“I am afraid that your sister is very ill, Mr Darcy,” the doctor began without preamble. “She has contracted a nasty fever, and cannot possibly be moved.”
Darcy’s jaw jutted as he ground his teeth, very aware of Elizabeth hurrying down the stairs and towards the kitchen. “What are you doing for her treatment?” he demanded.
“I have given her a draught, and supplied instructions for other remedies which may prove efficacious. Mr Darcy, your sister is in the best possible place for such an illness. She could not possibly have better nursing than she will receive from the Misses Bennet, I assure you.” Doctor Jones peered at him anxiously from over his half-moon glasses.
“How soon is she likely to be recovered enough to travel?” Darcy finally managed to get out in a moderately civil tone, while inwardly he railed at the unfairness of life. Was God punishing for something, forcing him to stay under the same roof as Miss Elizabeth? She came back into the hall now, a packet of something in her hands, paused when she saw him still speaking to the doctor.
Doctor Jones shook his head. “I cannot say, Mr Darcy. Not less than a week, I am certain.” Turning away, he accepted the packet Elizabeth offered and opened it to examine the herbs inside. “Good, I will take these up now,” he pronounced.
“Hill will bring hot water up in a few moments,” Elizabeth promised, and the doctor nodded and hurried back up the stairs.
“Damn!” burst out of Darcy, startling Elizabeth into taking a step backwards.
“Mr Darcy!” she exclaimed, rather shocked that he would curse in front of a lady, even if he did not hold much good opinion of her or her family. “I assure you that Georgiana has not fallen ill merely to spite your plans!”
In his frustration, he spoke unguardedly. “I thought I had washed this damnable place’s dirt from my boots for good a month hence when I persuaded Bingley to return to London!”
Elizabeth’s face grew cold. “You persuaded Mr Bingley to leave Netherfield and not return?”
“I was instrumental in convincing him that his best interests lay elsewhere, yes,” Darcy snapped in return.
“You unfeeling monster,” Elizabeth spat, and Darcy took a step back, startled by her sudden rage, the fire that leapt in her eyes. “Do you have any idea what my sister has suffered by his abandonment, how miserable she has been, she who is all that is good and sweet, who least of anyone deserves to suffer?”
“No promises were exchanged, I am given to understand,” Darcy said stiffly, finding himself suddenly on the defensive. “Which is just as well, for the match was entirely unsuitable. A connection with your family, even so remote as to have my friend married to your sister, could not be borne; I should have had to cut my friendship with Bingley, which would have grieved me greatly.”
He never even saw the slap coming. Elizabeth struck so hard that the crack echoed in the hallway, his head snapping to one side with the force of it.
“You selfish, disgusting excuse for a man,” Elizabeth seethed. “You have destroyed my sister’s chance of happiness, and for what? Because you are too proud to associate with a friend who might choose to ally himself with someone who in your eyes is beneath him? You, Mr Darcy, are no gentleman!”
“Elizabeth.” The sharply spoken word behind her cut off her tirade, and they both turned to see Mr Bennet standing at the open door of his study. “Go upstairs to your sister. I do not doubt that she, as well as I, heard every word of that and I believe she may need your comfort just now.”
Without another word, Elizabeth turned on her heel and ran up the stairs. Darcy, hand pressed to his smarting cheek, was left with only the fulminating glare she threw at him before her departure.
“If you would, please, sir,” Mr Bennet gestured, and despite the polite words there was no question but that his words were intended as a command. Darcy took a deep breath and entered the study, taking the seat he had occupied last night as Mr Bennet closed the door.
“Are you truly the cause of my Jane’s broken heart?” Mr Bennet came straight to the point. “And you dare to come into my house and boast of it to Elizabeth, who has done nothing to harm you and has tried everything to try to ease Jane’s pain these last weeks? If manners such as this are customary among those of high rank, sir, I am glad not to count myself among your company. I would throw you from the house this instant, if it were not for your sister’s grave condition!”
There wasn’t a lot Darcy could say. He had behaved abominably; his pride stung just as much as his slapped cheek. He hung his head, ashamed. To insult Elizabeth so in her father’s home was truly beyond the pale.
