The low-ceiling room in which she found herself reeked of stale beer, unwashed bodies, cabbage water and sundry other scents she could not identify but which were equally obnoxious. She put her handkerchief to her mouth and advanced towards the man who was sweeping the floor. He looked up in surprise at the apparition in front of him and then his eyes narrowed with a gleam which was both malicious and avaricious.
"Well, well, what ’ave we ’ere?" he said, softly, leaning on his broom handle to survey her. "Come to join the other girl, ’ave you?"
"Is she here?" she said eagerly. "Take me to her at once."
"Well, as to that, I ain’t sure as I should. I’ll ’ave to ask."
She tapped her foot impatiently as he disappeared into the gloomy depths of the tavern. She was shaking with fear, wondering how long it would be before Darcy arrived and whether she or Georgiana would still be alive when he came. But she would not leave, could not leave without Georgiana.
"Now, who might you be?" a voice asked from the doorway at the back of the room.
The fear disappeared in a red surge of anger as she turned to face the speaker, a big roughly dressed man wearing a fustian jacket and breeches tucked into gaiters. "Never mind who I am, what have you done with Georgiana?"
"She is safe and well, though I tell you straight, if she were mine, I’d put her across my knee and dust her drawers. Such a wildcat as I never met, but what can you expect, with a brother like hers."
She was about to make some scathing comment of her own but wisely desisted. "Where is she? I demand you take me to her."
"Demand, Miss Bennet? Oh, I do not think demands serve. Now a polite request, that’s a different matter."
Elizabeth swallowed hard. "Then, may I see her please?"
"Certainly you may. Follow me."
Reluctant as she was to venture any further into that depressing building, she felt she had no choice and followed him through the door against which he had been leaning, along a corridor and up some twisting stairs where he flung open a door and pushed her inside.
The tiny room was furnished with a truckle bed, a washstand, a table and a single chair. Georgiana was sitting on the bed, but sprang up when she saw Elizabeth and threw herself into her arms. "Oh, thank God you have come. I thought he would kill me." She stopped suddenly when she saw Wickham behind Elizabeth and realized she had not been delivered but that Elizabeth was to share her prison. "Oh, what are we to do?"
"Do? Why, nothing," the man said. "Now Darcy has a double reason to pay up. You will excuse me, while I send to him with the glad tidings." And with that he turned and left them, bolting the door from the outside.
Georgiana subsided onto the bed and burst into tears. "I thought you had come... I thought William was with you..."
"I do not think he is very far behind," Elizabeth said, sitting down beside the girl and putting her arm about her. "But there is no doubt that dreadful man will not give us up without a fight."
"Wickham said he had something to show me and I thought he was going to take me to the little boy. Only there was no little boy and he brought me here and locked me in. I told him my brother would punish him, but he just laughed and said, his luck must be in for a ripe plum had fallen into his lap and he wasn’t going to waste it."
"But what were you thinking of, to come out here by yourself? Surely you knew it was dangerous. Your brother is distraught with worry at your disappearance..."
"Oh, I do not think so. He is far more concerned with searching for his...his..." She did not know what to call him.
"The little boy is not his child," Elizabeth explained. "He belongs to your cousin Richard. Your brother promised Colonel Fitzwilliam that he would look after the child and when the boy's mother disappeared with him, why, he had to find them, didn’t he?"
"Oh." She was silent for a moment, digesting this, and then added, "He should have told me. I am not a child."
"To him, you are. And he wished to protect you, but—" She stopped to hug the girl. "I think he has seen his mistake. Now, I think we must do what we can to free ourselves."
"But you said William was coming."
"He should be, but he cannot know exactly where we are, so we must at least get away from here or make such a commotion he cannot fail to hear us."
"Shout for help, you mean?"
Elizabeth smiled. "Perhaps, but not yet, or Wickham or his friends will gag us and tie us up. We must pretend to be helpless creatures, waiting for rescue. Then he will perhaps drop his guard."
"Even if he does, we cannot rush past him and escape. We have to go down the stairs and through the taproom to reach the street and there is the tavern keeper..."
"Yes, I know." She rose and went over to the window. It was not a great drop to the street, but it was a very busy one, with people coming and going, women gossiping on doorsteps and ragged children playing in the gutter.
"Do you suppose he is one of those?" Georgiana asked, nodding towards the children.
"No, he is safely at the orphanage, taken there last night."
"Oh, if only I had gone there first, but they said they had not seen him when I showed them that drawing. Does William know?"
"I think he does by now." She was wrestling with the catch of the window, but it would not open. "I shouldn’t think this has been opened in years. It’s jammed solid."
She was wondering whether to risk trying to break the glass when Wickham returned carrying paper, pen and ink.
"I think a letter from you, Miss Bennet, would do more to persuade Darcy than any words of mine," he said. "So you will please sit down and write what I dictate."
Elizabeth turned from the window to face him. "And if I don’t choose to?"
"Then it will take something else to convince him I have you. A lock of hair, or a finger perhaps. Yes, a finger, that will do."
