Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife (59 page)

“Young Hinchcliffe has gone, too,” Bingley ventured timorously.

Thus far, the only thing of Bingley’s endangered by the endless monstrosity of war were the manufactured goods from which his own fortune was claimed then piling up on British docks. The wavering blockade by France loosened those monetary fears and beyond that, he held no personal ideology. He had told Jane he was grateful the decision to join the fight against France was not his. (The long held British hatred for France was in reverse proportion to the wealth of the British citizen in question. Perversely, those who had the least to lose, bore the greatest malice.)

The reminder of the scurrilous pool of which officer material was drawn to support Fitzwilliam was of no particular comfort and Darcy begat a pace about the room. “A bloody mess,” he muttered, then louder, “A bloody massacre.”

Flabbergasted to hear Darcy actually curse, Elizabeth had set down her sewing, giving up any pretense of needlework. By that time, their nurses finally had the various nieces and nephews in hand and the children began a reluctant tramp up the stairs, thus effectively drowning out what little Elizabeth could hear.

“Bloody bother,” she muttered, then hastily glanced about to see if she had been overheard.

It was additional frustration for her husband’s profanity to have encouraged her to exercise her own. So intent upon her eavesdropping, Elizabeth had not paid due attention to Georgiana who, as always, sat quietly at her elbow. Beyond the brief prayer that Darcy’s sister had not overheard her curse, she had not given her notice. Hence, when Georgiana finally spoke, even in so soft a voice, Elizabeth was startled.

“You understand what is happening, Elizabeth?”

Astonished, Elizabeth turned to Georgiana and shook her head, for she was not certain, only suspicious, and that Georgiana was not asking her for information but offering it was an amazement.

“Fitzwilliam is going to Belgium to join Wellington,” Georgiana stated. “I fancy he is to depart immediately.”

Elizabeth furrowed her brow, “Wellington?”

“Wellesley. He is now a duke.”

She knew that Wellesley had been made a duke. The newspapers were full of it. It had slipped her mind momentarily. Darcy shared his gazettes with her, even the most scurrilous. She devoured them voraciously. She fancied there were few ladies more informed about public events than she. Unless conversing with her husband, she spoke of matters foreign but seldom, so rarely did she find any interest or knowledge of it in her society of gentlewomen. It was a mild irritation upon the very first occasion she had to speak intelligently about intelligent matters she sounded thick as a post.

In Paris, ladies sat smoking amongst gentlemen in grand salons dedicated to affairs of state, not just affairs. In London, they were certainly less prevalent, if not absolutely nonexistent. Just how an innocent such as Georgiana came in possession of information so esoteric to men was a considerable mystery to Elizabeth. Obviously, she did not spend all her time cloistered amongst her books.

Knowing it sounded patronising even as she said it, Elizabeth offered, “How can you be so certain, Georgiana? We best wait and see, perchance it is only a possibility.”

She patted Georgiana’s hand reassuringly.

“No, Elizabeth, he will go. I know he shall. I know why he shall, as do you,” Georgiana said, and said no more.

Elizabeth sat silently also, looking directly at Georgiana, whose gaze held hers without faltering. Glancing covertly about the room to make certain she would not be overheard, she spoke.

“What do you know of this, Georgiana?”

“I came upon you the day my aunt called.”

Elizabeth nodded once.

“Go on,” she bid.

“I overheard her harsh words to you and hurried to your defence. But I was preceded.”

Elizabeth dropped her head and touched her forehead with her fingertips. The reason for Georgiana’s own disconcertion that day was uncovered. She overheard Lady Catherine’s accusations against her brother, and from the look upon her countenance, Elizabeth was certain she was about to hear Georgiana announce she heard Fitzwilliam’s vow of love as well. Elizabeth’s foremost fear was that one more person knew of it. That bade it one step closer toward Darcy hearing of it. Truly, she did not want to come betwixt her husband and his cousin. That simple wish was soon forgot.