“Are you so high in the instep that your friend’s connections are more important to him than his happiness?” Mr Bennet’s voice was honestly curious, and Darcy looked up to meet his eyes. “Can that really be true? I cannot imagine such a thing, sir.”
“I… did not believe that Miss Bennet’s affections were truly engaged,” Darcy said in a low voice. “I believed that his happiness would be better served to look elsewhere, for a woman who truly loved him.”
Mr Bennet only shook his head, sitting down at his desk and rubbing at his face with both hands. “Did you truly believe that, or did you only want to?”
Considering that he had not already been ordered from the house, Darcy owed the older man nothing less than honesty. “I do not know.”
“I have had to watch my Jane waste away into a decline, and you do not know?”
Humiliated to think that his actions were the cause of Miss Bennet’s new thinness and her pale, sad face at dinner the previous night, Darcy shut his eyes. This was without a doubt the worst interview he’d ever had in his life, and that included the time at Cambridge when Wickham landed him in hot water with the Dean, because this time Darcy was actually guilty of the awful things he was being accused of.
“I will write to Mr Bingley,” he said, “and suggest I have reason to believe that if he returned to Netherfield, Miss Bennet would be extremely glad to see him.”
Mr Bennet tapped his fingers on his desk for a moment, thinking. “I will consider it,” he said finally, in a tone of clear dismissal.
Darcy rose to his feet and abased himself in a deep bow to the older man. “I am most humbly sorry for the insults I have given to your daughters and to your house, sir. I am conscious that I have not acted as a gentleman ought.”
“Well, at least you are aware of it,” Mr Bennet said dryly. “I daresay you know what you need to do, then, for it is not I to whom your most humble apologies are owed.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Darcy knew Mr Bennet was quite correct: though he winced internally at the thought of having to abase himself in apology, particularly to Elizabeth, he also knew he must do so as soon as possible. “Will you ask Miss Elizabeth if she will see me, so that I may apologise? And Miss Bennet, too,” he added as something of an afterthought. “I shall ask her what she would wish me to do, to make amends with Bingley.”
“Perhaps it would be best to wait a little while,” Mr Bennet replied dryly. “At this moment, I suspect Jane is once again crying her eyes out and Elizabeth is wondering if there is any way she can legally get away with murder.”
Darcy grimaced. From the last rage-filled look Elizabeth gave him before running up the stairs, he suspected Mr Bennet was entirely correct.
“I am, of course, privy to information that Elizabeth is not. Namely, why you are so eager to get out of Hertfordshire and remove your sister from any possible exposure to Mr Wickham once and for all.”
“I will not use that as an excuse for my behaviour this morning,” Darcy said, his chin held high. “My most grievous offence towards your family occurred some time ago, it seems. Please, Mr Bennet… please believe me when I say that truly, I would not have purposely caused such grief to Miss Bennet. It was very ill-done of me to act as I did without true understanding of and due consideration to her feelings and I only hope that I may in some way be able to make amends.”
“Pr
ettily said,” Mr Bennet said with a thoughtful nod. “Well, you may as well make yourself comfortable, Mr Darcy,” he gestured around at the book-lined walls. “I should suggest giving Elizabeth at least an hour to stop contemplating methods by which she could bring about your painful demise before I approach her to ask if she would be willing to hear your apology.”
“Thank you,” Darcy said sincerely. “You will not object to my company?”
“Not so long as you keep your mouth shut and refrain from insulting my family again, sir.” Mr Bennet’s eyes were uncomfortably penetrating even through his glasses. Darcy broke eye contact first, picking up a nearby book at random and opening it. It turned out to be in German, of which he had never learned more than a few phrases.
Absorbed in his own book, Mr Bennet ignored him, which suited Darcy exceedingly well. He sat in silence, staring unseeingly at the incomprehensible text on the page, his mind re-running with awful clarity the events of the previous half-hour. Had he really told Elizabeth that her family was so far beneath him he would have to cut the friendship should Bingley marry Jane? The awful truth was that he should have had to cut the connection to avoid driving himself mad with that which he could never have. A wedding between his friend and her sister would necessarily have thrown them into company more frequently, and Darcy knew himself well enough to know that at some point, he would have cracked.
