Longbourn's Songbird

by Beau North

Jane didn’t want to believe him. She wanted to despise the man who had caused Elizabeth so much pain. But he was Bingley’s friend, and she heard the ring of truth in his words, so she could not bring herself to hate him.

  And she had seen the way Elizabeth held him. There had been more than simple surprise in her sister’s face. Jane gave Richard an assessing look. He was still wild-eyed with shock, but there was straightforwardness to him that she appreciated. He was too handsome for his own good, she thought. She could almost see the same magnetic charisma in him that came so effortlessly to Elizabeth. Oh dear, I can already tell that they are far too much alike. She felt a moment of sympathy for Will Darcy.

  ***

  The room was filled with smoke and music, and it suited Darcy just fine. He had to do a bit of driving around, but he found the ideal dive on the outskirts of town. There were a few women who eyed him with interest—or rather his expensive clothes—but Darcy was in no mood.

  The drink started bad but improved the more he drank. He drank quite a lot. After a few drinks, he bought a pack of Chesterfields, knowing he would smoke them all and throw up later. He was on his third cigarette when a familiar face appeared next to him.

  “Well, well, well.” George Wickham took a stool next to Darcy. “Isn’t this a surprise?”

  “Hello, George,” Darcy said, exhaling his cigarette smoke at the newcomer. “I’m not a bit surprised to see you. That’s just the kind of day I’m having.”

  Wickham signaled the bartender. “Two for me and another two for him. Put it on his tab.” The bartender looked at Darcy who nodded. A moment later, four fresh bourbons sat in front of them.

  Wickham tossed his first drink back in one swallow, making a face as he did.

  “It’s not exactly Pemberley stock, is it?”

  “The journey may be different, but the destination’s the same,” Darcy said, crushing out his cigarette.

  Wickham shook his head. “So you still do that.” He chuckled. “You know what I call it? Proverbalizing.”

  Darcy grunted but said nothing, intent on his drink. Wickham reached over and took Darcy’s cigarettes, tapping one out of the pack for himself.

  “So what’s the story, Darce? Why slum it?”

  “Don’t be coy, George. You know perfectly well why I’m here.”

  “Would that be a pretty, young spitfire with an excellent pair of legs?”

  “Say another word about her legs and you’ll spend the rest of your life sitting down to piss.”

  Wickham raised his hands in surrender. “Easy, Will. I’ll not speak of thy lady fair, no matter what she’s done to drive you to drink.”

  “She’s not my goddamned lady,” Darcy insisted as he lit another cigarette. “That honor belongs to another sap.”

  “Well, now I am curious. Not many women would turn a Darcy away. Who’s the lucky gent? Anyone we know?”

  To Wickham’s surprise, Darcy laughed. “Oh, we know him all right. The scourge of Garrison Forest himself.”

  Wickham choked on his drink. Darcy laughed derisively. The story was still whispered about in every private school in Maryland. Richard had snuck into the all-girls’ school of Garrison Forest (where he had a number of girlfriends) the night before his high school graduation. Rumor had it that several angry fathers had demanded his arrest, and several others, knowing his family connections, demanded he marry their daughters.

  “Didn’t see that one coming, did you, George?” Darcy continued on with a hollow cheerfulness. “Well, you’re adaptable. No doubt, you’ll find a way around this wrinkle. Richard’s rich too, you know. You could just try to extort him instead.” Darcy turned his head to look at Wickham. “That was what you were planning, wasn’t it?”

  Wickham closed his mouth. “Well, that’s not nearly as much fun, Darce.”

  “You know I’m going to beat the shit out of you, don’t you?”

  Wickham nodded. “I knew it was a possibility. Buy me another drink first?”

  “Why not,” Darcy said, signaling the bartender.

  ***

  The sound of a window sliding open roused Jane out of her uneasy sleep. She had slipped into Elizabeth’s room that evening after dinner. She didn’t find her sister there, but she hadn’t expected to. Jane had calmly told her parents that Elizabeth had a terrible headache and decided to go to bed early. They didn’t question her. One of the benefits of being the oldest and most even-keeled of all the Bennet girls was that everyone took her at her word.