“Colonel Fitzwilliam has chosen to put himself in harm’s way rather than cause a cleft in our family. He shall submit himself to a felo-de-se,” Georgiana deduced, thus eliminating any other possible interpretation of events.

“I would do anything to undo this,” Elizabeth said.

When Georgiana did not respond, Elizabeth asked, “Do you see any way out? I truly believe the colonel’s regard is merely an infatuation, not true love. I believe him misguided…”

Before she could say more, her husband burst into the room indignant and angry. Discreetly, Georgiana withdrew. And after Darcy gave them a pronounced glare, she was followed hastily by Mrs. Hurst, Miss Bingley, and Jane. Had she not been so utterly confounded by Georgiana’s revelations, Elizabeth might well have fled after them. Darcy seemed not to notice the flight he incited, but walked to the fireplace and hit it with his closed fist causing the bric-a-brac upon it to shimmy.

“Fitzwilliam has decided to take leave at dawn to-morrow to go to Portsmouth and join a regiment bound for Brussels,” he announced. “He knows with his connexions he will not be turned away. Wellington remembers Fitzwilliam from the Portuguese encounter and will be most happy to have a man of his ilk to join him.”

Elizabeth raised her forefinger in an attempt to interject a question, but it was not significant enough a gesture to be noticed.

“Fitzwilliam is an excellent horseman. Well-schooled. His men admire him. Every manner of a man that the King’s army should want in an officer. But however courageous, however laudatory his horsemanship, he will be but fodder for the amateur leadership of the great British army.”

He took a heavy breath at this and Elizabeth leapt into the brief pause to becalm him.

“But Darcy, Fitzwilliam came home from the peninsula with honour. He survived that war.”

“Fortune was with him there. The need to stop Napoleon has reached desperate proportions. Fitzwilliam is courageous, but he does not have the guile nor the perversity to survive in this coming Armageddon, Lizzy. He will put nobility and selflessness before his own well-being and shall not last a single campaign more. I know it. I know it!”

His anguish was expressed in fury, and that was not lost upon his wife.

When he continued to rant, “He knows what I have said is true, we have talked of it often. Why has he decided to go now? I know it is not for him to find glory for himself. He is not of that sort. Why is he going Lizzy? Why?”

A fair question. Elizabeth hid her face in her hands rather than risk answering him. Her mind moiled about, what with her husband’s indirect wrath and knowing herself to be the reason for possible loss of life or limb. Should she go to Fitzwilliam that night and tell him he need not take leave? She practised that speech in her mind; she would assure him the matter betwixt them forgot. It would not be spoken of again. If he would only not go.

Unable to find words of comfort, she went to the fireplace where Darcy stood making angry jabs at the ashes. She put her arms beneath his. Howbeit it was fleeting, he patted her reassuringly. Momentarily, he let her go to poke at the fire and to vent his ire upon the mantelpiece.

“Fitzwilliam will be gone before first light,” he said dejectedly, acceptance of the inevitable gradually sapping his anger.

That decided her quandary. There would be no time for entreaties from her, Elizabeth knew. She made a hasty consideration that perhaps if Darcy knew why Fitzwilliam was so determined to go to Belgium he could reason with him…no. No, if Darcy knew of Fitzwilliam’s declaration of love for her and told him thus, Fitzwilliam would still take leave. And his return, was he to return, might be all the more difficult.

With daybreak yet only a promise, Darcy rose from a sleepless bed. It was imperative to go to Whitemore and intercept Fitzwilliam before he left for the sea. At that moment, there was nothing of greater importance to him than that their last words not be spoken in disagreement.

For some unfamiliar reason of sentiment, Darcy took Blackjack, not by the road, but by way of a shortcut through the chase. It was once a well-travelled route. The hedgerow twenty years later showed yet the effects of when, as young boys, he and Fitzwilliam had regularly trod through them. Maturity and civilisation eventually influenced them to traverse more sedately via the road. Thus, the gaps had over-grown to a mere cleft betwixt the hawthorn, the locals having more respect for greenery than the young bucks of station.