Lifting his hand, he slowly fingered the reddened mark on his cheek. Any dream he might have nurtured of a possible future with Elizabeth was well and truly ended now. The look of hatred she had thrown in his direction before storming up the stairs was seared forever into his memory. He had been the cause of hurt to her dearly beloved sister, and even if he was somehow able to remedy the error by bringing Jane and Bingley together, he was quite sure that Elizabeth would never be able to forgive his separating them in the first place.
Wickham had done his worst in pouring poison into Elizabeth’s ear, but Darcy himself had completed the damage. The only woman he had ever felt that he might possibly have become able to love was now lost to him forever.
Closing his eyes, he sat in silent despair until Mr Bennet’s voice broke the silence.
“I know Goethe can be rather dry, but it usually doesn’t put me to sleep, Mr Darcy. Are you quite all right?”
Heaving a deep sigh, Darcy opened his eyes. “No insult intended to your book, sir.” He closed the book and set it aside. “I was just ruminating on my mistakes.”
“Oh, you do not want to do too much of that, Mr Darcy. That way lies a great dissatisfaction with life, I fear, and I do not see that you have so very much to be dissatisfied about.” Mr Bennet’s tone was once again exceedingly dry.
“Discovering that I have utterly failed to act in a fair and decent manner towards a family of gentlefolk who have done me no ill whatsoever is a great source of dissatisfaction to me,” Darcy said in a low voice. “My father would have been ashamed.”
“Was it not your father who gave you such pride in your great lineage and family wealth?”
Darcy’s nostrils flared, but Mr Bennet had a right to sound aggrieved and sarcastic, considering the shocking insults Darcy had dealt his daughters that morning, and the grief his actions a month past had brought Jane. “It was, yes, but my father also impressed upon me the need to respect persons from all stations in life until they show me that they do not deserve it. Your daughters… Miss Bennet and Miss Elizabeth have never acted with anything other that the utmost decorum.”
“Well, I am not sure that is entirely true in Lizzy’s case,” Mr Bennet said with a wry little smile, “but I don’t recall Jane doing anything unladylike in the last decade or so.”
“I have grievously injured a lady, Mr Bennet, and I am sitting here stewing in self-despite,” Darcy said miserably.
“I’m afraid I cannot help you with that, Mr Darcy, even if I cared to, since my daughter is the lady in question.” Setting down his book, Mr Bennet rose to his feet. “I will go and see if either Jane or Lizzy are willing to speak with you.”
“Thank you.” Darcy rose to his feet and bowed as Mr Bennet left the study. Left alone, he found himself pacing again. The image of Elizabeth’s face, the rage and hurt clear in her blazing eyes, would not leave his mind. He had done that, he and he alone. He could lay no blame at Wickham’s door for this disaster.
Darcy paused in his pacing. Disaster? he thought.
Perhaps the day before, he would have dismissed the thought as foolishness, as a momentary lapse of reason. How could it be a disaster that a country miss with neither wealth nor connections to recommend her, possessed of no particular beauty but a pair of fine eyes, should hold him in ill regard?
Today, after coming face to face with Elizabeth Bennet again, Darcy acknowledged to himself the truth. It mattered very much that Elizabeth Bennet despised him; his future happiness was in serious jeopardy because of it.
“Elizabeth does not wish to see you,” Mr Bennet said from the doorway, and Darcy’s head dropped forward. Of course she did not. She had mocked his implacability when he told her that his good opinion, once lost, was lost forever, but he was the one who had given her every reason to despise him. No doubt she wished him in Hades.
“Jane, however, has agreed to give you a few minutes. She will be down shortly. I plan to remain in the room, Mr Darcy, to ensure that no further insults are offered to my daughters, and if I believe that you have done so, I will request that you leave Longbourn immediately. Miss Darcy will be cared for, of course, to the very best of our ability, and we will send word to you when she is recovered enough to leave.”
