Elizabeth remembered Lady Catherine’s shock that the Bennets had had no governess and felt that Mr. Darcy, too, would disapprove.
Georgiana enjoyed lively correspondences with several girls she had studied with at her school, and she shared with Lizzy stories of their activities and adventures. And though Maria Lucas listened eagerly to these tales, Miss de Bourgh sniffed and declared that she was certain she would have rafts of friends at school, had her health allowed her to attend.
“Of course, dear Anne,” said Georgiana, and then allowed her cousin to suggest a song for her to play.
All in all, Elizabeth found she was enjoying herself in Kent far more than she had anticipated, and it was primarily due to her growing affection for Mr. Darcy’s sister. She was as sweet-tempered as Jane, as sensible as Charlotte, and as curious and fond of a good laugh as she was herself.
A spate of bad weather had kept the party at Hunsford away from those at Rosings for several days. When the storms finally cleared, Mr. Collins hied off to his patroness’s quarters to ensure her that their temporary separation was not the result of any decrease in loyalty or devotion on his part. No sooner had he left, though, than the ladies of the house were treated to visitors in the form of Georgiana Darcy and an unknown gentleman.
It was Maria Lucas who first spotted them entering the courtyard in front of the parsonage on the backs of two beautiful horses. Elizabeth joined Maria at the casement to watch and could not help but think that the gentleman’s horse, at least, appeared very familiar. The gentleman dismounted, then helped the lady down, and they made their way to the front door, where Charlotte rushed to meet them.
“Mrs. Collins,” Georgiana said, after she had welcomed them inside. “Allow me to present my cousin, Colonel Fitzwilliam.”
Elizabeth’s eyes widened. So this was the man she had heard so much of. The man who shared the guardianship of Georgiana with Mr. Darcy, who so worried about Mr. Darcy’s activities on the continent. She hoped his arrival did not bring ill tidings of the other gentleman’s fate.
Introductions were made all around. Colonel Fitzwilliam was a man of around forty, not handsome, though possessed of a pleasing manner, and was every inch a gentleman.
“Ah, the famous Miss Bennet, of whom I have heard so much.” She must not have been able to conceal her shocked expression, for he quickly glanced at Georgiana with a smile. “I see none of the praise has been exaggerated.”
“It is good to meet you, sir,” Elizabeth replied with a curtsy.
They sat, and as Colonel Fitzwilliam set about the expected task of praising Charlotte’s efforts to improve the parsonage, Elizabeth was left to contemplate whether or not the colonel had heard of her prior to speaking to Georgiana. She knew she could trust Georgiana to be discreet about what Elizabeth had confided in her, just as Georgiana had trusted her.
But what if Colonel Fitzwilliam knew the truth of what had occurred the night of the Netherfield ball?
The conversation continued without her involvement for quite some time, and every moment, Elizabeth’s distress grew. Finally, she managed, “And what brings you to Kent, sir? Family duty to her ladyship, or did you miss the sight of your ward?”
“I am not ashamed to relish the time I spend with Georgiana,” he said. “And I wanted to bring her gift in person, for I find it likely I must soon travel to the continent.”
So he does go in search of Mr. Darcy. “A gift?”
“My horse,” said Georgiana. “Moth. I was forced to leave her behind when I left London, and I have been quite desolate without her.”
“But… Moth is not the only Darcy horse that stands in the courtyard, I see,” Elizabeth replied. “Is that not Mr. Darcy’s mount, Peaseblossom?”
“It is!” Georgiana exclaimed with some delight. “I had not thought you acquainted. Do you ride, Elizabeth?”
“No, not at all,” said Elizabeth. “But I often saw Mr. Darcy taking the horse out.” Once, she had wondered if the steed’s silly name, chosen by his unknown sister, had been a symptom of foolishness or humor. Now that she knew Georgiana well, she saw it had been an attempt to get a laugh out of her too-serious brother.
