.
“I heard shouting – Lizzy, dearest, you are not at all well,” Mrs. Gardiner cried. “This is why I tried to insist you rest yourself.”
“What can I do?” Mr. Darcy began to pace. “This is alarming indeed; may I get you some wine perhaps, or anything you require for your relief?”
He had still been clutching the horrid letter of Lydia’s folly in his hand, and let it now fall from his grasp.
Elizabeth watched it land on the carpet and swayed with another wave of dizziness.
She looked back at Mr. Darcy, tears pouring down her face at his kindness, which she had done little to deserve.
And then the room spun wildly, her limbs all beyond her control, and Elizabeth heard him cry out as if from a terrible distance before everything faded away.