Hence, Darcy spurred Blackjack and leapt each one. And as each stile, each hedge brought him closer to Whitemore, their youth too seemed close at hand.

* * *

By the time Darcy arrived at Whitemore, day had broken and his canonising of lost boyhood had ripened his already low spirits into full-fledged melancholia. This farewell was to be very different from that when Fitzwilliam had departed for Spain. That leave-taking had invoked a raw jubilation, an excitation born of innocence of just what lay ahead. At that time, Darcy had felt the anticipation almost as acutely as Fitzwilliam. Thenceforward, neither had any illusions.

When Fitzwilliam saw Darcy had come, he stopped his preparations and forsook Scimitar’s reins to his groom. The expression Fitzwilliam bore as he walked over was strange, one that Darcy could never recall of him. It might have been perceived, appropriately, as one of apprehension. But misgiving was not what Darcy believed it was. He thought it was a look of loss.

“You shall take Scimitar?” Darcy asked.

“A good mount is essential.”

“Undoubtedly.”

Only a few more terse comments were made. Those were the obligatory ones about the expected weather, the possible conditions of the roads; it did not truly matter. That Darcy had come was the statement, the words were irrelevant.

“Fitzwilliam,” Darcy reached into his breast pocket and removed a sealed letter, “here are a few names of family in France. A vouchsafement should you need it.”

Fitzwilliam smiled ever so briefly and tucked the paper, warm yet from Darcy’s waist-coat, beneath his own. He knew regardless of the political situation, family would rise above anything else. He mounted Scimitar.

“And Fitzwilliam,” Darcy took the reins from the groom to hand to him, “do cover your ballocks.”

Smiling more openly at his cousin’s improbable vulgarity, Fitzwilliam said, “I thank you for the sentiment, Darcy. I shall indeed look out for them.”

With that, he removed his hat with a flourish and a bow. Thereupon, man and mount wheeled about and cantered away. Darcy watched as he rode off, his figure and horse gradually being swallowed by the early morning fog.

* * *

By the time Darcy returned to Pemberley, the morning sun had disintegrated the fog into the merest of haze. His sleepless night and the exercise of his seldom-used sentimentality had rendered him quite fatigued. It was a relief to step down and hand off Blackjack’s reins. As he dropped to the ground his knees almost buckled so great was the weight of the morning. Shoulders sagging, he started for the house and he could not will them back in place.

Just as he entered the stone arch leading to the courtyard, John Christie stepped out in front of him.

So abruptly did he appear, Darcy stopped in his tracks. He eyed him a little warily, so precipitous was the encounter and so truculent was the expression the young man bore. Mr. Darcy was never confronted, partly because of his position and partly because of his size. That his own shirt-sleeved servant accosted him in such a hostile manner did not improve his ill-humour.

His lethargy lost in ire, he automatically reclaimed his stature and exercised a posture particular only to him. This bearing was one which allowed him to look down upon anyone in his eye, regardless of their height, with an exceedingly keen gaze (a vexatious position, indeed, and no one once escaping from thence wanted to return). He impatiently slapped his crop against the top of his boot.

“Yes?” he said, and nothing more.

His master’s displeasure was obvious. If John recoiled at the sight, it was only inwardly.

“Aye must speak to yer, Mr. Darcy. Aye must speak to yer now.”

Placing his hand upon his hip, Darcy tapped his crop a few more times whilst he considered whether to grant the lad some time. Then, with a curt nod, he agreed.

Another groom stood holding the reins to Blackjack and John’s eyes flicked nervously to the audience then back to Mr. Darcy.

With even more brazenness, he insisted, “Private.”

Having already abused his patience, at this additional demand Darcy gave a slight shake of his head in incredulity at the impertinence. However, he begrudged himself of his gloves, handed them and his crop to the groom, and walked with John toward an arbour a few yards away. It was not with a countenance of civility that he looked upon the young man as he awaited to hear why this servant son of Wickham was plaguing him.

