Chapter 53
Darcy kept his silence because every answer within reach belonged first to Mr Bennet. The rope cut across his wrists. Wickham had tied it with more malice than skill; given time, Darcy might make use of that. For the moment, time mattered more than comfort.
On the other side of the wall, Miss Bennet waited.
Kerr had given her grievance, not proof.
He turned his head until his cheek nearly touched the plaster.
“Miss Bennet,” he said, “I do not know what Mr Kerr believes your father owes him.”
That was true. Not sufficient, but true.
“But you know something,” she said.
Darcy closed his eyes. Her understanding spared him explanation and denied him evasion.
“I know much of Wickham,” he said.
“Then begin there,” she said.
Darcy shifted his wrist against the rope and stopped when the chair gave the smallest sound.
“He was raised under my father’s protection.”
“Protection?”
“Favour, education, expectation. More than many sons receive from their own fathers.”
Miss Bennet was quiet.
“He did not repay it with gratitude?”
“No.”
“That does not surprise me as it ought.”
Darcy looked towards the opposite wall, though there was nothing to see but cracked plaster and the bar of morning light beneath the shutter. “My father intended a living for him. Wickham declined it and took money instead.”
“And spent it.”
“Yes.”
“Then returned.”
“Yes.”
A faint breath touched the wall. “How constant he is in disappointment.”
Darcy’s mouth tightened before it could become a smile. “He dresses disappointment very well.”
“He dressed it for Meryton.”
“Then you saw him clearly.”
“Not at first.” She paused. “Nor did my elder sister.”
The admission came quietly. Darcy heard the anger beneath it, turned inward.
“Wickham is practised.”
“Then Meryton was not his first performance.”
“No.”
“Nor his worst?”
Darcy’s hands closed against the rope before he could prevent it. The hemp bit deeper.
“No,” he said.
The answer left no room for pretence.
Miss Bennet spoke more softly. “I have no wish to compel a confidence.”
“You do not. But you must understand the men who hold us.”
“Men?”
“Wickham first. Kerr because of him.”
Darcy kept his voice low. “Last summer, at Ramsgate, Wickham attempted to obtain my sister’s fortune by deceit.”
No sound answered him.
“Your sister?” she said at last.
“She was sixteen.”
The silence sharpened.
“Then I withdraw every charitable thought I had not yet entirely dismissed.”
“Do not waste charity upon him.”
“And Mr Kerr?”
“He was there as well.”
“Then he knows what Mr Wickham attempted.” She took in a breath. “He was an accomplice?”
“Though he denied it, he was.”
A faint shift came through the plaster. She had come nearer.
“Were you alone?”
“No,” Darcy said. “He saw Colonel Fitzwilliam. He cannot mistake the connexion.”
“And yet, Mr Wickham brought you here.”
Darcy looked towards the door. No step sounded beyond it.
“Kerr’s grievance is stronger than his judgement.”
“And Mr Wickham’s?”
“His vanity.”
She breathed once, slowly. “Then Ramsgate gave them both something. Mr Wickham a humiliation. Mr Kerr a measure of your family.”
Darcy turned his face nearer the plaster. “Yes.”
“And Colonel Fitzwilliam will remember him.”
“He forgets very little.”
Three soft knocks came through the wall.
“Miss Bennet?”
He heard a muffled breath.
“Miss Bennet?” he asked, louder now.
“They have taken me because they do not fear my father as they fear Colonel Fitzwilliam.”
Darcy had no answer swift enough to spare her.
On the other side of the wall, Miss Bennet drew one careful breath.
“I had hoped,” she said, “to be wrong.”
Darcy flexed his hands. “Your father is not without friends.”
“No,” she said. “But I am without protection here.”
Something touched the plaster—her hand, perhaps, or her shoulder.
“A gentleman’s daughter need not be harmed to be injured,” she said. “She need only be missed.”
Darcy closed his eyes.
He had known it. Every gentleman knew it, though gentlemen seldom paid the cost. Rumour required little proof when a woman supplied the suffering.
“My sisters,” she said, her voice strained. “What will happen to my sisters?”
“Miss Bennet—”
“Jane will bear it first,” she said. “She will bear it most sweetly, which is to say she will bear it most cruelly. Every smile offered to her will ask where I was. Every kindness will pity her for belonging to me.”
He said nothing.
“Mary will find a lesson in it because she must have one. Kitty will hear whispers where there are none. And Lydia—”
Her breath caught there, scarcely more than a break in the plaster.
“Lydia will laugh too loudly. She will not know they do not laugh with her.”
Darcy’s hands closed against the rope.
“Miss Bennet—”
“No. Pray allow me the sum of it. Mr Kerr speaks of debts. Mr Wickham speaks of money. It seems I am to learn how much a woman’s absence may purchase.”
The words struck him with a force no blow of Wickham’s had carried.
“If any consequence attaches to your name because I am here,” he said, “I will answer it.”
The silence changed.
“Answer it?” she said.
Darcy bent his head towards the wall. “Yes.”
“Do not pity me, Mr Darcy.”
The words came at once, low and exact.
“I was not—”
“You were,” she said, her tone hardening. “I will not have it.”
Darcy drew one breath through his teeth and set his wrist again against the rope.
“Then I shall not offer it.”
The chair gave beneath him. He stilled it.
Pity had no use here. Honour did, if it could free her.
Darcy bent his head nearer the wall. “Miss Bennet, if that door opens and escape is possible, you must go.”
A pause followed.
“And leave you?”
“Yes.”
“That is a very convenient instruction for you to give.”
Darcy bowed his head, though she could not see it.
“Your return was the object of my coming.”
The wall held her silence.
“If you remain because I am detained,” he said, “you defeat that object.”
“And if I am discovered in the attempt?”
“Then you will have risked little more than they already intend. But if you succeed, you end their power over you.”
No answer came.
“You are not bound to me, Miss Bennet. You owe me no attendance, no risk, and no sacrifice.”
Darcy lowered his voice.
“If escape offers, take it.”
For several seconds, only the plaster answered him.
“I understand you,” she said at last.
Darcy exhaled slowly.
It was not assent. Neither was it refusal.