“You would be well within your rights to do so for the insults I have already offered, sir, but you have been generous thus far. I seek only now to make amends for my ungentlemanlike behaviour,” Darcy said as humbly as he could manage, though the attitude was entirely foreign to him.
“We shall see.” Mr Bennet took a seat behind his desk again, but did not pick up his book.
A soft footfall alerted Darcy to Jane’s presence as she entered the room, closing the door behind her. Her eyes were red-rimmed, high colour painting her pale cheeks, and she held a handkerchief in one hand, her grip on it so tight that her knuckles had turned white.
“You wished to see me, Mr Darcy?” Her soft voice was hoarse with tears.
“Please take a seat, Miss Bennet,” Darcy grabbed the chair he himself had lately occupied and held it for her before finding another and sitting down facing her. It would be rude and insulting to ask after her health when she was very clearly distraught, so he dived straight in. “I owe you the most fervent, heartfelt apology it is within my power to deliver.”
Jane bit at her lip, glanced at her father, but said nothing. Taking a deep breath, Darcy ploughed on. “I made assumptions about you which I now know were fundamentally incorrect, and because of my assumptions I took actions which have grievously and unfairly injured you.”
Still she did not speak, just twisting her handkerchief tightly in her hands.
“I would like your permission to write to Mr Bingley and tell him I have lately become aware that I was incorrect in my assessment of you. To tell him that if he should return to Netherfield, he should find a warm welcome here in Hertfordshire, and at Longbourn in particular. Is it your wish that I should write such a letter, Miss Bennet?”
Jane’s blue eyes searched his face for long minutes. At last she said “You must do as you think fit, Mr Darcy.”
That wasn’t much of an answer, but he thought he saw a tiny glimmer of hope in her eyes, so he merely bowed his head. It was possible Bingley might not return to Hertfordshire even with Darcy’s urging, so he would not raise her hopes any further at this time. “I understand your sister is very angry with me, and rightfully so. It is entirely her right to refuse to see me, but if I may ask one thing of you?”
“You may ask; I make no promises.” Jane held her head high, and Darcy thought that she had a lot more spine than he had ever g
iven her credit for.
“Please convey to Miss Elizabeth that I am aware I have wronged you, your family, and Miss Elizabeth herself, and that I will do my best to make amends. I owe you more than I can express for your care for Georgiana, and I have repaid you in very poor coin thus far. I will endeavour to do better in the future.”
Jane studied his face for a long moment, seemed to be waiting for him to say something else. At last, she glanced at her father, who nodded to her. Dipping a small curtsy, she turned on her heel and departed without another word.
Puzzled, Darcy looked at Mr Bennet as the door closed. “What did I say?”
“I think it is rather what you did not say.” Mr Bennet harrumphed, shook his head and picked up his book again. “That pride of yours will be your downfall, lad.”
Darcy bristled a little at the lad, but he’d made enough of a fool of himself today. “Very well, what did I not say?”
“While you apologised to Jane, and rather handsomely too, you did not ask Jane to convey any apology to Elizabeth.”
Aghast, he thought back over his words. “Oh, dear Lord!”
“Too late now,” Mr Bennet pointed out as Darcy looked frantically towards the door. “I am not entirely sure that Elizabeth would believe your words, even if Jane does decide to convey them.”
Darcy dug his hands into his hair. “Every time I open my mouth around Elizabeth, I make an utter fool of myself,” he muttered.
“You are hardly the first young man to do so, and you will not be the last.” Mr Bennet sounded highly amused.
Darcy cursed under his breath. He hadn’t thought the older man’s hearing would be sharp enough to catch his words. Glancing up, he found Mr Bennet watching him with a distinct smirk on his lips.
“I was a little curious, I must say, when I first heard her snapping and snarling about you. Clearly you got under her skin; I wondered if she had done the same to you.”
Darcy’s mouth opened and closed soundlessly several times before Mr Bennet took pity on him.
A Christmas Miracle At Longbourn (The Darcy And Lizzy Miracles Book 1) Page 7
