To Teach the Admiring Multitude

by Eleanor Wilton

  She felt Darcy stiffen and pull away.

  “Pardon me?” he replied with consternation.

  “Many people appear to have been quite altered by her presence.”

  “She did not leave England on good terms.”

  “Oh, is that all?”

  “Why are you speaking of that woman?” he replied angrily, feeling the harmonious ease of a moment ago immediately tainted. He rose from the chaise and went to stand by the mantel, placed down his glass and began fiddling nervously with the candelabra’s base in a most uncharacteristic manner.

  “I am not sure.” Elizabeth spoke slowly, not certain if she wished to proceed, but compelled to do so. “I think she may have been something to you once.”

  He turned to her, said nothing, his expression closed and his gaze fixed upon her in agitation.

  “When you told me you had never felt more than a passing inclination for another woman, perhaps you meant differently than I imagined. A passing inclination can be many things.”

  “Are you suggesting that I spoke to you untruthfully on our wedding night? That I began our marriage with a falsehood?”

  “Oh no!” Elizabeth cried, reproaching her clumsiness. She rose quickly and came to his side. “I know you spoke truthfully; I could never doubt your word. Yet, this woman, what was she to you? What made her believe she had the right to touch you as she did, to lay her hand so familiarly upon your arm, to caress you there in the middle of the opera house for all to witness?”

  “Elizabeth, she had no right. She is arrogant and provocative. She meant to provoke,” he replied in consternation, turning away from her.

  Elizabeth gently placed her hand on his arm. “Did we not pledge to be in one another’s entire confidence? I am not afraid of what you may disclose.”

  He threw back his head and closed his eyes. The conversation was extremely disagreeable and he could not comprehend her persistence. “Why would you even wish to know?” he replied impatiently. “What transpired was many years ago.”

  Elizabeth stepped closer to him, caressed his cheek. “You are my husband and I wish to know all that has made you into the man you are.”

  He searched her face uneasily. He could not comprehend why she wished to hear him speak of another woman. “It is no great mystery or romance, Elizabeth. It is rather an episode I am ashamed of,” he confessed at last.

  “Tell me,” she insisted gently. “You know what my life has been, so quietly lived at Longbourn. I want to know better what your life has been. When you took me to Wolfe’s I felt when we left that I knew you better. That is all I desire, to know you better, more intimately.”

  “You already know me more intimately than has any other. What importance in some passing moment of my youth?”

  “I suspect this one had significance or you should not be so altered.”

  Darcy sighed deeply, closed his eyes to compose himself—the utterly unforeseeable return of that woman, her remarkable beauty unchanged, had unsettled him and he had not been immune to the recollection of either potent cravings or resentments seemingly long forgotten. He turned to his wife. She looked at him with that expression of unimpeachable honesty and openness that he so valued. “That woman deserves neither your curiosity nor your concern. She is in all ways unworthy of your notice. I will tell you my brief history with her, only so that you do not imagine what never was. But I must tell it to you frankly, or there is no point.”

  “Did you not say there had been no false modesty between us?”

  “You will find it an entirely unremarkable tale of youthful foolishness,” he declared before continuing in a cold and dispassionate tone.