  Jane knew that, wherever Elizabeth was, she had to come home eventually. She passed the hours waiting by flipping through the stacks of books cluttering Elizabeth’s room, hoping to find some small clue that would help her solve the puzzle of her sister’s past with Richard Fitzwilliam. Jane suspected that Will Darcy’s cousin and Elizabeth were once lovers. She found the thought unsettling. It didn’t make her think less of her sister but rather made her respect her more. If her suspicions were true, then Elizabeth had shouldered a heavy burden for years and done it with a measure of grace that belied her true strength.

  She peeked through her eyelids to see Elizabeth climbing in through her bedroom window. Her face was pale, and her eyes were red-rimmed from crying. She closed the window and toed off her shoes before padding over to the bed and climbing in, facing away from Jane.

  “I know you’re awake,” Elizabeth said in a hollow voice.

  Jane put her arm around her waist and pulled her closer, giving all the comfort she could. They fell asleep that way without saying another word.

  ***

  “Hold on, hold on,” Wickham said laughingly as they staggered out the back door of the bar while the sounds of Vaughn Monroe on the jukebox ushered them outside with a “Yippie-aye-yea, yippie-aye-oh.” Wickham pulled his jacket off and placed it carefully across the nose of a Ford Pilot before turning back to Darcy.

  “All right then, Darce.” He grinned. “Do your wor—”

  The crunch of Darcy’s fist against his nose shut him up. Blood immediately started dripping from his nostrils, filling his mouth with the taste of copper. He jabbed left, landing a punch on Darcy’s ribs. With an “Oof!” Darcy stepped away before Wickham could land another hit. Wickham knew he was at a disadvantage as he was shorter, slower, and far drunker than his old companion.

  For himself, Darcy was having a grand time. He reveled in the meaty thud of his fists making contact with Wickham’s flesh. His knuckles were split and bleeding, but he hardly noticed. Not that he minded. He gladly welcomed the pain. Anything was better than the staggering numbness he felt since he saw tears coursing down Elizabeth’s face.

  Elizabeth. Just thinking her name sent him into a frenzy. She was right all along. Love was catastrophic. Love like a raging sea ready to swallow you whole, she had lamented, and he felt those words keenly now. Who wants to be swallowed whole? He doubled his efforts on Wickham. Someone would suffer, by God, and he could think of only one person more deserving.

  ***

  Darcy barely avoided crashing a second car in the damnable bend of Netherfield’s drive. He parked the Jaguar haphazardly, the nose almost touching the house’s front veranda.

  He stumbled into the house, relieved that at least Caroline was not there. No need to pile on another future regret. He careened into the family room, where Richard sat waiting for him, alone.

  “Have a nice reunion?” Darcy slurred. “Was it everything you hoped it would be?”

  Richard sat up, frowning at Darcy’s torn shirt and bloody knuckles.

  “Jesus, D. What have you been into?”

  “Trouble,” Darcy said, throwing himself into a chair and slinging a leg over the arm. He pulled a small glass bottle out of his torn jacket and took a drink, wincing. Wickham was right. It was vile stuff.

  “Will—”

  “Women!” Darcy slung the word like a curse at Richard. He pointed at his cousin. “You never were very good with remembering their names, were you? Oh you never remember them, but you s
ure as hell make sure they never forget you.”

  “I think you’ve had enough.” Richard reached out to take the bottle away.

  “Stay away from me, Richard!” Darcy hissed, shoving his cousin back as hard as he could. He smirked at Richard’s glare before taking another deep pull from the bottle.

  Richard stood to his full height, glaring down at him. “Fitzwilliam Darcy.”

  “Richard Fitzwilliam,” Darcy said mockingly, making a face. Under any other circumstances, Darcy knew that gesture would have sent Richard around the bend into hysterics. As it was, all the hot air seemed to leave him in a rush.

  “What can you be thinking?” Richard asked, running a hand through his hair. “Do you have any idea how fucking crazy you look right now? What’s Charles going to say if he wakes up to see you like this?”

