Chapter 48
The gravel shifted beneath Darcy’s boot as he mounted. Behind him, Longbourn’s door remained open, Bennet standing within it, one hand upon his cane. Wickham watched the canvas bag in Darcy’s hand and smiled as though coin already rang beneath the cloth.
Dust rose beneath the horses’ hooves and settled upon the hedges. Wickham rode half a length ahead, loose in the saddle, his old insolence restored with distance from Longbourn.
“Strange, is it not, Darcy,” he said, “how swiftly fortune shifts? This morning I carried a message, and now—well, here we are, you and I, upon the road together.”
Darcy kept his horse to a measured pace. At the first turn beyond Longbourn’s lower field, his hand slipped to the canvas bag. One small stone fell into the dust by the wheel-rut.
“How far?” he asked.
Wickham laughed. “So soon impatient? I wonder whether captivity will improve your manners.”
“I am not yet captive.”
Wickham glanced back. “No? Then you have a generous understanding of liberty.”
They passed between high hedges, then over a narrow rise where the road broke towards rougher ground. Darcy marked the turn, the low ash tree near the ditch, the broken rail beyond it. Another stone dropped where the lane narrowed.
Wickham’s gaze flickered once towards the bag. “You carry another man’s fortune very lightly.”
“It is not yours yet.”
“No. But it will be.” Wickham’s smile sharpened. “You came quickly enough. I confess, I had not expected quite so much devotion to a country gentleman’s daughter.”
Darcy looked past him to the road. “You have never understood why a gentleman acts.”
“I understand price.”
“Plainly.”
For a while, only hoofbeats and the creak of leather filled the lane. Wickham took a side track where the hedgerow thinned and the ground grew rutted from carts. Darcy let another stone fall at the entrance and saw, without turning his head, that Wickham had not noticed.
“Whose track is this?” Darcy asked.
“One that keeps us from company.”
“Yours?”
“Today.”
“And yesterday?”
Wickham did not answer.
They rode another quarter of a mile before a low building appeared beyond a stand of scrub and ash: an abandoned stable or cart-shed, its roof sunken at one end, its door hanging crooked from an iron strap.
No smoke rose from it. No sound came from within.
A single horse stood tethered in the shade beside the wall.
Wickham drew rein. “Our destination, sir. Modest, but sufficient.”
Darcy dismounted, keeping the canvas bag in his hand. The stones shifted inside it with a dull weight. Wickham looked at it and smiled.
“You see?” he said. “We understand one another after all.”
“No,” Darcy said. “We do not.”
The door opened before Wickham could answer. Kerr stood within, pale against the dimness behind him, his coat unbuttoned and his expression already hardening at the sight of Darcy.
“What is this?” Kerr said.
Wickham spread one hand. “Surety.”
Darcy looked past Kerr into the stale dark of the building. Somewhere within, a board gave a faint creak.
Miss Bennet.
He did not move towards the sound. Not yet.
Kerr’s eyes dropped to the bag, then returned to Wickham. “You were told to bring an answer.”
“I brought a better one.” Wickham’s smile did not reach his eyes. “Darcy offers himself as surety until the money is called for.”
Kerr went still. Surprise crossed his face first; calculation followed close upon it.
“I see Miss Bennet first,” Darcy said.
* * *
Darcy House, late afternoon
Colonel Fitzwilliam had not left Darcy’s house.
He had seen to Perseus, sent for reinforcements, and instructed Hudson to provide whatever four veterans might require before taking the field on English soil.
They arrived without ceremony and settled where the room best served them.
Villiers stood nearest the door, as he had stood nearest too many doors in Spain, Portugal, and worse places men did not name in drawing rooms. He had been Fitzwilliam’s batman long before he had become his shadow in a fight; he could hear trouble through two walls and sort it before a footman had finished announcing it.
Harris and Simms occupied opposite sides of the hearth.
They were armourers by trade and Quince Men by blooded reputation, two of that quiet company whose name had once run so close behind the colonel’s that officers learned caution when they spoke of impossible work.
Harris was narrow, grey-eyed, and clean-shaven, with a hand that never rested far from his coat.
Simms looked heavier and slower until one noticed that nothing in the room escaped him.
Between them, any blade in London would have found kin.
The bell rang below.
Villiers’s head turned. A moment later, hoarse words rose from the hall: Mr Darcy. Express. Longbourn.
Villiers opened the library door before the footman reached it. James stood below, one hand braced against the newel post, dust from road and field streaking his coat. His face had gone grey beneath it.
“For Colonel Fitzwilliam,” James said, holding up the sealed sheet.
Villiers took it and glanced once at the seal. “Well done, James. Spill any blood?”
James blinked. “No, sergeant.”
“Good lad. Leave that to the colonel. Kitchen with you.”
“But Mr Darcy—”
“Will still need you breathing when next he gives an order. Off you go.”
James’s mouth tightened, but he bowed and let the footman take him towards the servants’ passage. Villiers shut the door and crossed to the desk.
“From Longbourn, sir.”
Fitzwilliam broke the seal. He read the first lines in silence. Then he looked once at Villiers, Harris, and Simms.
“Attend.”
He read aloud, omitting the initial.
Miss Elizabeth Bennet, daughter of Mr Thomas Bennet of Longbourn, was taken yesterday afternoon between Oakham Mount and the lower lane. A covered cart was seen near the mill lane. The demand is ten thousand pounds, to be delivered by Mr Bennet’s hand.
Wickham brought the demand and is to return at noon for Mr Bennet’s answer.
The man named Kerr, whom we encountered with Wickham at Ramsgate, may be involved.
Bennet recalls the name Kerr in connexion with Lord Julian Ashby’s family.
This may be an old grievance attached to Bennet, as well as the Darcy and Fitzwilliam families, though Bennet does not yet know the nature of the present demand beyond money.
Roark’s name has arisen. I do not know whether he directs this matter, lends men to it, or only furnished Kerr with means. Go to Roark before you come to Longbourn. If he has a hand in this, he may know where Miss Bennet is held, or who does.
I shall keep Wickham engaged and offer myself as surety until the money is called for.
Come quickly and bring whom you trust.
D
No one spoke when he finished. Simms looked at Harris. Villiers looked at Fitzwilliam.
“Roark first,” Fitzwilliam said.
Villiers nodded. “Then we had best not knock like gentlemen.”