  “When I was a young man of nineteen, I was infatuated with that woman. Perhaps it is more truthful to assert that I was infatuated with her beauty, for her character has always been markedly wanting. She appeared in my circle of acquaintances rather mysteriously, nothing was known of her origins, but her beauty was accepted as sufficient cause to give her a character and she was welcomed everywhere. She lived with a guardian who gave her great liberty. My infatuation was not immediately returned and I was one among many admirers until one day I quite suddenly became her favourite. The abruptness of such favour I did not at the time consider, but it was later entirely comprehensible. After what was in fact a brief flirtation between us, she made an assignation with me to visit her, alone, in her home. I was fully determined to keep this assignation though she clearly intended to entangle me, that I might be honour bound to restore her reputation. I will not deny to you that I was in danger of being entangled in a most irrevocable manner. Her intentions and my infatuation were public and notorious. My father, made aware of the situation, fortunately succeeded in reminding me with time that I was never to compromise Pemberley, most certainly not for the satisfaction of mere profane desires that could be otherwise satiated without entanglement or complication. It is a lesson for which I was soon most grateful. I was very much under my father’s influence and I did not, in the end, keep the assignation; her true character was soon thereafter revealed and she left for the continent in disgrace.” He paused before admitting the full humiliation of the situation. “She unquestionably sought my fortune and the protection of my good name. She was with child by a man who would not recognize his paternity and whose identity, I should imagine, remains a secret. Her intention was to seduce me and to pass off that man’s child as my own, to claim Pemberley and the Darcy name for herself and her child. It had been well planned; the public flirtation, the speed with which she moved from flirtation to intention. She played me as a fool and only my father’s intervention saved me from a ruinous obligation. It was then I vowed to myself that I would have relations with no woman but my own legitimate wife, be that when it might be. I would not be so conspicuously, publicly made a fool again; I would not risk the legacy of Pemberley for a lamentable lack of self-regulation. I kept my vow, though you must now see that honour and rectitude did not solely guide my avowal; pride most assuredly gave it force.”

  Darcy made to turn away in embarrassment but Elizabeth stopped him, grasped him by the arm. “She did not break your heart?”

  “I did not love her,” he replied with disgust. “What I felt was nothing more than lust of a most primitive and irreligious nature. She made a very great fool of me, but she did not break my heart. Only you have ever done so,” he added gravely.

  “Forgive me, darling,” Elizabeth whispered, wrapping her arms around him, feeling a tremendous relief. “I am sorry for making you confess what you wished to forget. My only excuse is that something like jealousy was roused in me when I saw her place her hand upon you so familiarly.”

  “Jealousy?” he replied. “I have known those abysmal pangs.” He paused, hesitated, but only a moment. “And what of you?” he continued. “Has your heart never been broken?”

  Immediately she understood he alluded to George Wickham to whose defence she had once so passionately leapt. Elizabeth comprehended that Darcy still longed for a confirmation that the man he so violently loathed, the man who had played so forceful a role in her own early dislike of him, had never truly touched her heart. “No, my darling,” she replied softly. “I have been as foolishly infatuated as any other, but my heart has never been broken, was never touched before you so unexpectedly claimed it for your own.”

  “Thank God!” he exclaimed, and with an urgency that instantly possessed him he kissed her with a passionate claim that aroused a forceful desire within her. Disrobing one another with sudden impatience, they embraced with a heedless, determined ardour, as though to erase any last vestige of past infatuations and to immunize from any possible future fascinations. When she murmured his hitherto unclaimed name—Fitzwilliam—at the very moment of greatest pleasure, he felt she had touched his innermost soul, that layers had been stripped away and some powerful new intimacy and union had been reached.

  Chapter 14

  The Norburys

  Elizabeth entered the drawing ro
om dressed and ready to depart for Grosvenor Square. They were to dine at Richmond House with the family to celebrate the Viscount Highpointe’s engagement to Lady Patience Faircloth. The eldest Fitzwilliam sibling, Lady Edith Norbury, and her husband, Mr. Spencer Norbury, had made a rare trip into London from Surrey for the occasion. Lady Edith was so thoroughly satisfied with her life as the mistress of Matchem that she did not often leave her fine estate—Edith’s little fiefdom, as her mother wryly remarked when mentioning the same to Elizabeth—unless she felt the occasion absolutely merited the exertion.

  Elizabeth found Georgiana already in the drawing room sitting quietly, her hands folded neatly in her lap, staring out the window and with a sullen expression upon her face.

  “You look very lovely, Georgiana, in your new dress,” Elizabeth remarked as she entered and sat at her sister’s side. “You do not, however, look very pleased,” she added with a warm smile.

  Georgiana raised her eyes to Elizabeth and sighed, momentarily ashamed of her own nature. With each passing day she was more keenly aware of how utterly she lacked the equanimity that Elizabeth possessed in such abundance. When a few evenings past Elizabeth had hosted a dinner at Portman Square for the first time, she had displayed such a winning, unpretentious grace and amiability. Georgiana had observed with admiration how Elizabeth went about her life with no apparent fear or timidity, though almost every day brought her some new acquaintance or new circumstance to confront. “Are you never frightened?” Georgiana asked spontaneously.