She sat down at the table and he placed the writing things in front of her. "Now write," he said, dipping the pen in the ink and handing it to her.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Darcy arrived at Bingley's, and wasted no time with small talk. I need you. Georgiana has disappeared."
"Disappeared? How? When?"
"I don’t know. The silly girl decided to take herself to the ball last night and that scapegrace, George Wickham, told her about the child, said it was mine. She may have been upset."
"May have been! I should say she certainly was. But you think that was why she disappeared, ran away because she couldn’t face up to it?"
"Miss Bennet certainly thinks so."
"The lady knows the truth now, does she?"
"Yes." He was not inclined to elaborate. "Now, I mean to organize a proper search. Get help from the Runners. If that madman..."
"Wickham, you mean? You think he’s back in London?"
"He would still want his revenge, wouldn’t he? If Georgiana was wandering about town on her own, he might very well have picked her up. Do you have any idea where the man might be lodging?"
"None, my friend. Our best course is to go to where we saw him at that first meeting, someone there might know, though persuading them to tell us might be more difficult." He paused. "But are you sure there isn’t some more simple explanation. Could she have gone visiting friends, or shopping?"
"No, I’ve been everywhere she might be and no one has seen her. I thought she might have gone back to Pemberley on her own, but my groom has checked all the coaching inns she might have left from. And Elizabeth doesn’t think she has eloped to Gretna Green or anything like that because as far as anyone is aware her affections have not been engaged by any of the young bloods in town this year and she could not have done it without involving someone else to help her. Besides, she has taken no baggage. She never meant to be away more than an hour or two."
"If Wickham has her, he won’t harm her, he’ll demand a ransom. It will be his passport out of the country."
"I can’t wait for that. Anything could have happened. Are you going to help me or not?"
"Of course I am, you don’t have to ask." He turned to tell his butler he was leaving for the day. "When was the last time you were at home?"
"Hours ago. I have been combing the streets looking for her and you too. No one at your lodgings knew where you were."
"I suggest we go back to Darcy House before we do anything else. She may have returned or there may be a ransom demand waiting for you..."
They clambered into the curricle and set off as fast as the traffic would allow which was not fast enough for Darcy who swore at a dray which impeded them and a phaeton being driven by some young blade.
"Paying a ransom would not necessarily ensure her safe return," Bingley said calmly as Darcy negotiated a hackney carriage which had moved out to overtake a slower vehicle and suddenly blocked the road. "And I do not fancy being thrown into the road and trampled to death by flying hooves, so go handsomely over the bricks, will you?"
Darcy smiled grimly, remembering that he had used that phrase the evening before, hoping to prolong his conversation with Elizabeth in the carriage. And all the time she was listening to his explanations, his declaration of love, his proposal of marriage, she had been keeping from him the fact that his sister had gone out on her own and she had condoned it by covering up for her. And because of that Georgiana thought she could do as she pleased and go out when she pleased. According to Elizabeth, Henry Gardiner had seen her home, but supposing he had left her at the door and not watched her go in? Supposing Wickham had been lying in wait?
As soon as his sister was safe, Elizabeth Bennet would learn from him that he was displeased, more than displeased, he was angry. And after yet another confrontation, she would turn down his offer. Why, in heaven’s name, had he ever made it? He must have been mad.
They were approaching the house when he noticed Henry standing beside his horse on the road by the door. He jumped down almost before the curricle came to a halt. "Have you news, Gardiner? Is she found?"
"No, but Elizabeth had disappeared too."
His heart missed a beat. "You can’t mean it? She has just gone off on some errand of her own. You know she would not think it necessary to tell anyone where she was going."
"I know she could never sit at home doing nothing, waiting for news, even though she said she would," Henry said, ignoring the implied criticism. "And I was right. Her groom, you know—came to me in a great panic. He’d come from the orphanage where he’d taken her. She told him to tell you where she had gone but he couldn’t find you and so he came to me. The message was that Georgiana had been seen talking to a man in the market and Elizabeth was of the opinion it was a man called Wickham—"
"I knew it," Darcy said. "And I suppose the silly ninny set off to look for them."
"Something like that. She also said to tell you that the child was safe in the orphanage."
"It appears Elizabeth is better at finding people than we are," Bingley said laconically, as he came to stand beside the two men.
"And losing herself into the bargain," Darcy snapped. "They are a pair, those two. Was ever a man so plagued with independent women!"
~ ~ ~ ~
The independent women were busy trying to open the window of their prison. Elizabeth had taken a dirty blanket off the bed to help deaden the sound and protect their hands and faces from broken glass as she hit it with her shoe. One pane shattered and they could hear the broken glass falling into the street with a clatter which could not fail to be noticed by the people going about their business down there. But the window itself remained obstinately shut and removing one small pane did not help. The wooden frames were rotten and she might be able to break them, but it would take time and make a great deal of noise.
"I’ll have to hit it with something heavier and break the frame as well," Elizabeth said.
"Even if you could, we couldn’t climb down; if we jumped, we’d break our necks. And if we didn’t do that and landed safely, we wouldn’t get far considering the street is full of people and they’d set up a hue and cry. Mr. Wickham is bound to have left the tavern keeper on guard."