  “I’m guessing I look very crazy, not that I give a damn what you or anyone thinks.”

  Darcy stood, tottering over to the window. It took a minute of fumbling with the latch before he was able to lift it. His mind inevitably turned to Elizabeth sneaking out of her bedroom window, climbing down the rose trellis in her nightgown. His knuckles turned white on the windowsill. He hung his head and spoke to the floor.

  “I don’t care for your good opinion at the moment, Cuz. Or Bingley’s. Anyway, this”—he looked up and gestured to his own rumpled and bruised appearance—“this is all his fault. Charles fucking Bingley. His fault for dragging me to this godforsaken backwater in the first place. He could have gone anywhere. Raleigh, Atlanta. But no, he came here! And then he got that sickness… Do you know the one I mean? The one where you can’t eat or sleep or act like a sane, rational person because you are so full of her?”

  Richard was silent, but the look on his face spoke volumes. Darcy grabbed at his head, hiding his face. “Damn you,” he groaned. “Damn all of you.”

  “You can damn me all you want,” Richard said quietly. “Would you damn Elizabeth as well?”

  Darcy turned away, wiping his face with his arm. “Damn her most of all,” he said in a strangled voice.

  “You don’t mean that, D.”

  “Don’t I? I knew right from the beginning that it was a mistake to have any kind of feelings for her. I should have just done what you did. I should have taken her to bed and forgotten about her.”

  Without warning, Richard grabbed a handful of Darcy’s shirt and pulled his cousin around to face him.

  “Is that what you think, you son of a bitch? That I forgot? Would you like that better, you arrogant asshole?” He shoved Darcy roughly away from him, clearly disgusted. “Have it your way.” Richard’s face was tight with fury. “You’re right. She was just another inconsequential fu—”

  Richard’s words were cut off by Darcy grabbing him around the waist and tackling him to the floor. Darcy heard one of Caroline Bingley’s little tables break beneath them. Without thought for his already battered knuckles, he brought his fist down onto Richard’s face, effectively ending the conversation.

  ***

  Darcy still felt like he had crawled from under a ton of bricks as he shifted in his seat, acutely aware of his bandaged hands and his unrelenting hangover. Still, he would take a hundred hangovers if he did not have to look at the purpling bruises on Richard’s face.

  Bingley had given them a pot of coffee and his office after Jane had seen to them both. Darcy gritted his teeth while she had pressed and moved the small bones of his hand with detached professionalism. When he asked about Richard, she calmly assured him that the bruises were the worst of the damage done.

  Darcy was not so sure that was true.

  “Will you stop looking at me like that?” Richard snapped at him.

  “Richie—”

  “Shut up.” Richard interrupted. “I know I look like shit, possibly for the first time in my life. Don’t think I’m too happy about that. But these”—he gestured to his black eye—“I earned these.”

  Darcy sighed, looking down at his hands. His bandages were speckled with red. When it all came down to it, all his wealth and privilege had meant nothing. With a few words, he was no better than any street thug, mindless and violent. The worst part, he still was not fully in control of himself.

  “Just tell me you didn’t mean what you said, Richard. For your own sake. Please tell me that.”

  Richard looked at him flatly. “I can see how you might think that. I know what kind of man I was before.”

  “Before her?”

  “Before the war. It’s not like it is in the movies, Will: all Captain America and Victor Laslzo singing La Marseillaise. In the end, it’s all burning and blood and shit. That changes a man. You find you have to kill a piece of yourself just to make it to the next day. You saw it yourself when I came back.”

  Darcy nodded, remembering the haggard, hollow-eyed man who had stepped off the train in Lambton. At the time, he could not comprehend why his cousin’s voice was coming from that pale stranger’s mouth.

  Richard picked up the cup of coffee that had been cooling at his elbow. “This is kind of a long story,” he said apologetically.

  “Go ahead,” Darcy said more calmly than he felt. “I’m listening.”