“Yes, that is the creature,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam. “And he might as well be in Kentish stables than London ones. His master will not be returning for some time.”
Elizabeth looked at Georgiana, who would not meet her gaze.
Later, when they were alone, she confirmed the colonel’s dire words. “They were able to find no trace of my brother in Belgium. He has even dismissed his valet. Colonel Fitzwilliam has closed up our house in London. I do not wish for him to leave me in Kent. He says he will go to the continent, but I would much prefer he took me home to Pemberley. If I am to be without my brother, I would rather do so in Derbyshire.”
“Of course,” Elizabeth said. “There is nothing like the comforts of home when all seems topsy-turvy.”
Yet, even as she said it, she thought it did not quite describe her own feelings. For at home in Longbourn she had felt ill at ease, wondering all the time what Mr. Darcy might feel, how he weighed the price he had paid to keep her name from ruin.
Now, she knew: he had been driven from England’s shores entirely. And though the thought grieved her, she found she could bear it so much better in the society of his sister, who thought of him with an even greater frequency and stronger affection than Elizabeth’s own.
Affection! How curious. She had never before considered her feelings for Mr. Darcy to be those of affection. Gratitude, surely, and regret that she had not been given the chance to know the truth of his character during their short acquaintance. Then she had thought him only snobbish and disagreeable, like his constant companion, Miss Bingley.
She had not known the depth of his nobility, nor of his capacity for great feelings. She had seen only the briefest glimpse, that single afternoon beneath the yew tree.
And she had run away. Abandoned him and Peaseblossom and the sheltering boughs of the yew in order to make plans with Mr. Wickham.
What a fool she had been. What a wretched fool.
And what a simple choice, which had cost them all so much.
Chapter 18
Dear Elizabeth,
I wonder what you would think if you could see me now. The fine Mr. Darcy you knew at Netherfield has all but wasted away. Pasty, wretched gentleman he was, too, who thought an afternoon of riding was healthful exercise, who had soft hands and a clean-shaven jaw and would not dare be seen in public without a perfectly knotted cravat.
There are no mirrors here, but I occasionally catch a glimpse of myself in a still pond surface. I hardly know the man I see. I wonder who would recognize him? Who would love him, in his present state?
I wonder, now, whoever loved me. I thought my sister did, but what real choice had she been given? I was more even than a brother to her—she looked up to me almost as a father. In me she placed utmost trust, but also utmost expectation that every choice I made was correct. One must believe this of one’s parents. I certainly believed it of mine. I loved and trusted all the principles they instilled in me since birth. What choice did I have?
What good did it do me? I cannot conceive of what my father, in his wisdom, would say to me now, if he knew where all these principles and responsibility have led me. To the alienation between his beloved son and the man he loved almost as well as a second son. To the latter’s ignominious career and untimely death. I always thought I was left with good principles, and so must Wickham have been, as we received them from the same source. But now I think good principles were not enough, for were we not both left to develop and practice them in pride and conceit? I had my arrogance, my selfish disdain for all those I thought beneath me. And I thought far too many people beneath me. I imagined myself liberal-minded, but look at the contempt I held for those whose positions in life were below my own? For you, and for Wickham, too.
And George had his own trials to bear. Was my father right to want for W
ickham a life in the church, the moral responsibility over a parish that his lack of fortune or property would not allow a material responsibility? He yearned for us, I think, to be joined in our goals for the care and comfort of the people in and around Pemberley, as our fathers had been. My father’s love made him blind to the flaws in Wickham’s character, flaws that must only have been exacerbated by the manner in which he was raised—so like a gentleman—which in Wickham’s weakness made him strive only for the trappings of such a life, without the burdens.
Of course, I know many like him who do possess property and name and fortune, yet lose themselves to idleness and excess. My family even now believes they have lost me that way. I shall become another ne’er-do-well, wandering aimlessly through Europe and making no one proud.
