Chapter 14 #3
Jane stared at him for a long moment. Her eyes were not like her sister’s and held a different sort of feeling behind them, but he recognised resolution when he saw it. “You cannot think Lizzy will be satisfied with that. It will ease her mind to hear how you are.”
Darcy looked away, delaying his answer. No one wanted to admit to weakness, but lying to Jane would only hurt Elizabeth.
The truth always came out. “The surgeon says the poison will work itself away, but it will take weeks. I am exceedingly tired, but I feel more like myself every day, and can tolerate the draughts and nourishment Mr Hunter deems necessary.”
The chest pains were gone already, and his shortness of breath only bothered him on the stairs. His sore throat lingered, but the pricking feeling in his hands and feet was lessened. Exhaustion and nausea were the strongest and most distracting symptoms.
A shadow clouded Jane’s gaze. She pitied him.
He would be met with pity or revulsion whenever the story was told.
What would it be like once the world at large understood the events at Epsom?
It would be in all the London papers if it was not already.
He would marry Elizabeth in Hertfordshire and then hide them both away at Pemberley for months.
“How much did you drink for such an intense effect?” Jane asked softly. There was something about her gentle manner that made one feel she was trustworthy.
“Scarcely a sip.”
“How lucky you suffered no worse effects.”
He scoffed. “I am lucky Elizabeth did not drink an entire cup when it was hot and she wanted to be respectful of someone she thought was showing her a kindness.”
A swell of anguish staggered him. She had been so close to dying. She might have drunk the poison and died in agony, or she might have been crushed to death—and by only chance and luck had she been spared. How would he have lived with himself if she had died?
A gloved hand took his, and the contact forced him back to the present.
Jane offered her silent comfort, and he was not too proud to accept it—or he was so distressed that he had no choice lest he lose all control.
But he could not break down in front of Jane, so he collected himself and nodded his thanks.
She gestured toward a bench at the entrance of the sad space Woodcote called a park.
“I am sure we will become great friends from our united love for Lizzy,” Jane said as they sat.
Darcy wondered if she led him here to talk, or if she noticed him tiring. “And for Bingley too. I do not mind having him as a brother,” he said, forcing himself into cheerfulness. “Although it is not how your future sister Caroline Bingley imagined it would happen.”
If Jane was to be his sister, and if they were to be friends—and how could they not with her and Elizabeth being so close and he having a steady friendship with Bingley—he had to tell her the truth.
Jane must not know what he had done to keep her and Bingley apart, not if she was being so kind to him.
She seemed to know nothing of his failed proposal or what had happened to Georgiana, but she should know that he had delayed her current happiness.
“I have a confession, Jane,” he began. “I feared you did not care for my friend last autumn, and I had some foolish and selfish pretensions about your family. I never should have interfered,” he rushed to say.
“I thought it would be an unhappy connexion for Bingley, and one of unequal affection, so I encouraged him to never go back to Hertfordshire. I am exceedingly sorry.”
“I forgive you.”
Her answer was swift and without a hint of distress. She did not even sound surprised. “You knew? But when did Elizabeth tell you?”
“Bingley told me. He mentioned his sisters’ interference as well, but he takes the blame on himself.
He says he was more dependent on your judgment than on his own.
But you sent him back in April? Because Lizzy told you I loved him?
” He nodded. “I cannot imagine how such a subject was broached. You were not engaged whilst at Hunsford, were you?”
Certainly not, but he would let Elizabeth tell that story if she wished. “We had some frank conversations in Kent and…and she was furious with me. Rightfully so,” he added.
“It seems she has forgiven you,” Jane said. She did not have Elizabeth’s vivacity, but she had her own quiet humour. “And so have I, and so has Bingley. I am happy you and I will be brother and sister.”
Her words were a more profound relief than he expected. To cover his feelings, he coughed and said, “Will your parents come soon? Your father’s letter said nothing of their plans, but I am sure they were too much in shock to decide anything at that moment.”
“I doubt they will come since I told them Lizzy is lucid.” Perhaps his disapproval showed in his face because she added, “My father was worried, of course, but he has no patience for nursing.”
“And Mrs Bennet?”
