17. The Awful Truth
The Awful Truth
The statement occasioned a new expression on Mr Darcy’s countenance. Since his arrival, he had shown more feeling on his usually cool mien than Elizabeth had believed him capable. She had seen him concerned, startled, earnest, angry, and offended. Now he exhibited shock.
“Protect them from Bingley? Of what do you speak?”
Mr Darcy did not wait for her response but made a further, heated protest. “I criticised my friend for youthful ebullience and lack of seriousness, but he is neither a scoundrel nor a libertine. He would not importune a woman in his employ.”
Elizabeth raised her chin proudly. “Jane was raised in a household where no matter the silliness of my mother and sisters or my father’s disinterest in managing his estate, all of us treat our servants with respect. She deserves better than a man who flirts openly with maids.”
Mr Darcy flinched, and Elizabeth watched as his expression moved from perplexed to wary. Finally, in a voice as full of disbelief as disgust, he said, “Do you suggest Bingley abused a servant at Longbourn?”
“I refer to events at Netherfield that I believe were not unknown to you.”
“I do not take your meaning. Please, explain.” He stood behind the chair across from her. His astonished expression was gone, replaced by a pained gravity that stirred something inside of her.
Elizabeth swallowed. She had not spoken of what she had seen to anyone but her aunt Gardiner. To speak of what it meant—what it implied—to a gentleman who was friend to the man she accused! Well, it needed to be done.
Mr Darcy’s gaze sharpened as she described seeing Mr Bingley stand in a little-used corridor with a maid and later lean too close and pass her something. “The following day, when I left you and Mrs Hurst and Miss Bingley in the gardens, I saw them again.”
Sighing, Mr Darcy gripped the carved oak frame on the back of a maroon velvet chair that once had gathered dust in Rosings’s attics. “Was she red-haired? Rather slight?”
At her nod, he closed his eyes briefly before pacing to the other side of the room.
She saw rather than heard him take a deep breath.
His shoulders rose and fell before he turned and stepped towards her.
He eyed the chair across from her but did not take it.
“Your sister was placed in the guest wing at Netherfield, away from the family wing,” he said quietly.
“You would not have met Miss Bingley’s lady’s maid. ”
She shook her head.
“As you surmised from your acquaintance with Miss Bingley, she was unhappy in Hertfordshire. A day before Miss Bennet came to the house and fell ill, Bingley’s sisters had argued, as they often do, and Miss Bingley, in her anger, threw a hairbrush at her lady’s maid.”
“Oh!” Elizabeth’s hand flew to her mouth, and he paused, nodding as if to show he shared her disgust.
“The brush was silver and heavy enough that, when it hit the woman near the eye, it blackened it. The apothecary advised bed rest and cold cloths to alleviate the pain and swelling. The red-haired servant you saw with Bingley was sent from my house in town to fill the role of lady’s maid.
She is the niece of my housekeeper, and unlike the hired servants at Netherfield, she—Nora Russell—is known to Bingley. ”
“Known well enough to pull aside into private conversations?”
“She was made aware of the circumstances requiring her service at Netherfield. I am unsure of Mrs Hurst’s trustworthiness, nor do I know the servants hired locally, so I had requested Nora keep Bingley apprised of his sister’s temper within her rooms and of the condition of Miss Bingley’s maid.”
“Oh.” Some of her anger was assuaged—certainly all her ire at Mr Darcy was gone—yet she could not overlook how careless Mr Bingley had been to have such intimate meetings with a lady’s maid. Mr Darcy must have read her thoughts as he continued his explanation.
“Truly, it was nothing more than a servant reporting to her employer. Perhaps I should have requested the girl come to me, but for the sake of Bingley’s pride, I wished to allow any communication to remain within his family.
” Frowning, he pushed at the lock of hair that had fallen across his brow.
“However, Bingley was a fool to speak to her in so familiar a manner within public view. And to give her something… Might he have been adding to her wages? He has a kind heart, but he lacks…”
“Sense and discretion,” Elizabeth murmured, suddenly gripped by the gravity of her mistake, of the assumptions she had made and shared. She had misunderstood what she had witnessed. She had misjudged Mr Bingley and thrown her disgust at Mr Darcy.
I underestimated the awfulness of Miss Bingley. At least there I did not go too far.
Such consolation meant little when she considered the true victims of her error. Had she ruined Jane’s happiness? Sinking more deeply into her chair, she looked away from Mr Darcy, who remained standing, evidently still stunned by the turn in conversation, and gazed out the window.
The silence they shared was broken by the chiming of the mantel clock. When the eighth and final peal sounded, Elizabeth, still somewhat numb with new understanding, heard Mr Darcy clear his throat.
“Miss Bennet, you and your sister left Longbourn soon after we returned to London. Am I correct that you separated her from Bingley based on this misunderstanding?”
I did. I judged Mr Bingley as immoral when it was likely he was merely stupid.
She weighed her words and felt all the consequence of her blunder.
“I said nothing to Jane of what I had seen—what I thought I had seen. I was horrified and worried for my sister, and after cautioning her against showing more inclination in Mr Bingley’s favour, I encouraged her to visit my sensible aunt in Cheapside. ”
“I see.”
Mr Darcy stared at her in grim astonishment, prompting Elizabeth to remind him that both parties were equal in their abandonment.
“Your friends were eager to give up Netherfield and forsake the neighbourhood.”
“Bingley planned to return.”
His reply sparked in Elizabeth the sort of anger that usually only Lydia could rouse.
“Did he break his leg in London? Perhaps that would excuse his absence, for he did not return within the few days he had promised, and all of you had already followed him to town.” She drew her hands to her face, steepling them to her lips as she took a calming breath.
“As you would imagine, your removal so quickly after the ball led to speculation that something untoward may have occurred that night and caused distress to the servants hired locally who found themselves without employment.”
A slight wince, the crease in his brow, made evident that Mr Darcy—a proud master—felt the sting of his friends’ actions.
“It was then I was decided that, despite the friendliness he had exhibited towards my sister, his feelings were not genuine.” Elizabeth hesitated.
Already she had insulted Mr Darcy and overstepped in speaking to Colonel Fitzwilliam about his own rumoured alliance with Miss de Bourgh.
Dare she mention the romantic intentions Miss Bingley had implied in her letter?
No, she would not, not when Mr Darcy stood before her, already wounded by his own misdirected affections and her unjust accusations.
Yet even as shame flooded through her, Elizabeth could not stop herself from alluding to his friend’s fickleness.
“Had Mr Bingley’s interest in Jane been earnest, he should have returned to Netherfield.
When he did not, we were left to suppose that his affections might lie elsewhere. ”
Mr Darcy’s response neither confirmed nor denied her suggestion. “Bingley alone must take responsibility for his lack of conviction. Like any man,” he said, his voice rough, “he is the author of his own mistakes.”
Before she could reply, Mr Darcy had stepped across the room and retrieved his hat. He turned to her, his face pale and his eyes strained.
“You have long desired my absence. Forgive me for having taken up so much of your time and accept my best wishes for your health and happiness.”