"They might help us."
"Do you think so? Do you really think those people down there care a fig for us? They’d strip us bare as soon as look at us and you know it."
Elizabeth was well aware of the truth of that, but she had to do something, she could not sit and meekly await their fate. She dropped the blanket on the floor, scattering broken glass, and tugged ineffectually at the window frame. "Considering these buildings are all but tumbling down with neglect," she said angrily, "you’d think the windows would fall apart at the least breath of wind. Instead they are as tight as any prison bars. Oh, damnation, now I’ve cut my hand." She turned suddenly and caught the sleeve of her gown on a splinter of wood. "And now I’ve torn my gown as well."
Georgiana grabbed the bleeding hand and wrapped her own handkerchief about it. "Elizabeth, leave off, do. Come and sit down and we will think of something else."
Elizabeth smiled as she went to sit on the edge of the bed beside the girl. "You know, Georgiana, you are very cool. I expected to find you in a quake."
"When I was alone I was very near it, I confess, but now you have come and you say William is on his way, I am not at all troubled." She laughed suddenly. "Though we shall both have to have an extra long bath and burn our clothes, for I very much fear this mattress is full of ticks. William will undoubtedly not allow us into his carriage and we will have to go home in a cab."
Elizabeth was glad the girl could joke about it, but then Georgiana did not know that the mother of the orphan boy had died.
She smiled. "At least we now have some fresh air, and if we watch out we shall perhaps see your papa approaching and can shout out to him."
But that was not to be, for a few minutes later Wickham returned with the tavern keeper, whom he called Dolan, and informed them they were being moved.
"Why?" Elizabeth demanded.
"To keep Darcy and his minions guessing. If you could find me, so can they and I don’t choose to let them, not yet."
He grabbed Elizabeth by the arm and, helped by the tavern keeper, swiftly tied her hands behind her back and gagged her, before turning to do the same to Georgiana who had tried pummeling him on the back and been unceremoniously thrust aside. Then each man picked up a struggling female and flung her over his shoulder and in that way they were carried downstairs, through the taproom and out of the door where they were deposited in a dilapidated closed carriage.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
They traveled for hours, first over cobbles with the sounds of the busy streets ringing in their ears, and then over rougher ground when all they could hear was the creaking of harness, the clop of hooves and the soughing of the wind, until suddenly they stopped. Elizabeth, who had sat up and was doing her best to work her wrists free, looked up as Wickham opened the door. "Out!" he commanded.
When she did not obey quickly enough, he grabbed her arm and hauled her out. She stood unsteadily, looking about her while Georgiana received the same treatment. They had drawn up outside an isolated cottage. There was nothing to be seen but the narrow path over which they had just come, winding its way over flat uneven ground which she was sure was marshland and very unstable. In the opposite direction she could see a church on the distant horizon. There were no other buildings.
"Inside," Wickham commanded, pointing to the cottage.
They stumbled inside. They found themselves in a tiny room with a bare earth floor and very little in the way of furniture. There was a table, four upright chairs, a sagging horsehair sofa and a dresser. The grate spilled cold white ash.
"You’ll be tight enough here and Dolan will look after you," Wickham said, pulling off their gags. "No use shouting, there’s no one to hear and no point in trying to cut and run, there’s nowhere to go."
"You are going to leave us here with him?" Elizabeth demanded, nodding in the direction of the tavern keeper.
"I am. But you had better pray it w
on’t be for long. When I come back, if Darcy has been disposed to be generous, then I might set you free."
"You expect him to pay a ransom for us?" Georgiana asked.
"Oh, he will pay. Even if he were glad to be free of your troublesome self he would never acknowledge it; he cannot be seen to cut off his own sister, can he? Not his legitimate relation. Now his bastard, that’s another matter, he can throw him off with impunity..."
"That child is not Mr. Darcy's son, whatever you may think," Elizabeth said. "You are mistaken if you imagine an honorable man like he is, who had promised to look after his people, would do such a thing."
"Oh, ho, methinks I smell a romance here. The tales of you and he were not so far abroad after all. I am doubly blessed with two such fine specimens for barter. If you are good, friend Dolan will untie your hands, but you had better behave, because I have to tell you he has a very short temper and there’s no telling what he’ll do if you cut up rough." And with a last instruction to his accomplice to watch them carefully, he returned to the coach and drove away.
For the next hour Elizabeth and Georgiana sat side by side on the sagging sofa, while Dolan relit the fire and set a pot on to boil into which he threw some meat and vegetables. This they knew would be their supper, but though they were very hungry, neither of them could eat any of it when it was served to them on two cracked plates taken from the dresser.
"Starve, then," he said, taking their plates and scraping the contents on to his own. "You’ll get nothing else."
"I need to relieve myself," Elizabeth said.
"There’s a privy out the back." He stood up and opened the back door for her. "There." He pointed. "And don’t shut the door."
"Why? Do you think I can disappear from there? And if I could, where would I go? Mr. Wickham is expecting to release us unharmed. Should I not believe him? And would I go anywhere without my young friend?"
Mr. Darcy's Scandal: A Pride and Prejudice Variation Page 7