Chapter XXVIII #2
“Does that man cheat everyone?” Kitty surprised everyone with her question.
Darcy answered, “Not for long. I promise you.”
Mr. Bennet folded his newspaper completely.
“You do not expect him to repay you.”
“No.”
“You wish to ensure that when he is found…”
“… he discovers that disappearing has not solved his difficulties.”
Mr. Bennet studied him for several moments. Then the corners of his mouth lifted. “I begin to suspect, Mr. Darcy, that you are a mighty opponent.”
Darcy met his gaze.
“Only where justice is concerned.”
Mrs. Bennet, who had followed the conversation with increasing bewilderment, finally declared, “Well! I hope the horrid man owes everybody.”
That broke the silence. Even Mr. Bennet laughed.
“Mr. Darcy, God bless you,” she said.
And Elizabeth followed Darcy into the hall. She watched Darcy draw on his coat with the same composure he had displayed throughout the conversation. He spoke as though he intended nothing remarkable. That, Elizabeth thought, was precisely what made it remarkable.
She watched him take up his gloves, entirely occupied with plans for her family’s future, while asking nothing for himself.
She became suddenly conscious that she was smiling. Her heart quickened, and she looked away before he could notice.
***
After many embraces, repeated promises to write, and Mrs. Bennet’s final injunction that Lydia was to eat well, keep warm, and never again trust a handsome officer, the travellers at last took their leave.
Lydia cried once more before the carriage had reached the gates, though she recovered with surprising speed when Elizabeth slipped an arm through hers.
She turned several times to wave towards Longbourn until the house disappeared behind the trees altogether.
Mrs. Bennet’s final embrace seemed still to linger about her, for she touched the ribbon upon her bonnet absently and smiled to herself.
Longbourn disappeared slowly behind them.
“I shall miss them dreadfully,” she admitted at last. “Thank you, Mr. Darcy.”
Lydia’s unexpected seriousness surprised everyone.
“For what?” Darcy asked.
“For everything.” She smiled. “I know very well it is all you.”
Darcy looked faintly uncomfortable. He had never learnt what to do when people thanked him. Criticism was much easier. “You give me more credit than I deserve.”
“I do not think it is possible. It is best if you accept our thanks.” Elizabeth said.
Darcy held her gaze for a long moment. In the end, he inclined his head. “Very well,” he said quietly. “I shall accept your thanks.”
He leaned back against the squabs with a faint sigh.
“Your father appears no longer opposed to the move.”
“Really?” Both Lydia and Elizabeth said at the same time.
“Yes.”
Elizabeth drew a quiet breath of relief. “Then there is hope. Perhaps I shall not need to become a governess.”
Silence fell within the carriage. Elizabeth looked from one astonished face to another and only then understood what she had said.
Darcy went very still.
“You had considered working as a governess?” he asked.
“All because of me! Oh Lizzy, I am so sorry.” Lydia turned anxiously to Darcy. “But she will not have to now, if we remove from Hertfordshire, will she?”
Elizabeth crimsoned to her hairline. She did not realise she said that out loud.
“That was before…”
The thought of Elizabeth compelled by necessity to enter a stranger’s household – dependent upon his temper, his generosity, perhaps even his whims – struck him with a force he could not conceal.
Worse still was the knowledge that she had contemplated such a future while he possessed the means to secure her from it, yet no right to offer them.
“Before what?” he asked, more quietly. “Before we found another course?”
“You found another course.”
She shifted in her seat. “I beg you will forget I spoke of it. I must have grown too comfortable among you all. The thought occurred to me naturally enough; I believed my family ruined.”
“I wish I could undo everything,” Lydia whispered.
“There is no longer any need to speak of it,” Georgiana said gently. “Brother, tell them. Everything will be well now.”
“It is a new opportunity for all of you,” Darcy agreed.
He, perceiving that Elizabeth wished the subject ended, turned to practicalities. “I promised that we would inspect the place and report upon it. Your mother will wish to know what ought to accompany the family and what may safely remain behind.”
“We are to the seaside?”
Darcy turned to Georgiana. “You do not have to come.”
She glanced at Elizabeth uncomfortably. “No, it is all right. I will be glad to go.”
The conversation lapsed into a comfortable silence.
Darcy, meanwhile, rested a hand against his coat. Several folded receipts lay safely inside his breast pocket.
Elizabeth noticed the unconscious gesture. “Everything went well in town?”
He looked across at her. “Better than I expected. They proved remarkably willing to part with Mr. Wickham’s obligations.”
Lydia leant forward. “You really bought them?”
“I did.”
She stared. “I never imagined debts could be bought.”
“Almost everything may be bought,” Darcy replied. “Provided one pays the proper price.”
Elizabeth smiled. “I suppose Mr. Wickham will discover that one day.”
“I hope so.”
There was something in the quiet certainty of the answer that made Lydia shiver with satisfaction.
“I should like to see his face.”
“I confess,” Darcy said, “that image has occurred to me as well.”
That surprised a laugh from all three ladies.
Elizabeth wondered. It was probably the nearest Mr. Darcy ever came to admitting he intended revenge.
After a few moments, he added, “I had one unexpected encounter.”
“Indeed?” Elizabeth asked.
“I met Sir William Lucas.”
“Oh?”
“He seemed delighted to meet me.”
“I can imagine.”
“He was considerably less delighted when I informed him that Georgiana and I are staying with your family.”
Elizabeth’s eyes sparkled. “You told him directly?”
“I saw no reason not to.”
“And what did Sir William do?”
Darcy’s expression became almost thoughtful. “For perhaps half a minute he appeared engaged in a severe internal debate.”
“A debate?”
“I believe he was attempting to determine whether he ought to warn me of your family’s disgrace.”
Lydia made an indignant sound.
Elizabeth, however, laughed. “Oh, poor Sir William.”
Darcy shook his head. “Eventually, he concluded that I must already know.”
“And then?”
“He appeared immensely relieved.”
Elizabeth smiled, but her smile gradually faded. “He expected you to leave us.”
“I believe he did.”
“And yet you told him you were our guest.”
“I merely stated a fact.”
She looked at him for a long moment. It was, she realised, precisely because he regarded it as no more than a fact that it affected her so deeply.
Society expected him to distance himself.
He had done the opposite, without hesitation, and without imagining he deserved credit for it.
She lowered her eyes. Her heart gave one quick, unexpected beat.
Across from her, Georgiana saw the look that passed over her brother’s face as he watched Elizabeth. She smiled to herself and quietly turned towards the window. Some conversations, she thought, were best left uninterrupted.
Conversation gradually gave way to a comfortable silence.
Lydia leant her head against the squabs and, despite every intention of remaining awake, was asleep within a quarter of an hour. Georgiana smiled at the sight and returned to the book resting upon her lap.
Elizabeth, however, found her attention wandering elsewhere.
Mr. Darcy had said nothing for several miles.
He sat opposite her, one arm resting against the window, his gaze fixed upon the passing countryside. There was nothing remarkable in the posture itself. It was only because she had spent the last few days observing him so closely that she noticed the difference.
The alertness had gone.
His shoulders had relaxed at last. There was weariness in his face she had not seen before, as though the effort of remaining composed had finally become greater than he could sustain.
She realised, with a slight tightening of her heart, that while everyone else had been celebrating Lydia’s return, he had spent the morning purchasing Wickham’s debts, the previous night reading yet another disappointing report, and the days before that searching half of London.