The Darcys of Pemberley (30 page)

Elizabeth did eventually sleep, however, and
more restfully for her improved state of mind. When she awoke,
Darcy had already dressed and gone, which was just as well. Despite
her eagerness to settle things between them, there would be no
point in beginning such a critical discussion with guests still
under their roof. Elizabeth went downstairs with more genuine
cheerfulness than the night before and found everyone in the
breakfast room excepting her husband.

“Has anyone seen Mr. Darcy this morning?”
Elizabeth inquired of the others.

“The footman said that he went out early on
an errand of business,” answered Miss Bingley.

“Ah. I daresay he will be back shortly; I
know he would not let you go without seeing you off,” said
Elizabeth. “You must be impatient to be getting under way. Have
your trunks been brought down?”

“Not yet,” said Louisa, “but they are packed
and ready.”

“How pleased the Bingleys will be to have you
with them,” Elizabeth continued. “Mr. Bingley will be glad of your
company, Mr. Hurst, with the shooting season about to commence. I
am sorry we could not provide that kind of sport for you here.”

Just then, Darcy entered and greeted
everyone, his eyes moving from face to face and coming to rest on
Elizabeth’s. This time she did not turn away. He held her gaze with
the strength of supplication, begging, and in turn receiving, her
reassurance through that silent communication.

With both of them thus encouraged and their
guests happily anticipating their relocation to Heatheridge, the
next hour passed congenially. Once everyone was fed and the
carriage loaded, nothing remained except for all to express their
satisfaction with the time spent together and their regret that it
had come to an end so soon.

The Hursts climbed into their barouche and
settled themselves, facing forward. Miss Bingley lingered a little
longer by Mr. Darcy’s side, torn between the pleasure of staying
and that of going. “It is always so difficult to leave Pemberley,”
she said. “And this time we must go without having seen our dear
Georgiana. It really is too cruel. You must tell her, Darcy, how
sorry I am to have missed her. I do hope we will have an
opportunity to correct that wretched misfortune before we return to
town.”

“As you wish, Miss Bingley. I shall be sure
to tell my sister how wretched you were … at missing her I mean, of
course.”

Catching her husband’s eye, Elizabeth
struggled to suppress a laugh at Miss Bingley’s expense. Caroline
seemed blithely unaware of the joke. She allowed herself to be
handed into the carriage after one last wistful look at what she
left behind. Mr. Hurst gave the order and the coachman drove them
away down the gravel sweep and presently out of sight.

Darcy turned back toward the house and said,
“Now, my love, I think we had better talk.”

“Yes, that we most certainly must do,” she
replied, following him up the steps and through the door.

~*~

As they retreated to their private
apartments, Elizabeth’s hopefulness mingled with an equal measure
of trepidation. There was a sense that the next hour could easily
constitute the most crucial minutes of her married life, deciding
the difference between a glorious reconciliation and a deeper,
possibly permanent, divide. She had made mistakes. One more false
step now and the teetering balance might fall irrevocably against
her.

Elizabeth took Darcy’s hand and pulled him to
sit alongside her on the sofa at the foot of the bed. After an
awkward silence, she took courage and began. “I cannot bear to have
you thinking ill of me any longer, Darcy. And I have good reason to
believe we can clear away much of the trouble between us without
further delay. Yet I must ask you to be patient with me until I can
explain the rest. Will you do that for me?”

He hesitated, searching her face. “I will try
to be understanding, Elizabeth. But remember, I have had this …
unpleasantness … pressing upon me for some months already,” he said
with a pained aspect.

Elizabeth recognized that look; she had seen
it before. It was the same expression he wore when he returned from
that particularly disagreeable business appointment in London …
which, it suddenly occurred to her, might well have been a meeting
with Wickham. Then as now, she understood it to be a look of
anguish rather than anger, as if she had badly hurt or disappointed
him in some way. She had no idea then what could possibly have
caused it, but she had the distinct impression she was about to
find out.