Jane dropped her eyes. “She is most concerned that Lizzy is healthy enough to marry you, and if you are still here, she is satisfied.” In a rush, she added, “Lizzy needs the quiet, and I can take care of her. The surgeon was insistent on no visitors, anyway.”
“Surely your parents would not be considered visitors.”
“I think the matter was nothing to distress or vex her.”
He did his utmost to quell his feelings of abhorrence.
Elizabeth’s parents should want to see her regardless of the surgeon’s orders, or at least they should be here to see her as soon as he said it was permissible.
But Jane thought they would be more disruptive than calming.
Darcy was dying a slow death waiting to see Elizabeth, and only the fear of distressing her and setting back her recovery kept him away.
“Mr Darcy—”
“Darcy,” he insisted.
She smiled, but wore a serious expression. “Lizzy is worried about you. She knows you were poisoned, and she keeps asking about what happened that day with Lady Metcalfe.”
“Does she want to see me?” A hopeful lilt, he was aware, coloured his voice. “Ask me questions?”
“I will tell her you are recovering, but she wants to know what happened to both of you. I do not approve,” she said firmly.
“It is too soon. The surgeon said nothing should trouble her, that she should not concentrate on anything. But Lizzy would ignore the surgeon’s instructions if you asked to see her. ”
“No,” he swore. “I will discuss it when she is better, but I do not want to set back her recovery. How is she, truly? Spare me nothing, Jane.”
“She is sitting up for longer, but her head, though clear, is exceedingly weak. I feel that although she might be altogether doing well, all things considered, it is impossible to say when she might bear the removal home.”
“Or bear the reminder of what injured her in the first place?” Jane nodded sadly.
It disappointed him, but nothing was more important than her recovery.
“Then I will wait to see her. Tell her I have not even asked for an interview, although of course I will stay at Woodcote until Elizabeth can return to Longbourn.”
They both turned at a noise and saw his valet coming toward them. “The magistrate has sent for you. He has questions for you, and his man intends to bring you back with him. Shall I tell him to return and interview you here?”
He must give his deposition. All the fear and anger he felt on Saturday would return to the fore. “No, I can manage a carriage ride.”
“Sir, you are still very…ill.”
Warren had been about to say “weak.” Darcy resented the implication, no matter how true it was. Weak though he might be, it was not as though he were brittle and frail.
“Not so ill that I will give such critical evidence from my chamber in a dressing gown. Tell him I will be ready in half an hour.”
His valet left, and Darcy looked at Jane. “Do not tell Elizabeth yet about giving evidence. She ought not to worry about such a thing whilst she recovers.”
Darcy parted from her and carefully made his way into the house.
He would demand from the magistrate that Elizabeth be spared questioning until she was fully healed.
He was so extremely fearful of any ill consequence to her from an interview with himself that he would not press for it at all, nor encourage her in the hope that he would see her in spite of the surgeon’s warning.
Although not seeing Elizabeth was ripping out his heart.
“After Mr Henry Tessier directed our attention to the cart, I then saw Lady Metcalfe try to push a bundle onto the turf. When she moved to get a better grip, I saw feet and realised it was a person.” Darcy’s voice caught. They had been so close to tragedy.
“And you ran across the turf and climbed into the cart?”
“Yes,” Darcy answered. The magistrate, Mr Cole, and his secretary were in the former’s library.
He had given his statement regarding the arsenic and was now explaining the horrific moments before Elizabeth was nearly tossed in front of the horses.
“I climbed in and pushed back Lady Metcalfe from Miss Bennet, who was still wrapped in the horse rug.”
“Did she strike you?”
“I do not remember specifically. She did try to fight past me to get to Miss Bennet, but the horses had already run by. Two other men climbed in to help restrain her, and they removed her from the cart whilst another man tied her arms behind her back.”
“Did Lady Metcalfe say anything to you?”
“She screamed in outrage. After I untied and cut free Miss Bennet with a knife one of the spectators handed me, Lady Metcalfe said—” Painful memories intruded, and the swell of sickness sweeping over him had nothing to do with the arsenic.
“That getting Miss Bennet out of the way gave her daughter time to secure my affections instead. And she said that once I married her daughter, she could then marry Mr Travers, whom she referred to by his given name.”