by Jayne Bamber
***
While Elizabeth was speaking with her mother, Sir Edward, Richard and Darcy met with Inspector Renard, who arrived shortly after Lady Anne.
Sir Edward could do little more than listen as Darcy detailed his plan – he listed Wickham’s many debts, which he had collected over the years. Darcy intended to search out any new debts Wickham had accrued more recently, in the hope that it would be enough to put him away in Marshalsea for quite some time.
“If we find him, of course,” was Richard’s contribution. Inspector Renard outlined a plan to investigate any debts incurred under the names Wickham or Smythe, and promised to report back the next day. The meeting was a brief one, both due to Darcy’s premeditated arrangement, and likely also the hostile air in the room.
Sir Edward was angrier than he had ever been on his nieces’ behalf, both Jane and Elizabeth. And yet, the two young men he rather wanted to horsewhip were just as likely to do far worse to each other – though he was furious at being the last to know about Wickham, he decided it best to steer everyone’s anger toward the man tied up in his cellar.
The three men went down there, where Wickham was tied to a chair and guarded by two soldiers who seemed to take their orders from Richard. The coachman that Wickham had employed as his getaway driver was tied up on the floor beside him. “Please,” the coachman cried, showing them where his neck had been wounded. “Please, I need a surgeon.”
“Buchanan,” Richard drawled. “You stitched me up on the field once, a couple years ago. Can you do it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Sorry, old boy,” Richard taunted the coachman. “If we take you to a doctor, who knows what song you would sing? We need to keep your co-conspirator here with us a little longer. Take him into the next room, Buchanan. And you,” he said, pointing to Wickham. Sir Edward hung back, watching with a rising ire in his chest as Richard went forward and taunted the villain. “I have been long overdue in welcoming you back to England,” Richard growled before he punched Wickham in the face.
Wickham spat blood at Richard’s foot, and Richard hit him again. Darcy came forward and pulled Richard back by the shoulder, away from Wickham. “I need to question him, Richard.”
For a moment Richard turned and looked as if he would lash out at Darcy, but he did not. He cracked his knuckles loudly, and then clenched his fists. “This is not over, Wickham,” he said, backing away. “Darcy has some questions to put to you, and I shall decide if I like the answers or not.”
Darcy began by asking Wickham questions about the nature of his debts accrued while in London, but the villain was not very forthcoming. Richard was clearly growing impatient, and took another swing at Wickham, but elicited no information. Sir Edward waved Darcy off, and began a different approach.
“I want to know what Mrs. Younge has to do with all this.”
“She is innocent.”
“Oh, is she? She is no friend of my sister’s, and I think we both know that. How came she to have so much information about my family?”
“One of the servants gave this to us,” Major Pruett said, handing Sir Edward a letter. “Wickham gave it to them, to give to you.”
Sir Edward opened the letter and read it over. It appeared to be written in Elizabeth’s hand – but no, it was quite similar, though not exact. It was addressed to himself, explaining Elizabeth’s violent passion for Mr. Smythe, and her intention of eloping with him – it went so far as to suggest that she forfeited all claim to her dowry, and urged Sir Edward to divide her portion between her two sisters.
“This was meant to be left behind, had you succeeded in your abduction?”
Wickham said nothing, and only shrugged at them, smiling wickedly. Richard struck him in the face again, the force of his blow sending the chair backward. There was a loud thud as Wickham’s head hit the ground, but the villain only laughed again. Richard kicked him several times in the stomach, until he began to choke on his own blood.
“That is enough,” Darcy said, and Richard set Wickham’s chair upright. The scoundrel’s body sagged now, blood pouring down his face and mouth.
Sir Edward regarded him thoughtfully. “Did you read this letter?”
“No – it was meant to explain Eliza’s absence.”
“I wonder who wrote such a thing. It could not possibly have been your co-conspirator, Mrs. Younge, for I am sure you were only in it for the financial gain, and yet right here it says that Lizzy wishes me to give her dowry entirely to her sisters. Why should you relinquish the claim on such a substantial sum?”
