Nothing to Observe
Nobody spoke.
Elizabeth looked from Richard to Darcy. Whatever she saw in Darcy’s face was enough.
At last Bingley said, “Good God.”
Richard’s eyes moved around the hall with the rapid assessment of a soldier reading ground. Miss Bingley had appeared at the drawing room door. Mrs Hurst behind her. Morris at the far end of the passage, perfectly still.
“We need to speak privately,” Richard said.
“Yes,” Darcy said. His voice was entirely controlled, which was worse somehow than if it had not been.
Elizabeth had understood it, not the detail, but the shape. Another attempt. Tomorrow. The burned library and the locked door had not been the end of it. They had been a message about what was coming.
“Miss Elizabeth,” he said. “The carriage…”
“I heard you,” she said quietly. “I am going.”
But she did not move immediately. Neither did he. Richard and Bingley were watching; Morris, with his back turned at the far end of the passage, was listening too carefully. Darcy did not care about any of them.
“Miss Elizabeth,” he said quietly. “I am sorry. For last night. For this morning. For all of it.”
It was not enough. It was not close to enough. But it was what he had, standing in a hall with his cousin covered in road dust and a letter in Richard’s coat that meant everything had changed.
“I know,” she said.
Then she turned and went upstairs. Darcy watched her go. Richard’s hand came down on his shoulder, not gently.
“My study,” Bingley said quietly. “Now.”
They went. Bingley closed the door. Morris took up his position outside it without being asked.
Richard’s eyes moved briefly from Darcy to Bingley and back.
Darcy answered with a slight nod. Richard accepted this without comment.
He had always trusted Darcy’s judgement in danger, even when he disagreed with his conclusions elsewhere.
“Bingley,” he said, turning. “What I am about to tell you does not leave this room.”
“I am aware of that.”
Richard nodded once, apparently satisfied. Richard did not sit. He stood in the middle of the room with his riding coat still on and produced two letters from inside it. He set them on the desk side by side.
“Morris’s express I expected,” he said. “This one I did not.” He tapped the second letter. “Jenkins. Lambton. Sent yesterday morning.”
“Wickham left Pemberley yesterday,” Richard said. “With Georgiana and the children. They are on the road south.”
“He was already coming,” Darcy said.
“Yes. Before he could have had word about the fire either way.”
“Then his journey may be connected,” Bingley said.
“We believe it is,” Richard replied. “He will be here tomorrow. Perhaps tonight.”
“We receive him,” Richard said. “Normally. A terrible accident, unstable candle, old curtains. We are shaken but well. We watch him.”
“And Georgiana,” Darcy said quietly.
Richard’s hand remained on the letters. “And Georgiana.”
Bingley had questions. He asked them steadily and without flinching, which confirmed what Darcy had already concluded about his friend’s character.
Richard answered most of them. Darcy answered the ones Richard could not.
They told him only what he must know: that the fire had been deliberate, that Wickham was almost certainly involved, and that the danger had not ended when the flames were extinguished.
By the end, Bingley said only, “Right.”
That was all. Then he stood and went to the sideboard and poured three measures of brandy, and brought them back, and sat down again.
Richard leaned forward. “He will be watching everything. Every servant, every arrangement, every conversation within his hearing. He reads rooms extremely well.”
“He has had years of practice,” Darcy said.
“Henderson and Morris will need to be briefed,” Richard said. “The household needs to hold. One wrong look, one servant who behaves oddly, and he will know.”
“Morris will manage it,” Darcy said.
“Georgiana must not be alarmed,” Richard said. “And Wickham must not see that we are.”
“And Miss Elizabeth?” Bingley said.
Darcy’s hand tightened around the glass.
“What does she know?” Richard asked.
“Enough,” Darcy said.
“That is not an answer.”
“It is the only one I have.” Darcy set the glass down untouched. “She knows the fire was no accident. She knows there is more than I have told her. She heard your arrival. She heard tomorrow.”
“And she is leaving.”
“Yes.”
“For Longbourn.”
“Yes.”
“Can Wickham connect her to you?”
Darcy did not answer quickly enough.
Bingley made a sound under his breath and looked away.
Richard’s mouth flattened. “Darcy.”
“She and her sister have been here nearly a week,” Darcy said. “The neighbourhood knows it.”
“Yes,” Richard said. “And Wickham will hear it the moment he arrives.”
“Then they go home,” Darcy said. “I keep away from her. If there is nothing to observe, there is nothing for him to use.”