  Chapter Ten

  March 1942

  Fitzwilliam Estate

  Annapolis, Maryland

  Richard straightened his shirt before entering the dining room. Ideally, he would have changed into something that didn’t still carry the lingering scent of Chanel No. 5, but he was already late, and tardiness was one of the admiral’s pet peeves.

  Richard had no doubt his father would be even less pleased to know how his youngest son spent his afternoons. Lately, he’d been fully occupied with fond good-byes to some ladies of his acquaintance. Socialites, nurses, a policeman’s daughter, one or two senator’s wives… Richard had always been something of a socialist when it came to his lovers.

  The family was already seated when he strode into the room. His brother James shook his head with a knowing smile as Richard seated himself beside Anne. His father and Aunt Catherine were having their version of a conversation, which was nothing more than a series of terse exchanges. Little Georgiana looked smaller than usual seated next to the imposing figure of Aunt Catherine. Richard gave his youngest cousin a reassuring smile, which she returned timidly.

  “Sorry I’m late, everyone. So glad you didn’t start without me,” Richard said as he took his seat across from Darcy.

  “You’ll soon realize that the Germans aren’t going to wait for you to show up either,” said the admiral.

  Richard bit back a laugh as he looked down the table to see his brother doing the same. They were only two years apart but to their father, James would always be the adult and he would always be a bumbling child. Not that either of them minded; it was an arrangement that had always suited them. Richard bore the brunt of their father’s ire, and James bore the brunt of his love. Both were heavy burdens in their own way.

  Richard cleared his throat. “Yes, sir.” His father nodded, satisfied, and returned to his meal.

  Anne leaned towards him and whispered, “So, who was it this time?”

  Richard grinned behind his napkin. He’d always been amused by his cousin’s blatant curiosity over his conquests.

  “Charming young writer,” he whispered back. “Has a society column at the Times Herald.”

  “Any good?”

  “Now what kind of good southern gentleman would I be if I told you that?”

  “Richie,” Darcy hissed, nodding towards his younger sister.

  “What’s going on down there?” Catherine barked. “I abhor snickering at the dinner table!”

  James covered for them by turning to his aunt and asking whether she had any other plans while she was in Annapolis. Out of the corner of his eye, he gave Richard the smallest of winks.

  “You really will have to learn how to behave,” said Darcy.

  Richard laughed. “God, I hope not.”

  “That ma
kes two of us,” Anne said. “If I have to live vicariously through you, Will, I’m absolutely doomed.”

  “You should enlist, Anne,” Richard said jokingly. “It would get you out of the house.”

  “To hell with that. They ought to send Mother. She’d have this business wrapped up in no time.”

  “Yes.” Richard elbowed her. “But for which side?”

  The admiral stood, bringing all conversation to a halt.

  “I am glad,” he said, “to have our family here on this night before we all go our separate ways. We have heard the call of duty and answered, as this family has always done and always will do.”

  He stopped, smiling fondly at his eldest son. “The Lexington is getting a fine lieutenant in you, James. I know you will make this family very proud.”

  James bore the attention with his usual good humor, nodding thanks to his father.

  “And Richard”—the admiral shifted his focus to his younger son, his tone noticeably drier—“may the army teach you well. I hope that you will do us proud.”

  “Hear, hear,” Richard said with a grin. He found that laughter could often take the sting out of his father’s barbs. The admiral sat back down, and the murmur of conversation resumed.

  Richard noticed Darcy looking thoughtfully into his glass. He’d seen that expression in his cousin’s face more often lately since John Darcy had passed. Richard wondered whether his cousin was lonely.

  “What’s wrong, D?”

  “War is like love.”

  “Messy?” Richard offered with a grin. Darcy gave him a tired, resigned smile.

  “It always finds a way.”

  ***

  Richard lowered himself onto the Chesterfield sofa in his father’s study, stretching his long legs out in front of him. He looked over at his brother, who was fiddling with the dials on the Zenith.

  “Are you going to play with that thing all night?”

  “That sounds more like your line of work,” James said distractedly. The sound of the Jimmy Dorsey Orchestra filled the room. “There we go, that’s the ticket.”