Chapter Thirty-Eight
Longbourn
Elizabeth
Nearly two hours later, Elizabeth had heard enough to understand what had happened to the Hardings after they left Willowbrook.
Much of Julia’s illness remained a blur even to Julia herself, though she spoke through tears of her aunt’s death and of fragments from the difficult months which followed.
Her stepmother, who had been with child when Julia’s illness worsened, had returned to her own family rather than risk exposure to the same sickness, while her father and aunt had taken Julia to London in search of better care.
“She is still with her family,” Julia explained. “She has since given birth to a son and brought him to see us once I was well enough. Papa would not hear of her bringing so young a baby into Hertfordshire in winter merely to accompany us, so she has remained with her family until we return.”
“You have a brother?” Elizabeth smiled and squeezed her hand. “Then I have missed considerably more than I imagined.”
“So have I, it seems.” Julia looked down at their joined hands, her smile fading a little. “There are whole portions of those months which remain quite lost to me. The physicians tell me I must be patient, but they believe more will return in time.”
“And you remember Longbourn now? All of us?”
“Some things more clearly than others.” Julia turned her hand beneath Elizabeth’s and clasped her fingers. “When Colonel Fitzwilliam found us, I remembered very little of anything before my illness. It was not until Mr. Darcy brought me your letters that something began to change.”
Elizabeth stilled at the mention of Mr. Darcy’s name but said nothing.
“I read the first and remembered nothing at all,” Julia continued. “I read another, and another, until I had gone through every one of them. There were so many that when I reached the last, I began again from the beginning.”
“That must have been difficult.”
“It was at first. I knew from the letters that this Elizabeth Bennet must have been very dear to me, but I could not remember being dear to her.” Julia’s eyes glistened as she smiled.
“Then, somewhere during the fourth reading, I saw your face. Not as you are now, but beneath the old tree at Longbourn, laughing at me because I had become terribly cross over something I considered very serious.”
Elizabeth laughed, though tears immediately blurred her sight. “That does sound like us.”
“It does, does it not?” Julia squeezed her hand.
“After that, other things began returning. Jane, your father, parts of Longbourn. Some memories came only as impressions, and others quite suddenly. The physicians say the letters may have awakened associations which were already there, and that being amongst familiar people and places may help still more.”
Elizabeth could no longer keep the tears from escaping. “And if Colonel Fitzwilliam had not found you...”
“You would still be writing to an empty house, and I might still be wondering why the name Lizzy felt as though it ought to mean something to me.” Julia brushed at her own tears and gave a small laugh.
“So you see, I owe Colonel Fitzwilliam a great deal. And Mr. Darcy too. If he had not brought me those letters, I do not know when, or whether, I should have remembered you at all.”
“Then you shall be surrounded by all of us until you are heartily tired of remembering.”
“I am relying upon it.” Julia laughed before glancing towards her father, who was speaking with Mr. Bennet near the windows.
“Papa was much improved by then as well, and once the physicians believed I could travel, we decided to come to Hertfordshire. Mr. Darcy thought Netherfield would be the most convenient place for us to stay, and Mr. Bingley was kind enough to insist upon it.”
Elizabeth followed her gaze. “I am very glad you came.”
“So am I.” Julia hesitated, and something in her expression changed. “Though I must say again that none of it would have been possible without Mr. Darcy.”
Elizabeth’s smile faltered slightly.
Julia seemed not to notice. “Lizzy, Mr. Darcy told me everything. How he found the letters, why he opened the first and why he continued reading the others.” She paused and drew a breath.
“There is a great deal we shall have to discuss, but Colonel Fitzwilliam only found us because Mr. Darcy asked him to continue searching. He arranged for Papa to receive better care, settled his debts and brought me your letters himself. I do not know what would have become of us without everything he did.”
Elizabeth lowered her eyes to their joined hands. Three weeks had passed without a word from Darcy, yet while she had been wondering whether the search for Julia continued, he had not only continued it but found her.
Yes, he had restored her dearest friend to her, and gratitude for that threatened to overwhelm every other feeling. But could even so great a happiness undo the hurt he had caused her?
