Chapter 27
Darcy’s horse snorted as they turned onto the drive that led to Rosings Park. He patted the stallion’s glossy dark neck. “I could not agree more, Saturn,” he murmured. As a commentary on Lady Catherine and the arrogant presumption of her actions, it could hardly be improved upon.
But whatever he might have thought of the mistress of Rosings Park, her grooms were above criticism. Darcy gave Saturn to them with a word of thanks and turned to walk up the long steps to the front door.
He was conducted at once to the drawing room.
Lady Catherine was there, seated, as was her custom, in a chair that rather resembled a throne in its ornamentation and position at the head of the room.
She extended her hand as he approached, her manner at once satisfied and expectant.
Anne sat near her in her usual place, composed but attentive, and Mrs Jenkinson remained close at her side with habitual vigilance.
“My dear nephew,” Lady Catherine began as he entered, “I am glad to see you returned at last. You have been gone too long. At last, all the confusion has been cleared away, and we may sort out what is to be done next.”
Darcy inclined his head slightly, but he did not take the offered hand.
When he spoke, his tone was even, but it had nothing in it of softness.
“I shall not detain you long, Lady Catherine, but I must speak with you. It cannot be delayed another moment. Perhaps you would prefer to speak in private.”
Lady Catherine must have expected something very different.
She drew herself up at once. “No, Darcy, you shall speak to me here and now. If this relates to the arrangements I have long had in view, you may be assured that I am entirely prepared to hear you, for I have always considered it as a matter which must, in time, be properly concluded.”
“It does not relate to that.”
The interruption was calm but decisive, and it produced a moment’s pause in which Lady Catherine regarded him more closely. “To what, then, does it relate?”
“It relates to your conduct toward Miss Elizabeth Bennet.”
The name altered her expression immediately. She did not rise, but the ease of her manner was gone. “I do not understand your meaning,” Lady Catherine said warily.
Darcy met her gaze steadily. “You understand me perfectly, but I shall humour you. You compelled Miss Elizabeth to leave her cousin’s residence abruptly and without the common civility which any guest has a right to expect, and forced her to take an unpleasant and wearying journey despite her recent injury.
You shamelessly misrepresented her departure to concealed the truth, and you deliberately deceived me in a manner that violated all honour, all honesty.
I still do not comprehend how any relation of mine, any person of supposed character, could have done it. ”
Lady Catherine’s colour rose as he spoke, and she answered with quick agitation. “I acted as I thought proper. The young woman was not a suitable visitor, and I had every right to dismiss her from my house.”
Darcy answered her levelly. “Miss Bennet was not staying in your home, and you had no right to treat her in a manner which could expose her to injury.”
“She has suffered none,” Lady Catherine returned. She rose abruptly from her seat, her voice gaining force as she spoke. “Her family received her, and if any inconvenience was felt, it was no more than might be expected from her impudence and her grasping ambition.”
“You mistake the matter,” Darcy said. “In the first place, Elizabeth’s actions have been entirely correct. She has never acted with either impudence or ambition. In the second, nothing could justify your conduct.”
Lady Catherine advanced a step toward him, as though to better assert her authority. “You forget yourself. I am not to be addressed in such a manner.”
Darcy did not move as she approached, and his answer remained entirely composed. “I forget nothing. It is you who have forgotten what is due to others.”
The restraint of his tone made the rebuke more severe than any raised voice might have done, and Lady Catherine was checked for a moment before she could reply.
“You have acted,” he continued, “with a degree of violence which cannot be defended, and you have done so under the pretext of an authority that you had no right to exercise. You have not only insulted a lady whose conduct was beyond reproach, but you have attempted to impose upon me by concealing the truth of what you have done.”
Anne, who had listened without interruption, now raised her eyes and spoke, her voice quiet but distinct as she addressed her mother. “Is this true?”
The question altered the whole character of the room.
Lady Catherine turned toward her impatiently. “My dear Anne, you need not concern yourself with this. Miss Bennet would have returned soon in any case. I merely hastened what would otherwise have occurred a little later.”
Anne did not look away. “That is not what I was told,” she said.
