Chapter 2 #3
And so Fitz traveled, with Wickham at his side.
France reopened at last under the brief peace following Amiens, allowing English gentlemen onto the Continent again after years of danger and uncertainty.
From Greece they journeyed through Constantinople, where Fitz wandered the ancient Hippodrome for hours while Wickham lost scandalous amounts of money gambling with foreign merchants.
Italy followed.
Florence.
Venice.
Rome.
Rome especially seized hold of Fitz’s imagination with almost painful force.
He walked beneath shattered triumphal arches and through the vast broken skeleton of the Colosseum while scholars argued over emperors and republics around him.
He spent entire afternoons at museums studying Roman statuary with renowned antiquarians whose published works he had previously encountered only in books.
For the first time in his life, he found conversation that stirred genuine excitement within him.
Not estate management.
Not society trivialities.
History.
Civilizations.
The rise and collapse of worlds.
In Rome, an elderly historian spent three hours discussing the engineering of ancient aqueducts, as well as the lost treasure troves that had been discovered, with Fitz. Afterward, the scholar declared the young man “the only English youth I have met who listens more than he speaks.”
Wickham nearly died laughing upon hearing it.
“It is because Fitz has spent years practicing looking solemn while other people enjoy themselves.”
Yet even Wickham’s mockery no longer cut quite as sharply as it once had.
Distance had clarified things.
At Eton, Fitz still clung desperately to the remnants of their childhood friendship. On the Continent, however, he began finally to see Wickham clearly.
Wickham was charming.
Exceedingly so.
People adored him within minutes.
Innkeepers offered better rooms. Ladies smiled longer than propriety strictly required. Men invited him readily to supper and gaming tables.
Wickham moved through life as though consequences belonged solely to other people.
Money vanished through his fingers like water. Debts accumulated quietly behind them in nearly every city. He flirted recklessly, drank heavily, and spent astonishing sums pursuing amusement that rarely held his attention longer than a week.
And always, somehow, Fitz paid.
“You fret too much,” Wickham told him repeatedly whenever finances arose. “What use is wealth if one cannot enjoy it?”
Fitz never answered aloud.
But privately he thought of Pemberley accounts. Tenant families. Stewardship. Obligation.
Things Wickham had never truly understood because he had never been required to bear them.
Still, despite everything, something in Fitz kept reaching for his father's approval, the way a man reaches for a door he already knows is locked, and he turned a blind eye every time his father’s valet de place stayed behind to settle the bills.
George Darcy had never once told his son he was proud of him—not plainly, not in words Fitz could keep—yet he had educated Wickham alongside him, laughed at his jokes, forgiven in him what he never forgave in Fitz.
Fitz understood exactly what that meant. He had understood it for years.
And still some small, humiliating part of him went on believing that if he studied harder, argued better, proved himself steadier than Wickham in every particular, his father might finally notice the difference.
It was easier to keep trying, than to admit that no version of himself had ever been the one his father wanted.
Their travels carried them onward through Austria and the German states.
In Vienna, Wickham danced attendance upon noblewomen while Fitz attended lectures regarding Roman military campaigns along the Danube frontier.
In Scandinavia, Fitz became fascinated by ancient burial mounds while Wickham complained constantly about the cold and the absence of attractive society.
Only Georgiana’s letters remained constant.
They waited for him in nearly every major city.
Thick childish handwriting at first.
Then gradually neater.
Dearest Brother, one began from Pemberley, Mrs. Reynolds says I must not feed cake to the dogs anymore because it makes them sick, though I think they appear very pleased whilst eating it.
Another included a tiny, pressed flower folded carefully inside.
I found this near the western stream and wished you to see it.
Fitz carried that flower for nearly six months tucked inside his pocketbook, only discarding it when it had entirely dissolved into dust.
At night, while Wickham vanished into gambling hells or private parties, Fitz often sat alone beside unfamiliar fires reading Georgiana’s letters again and again until homesickness settled heavily in his chest.
He missed her terribly.
Missed Pemberley.
Missed even the Derbyshire air.
But he comforted himself with the knowledge that Mrs. Reynolds remained there. Faithful, sensible Mrs. Reynolds: the woman who had raised Georgiana from infancy.
As long as Georgiana remained safely at Pemberley, Fitz could endure almost anything.
Even Wickham.