Before she could decide what to say, Mr. Harding approached them. “Miss Bennet, might I have a word with you?”
Elizabeth looked up. There were two folded papers in his hand, and the sight of her own name upon one of them caused something inside her to tighten.
“Of course, Mr. Harding.”
“There is something Mr. Darcy entrusted to me before we left London.” Mr. Harding glanced at the letters before holding them towards her. “Or rather, two things. He asked that your father read them first and, with his approval, that I place them in your hands.”
Elizabeth coughed softly, suddenly uncomfortable with how thoroughly Mr. Darcy had become the subject of the afternoon.
Her eyes went at once to her father, who met her gaze and gave a slight nod before returning his attention to Mr. Bingley.
That Papa had already read whatever Darcy had written made her curiosity considerably more uneasy, and she looked again at the papers in Mr. Harding’s hand. “Mr. Darcy gave you letters for me?”
“Two. This first was written some months ago, at Willowbrook, though he tells me it was never sent.” Mr. Harding held it out to her. “He believed you ought to have received it then.”
Elizabeth accepted the letter. The parchment had yellowed slightly with age, its edges worn from the months it had spent folded away.
She unfolded it carefully, and the date alone was enough to unsettle her, for it preceded their meeting in Meryton by several months.
As she began to read, the voices around her seemed gradually to recede.
Madam,
You do not know me, nor, until very recently, did I know anything of you beyond your name and direction.
I hope you will forgive the liberty of my addressing you.
I would not have presumed upon an acquaintance which does not exist had circumstances afforded me any other reasonable means of informing you of what has occurred.
Her eyes moved over the explanation which followed, much of it now painfully familiar.
Darcy wrote of Willowbrook, the Hardings’ departure and the letters which had continued to arrive after the house was left vacant.
He explained how they had accumulated in the care of the man watching the property before at last arriving at the admission Elizabeth had not expected to find.
I must also acknowledge an impropriety of my own. In attempting to discover the identity and direction of the person who continued to write to Miss Harding, I opened your most recent letter. I will not attempt to excuse an intrusion which I know I had no right to make.
Elizabeth stopped there, her fingers tightening upon the page.
He had written it before Meryton, before the assembly and before he had ever stood before her as Fitzwilliam Darcy.
She had spent three weeks believing that he had never intended to confess what he had done, yet the proof that he had once meant to do precisely that was trembling slightly between her fingers.
Thinking of it now, Elizabeth remembered that Darcy had mentioned this letter during their confrontation at Netherfield. She had been far too angry then to believe him, or indeed to give much credit to anything he said in his defence. Yet here it was, written months before they had ever met.
Elizabeth forced herself to finish. He had promised to make enquiries concerning the Hardings and to send her whatever information he discovered, ending with an apology that she had been permitted to continue writing for so long without knowing that Julia was no longer there.
Elizabeth lowered the page slowly when she reached his name and looked at Mr. Harding. “He should have sent this.”
“He said the same.” Mr. Harding offered her the second letter.
Elizabeth looked down at her own name upon the outside. She recognised Darcy’s hand now, and for several seconds she merely held the letter while the hurt she had carried for three weeks struggled against the evidence of the first one still open in her other hand.
“Mr. Darcy asked that I give this to your father first,” Mr. Harding explained. “I did so, but Mr. Bennet declined to open it.”
Elizabeth’s eyes went immediately to her father.
“I trust my daughter’s judgement well enough to decide whether she wishes to read a letter from Mr. Darcy,” Mr. Bennet said from across the room.
“And I trust the gentleman sufficiently to believe he has written nothing she ought not to see. Whatever he has to say is for Elizabeth’s eyes, not mine.
” His mouth curved slightly. “Besides, I should hardly improve upon Mr. Darcy’s mistake by opening correspondence which was not addressed to me. ”
Despite everything, a chuckle escaped Elizabeth. “A very admirable restraint, Papa.”
“I thought so.”
Her smile lingered for only a moment before she looked again at Darcy’s name upon the letter. Whatever amusement her father had afforded her could not quiet the sudden beating of her heart, and after one last hesitation, Elizabeth broke the seal.
My dear Miss Bennet,