Wickham looked genuinely surprised, and sputtered as he coughed up more blood. “That bitch!”
“What bitch?” Richard growled.
Wickham smiled over at Darcy. “Your best friend’s mother, Madeline Bingley. She is Evelyn’s sister, and she copied one of Eliza’s notes to Evelyn, practicing getting her hand just right. Filthy, lying whore! It was all her plan; Evelyn wanted nothing to do with the idea, she would tell you anything you wish to know. I went along with it for the money, but it was all Madeline’s plan. She sought us out, to bring you all down, and I could not pass up the opportunity.”
Sir Edward staggered backward as if he was the one who had been struck. That was how Mrs. Younge seemed to have just enough information to pass herself off as a friend of Fanny’s – Madeline knew a little of his sister’s history, and Wickham must have filled in the blanks. They had all had the wool pulled over their eyes, and it had almost cost him Elizabeth.
When Sir Edward said nothing, Richard hit Wickham again. “I have a few more questions for this bastard. Leave me.”
Darcy leaned in to Richard, whispered something, and Richard nodded. “I shall try to find out,” he said. Darcy muttered something else, and Richard only shook his head. “You owe me this,” he hissed, and gave Darcy a dark look and a rough shove.
At that, Darcy approached Sir Edward, who was still reeling from this new information. “Uncle, let us rejoin the ladies upstairs. You will not want to see any more, I think.”
***
Darcy led Sir Edward back upstairs in search of Elizabeth; he tried to push from his mind what his cousin was likely doing to George Wickham at present. Nothing the blackguard does not deserve.
Elizabeth was in the drawing room, laying on the sofa with her head in Lady Anne’s lap. It was plain to see that Elizabeth had been weeping a great deal. She sat up from her recumbent position as Darcy and Sir Edward entered.
Sir Edward looked over at Darcy. “I shall give you two a moment,” he said. “I am going to my study.”
Darcy nodded gratefully, and went to sit down beside Elizabeth. He took her hands in his and gently nudged her forehead with his, hoping she would look up at him. Finally she met his eye, and fresh tears began to stream down her face as she leaned into him. “Oh, William, how could you not tell me?”
“I was coming to tell you, even this morning. I ought to have gotten here before that villain laid a hand on you.”
“I know – I understand. Mamma told me you were detained, that you told Jane the truth.”
“She has every right to be angry with me; so do you all. To own the truth, I considered simply not telling her, and even though it would have gotten me here faster, I cannot regret it, now that I know that you are safe. I cannot regret being honest with Jane – I thought it was what you would want of me. I truly believed I might resolve the matter in some degree of secrecy – I did not think he would come here. I had instructed him to wait in Portman Square, with the promise of another bribe.”
“Another bribe? The first one obviously worked so well! You would teach him to be forever coming back, wreaking havoc and asking for more?”
“Lizzy,” Lady Anne hissed. Darcy leaned over and looked imploringly at his mother. He needed to be alone with Elizabeth. She seemed to understand, and nodded. “I shall go and look in on your uncle, Lizzy.”
After Lady Anne left the room, Darcy turned his attention back to Elizabeth. As m
uch as he wanted to explain himself to her, he could only take her in his arms and kiss her deeply. Her back and shoulders relaxed and she gave into his embrace, and a moment later he grew emboldened, and pulled her onto his lap, their lips never parting. There was a trace of desperation in the force of her kiss, and he likewise felt as a man drowning; he needed her, he needed not to stop.
Finally Elizabeth drew away, her breathing ragged; she pulled herself off of his lap and crossed her arms. “I am still angry at you, William.”
“That was anger?”
“How could you do this? Have you any idea, you who have lived with her the most, what Jane has suffered these last three years? Longer still – for two years she pined for him, while he was at sea, when you might have spared her that simply by being honest with her about your reservations as to his true character. Five years of her life have been wasted, and for what? It is everything I feared, everything I believed about you when first you came to London, that you are determined to manage the lives of others as you see fit, without a second thought for anyone else’s feelings.”