John uneasily shifted from one foot to another for a few moments before speaking.

“Me ma worked at Pemberley before Aye was born, did yer know that, sir?”

Darcy heaved a sigh of disgust at the horizon. Here was the reason for such effrontery. No doubt, Wickham’s visit had stirred talk. The boy wanted money. Another of Wickham’s debts to discharge. It was a moment Darcy had thought might come, thus such a demand had been considered. However, just how many pounds should he lay upon Wickham’s child, he had not yet decided.

“Yes. I know that,” he finally answered.

It would be best to await the demand. See how much the boy thought himself worth and thus be relieved of the unpleasant duty of determining a monetary value to put upon a human life.

“As well yer might,” John said bitterly, “though many such men as yerself might find it hard to recall what servants they lay with. Was me ma among many? Aye would guess most likely.”

Not only was this scoundrel demanding surreptitious pourboire, he had the brass cheek to heap additional insult. Clearly, he knew the amplitude of his impertinence. Yet, when Darcy’s face coloured, it was of such a peculiar hue that the boy retreated a step.

The irate flush of Darcy’s face was tempered with the humiliation of recognition, for he knew what John said was true by intent if not actuality. Had his father not chastised him, his youthful libido might have led him to bound from atop one servant girl to the next. Truth or no, however, he was not so generous to hear it from his own groom.

Though both knew John’s days at Pemberley were ended, John did not cease with that one accusation. He strove on.

“Me ma’s life was ’arsh, Mr. Darcy, ’arsher than Aye think a man like yer could imagine. Me own ’as been nothing to what she…” his voice cracked, he swallowed, then continued, “and it is because of yer.”

By the time John launched into the tale of his mother’s woe, Darcy’s forbearance had long past peaked. Thus, he was quite astonished to hear John lay the blame for his mother’s dissolute life at his feet. Perplexed, he was curious enough to know how he came to this rather daft conclusion to continue to listen, albeit with considerable scepticism.

“When she died, Aye came thinkin’ there was something for me ’ere. Me ma tol’ me she got with child with me ’ere and Aye heard she lay with yer,” John said.

Darcy’s stern countenance began to fail him. He blinked once, then again.

“Yer’re thinkin’ I’m wantin’ somethin’ from yer. Not true, though Aye guess yer owe it. Aye wanted to see what a man my father was. Aye heard ’im a great man, but that was wrong. ’e’s a man who gives no quarter to kindness, a man who spends ’is life havin’ ’is way with gerls and throwin’ ’em out when ’e gets ’em wi’ child. Aye see no greatness, Aye see a rich man who knows nothin’ but richness and cares fer nothin’ else.”

By the end of his oration, Darcy understood that the boy believed that he had ruined his mother. He did not understand, however, the plurality of the condemnation. Before he could disabuse him of the notion he had fathered him, John -interrupted, yet at full moil.

“The only cause Aye have to look to yer is that two ladies find yer a finer man than me. Mrs. Darcy and Miss Darcy is fine ladies. That they find some reason to give yer regard gives me the only doubt Aye ’ave of yer being nothing more than a bastard’s father.”

Upon hurling this last vilification, John pulled a vicious-looking dagger from his belt. He exacted this manoeuvre with an effortlessness that decried the infrequency of its occurrence, thus giving his quarry pause. Yet it was so ridiculously large a snickersnee and of such obvious mediæval origins, Darcy was almost moved to laugh at the incongruity of it being in the possession of his groom.

However old, the glint of the blade told it quite lethal. That understanding chased any semblance of humour from the situation. In the speck of time it took for him to see John held it by its tip and intended to fling it, Darcy made a decision. He folded his arms and made no move to run or feint.

Laudable as was his valour, had his wife witnessed it, she might have preferred discretion. Mr. Darcy, however, would rather have been murdered by his own servant than been known to have fled from him. This blade, though, imbedded itself where it was intended, in the dirt betwixt Darcy’s steadfast feet.