Though her voice was quiet as ever, she spoke with both determination and a hint of ice.
Anne, who had so long followed her mother’s will unquestioningly, would not be put off.
“You said she was called away unexpectedly, and that there was nothing in it which required further notice. If she was dismissed — if she was compelled to leave in such a manner — I wish to know it.”
Lady Catherine hesitated, and in that hesitation, the truth was already revealed.
“I did what was necessary,” she said at last. “I acted for your sake, and for the honour of the family. That young woman had formed expectations which could not be permitted, and it was proper that she should be removed before they could proceed further.”
Anne rose slowly, her gaze still fixed on her mother. “You dismissed her because you believed she might become my rival.”
Lady Catherine did not deny it. “I acted as any mother would act who had her daughter’s future at heart.”
Anne shook her head, as cool and certain as a judge.
“I would not wish my future secured by such means,” she said.
She turned towards Darcy and gave him a slightly rueful smile.
“I do not wish to marry my cousin. If I did, I would not wish it to be brought about in such a manner. To degrade another for my advantage would be no advantage at all.”
Lady Catherine attempted to interrupt her, but Anne continued without yielding. “You have misrepresented what passed, and you have done so in a way which reflects not on Miss Bennet, but on yourself. I cannot approve it. Excuse me, Mother. I have nothing more to say to you.”
And with a last nod to Darcy, Anne turned on her heel and left the room. After a moment’s hesitation, Mrs Jenkinson followed her.
Lady Catherine looked after her daughter for a long moment, her mouth gaping open in shock.
As Anne’s reproof sank in, she turned to Darcy in a rage.
“You see what you have done. You have turned my daughter against me and encouraged in her a spirit of opposition which I have never before had reason to fear, all for the sake of a young woman who should not have had the slightest claim on you.”
Darcy regarded her with composure. “I have encouraged nothing. Your daughter has judged for herself, and she has judged rightly.”
“I will not hear this,” Lady Catherine said, turning as if to dismiss him.
“You will hear it,” Darcy replied, before she could withdraw, “for it concerns not only what you have done, but what you may yet do.”
The calm authority of his manner made resistance impossible. Lady Catherine was visibly displeased, but did not interrupt him again.
“Hear me, Aunt Catherine,” Darcy began. “You have already lost the regard of those whose opinions you most value. I shall not soon forget how you have tried to interfere in my affairs, nor yet how you lied to me. Such respect as I once had for you, as my relation and my elder, is now gone. You are now in danger of losing your daughter’s confidence as well, and if you persist in the conduct which has produced this result, you will have no right to be surprised at its consequences. ”
For once, Lady Catherine had no reply.
“I would advise you,” he continued, “to consider what has passed, and to amend it where amendment is still possible. If your behaviour justifies such an indulgence, I will see you again for my cousin’s sake.
But if another insult towards my future wife should ever pass your lips, you will never see me again. ”
He inclined his head slightly, and without waiting for any answer, turned and left the room.
Darcy did not linger in the house, nor did he look back on it as he departed.
Whatever obligation he had once felt toward it was now altered beyond recovery, and though he could not entirely separate his present judgment from the habits of former regard, neither regret nor resentment was enough to detain him.
With her stern and proper judgement, Anne had punished her mother better than Darcy could have hoped to.
He was pleased by the justice of the arrangement, and doubly pleased for what it seemed to say about Anne’s increasing force of will, and what it might mean for her own future happiness.
His cousin had spent many long years following her mother’s will.
If Darcy was not much mistaken, that uncontested reign was about to end.
Almost as soon as he turned his horse onto the main road, Darcy’s thoughts turned from Rosings to what awaited him beyond it.
That he should soon return to Elizabeth, not in doubt nor in restraint, but with every obstacle removed which had once stood between them, placed all that had just passed in its proper light.
They need only wait for the banns to be read, and they would be married, with all uncertainties gone.
Elizabeth Bennet would be Elizabeth Darcy.
She would be his forever, and he hers. Georgiana would have a beloved sister, Pemberley would have a mistress for the first time in sixteen years, and Darcy himself would have a most cherished wife.
He could hardly wait.