“You would have me speak to a seventeen-year-old girl about his depravity, when even my own parents would not hear of it? I was protecting her!”
“You conspired to fake her fiance’s death! Yes, you should have simply been open with her, when she was at enough of an age to be deemed an adult in the eyes of society. If Uncle Edward does not relay the particulars of today’s events to Rose in full, I shall do so myself. She, of all people, ought to understand exactly how the world works, as Jane ought to have been told. You could have prevented everyone so much pain.”
Darcy stood and began to pace the room. “Since you feel the need to bring up past grievances, I might as well inquire why you have been so angry at me for failing to recognize you after three years of separation, when you yourself saw Wickham on several occasions, and continued thinking him a stranger.”
“Are you quite serious? I had not seen him in seven years, since I was a child! I saw him perhaps twice a year, at the most, before I went away. How could I be expected to know his face?”
Darcy sighed heavily. Wickham was much changed – he had grown tanned at sea, and wore his hair differently. It was an awful thing of him to say, and he knew it. “I apologize, Elizabeth.”
“Oh.”
“I am not angry with you – I have no right to be. In truth, I admire your courage today. I have never been prouder of anybody in my entire life. In contrast, I have never been more ashamed of my own actions.”
Elizabeth’s lip quivered. “I bared my soul to you, William. I told you my darkest secrets, everything. In all the times we wrote and spoke of Jane, you had every opportunity to tell me the truth. You had three years to tell her!”
“You are right, Elizabeth, and you must believe I will do whatever is in my power to make amends to you, and to Jane. I had no idea it would come to this.”
“You... you must have had some sort of plan, when you promised to visit today, and asked Richard to bring his men.”
“I had. I met with Wickham this morning, and I promised him a substantial bribe if he would truly disappear this time. I told him I would return in two hours. I knew it was possible he would come here, and so I asked Richard to arrive early, but I had rather hoped I was convincing enough – that he would simply await my return to Portman Square. If Wickham had not come here, it was my intention to take Richard’s men and collect him by force, and then assemble certain information to ensure he rots in debtors’ prison.”
Elizabeth wrapped her arms around her chest and chewed her lip. “I see. You might have accomplished it – for all you knew, it would be carried out without a hitch, and yet you told Jane the truth anyhow. You might have concealed it from her still.”
“Yes. And we will still carry out the rest of the plan. He will be imprisoned, and soon. Inspector Renard has his men on the case, and already I hold enough markers to get him several years at Marshalsea. I want him in there forever.”
Elizabeth nodded sadly. “Poor Jane,” she sighed. “I wish to go to her.”
“You should,” Darcy said, stepping closer to Elizabeth. She looked longingly at him, and he quickly closed the gap between them and took her in his arms. He kissed the top of her head as she buried her face in his chest, and Darcy felt he could be content to remain in such a pose forever. “Stay at Darcy House tonight, with Jane. Take Rose, too. I shall stay here with your uncle and guard the prisoner. Inspector Renard should have an update for us in the morning, or with any luck, this evening.”
“Very well, William.” She looked searchingly up at him.
“Elizabeth… do you still wish to marry me?”
She laughed. “For Heaven’s sake, William, of course. We have only had a little row; I daresay it shall not be our last.”
“I should rather wish it was.”
“No indeed,” she said with a smirk. “Whenever we quarrel, we shall have the pleasure of making up afterwards.”
“And how shall that go?”
She grinned, and stood up on her toes, pulling his face down toward hers. “Something like this….”
***
Determined to give William some privacy, Anne went down the hall and knocked on the door to Edward’s study. There was no answer, but she let herself in. He was sitting at his desk, staring down at a revolver in his hands. “Edward!” He looked up as Anne rushed to his side. “What are you doing?”
“Thinking,” he said, his voice heavy with emotion.
“Edward....”
