Chapter 11
Georgiana Darcy was sitting gingerly on the edge of her bed, her eyes to the floor, her hands clasped in her lap, her bonnet lying at her side.
Facing her, on a chair placed a short distance away, Elizabeth waited, struggling to curb her own impatience. Darcy and her uncle had not returned yet, and she wondered how their interaction with Wickham was proceeding.
On the table was a tray full of small covered dishes containing a variety of food, all untouched.
“I have no words to apologise…I feel like I want to die or at least to disappear…of shame…and pain…” Miss Darcy whispered.
“I can imagine how you must feel, Miss Darcy. But you will not die. Besides, we wish you in good health now and in good spirits sometime soon. Especially your brother.”
“Would you not call me Georgiana, please?” she asked in a weak voice.
“It would be my pleasure. But only if you call me Elizabeth.”
“I am sorry for all the trouble I have caused you, Elizabeth…I fear to imagine what you think of me. And my poor brother…how can he ever forgive me?”
“Miss D…Georgiana, for my part, I think you have made an imprudent mistake, as many young ladies are wont to do, as my younger sister has done too many times, not to mention myself! I have been plagued by the shame of my own errors too many times in the last few months, but believe me when I tell you that, eventually, the agony becomes bearable.”
“I doubt your errors compare to mine, Elizabeth. My mistake is much worse, more mortifying, as it was done by design and long planned. I have been a ninny for a very long time…”
“Yes, you have,” Elizabeth agreed, and the girl stared at her, surprised.
“Georgiana, you are too clever and too well-educated a young woman for me to even attempt to say that your misadventure was not dangerous and life-changing in many ways. But it has happened to many other women before and will surely happen again in the future. Your brother will forgive and forget long before you will, I am sure. He wished nothing but to know you were safe and healthy.”
“You are a clever and educated woman, Elizabeth. You would never have been fooled by such a man. You would never have risked your family’s name or exposed them to shame and ruin.”
“Oh, my dear girl, you are so very sweet and generous. You resemble my sister Jane so much, and just like her, you are partial to me and not correct at all. I am much older than you, and I thought myself clever, and still I did allow myself to be fooled, by none other than the same Mr Wickham. Should you wish it, I shall tell you all the details of my own foolishness one day.”
“Oh…Elizabeth, is it true that he spoke ill of me? And my brother?”
“Yes,” Elizabeth replied hesitantly. “To be truthful, of you he only said that you were very proud and unpleasant in manners, ‘just like your brother’. What bothered me the most was that he specifically informed me that he had not seen you in a few years — which is a clear sign of his deceptive and devious plans.”
Georgiana lowered her eyes again dejectedly and nodded.
“What will happen now?” she asked. “Oh, I did not take my trunk from there, I have nothing with me to wear, no clothes at all…” She spoke with much difficulty, her voice almost inaudible, strangled by tears.
Elizabeth moved closer to her and took her hands.
“You really should not worry yourself with that. I shall find something from my own trunk for you for tonight, even though you are taller than me, and tomorrow we may purchase more clothes for the journey back. It will give you something else to think about. All will be well, I promise, Georgiana. I know everything looks gloomy now, and I can only imagine how much pain is in your heart and how despondent you feel…”
“I am more troubled by Fitzwilliam’s pain than mine. I am such a bother to him. He must be hurt and disappointed…and he has every reason to resent me—”
“Resent you? Dearest, how can you even say that? I have rarely seen a brother so affectionate, so devoted to his sister! He speaks about you with so much admiration and pride! There is no other subject on which he is more eloquent. I am sure he would do anything for you!”
“I know, he is the best brother in the world. But he was already upset with me when…” The girl paused and looked at Elizabeth, indecision clear in her eyes.
“You would despise me too if you knew…it was not the first time when…last summer I tried to elope with George for the first time, but I confessed the plan to my brother just before…”
Elizabeth hesitated a moment, wondering how to react. With no time for much consideration, she decided to choose honesty.
“I knew that. Mr Darcy told me in the strictest confidence. Nobody else knows…”
“Oh…you knew? Oh…so…I am sure you wonder how it could happen again…how could I have been such a goose, a ridiculous silly goose twice…”
Again, Elizabeth squeezed her hands and replied sincerely.