“That is what Aye intended to give me father, Mr. Darcy. The same yer gave my ma. The same yer gave me. It would just come to yer faster’s all. Yea, Aye know it would find me gibbeted in chains at the Kympton crossroads, but at least there’d be…” he searched for the word, “revenge…yea, revenge. But your ladies will not mourn because of me. I’m done wi’ yer. ’ang me for the attempt, Aye don’t care no more.”

Dejectedly, he turned and walked away. Darcy looked down at the ancient knife resting betwixt his boots. Pulling it from the ground, he turned it over in his hand, noticing the elk horn peeking beneath the unravelling leather of the grip. It was an indefensibly crude weapon, yet certainly deadly. He let the dirk hang loosely at his side and watched as John’s back straightened in defiance of his dampened outrage.

Darcy knew happenstance was the only thing that stood betwixt what John believed and that which was true. Though he was not his father, he could have been. He mounted Abigail not out of love or even infatuation, but from the sheer innocence of lust. There was no affection (if anything, it could have been more truthfully identified as gratitude).

The incorrigible indocility of his adolescent libido notwithstanding, Darcy did not want John to believe him his father when it was not true. Loath as he was to mention the name, he thought he should tell the boy who did father him. Let him curse Wickham. Let John curse Wickham as well and let that cad share the damnation. Any young man deserved the truth, even one bent upon patricide. Although it was a temptation to sic John on Wickham, he did not. Nevertheless, he called out for him to stop.

John did stop, almost mid-step. He put his foot firmly down and turned, almost in a military about-face. His attention, too, was military. So military was it, he might well have been facing a firing squad. Nonetheless, his countenance betrayed not fear, but considerable contempt.

“Did he fancy I would shoot him?” Darcy wondered silently before it occurred to him that John just might have had that foreboding, so insistent had been the gossip since his infamous slaughter at the inn. Yet dangling the knife, Darcy walked toward him, thereupon stopped at a distance, not wanting to present menace.

“Young man, I fathered you not. Had I, I should not deny it.”

Hatred did not abandon John’s face entirely, but it was tempered by belief. Still, it was a half-minute before he spoke.

“If not yer, who?”

It was here that Darcy’s decision to leave Wickham’s name unrevealed wavered in the face of such a direct question. He very nearly defended himself by relating Abigail was with child when he lay with her. Prudently, he reconsidered. He could not bring himself to speak of having intimate relations with one’s mother. A gentleman should never speak of such indecorous matters. Particularly to a son. Highly improper. The courage Darcy had shown when threatened with the knife did not reassert itself in the murky waters of his own guilt. Wickham was not pardoned, just postponed. Thus, Darcy dodged the entire issue with a statement of evasive rationalisation that was worthy of a seat in Parliament.

“Only your mother had answer to that question for certain.”

John closed his eyes in frustrated anger. Turning, he stomped away and said to no one, yet to everyone.

“Damn yer,” he said. “Damn yer all.”

* * *

With leaden feet, Darcy trudged up the postern steps. When he had deserted their bed before dawn, he had thought Elizabeth asleep. She was sitting mid-most in the bed when he returned, her knees tucked under her gown. The drawn look about her eyes told him she had slept no better than he.

“You went to Fitzwilliam?”

It was not actually a question.

Pulling off his jacket and tossing it down, he did not answer her nonquestion.

Instead, he said rather stiffly, “Your groom (Darcy had been unable to bring himself to call John by his name) has, as well he might, accused me of his paternity. I told him I was not his father, but I could not tell him it was Wickham.”

Quite astonished, for John had never given a hint that he thought Darcy his father, she bid, “How did John come by this misinformation?”

Darcy shook his head that he did not know.

“Has he thought this all along?”

“Perhaps. But that it has only come up now leads me to believe Wickham’s visit prodded memories, instigated talk. I really have no idea.”

“And you had to tell him he was not your son? Poor John,” she fretted, then queried, “But why did he ask? Did he want something from you?”

“My life, it would seem.” Darcy said sardonically, tossing the decrepit knife upon the bed.