  Elizabeth furrowed her brow, surprised by the inquiry. “That depends upon the circumstances, but I find there are few of them that are truly worthy of consternation or fear. What are you anxious about that you should ask?”

  “The Norburys. I dread being in their company,” Georgiana confessed quietly.

  “Why would your own cousin and her husband cause you such anxiety?”

  “Oh, you have not yet made their acquaintance,” she replied honestly.

  “I will shortly enough. What shall I find?”

  Georgiana turned away, unhappy with her confession. “My brother does not approve of me speaking ill of others, particularly a relation.”

  Elizabeth was immediately filled with pity for the dear, sweet young lady sitting before her, for she comprehended how utterly wanting in trusted female companionship Georgiana had been for her entire life. Seemingly unwilling to defy her brother, even in the privacy of her thoughts, she most certainly had never sought confidences outside of home, and with her brother those confidences must necessarily be limited. She suspected that George Wickham must have found her a very easy victim, suspected that this trusting, warm hearted girl would have fallen quickly under the influence of Wickham’s deceptively persuasive charms. She took Georgiana’s hands gently within her own.

  “Dear Georgiana, you may confide in me with all impunity. Let us make a promise between us. I will never betray your confidences to your brother unless I believe you have shared something he ought to know, and I will never surprise you and will tell you frankly if I intend to do so.”

  “I would not keep secrets from my brother, Elizabeth,” Georgiana responded in consternation.

  “Confidences and secrets are not synonymous. I can assure you that your brother would be more than pleased to know that you confide in me. You will soon be seventeen, Georgiana. There will be many things which you would justly not feel comfortable sharing with your brother, but which you need not keep locked away in your heart—whether they be happy expectations or painful disappointments. Let me be a true sister to you; you can trust me with your dreams and anxieties. If you wish it, I can be your confidant. Trust me now,” she added gently. “What about your cousin inspires such apprehension on your part?”

  Georgiana smiled warmly and her eyes were bright with gratitude. She felt suddenly foolish for her anxiety. When Elizabeth spoke Georgiana always felt her courage grow in bounds, for Elizabeth made everything seem entirely governable. “It is nothing so very grave. I feel always clumsy and childish in her presence.”

  “It is not very strange that you should. She is very many years your senior.”

  “Oh, that does not bother me. My brother has always professed that our cousin Edith is the most accomplished woman of his acquaintance. Indeed, she does everything well and with taste.”

  “She does sound rather frightening, Georgiana,” Elizabeth laughed. “There is nothing as terrible as perfection! But do not be concerned, I am still a great novelty wherever I go and your cousin will be far too concerned with examining me and endeavouring to determine why your brother chose such an imperfect creature for a wife to notice what a fine young lady you have become.”

  Georgiana smiled, reassured, and Elizabeth embraced her. “Dear girl,” Elizabeth said quietly, “never allow anyone to make you doubt your own worth.”

  When they walked into Lady Richmond’s drawing room a little time thereafter Elizabeth immediately recognized why Georgiana would be so agitated by her eldest cousin. Lady Edith Norbury was an unmistakably formidable woman. She had neither the Fitzwilliam height nor their good looks—she was of average height, her visage unremarkable and crowned with a head of lustreless brown hair—but she needed it not, for she was in possession of a distinctly commanding air. Very elegantly and expensively attired, she had no wish to disguise her wealth and clearly was not a believer in the value or rightness of a little humility. Her posture, her gait, her every gesture spoke of a person in firm assurance of their superiority and significance. She approached them from across the room and examined Elizabeth with undisguised, if not entirely unfriendly assessment. Arriving before them, Darcy took her hand and kissed it with warm gallantry.