“Darcy.”
“I will be in the hall,” Darcy said.
Bingley rose. “I will have Morris tell them the carriage is ready.”
He went to the door. Then stopped.
“Could he not simply…” He turned back. “Gretna Green.”
“If they were married,” Bingley continued, “Wickham loses the lever entirely. And…”
“No,” Richard said.
Bingley blinked.
“A marriage would not end Wickham’s authority over Darcy.”
“And it would place Miss Elizabeth openly at the centre of the dispute,” Richard continued. “It would make her easier to use, not harder.”
Bingley opened the door and went out, no doubt to find Morris and the carriage.
“And Georgiana,” Darcy said quietly.
Richard looked at him then, and for the first time since he had entered the room, some of the soldier left his face.
“Yes,” he said. “And Georgiana.”
Darcy went out. Miss Bingley had retreated somewhere. Mrs Hurst with her. The servants had found tasks in other parts of the house. Morris stood at the far end of the passage with his back turned, which meant he was listening to everything.
Miss Bennet was at the foot of the stairs with her bonnet on, pale but composed, her travelling things beside her. Bingley was with her, speaking quietly and trying very hard not to show what he felt.
Elizabeth stood a little apart, her bonnet in her hands, not yet put on.
Darcy crossed the hall. Not quickly. Not slowly. Simply directly, because there was no point in anything else.
“Miss Elizabeth,” he said.
“Mr Darcy,” she said.
“The carriage is ready.”
“Yes. You are not going to tell me anything else.”
It was not a question.
“No,” he said. “Not today.”
“Then I will go,” she said.
“Yes,” he said. “Please.”
The word stopped her.
For one dangerous moment he thought she might refuse him.
Then Miss Bennet coughed softly at the foot of the stairs, and Bingley turned at once, all anxious attention. Elizabeth looked towards her sister. Whatever she might have said was gathered away.
“Very well,” she said as she put on her bonnet.
Darcy watched the small, ordinary motion as though it were a door closing.
Miss Bennet came forward then, and Bingley offered his arm with a care that would have been excessive if she had not looked so pale. He handed her into the carriage himself and stood beside the door a moment longer than necessary, speaking too low for Darcy to hear.
Elizabeth followed. She did not take Darcy’s hand. He had not offered it. At the step she paused and looked back once.
“Goodbye, Mr Darcy.”
“Goodbye, Miss Elizabeth.”
The door closed. The carriage moved off down the drive, wheels loud on the gravel in the cold morning air. Darcy stood in the hall doorway until it had disappeared beyond the bend.
Behind him, Richard said nothing. That was kind of him.
The hours after the Bennets’ departure were spent restoring Netherfield to an appearance of ordinary life.
He heard the carriage before he saw it.
It was not yet four o’clock but the November light had already flattened to grey, and Darcy had been at the window long enough that Fletcher had twice found a reason to come in and twice found a reason to leave again.
The carriage came into view at the bend of the drive. Wickham got out first. Of course he did. He handed Georgiana down with easy assurance, the gesture perfectly judged. She took his hand and stepped down and looked up at the house. Then the children.
Darcy looked away from the window. Fletcher was waiting with his coat. Darcy put it on without comment. In the mirror he looked composed and a little tired. He had practised that version of himself in the glass that morning until it felt natural. It did not feel natural.
“Sir,” Fletcher said quietly.
“I know,” Darcy said.
He went downstairs. Bingley was already in the hall, which was exactly what Darcy would have expected from Bingley. Richard stood to one side with the same stillness that meant he was reading everything and showing nothing. Morris was at the door.
The sound of boots on the steps outside.
Then the door opened, and Wickham came in.
He looked well. He always looked well. It was one of the things Darcy had spent years trying not to notice.
Coat perfectly fitted, colour good from the journey, the easy smile already in place before he had fully crossed the threshold.
His eyes found Darcy immediately. In the fraction of a second before the smile reached them, Darcy saw it.
Disappointment. Genuine, unguarded, involuntary disappointment. Gone before anyone else could have caught it. Replaced instantly with warmth and concern and brotherly affection.
But Darcy had seen it. He knows I am alive, Darcy thought. And he is disappointed. Which means he did not know until this moment.
Miss Bingley appeared at the drawing room door a moment after Morris opened it, drawn by the sound of arrival. She took in the newcomers at once: the quality of Wickham’s coat, his ease of manner, the bearing of the woman beside him.
“I beg your pardon,” she said, with pleasant expectation.