“I do wonder. But I am sure Wickham must have persuaded you in some way. It was not difficult for him to succeed since you knew little of his many flaws of character.”
“I can hardly believe what I heard earlier. I knew he was not flawless. Even he, himself, admitted his failings and his lack of ambition. He said he would change for me, once we were married…” Tears overwhelmed her, and she sobbed while Elizabeth embraced her.
“Georgiana, you may not answer if you do not wish to, but I must enquire. When did you speak about all this with Wickham? How? I understood from your brother that all connection with Wickham was to be severed after last summer…”
“I saw George in London last autumn. My brother was at Netherfield then, visiting Mr Bingley. I met him by chance one day when I was walking in Hyde Park…and then I received a letter from him…”
“A letter? How did Mrs Annesley allow it?”
Georgiana hesitated again, her hands rising to cover her face. “He signed it as Lady Anna Bell…he called me that when I was a child. Belle Anna, which means beautiful Anna. Only the two of us ever knew or used that name, so I recognised the letter. I know I should not have read it, but I did…”
Elizabeth immediately understood that Wickham had taken advantage of knowing precisely where Darcy was, and understanding that Georgiana was alone in London, attempted to approach his victim.
She was horrified by such audacity. It also dawned on her that this had probably happened during the Netherfield ball — Wickham’s sudden business causing his absence from the ball by ‘obliging him to go to town’ as his friend Mr Denny pronounced — and she recalled how at almost the same time she was attacking Darcy on the blackguard’s behalf.
“Then”— Georgiana’s feeble voice brought Elizabeth back from memories of her own silliness— “Fitzwilliam returned from Hertfordshire, and he was simply not himself. He spent more time in his library. He was very kind to me, but I felt he was somewhat different. And then he went to Kent, to visit Aunt Catherine, and George happened to be in town at the same time.”
“Indeed! How convenient,” Elizabeth slipped the remark, rolling her eyes.
“And when Fitzwilliam returned from Kent, everything changed…he was changed…I have never seen him like that. He barely spoke to me at all…or to anyone. He refused calls, he would not go to his club. He would rarely see our family. I am sure he was upset with me. I did not even know why… He could not have found out about me meeting George or about his letter. He avoided my company. He barely left his library at all…I found him drinking alone several times, other times he slept there, at the desk and when I asked, he claimed all was well…so…”
Every word broke Elizabeth’s heart a bit more, and the unexpected account delivered by so genuine a witness placed a block of ice in her stomach.
Words failed her, so she listened in silence, hoping the girl would not notice how ill she felt.
While Georgiana was completely unsuspecting of the effect her report was having and was oblivious to the reason, Elizabeth could easily deduce the cause for Darcy’s altered behaviour.
She had assumed that her rejection had affected him, but the dark picture drawn by the girl’s shaky confession grasped her by the throat.
“Did Wickham know?” she managed to ask.
“Yes, I wrote to him.”
“At his regiment?”
“Yes…I know it was unconscionable of me, foolish, but I was desperate! And he always listened to me and understood me. He replied that perhaps Fitzwilliam would rather live by himself, like any young man. He said that perhaps Fitzwilliam had not married yet because he had to take care of me…that perhaps it would be better to move into my own townhouse, that I should ask Fitzwilliam again that an establishment be made for me. And so it began…I did not move from Darcy House, but we wrote a few times, and one day, when I was back at Pemberley and visiting Mrs Skinner, I met him there, in the park. I did not think to ask how it came about that he was there. I was so surprised. Now, I realise he came undoubtedly by design. He said he loved me and always would and that my brother would eventually accept our marriage and would be relieved of the burden of being my guardian…and that he would work hard to build a career and to convince Fitzwilliam he was a good husband to me. He said nobody would understand me better than him…”
It was the longest string of words that Elizabeth had ever heard from Georgiana.
The long tirade seemed to both tire her and relieve her of a great weight from her chest. The more she spoke, the easier the words came out, and the tears flowed freely like the dam of her suffering was suddenly released.
Sitting by her side and trying to comfort her, Elizabeth shared the girl’s grief and took it upon herself, burdened by her own guilt and remorse.