  “Darcy, my dear cousin, how long has it been?” she replied, keeping hold of his hand within her own for a moment. “You have not been to Matchem in ever too long. You have abandoned me entirely of course; and my sons ask after you constantly. When will Mr. Darcy return, they cry; Mr. Norbury is a poor horseman and they miss your attentions and guidance most dearly. You know what a favourite you are with everyone at Matchem; we are all in need of your company. But of course you have been otherwise occupied. And so this is your wife,” she intoned evenly turning to Elizabeth and appraising her openly. “Mrs. Darcy, I have heard so much about you. Letters have travelled feverishly. What consternation and curiosity you have inspired, my dear lady. But there is something in the air. Both my brother and my cousin were confirmed and determined bachelors albeit both have an obligation to marry and produce an heir, particularly Darcy who has no younger brother. Both have been so obstinately opposed to taking the step and yet here you are, the surprise of the season, coming out of nowhere to succeed where so many worthy young ladies had failed. Will I like her, Darcy?” she inquired turning back to her cousin. “You know how few people inspire my sympathy.”

  “That will be enough, Edith,” said Lady Richmond coming to join the group. “You will weary her with your endless chatter.”

  “Truly, Mother,” Lady Edith intoned condescendingly. “Such solicitude is hardly necessary.”

  “Where is Norbury, Edith? I thought he was to be with you,” Darcy inquired.

  “He is in the library at the moment with some business or another, as you would expect.” She looked now to Elizabeth and spoke to her in a tone of unapologetic superiority. “My husband is never idle, Mrs. Darcy. He has many obligations and is a very great man. Even Darcy acknowledges his superiority and you must know how rarely he condescends to praise.” She turned and walked across the room to where her father sat by the fire.

  Elizabeth was left entirely without words. Lady Edith’s manner, her voice and gestures all spoke to intelligence and elegance, but just as surely of conceit and throughout as well a lack of either sincere or well-intentioned amiability. She was clearly fond of Darcy and just as clearly indifferent to Georgiana who stood at her brother’s side in absolute silence, evidently accustomed to being overlooked by the great lady, and not
hing like the sweetly affectionate young lady she showed herself to be in the privacy of their home.

  “My cousin is a remarkable woman,” Darcy offered quietly to Elizabeth as Lady Edith walked across the room, a picture of poised womanhood.

  “She evidently believes herself to be,” Elizabeth replied mordantly.

  Darcy looked at Elizabeth in surprise, his brow furrowed, for he truly valued his cousin, knew her to be an unusually accomplished woman of refined tastes. “With all justification,” he answered defensively. He turned away from Elizabeth and addressed Georgiana. “Sister, you have not greeted our uncle,” he said as he led her across the room. Elizabeth followed behind, feeling, for the first time, entirely out of place in her husband’s world.

  The party gathered around the Earl to await the arrival of Edward with Lady Patience Faircloth and her father. Elizabeth was surprised by how completely Lady Edith’s presence dominated the will of all those around her. Even Lady Richmond, who was such a luminary within society, acquiesced and bowed to the younger lady’s tastes and desires. She commanded now the conversation without any polite attentions towards Elizabeth or familial care towards Georgiana.

  “My dear father, you must be so pleased with Edward’s choice. He has demurred for far too long, but having waited so long to wed, we can only be pleased with his future wife. Fortunately he was never truly in danger with that pale-faced girl he so inexplicably admired. Mr. Norbury has only the very best to say of the Faircloths. He has been a guest at Goodstone Park and though it is naturally not as grand as Matchem, he has assured me it is a very superior property. Such an excellent family, as is only acceptable for the wife of your heir, Father. Would you not agree Darcy? That it could be no other way?”

  Elizabeth could not determine if Lady Edith intended to provoke her cousin by indirectly casting aspersions against her own modest family, regardless she found it ungenerous and ungracious, particularly towards a cousin with whom she so obviously got on well. Darcy appeared entirely indifferent to her provocation; indeed seemed almost amused, for he evidently thought so well of his cousin that he could find no fault in her words or intimations. Elizabeth was surprised, for if nothing else, Lady Edith’s curt indifference towards Georgiana would have seemed to be cause enough for Darcy to find her too officious by half, and she wondered how great a power of influence this woman might have upon her husband.