Chapter Eighteen
The occasion presented itself sooner than Elizabeth had anticipated, at an afternoon gathering given by Mrs. Fenwick for what that lady termed "a small and intimate circle of particular friends," a description Elizabeth had learned, by now, to regard with considerable suspicion, given how reliably Mrs. Fenwick's intimate gatherings produced precisely the sort of public exposure a genuinely intimate gathering ought to have avoided.
She had not wished to attend. Her aunt had counselled against it, given the unresolved matter of Wickham's letter still hanging unanswered, but a refusal, Elizabeth had judged, would only confirm to Mrs. Fenwick's circle that there was something to hide, and she had determined, weeks before, that she would not permit this business to drive her into a retreat that looked, to any observer, like guilt.
She had not, however, anticipated the particular cruelty of the trap Mrs. Fenwick had prepared for her.
"Miss Bennet." Mrs. Fenwick drew her aside within a quarter hour of her arrival, her voice pitched with just enough carrying warmth to ensure the small cluster of guests nearby could follow the conversation without appearing to listen directly.
"I wonder if I might trouble you to settle a small dispute that has arisen among some of my guests.
There is a story circulating, you understand, rather a persistent one, regarding Mr. Darcy's conduct in Kent this spring, and a rumour has reached me, from a source I need not name, suggesting the lady in question extracted from him a written confession of considerable detail, which she has since shown about to prove her own good conduct at his expense.
I did not credit it myself, knowing your character as I flatter myself I have come to know it, but I confess I should like to hear the matter denied plainly, from a source I trust rather more than idle gossip. "
Elizabeth felt the trap close about her with a precision she recognized, even in the moment of its springing, as considerably more sophisticated than Mrs. Fenwick's earlier attempt at Kent.
This was not a question designed merely to extract confirmation of her identity.
It was a question designed to force her, before witnesses, to either confirm the very connection she had spent weeks protecting, or to let stand an accusation that painted her as exactly the scheming, self-serving woman Caroline Bingley had always wished the world to believe her.
She understood, in the space of that single suspended breath, that Wickham's letter had already begun its work, whether through his own direct spreading or through some intermediary less careful than he had promised to be.
The rumour Mrs. Fenwick described bore too precise a resemblance to Wickham's own accusation to be coincidence.
She had a choice, in that moment, of two dishonesties available to her, a denial that protected her name at the cost of confirming nothing, or a silence that protected nothing at all while satisfying no one.
She found, weighing them both in the brief space Mrs. Fenwick's expectant pause allowed her, that she could bring herself to neither.
"I do not know the particulars of the rumour you describe, Mrs. Fenwick, nor do I know the lady it concerns, for you have not named her, and I will not presume to guess at a private matter that is not mine to discuss.
" Her voice, she was gratified to find, remained steady, though her heart beat considerably faster than her composure suggested.
"But I will say this, since the subject of Mr. Darcy's character has been raised, and raised, I think, with rather less generosity than the truth deserves: whatever passed between himself and whatever lady is presently the subject of this speculation, I have had occasion, this spring, to observe Mr. Darcy's conduct rather more closely than most in this room, and I can tell you with entire confidence that he is a man of genuine principle, considerable private tenderness beneath a reserve that does him no credit in company, and a willingness to take blame upon himself rather than let it fall unjustly upon anyone else, a quality I have found rather rarer in society than I once believed it to be. "
The silence that followed this declaration told Elizabeth, with unmistakable clarity, precisely how thoroughly she had just confirmed, without confirming anything explicitly, exactly the connection she had spent weeks trying to protect.
Mrs. Fenwick's eyes widened with undisguised satisfaction, and Elizabeth saw, in the faces of the small circle of witnesses gathered near enough to hear, the particular calculating attention of people who believed themselves, at last, in possession of certain proof.
"How very warmly you defend a gentleman you claim no particular acquaintance with, Miss Bennet," Mrs. Fenwick observed, with a smile that carried no warmth whatsoever beneath its social politeness.
"I defend him, Mrs. Fenwick, because I believe the truth deserves defending, wherever it is threatened by careless speculation, and I would extend the same courtesy to any person of my acquaintance whose character I had occasion to know better than the gossip presently circulating about them."
It was, she understood even as she spoke it, both entirely true and entirely insufficient to undo the impression her earlier warmth had already created.
She left the gathering within the half hour, pleading a headache that was not, by that point, entirely a fiction, and understood, walking to her aunt's carriage, that whatever ground she had gained in London society through weeks of careful, guarded conduct had very likely been surrendered in the space of a single unguarded defense.
The cost arrived within days. A note from Mrs. Vane, mother of the young lady Elizabeth had met briefly at the Hursts' dinner, arrived at Gracechurch Street with a coldness of tone that made its purpose plain without ever stating it directly, withdrawing an earlier invitation to a small family gathering in terms that suggested Mrs. Vane no longer considered the connection one she wished her daughter to pursue.
And a letter from Charlotte, arriving the same week, reported that Lady Catherine's displeasure had, if anything, sharpened rather than softened, her ladyship having heard, through whatever channels reached even to Kent with such alarming speed, that the lady in question had all but confirmed herself publicly in a London drawing room.
Elizabeth bore both blows with as much composure as she could summon, but she understood, reading Charlotte's letter a second time, that she had traded her own remaining privacy for a defense of Darcy's character, and had purchased, with that trade, nothing beyond a fresh and sharper danger to the very people she had hoped, through her silence, to protect.