Chapter 14
“Yes,” Elizabeth said simply.
“Yes,” Elizabeth repeated.
Wickham turned a grave look toward the jury and then back at her. “Now, Miss B., may I inquire as to where you were sitting at the time of the conversation you overheard?”
She frowned a little but said readily enough, “I was sitting near the window in the parlor, which was at the corner of the inn. The front of the parlor was parallel to the street, and the side was along the alley where you and your companion were.”
“And was the window open?”
“It was. It was a warm day.”
“Did you hear anything besides our voices?” Wickham continued in a gentle tone.
Elizabeth was confused by this question, but she had sworn to tell the whole truth, and she leaned back in her chair and thought hard.
“I heard some feminine voices from farther away,” she said, “and there was a rooster that kept crowing.”
“So you state, under oath, that you heard more than our conversation,” Wickham said.
She blinked. “Yes, I heard other noises besides the sound of your conversation.”
Wickham nodded slowly and gravely, and then said, “Miss B., I do not have the slightest desire to denigrate your actions on the 11th of June. I have no doubt that you acted based on a genuine concern for Miss Dar … that is, Miss D., that she was in danger of being abducted. I can even forgive you for attempting to strangle me, since I am confident you genuinely believed you were doing the right thing.”
Elizabeth opened her mouth, closed it, and looked at Darcy, who was staring at Wickham with blazing eyes and a clenched jaw.
“Well, Miss B.?” Wickham asked in a gentle tone.
She gathered herself and said, “You did not ask me a question, Mr. Wickham.”
“Oh, I did not. I am asking whether you are completely certain that you understood the conversation. You were, after all, some distance away, listening through a window, and with other noises distracting you.”
“I am certain that I understood the conversation completely,” Elizabeth said flatly. “You and Mr. Zimmer spoke very clearly of abducting Miss D., and dosing her with laudanum, and taking her across the border of Scotland for a forced marriage over the anvil.”
Wickham sighed and cast another look at the jury before turning back to the witness chair.
“No further questions, Your Honor,” he said, bowing toward the judge and sitting down once more.
“Mr. Talbot, do you wish to speak to your witness again?”
“No, Your Honor.”
“This way, Miss B.,” the officer of the court said, and Elizabeth left with a mix of relief and concern. What had been Wickham’s purpose in asking such questions?
***
Darcy Carriage
On the Way Back to the Golden Daffodil Inn
Elizabeth’s eyes skipped across the cityscape like a flat stone over still water, flitting from one sight to another.
She felt restless, though her hands lay motionless in her lap.
The buildings of the sprawling city were a welcome distraction; the people moving up and down the road, the many businesses lining the street.
Rising above all of the other roofs, the spire of the cathedral stood tall and proud, elegant and lovely and severe as it reached for the sky.
Elizabeth wondered briefly if they might go and see it before leaving Derby.
She sighed. Her heart was unsettled, troubled by the memory of her time on the witness stand.
She had not liked the look on Wickham’s face, nor the questions he had asked her.
Perhaps it was only a natural reaction to her integrity being called into question, but she could not shake an uneasy suspicion that Wickham had been leading her somewhere with his interrogation.
She hoped that she had not unwittingly fallen into some trap.
If she had, there was nothing that she could do about it now. Mr. Darcy would tell them all what happened when he rejoined them at the inn, which he would do as soon as the trial was over. No doubt, he would be anxious to comfort his sister.
Elizabeth cast Miss Darcy an anxious look where she rode next to Mrs. Gardiner’s.
She was no longer actively crying, and she had mopped her face with her handkerchief, but the redness had not entirely receded from her puffy cheeks and eyes and nose.
She was still blinking a bit too often to keep her eyes from glistening brightly, and Elizabeth’s heart tugged with sympathy and worry.
The poor girl was miserably upset, and Elizabeth was glad to see that her Aunt Gardiner was holding the girl’s hand in a gentle and comforting grip.
Elizabeth took a deep breath. Miss Darcy would, perhaps, share the source of her melancholy in a while, or she might not.
It would be terribly rude to ask, so Elizabeth turned back to the window, seeking to distract herself.
She had never been in Derby before, and she always loved exploring new places.
She ought to pay attention to the city and enjoy the scenery and the people on the twenty-minute ride to the Golden Daffodil, rather than brooding on what she could not change now.
“He said that I agreed to elope with him,” Miss Darcy suddenly blurted out, and burst into tears again.
Elizabeth turned horrified eyes on the younger girl, while Mrs. Gardiner pulled her close and Mr. Gardiner removed a large handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to the distressed lady.
For a minute, Miss Darcy sobbed into the kerchief, and then she raised a woebegone face to Elizabeth.