“I have failed Lizzy again. I fell right into that villain’s trap, getting lured out of the house by his false note, and if it had not been for Richard, Darcy, and Collins – in short, every man in her life except me… God knows what might have become of our dear girl. I am a useless, miserable old man.” He ran his fingers across the barrel of the gun. “Perhaps it is time I took some sort of action, did something good for this family.”
“Edward, no!” Anne took the gun away from him and set it on a shelf across the room. “How could you even think such a thing?”
“How could I not? I looked into that villain’s eyes, Anne, and I wanted to murder him. I saw in him all the years of pain and suffering this family has endured, and his part in it, and I wanted to kill him. What is to stop me? He is in my house, he is my prisoner, and when Richard is done, if there is anything left of the wretch, what is to stop me from sending the officers away and simply putting a bullet in the blackguard?”
Anne’s heart twisted and she let out a sigh of relief; she could not bear to admit that she had been thinking of something else entirely. “Edward, that is not who you are. They can put him in prison – let that be enough for you. I beg you, do not take his life, Edward.”
He stood from his chair and took Anne in his arms, weeping softly on her shoulder. “You are a good woman, Anne, to love such a stupid old man.”
She cupped his face in her hands. “Do not say that, Edward. How many years have I listened to you speak of yourself so meanly? Olivia broke you down, just as the years have broken me.”
“You are not broken,” he breathed. “You are the strongest woman I know and I... I need you, Anne.”
She closed her eyes as he caressed her cheek, and a moment later she felt his lips brush hers, tentatively at first, and then, as she leaned her body against his, with a greater intensity. A moment later he had swept aside the books and papers from his desk, and hoisted her onto it. “I need you, Anne,” he breathed in her ear.
***
Madeline Bingley awoke in good cheer, having slept late after the previous evening’s festivities. After she dressed and ate breakfast with Charles and Caroline, she expressed a wish to call on the Darcys. She rather expected them not to be at home, and sure enough, they were not.
“I wonder if they have gone to Grosvenor Square,” she mused. “Shall we call at Sir Edward’s house?”
“If that is where Mary is to be found,” Charles said,
“that is where I wish to be.”
It was certainly where Madeline wished to be. By now, she supposed, Wickham was on his way to Gretna Green with Elizabeth. She had left him with a note, written in her best imitation of Elizabeth’s hand, and Sir Edward had likely discovered it and summoned the Darcys at once. Now, she would be there to privately bask in her success, and lend Sir Edward what comfort her feminine wiles could muster.
They were shown into the house, where they met with Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy in the drawing room, alone. Madeline tried not to lose her composure when she saw Elizabeth standing there, and despite her mounting panic, she calmly replied, “Good day to you, Miss Bennet, Mr. Darcy. I was rather hoping to meet with your sisters.”
“They are at Matlock House,” Elizabeth said with her usual coldness, though her countenance betrayed no distress, or even awareness of what ought to have been afoot.
“I see,” Madeline said, calculating her next move.
“Perhaps we should go there,” Caroline said, smiling over at Charles. “Then we might both be satisfied.”
Charles turned to address Mr. Darcy. They had not been invited to sit down yet, and he asked, “Is something the matter, Darcy?”
“Not at all,” Darcy replied. Sir Edward and Lady Anne entered the room through a side door, and though Sir Edward looked greatly pleased to see them, Lady Anne’s countenance instantly took on the same standoffishness as her wretched daughter’s. “Edward, I think I should take Lizzy home.”
“No indeed, my love,” Sir Edward told Lady Anne, as Madeline flinched. “I would much rather you and Lizzy stay, and visit with the Bingleys. We have much to talk of, Madeline. Do sit down. Mr. Bingley, Miss Bingley, you are both marrying into this family, are you not?”
“How wonderful that it has brought us closer,” Madeline said carefully, taking a seat between her two stepchildren on the sofa. She was beginning to feel very uneasy, for Edward took a seat beside Lady Anne on the opposite sofa, and placed his arm around her, smiling all the while at his guests.