At least then I shall no longer be proud.
What do you think, Elizabeth? Was I born to be a monster, so puffed up by my own self-importance that I could not see it was consuming me whole? Was I as doomed by my upbringing as Wickham was by his?
In short, was there any way in which I might have saved him? Had I tried harder to reach him when we were still in school, still at Pemberley? Had I not turned him away when he came back, years after my father’s passing, and asked for more? Had I not threatened him at Ramsgate, when he came after Georgiana? Had I not laid hands on him, the night he tried to steal you away?
How curious to remember it now, here in this godforsaken shack at the ends of the Earth. I do not know what you think of me, or if you think of me at all. Do you curse me for having a hand in your favorite’s death? Do you remember me fondly for ensuring your name was not connected to the scandal? I wonder if you would speak a word in my defense to all those who disdain me.
There were times I think I could have made you love me, as I was half in love with you. Tiny, stolen moments. When we were alone in the drawing room at Netherfield Park, that last morning before you and Jane returned to your home. I remember it now. The fire was crackling, and you had your nose shoved in a book. I, too, pretended to read, to save me from speaking to you. So afraid was I that if I dared say a word, all the things I was feeling would fall from my lips, inelegant and far too soon.
But what if I had spoken then?
What if I had kept you from running that day in the rain? That day beneath the yew, when you and I were trapped alone at the entrance to fairyland?
This is no fairyland. They say we are at the very gates of heaven. I have never seen anything so brilliant as when the clouds part and the sun shines upon the ice. Tomorrow I shall reach the peak, or die. There, perhaps, I shall be close enough to God to ask for his forgiveness.
Yours always,
Fitzwilliam Darcy
Chapter 19
Elizabeth had been nearly five weeks in Kent when she learned that Georgiana and Colonel Fitzwilliam were to leave the neighborhood. Though glad her friend had convinced her guardian to take her home to Pemberley instead of abandoning her to Lady Catherine so he could search the continent, Elizabeth could not help but feel how much she would miss Georgiana’s company, and said so when Georgiana and Colonel Fitzwilliam came by the Hunsford parsonage to take their leave.
“I only regret leaving you, my dearest friend,” Georgiana said, pressing her hand. “If you will do me the honor of letting me write to you?”
“You may,” Elizabeth said, beaming. “That is, if it is all right with the colonel.”
“I have already received his permission. I knew you would ask. It is the elder sister in you.”
“Though I will not claim myself quite as protective as those who watch over you, I have nothing but the highest respect for their concern.”
“Oh, Elizabeth. How I shall miss your sense of humor! Will you write to me, too?”
“You may depend upon it.”
“I know not when we shall meet again.” Tears seemed to spring into her eyes, and Elizabeth felt moved. Poor little heiress. Poor, sisterless thing. It was not the same, perhaps, to have an elder brother as it was to have a sister.
“You will not be at Pemberley forever,” she said. “Perhaps you will be in London the next time I visit my aunt and uncle there.”
“That is a happy thought indeed,” said Georgiana, and she must have held it until the end of their call, as she sniffed no more.
Charlotte and Elizabeth watched them leave before returning to their work. Maria soon excused herself to another room, and they were free to talk. Elizabeth had noted, in recent weeks, that despite all the time she spent with Charlotte, the intimacy they had once shared could never be the same. There was a gulf between them now. Charlotte had embarked on a new part of her life, one for which Elizabeth, despite her genuine wish to help her friend, had little advice to give.
And there was another division between them as well. Despite her increased acquaintance with Mr. Collins, Elizabeth still could not find his qualities likely to recommend himself to any young woman of sense and understanding. She did not know what Charlotte saw in the fellow, beyond his position in life, and worried that her friend would grow to regret her choice, once the pleasures of having her own household had subsided. Thankfully, Charlotte’s disposition was not one that sought to tease or torment her partner in life, as Elizabeth’s father did to her mother. If Charlotte found her own, private humor in his follies, she kept them a secret. But Elizabeth was conscious of his every moment of foolishness, and could not on those occasions but glance at her friend and wonder what she was thinking beneath her sensible cap, and what might be felt behind her placid smile.