“He said I agreed,” she repeated in a shaky tone.
“Oh, my dear,” Mrs. Gardiner said, “how absolutely dreadful.”
“But also not entirely unexpected,” Mr. Gardiner remarked.
The ladies all looked at him in surprise, and he continued, “It is his only hope, you know. If he can convince the jury that this was a foiled elopement with two consensual parties, the three rogues may all avoid a guilty verdict.”
“But surely,” Elizabeth exclaimed, “surely it must be obvious that Wickham is lying! Miss Darcy, you told them all that it was an abduction, I presume?”
“I did, of course,” Miss Darcy said, one last tear sliding down her right cheek.
“I told the whole story to Mr. Talbot. He asked very clear questions, and I explained it all; how I was surprised when Mr. Wickham appeared at the Tea Emporium but pleased because I remembered him from my girlhood. But then you warned me, and Wickham and Mrs. Younge tried to push me into the carriage. I was terrified.”
“Of course, you were!” Mrs. Gardiner exclaimed.
Georgiana bobbed her head and dabbed her eyes once more. “And then Mr. Wickham stood up, and he started asking me about the letters. I asked, what letters? He said that we had been writing one another for a year, that we were in agreement that we loved each other, that … that…”
She choked again, and Elizabeth snarled, “How despicable, how absolutely despicable!”
“I am afraid they will believe him,” Georgiana whispered, “especially if Mrs. Younge concurs.”
“But I heard him say that you would be drugged with laudanum!” Elizabeth cried out.
“My dear girls,” Mrs. Gardiner said in a soothing tone, “there is nothing we can do now except pray that the jury will see the truth. We will be at the inn in a few minutes, and then we will have a nuncheon and perhaps take a nap.”
“I am not certain I can eat,” Miss Darcy said timidly.
Elizabeth’s aunt bent a fond look on the girl and said, “Now, now, Miss Darcy, neither you nor Lizzy ate much this morning, and you must keep up your strength. Moreover, I am hopeful that when you see food, you will feel hungry.”
***
Court Room
Courthouse
Derby
George Darcy had taught his only son to allow nothing to impair his self-possession, not anger, or fear, or worry, or grief, or even jubilation. For many years, Darcy had obeyed his father’s precepts and maintained a rigid discipline over his speech and actions.
It was taking every ounce of that hard-won self-control not to vault the table before him and drive his fist straight into Wickham's arrogant nose.
Darcy emphatically hoped that he was the only one who could hear his teeth grinding together as the man spun his lies.
Everyone who cared to look could see Darcy's clenched fists, his nails digging painfully into his palms.
Such brawling would be beyond the pale, of course, and entirely unacceptable for any gentleman in a court of law.
He could only wait and trust in the judge and jury to have the discernment to see through Wickham's deceit.
In this, Mr. Talbot was proving invaluable.
Darcy had almost decided not to engage the man's services, thinking that the case could not be clearer.
He should not have forgotten Wickham's nascent legal training!
He had not anticipated such a defense being mounted, clever in its ruthlessness.
He was glad now to have spent the money necessary.
It was both a relief and a satisfaction to observe the experienced barrister questioning the rogue with such wisdom.
“So you are saying, Mr. Wickham,” Mr. Talbot said in a slightly sarcastic tone, “that in spite of your position as old Mr. D.’s godson and his kindness in sending you to school and Cambridge, you decided to run off to Scotland with his daughter without the knowledge or consent of her brother and guardian for an illicit marriage? ”
Wickham’s head drooped slightly, and he plastered a mournful expression on his face. “I assure you, sir, that I would not have taken such a step if I had not known that his son would refuse our marriage.”
“Miss D. is but fifteen years old,” Talbot said drily. “I am certain that the jury agrees with me that she is too young for marriage.”
Wickham sighed deeply and said, “She is full young, of course, but she was afraid … oh, I feel dreadfully at having to speak of such things in open court, but her brother had told her that she would be married at sixteen to a high ranked member of society for the purpose of improving the connections of the family.”
Darcy opened his mouth in protest, and then closed it when Talbot shot him a warning look.
“That is not what Miss D. said on the witness stand,” the barrister said coolly.
Wickham shrugged, his face sorrowful. “Well, she could hardly admit that she agreed to run away with me when her brother is so…”
He trailed off dramatically, and Talbot asked, “So what?”
Wickham waved one well-kept hand, “For all that I greatly admire my godfather, his son is not nearly as good a man as he. It grieves me, and I can only be thankful that my dear godfather passed on without knowing that his only son is so ambitious as to elevate his desire for connections over his own sister’s need for affection in marriage. ”
Talbot peered glacially at the young man for a moment and turned toward the judge. “No further questions, Your Honor.”