“I was awake half the night thinking about
our quarrel,” Elizabeth continued. “From something you said
yesterday, I am convinced that at least part of the problem can be
attributed to a misunderstanding. I admit I am guilty of keeping
certain things from you for the sake of someone else, although I
believe it is not what you think, or possibly
who
you think.
Now, my dear Darcy, tell me if you will, of what sort of dishonesty
do you have cause to accuse me?”

He withdrew from her the hand she still held.
“Is that not going at the matter completely backward, Elizabeth?
You know better than anyone what you have done. You should be
telling me, not me telling you.”

“I know it seems the wrong way round. Still,
if you love me as you say, I
beg
you would indulge me in
this. It is the only way.”

“Very well, then,” he said, resigned. He
closed his eyes for a moment and dragging a hand across his
furrowed brow before continuing. “As you surely must know, I have
good reason to believe that you have misrepresented the nature and
extent of your former relationship with Mr. Wickham, and that you
are, to this day, still attempting to conceal the disgrace of it
from me. Furthermore, as I said yesterday, he does not deserve your
loyalty and protection. He certainly has not practiced discretion
as diligently as you have on his behalf.”

Elizabeth stared at him open-mouthed, stunned
and horrified by the allegation. Although she had tried to prepare
herself for some fairly damaging charge, she had not – could
never
have – imagined this.

Darcy hastened on. “I see it comes as a shock
to you, to find that I have long known of it. It is all in the
past, however, and I am reconciled to it, so you needn’t be
alarmed. I only wish you had been honest with me from the
beginning. The fact that you once had a rather … intimate
association with that man is extremely unfortunate. Yet the thing
that I find particularly painful is that you withheld the truth
from me. If you had only told me about it…”

“I did not tell you because there was nothing
to tell!” cried Elizabeth, finding her voice and struggling to her
feet. “There is no truth to it whatsoever, Darcy. There never was
any kind of serious attachment between us, and I did nothing
disgraceful that need be hidden from you or anybody else! How could
you believe such a thing? Who has been telling you these lies?”

“I … I had it from the man himself.”

“From Wickham? And you believed him?” she
demanded.

Darcy rose to his feet as well. “Not at
first, no, but then he showed me your letter.”

“My letter? I have no idea what you are
talking about, Darcy.”

“The letter you wrote him years ago, pledging
your … ‘eternal devotion,’” he explained, nearly choking on the
words. “I imagine you asked him to destroy it – any man of honor
would have done so – but he has kept it and now uses it against
you. He threatened to publish it and expose you to scandal for
writing something so improper. I could not allow that.”

“So his game is blackmail; he has been
extorting money from you, I suppose.”

“Well, yes.”

“Why did you not tell me? I could have
assured you there was no foundation for his claims.”

Darcy caressed her cheek, fixing doleful eyes
upon her. “As your husband, Elizabeth, I shall always defend your
honor without question,” he said softly. “In this case, I saw no
reason to remind you of an episode from your past which must only
bring you pain.”

“Oh, my love!” She retrieved his hand and
brought it to her lips. “I appreciate your gallantry, I really do.
And I do not doubt for one minute that Wickham is capable of such a
foul scheme, but I still cannot understand how he managed it.
Darling, upon my honor,
I wrote no such letter
! You
must
believe me.”

Darcy looked at her in confusion. “I wish to
believe you, yet the evidence is against you. I have seen the
letter with my own eyes. It was in your hand, Elizabeth. How can
you continue denying it?”

“I
shall
deny it … to my last breath,
if necessary!” Elizabeth clutched her husband’s hand all the
tighter, refusing to let him go. “I did not do it and I shall never
say that I did. If the evidence testifies otherwise, then the
evidence
is false! Consider the source, Darcy. You know
better than I do that Wickham is a consummate liar. Is it not to be
expected that what issues forth from him will prove just as
unreliable?”