She could not do it herself. She needed to be able to look up to her husband, and think him at least her equal, if not her superior, or she would be miserable.
“That is a wise friendship you have made, Eliza,” Charlotte said, cannily, as she worked her needle along a hem.
“It is a good friendship, Charlotte,” Elizabeth replied. “That young woman was sorely in need of decent companionship, and as much as I believe you respect the residents of Rosings Park, I know you are not ignorant of their deficiencies in companionship and conversation.”
“No, I am not,” her friend said with a glint in her eye. “Ah well, perhaps you are right. I will say that I find Miss Darcy to be a delightful little creature. She is young and naive yet, a bit like Jane in her sweetness, but I see in her the potential for a greater understanding and wit.”
“Yes, I think just the same,” said Elizabeth, offhand. She was working a particularly tricky bit of embroidery.
“You Bennet women have always had a knack for forming friendships with the sisters of wealthy men,” said Charlotte. “If only said ladies were better able to recommend you to their male relatives. Their affections have been far more fickle.”
Elizabeth gasped and stared at Charlotte, sewing forgotten. “Why, Charlotte! What ever might lead you to say such a shocking thing?”
“Is it shocking?” she responded. “Jane was quite intimate with Mr. Bingley’s sisters at Netherfield, and yet, he went away all the same. You yourself said that they only once returned the call she paid to them in London, then dropped the acquaintance entirely. And from what news I hear of Mr. Darcy at Rosings, he is quite lost in the Alps. He doted on you back at home—do you not remember him dancing with you at the Netherfield ball?—and now he is gone off forever. It shall not matter so much how often you write to Miss Darcy, if Mr. Darcy never returns to England.”
Elizabeth felt quite trapped. She wanted to say, He shall return…someday. But she could not bring herself to speak the words, lest Charlotte think she hoped for it for reasons above and beyond the fact that his return was so desired by all his relations. Instead, she shook her head.
“Oh, Charlotte, what intrigues you imagine! You are getting as wild in your schemes as my own mother. Tell me, is it thus for all married women, that they have nothing to do but plan the marriages of others?”
“Colonel Fitzwilliam, though. He might be something.”
“You are proving
my point with every word from your mouth! And that is even more unlikely than your other presupposition. The younger son of an earl will marry a woman of fortune. He has little enough of his own.” Had not Colonel Fitzwilliam joked about it often enough?
“Who has little enough of his own?” asked Maria, as she entered. Charlotte said nothing, just pursed her lips and gave Elizabeth quite a meaningful stare.
Elizabeth returned to her work. She was friends with Georgiana Darcy because she had found her to be, as Charlotte freely admitted, a delightful creature. She was friends with her because the girl was kind and thoughtful, and because, moreover, they were joined by the bonds of shared experiences with Mr. Wickham, and their concern over the grief the manner of his death had engendered in Mr. Darcy.
Of course, Elizabeth was hardly the equal of Georgiana in that matter. For Georgiana wept as a sister wept for a brother. She feared for his safety on the continent, not to mention the state of his mind, as he seemed so reluctant to return home.
Elizabeth could not touch such feelings. She sympathized deeply for her dear friend, but she was barely an acquaintance of Mr. Darcy’s. Had he departed before the Netherfield ball, she was quite certain that they would have soon forgotten each other entirely. To him, she was an impertinent country girl; to her, he was an arrogant gentleman from London. And so they might always have remained, with perhaps the occasional twinge of memory of those moments beneath the yew, but nothing more.
Now, though… she would never be able to forget him. Not for the service he had rendered her that night and in the days that followed, protecting her name and reputation from scandal, even at great personal cost.
In Darcy's Dreams Page 13