Blinking hard, Darcy weighed what she said
and held out against her determination only a few moments longer.
Then he fully embracing the sagacity of Elizabeth’s reasoning.
Given the character of the two opposing witnesses, accepting his
wife’s sworn testimony over Wickham’s was the only choice that made
sense. As he banished his last doubt, a shroud of sorrow fell away
from his soul; the pain, so long his constant companion, vanished
now that he knew his Elizabeth had never belonged to another.

“Of course; you must be right,” he said in
relief, kissing her over and over again between the words that
joyfully spilled out. “I have been such a fool. I should have had
more faith in you. My dear, darling wife, can you ever forgive me
for believing such a thing possible?”

“I can and I do,” she sobbed.

At once, the insidious barrier between them
came tumbling down. The next several minutes Darcy and Elizabeth
spent wrapped in each other’s arms in wordless gratitude. At
length, however, Mr. Darcy raised the one remaining unanswered
question.

“So, Lizzy, my love …” he tentatively began,
keeping her in his tight embrace.

“Yes? What is it?” she murmured.

“I say … if it was not Wickham’s secrets you
were guarding, then whose?”

Elizabeth could not help laughing aloud,
which, after the tension and high emotion of the past two days, was
a delicious release.

“For the answer to that question, my dear
husband, you must be patient a little longer. I hope to be at
liberty to tell you very soon. In the meantime, I can promise you
this: the truth about my conduct will not be nearly as shocking as
the lie you have got used to believing.”

Revelations

With light hearts, Darcy and Elizabeth
returned to the routine business of managing Pemberley, which had
of necessity been set aside whilst they entertained guests. Now the
air seemed fresher, the day’s work more cheerfully done, for the
knowledge that all was right between them again. No more than a
passing thought could be spared for the Wickhams. In accordance
with the reconciled couple’s happy outlook, the anticipated birth
of their first child was a much more suitable subject on which to
dwell.

Discovering his wife surveying her swollen
form in the mirror, Darcy quipped, “Your figure is not quite what
it used to be, Lizzy.”

“Please remember, sir, that you have no one
to blame for it but yourself.” Elizabeth shook her head in mirth
and amazement. “Thanks to you, I now look as if I had swallowed an
enormous melon. Yet I think a melon would be more comfortably
carried – not all these awkward parts poking out and digging in at
every angle.”

Elizabeth was only a few weeks from her
confinement now. In preparation, the Darcys had engaged the same
monthly nurse who served the Bingleys so well. When the time came,
Jane would be the only other attendant. According to Mr. Bennet,
who had written to boast of his triumph on Elizabeth’s behalf, Mrs.
Bennet would not be present after all. He claimed to have handled
the situation so adroitly that, in the end, Mrs. Bennet believed it
all her own idea to postpone her visit until the fall.

Mr. Sanditon had taken to calling at
Pemberley every week since Darcy and Elizabeth returned from
London. His visits, often with his sister-in-law accompanying him,
were valued as social high points, especially now when Elizabeth
refrained from going out in public herself. The conversation on
these occasions canvassed many topics but, at some point, Mr.
Sanditon was sure to ask for news of the ladies in London.
Elizabeth pitied him his disappointment, which seemed to be
settling into resignation. It had no doubt occurred to him that the
longer Georgiana tarried in London, the less likely that she was
eager to accept his proposal.

Georgiana’s most recent letter had conveyed
her intention of arriving home by the time Elizabeth’s child was
expected, if not before. The London social season was winding down,
so there was little of interest to keep her in town any longer.
Apparently, Colonel Fitzwilliam continued close at hand, although
Georgiana made no mention of progress on the romantic front, with
the colonel or anyone else for that matter. It looked as if she
would soon have to make her decision about Mr. Sanditon’s offer
according to its own merits, with no other prospects on the horizon
to influence her.

Mr. Sanditon happened to be at Pemberley the
morning Elizabeth received Georgiana’s response to her own urgent
communication. Coming as an express, the letter arrived earlier
than anticipated and roused great curiosity – both because of the
identity of the sender and the mode by which it had been sent. It
was very particularly addressed to Elizabeth alone, however, so she
took her letter aside and read it at once in case it was of a
pressing nature, which the fact that it came express implied.