“Better watch out. I’ll have that fortune of yours before the night is out.”
“Don’t be too sure. It’s a game of chance, you know. Luck, not skill, can win the day.”
Georgiana let out an exaggerated sigh. “Then you’re bound to win.”
GEORGE WICKHAM REFLECTED on the good fortune that had followed him all his life. He took pride in the fact that it wasn’t merely the common sort of luck that people mistook for “Providence.” Most of it was due, as his stern, puritan godfather would have exhorted, to his own efforts. Perhaps not directed precisely in the endeavors that old stiff rump would have recommended, but definitely productive. And always, as one avenue of potential profit was closed off, another opened up for George’s exploration…
The only woman here with half a brain and looks to match was this Elizabeth Bennet. Funny that sod Darcy hadn’t already made a move there, but it was exactly as George had suspected all along—the man was a genuine woman-hater. Didn’t just amuse himself with arse like most, but actually preferred it. Once again, George could benefit from this great deficiency in his former foster brother’s character. It almost made up for last summer’s disaster. Almost. If that had succeeded, he’d be set for life with Georgiana’s money. No need to do anything but live for pleasure, the way Nature intended, certainly not sign up with some rustic militia. But…if he hadn’t joined, he’d never have gone to Hertfordshire, never have met her.
If George had not spent time in Elizabeth’s company and seen that she was truly corporeal, not a phantasm, he would not have believed that such a woman existed. Clever, witty, beautiful, and fascinating, up in the ways of the world, not easily shocked. He had confessed to her the precise nature of his dealings with Darcy. Oh, not in the coarse, unambiguous terms he would use with a man, but unmistakable. Clear enough for anyone, even a carefully brought up female, to get the idea. Any other young lady would have fainted or run crying to her mama at the mere mention of such a subject. But this intrepid Lizzy Bennet not only listened with equanimity, she did not even pretend to confusion or ignorance. In fact, she had contributed her own considerable stock of knowledge on the subject to the conversational pool. George wondered how it was that she was so certain of it.
Well, what matter? It was obvious not only that she knew, but that it gave her an indecent thrill. What a find! George had met women like that before, the debased hags who kept molly houses, and the demireps whose “friends” were sodomites and madge culls, but they were rarely young and pretty, certainly not delectable virgins from country gentry families.
He sighed. A virgin. And chaste. There was the problem, that and her lack of money. He would marry her in an instant if she had the bare minimum of what he required. But she had nothing, not even close. He had made discreet inquires, just to be sure, but there really was no need. Everybody in these little villages was open about such things, however people tried to hide their situation or put on a brave show in town. The Bennet family was spoken of everywhere as a sorry case, five daughters, no son, an entail looming over them, and little left for marriage portions—a thousand apiece. God! The income from that would barely cover an evening at a gentlemen’s club once a week. Assuming he could find a patron to pay the dues…
As it was, all he could hope for was some weakening of her resolve. If he could not afford to marry her, at least he could enjoy her while he searched for the one who would make him a gentleman of leisure as he deserved. Unless he was very fortunate indeed, and found another extraordinary woman, one with money, George would consider Elizabeth his true wife and the other as merely his bread and butter. Surely, with her superior understanding and her natural wisdom, Elizabeth would acquiesce in the scheme, as the only way for them to have the best of both worlds.
But there was not the least indication of that ever happening. George knew, as he valued his continued survival, he must never allow the magnetic force of his attraction to blind himself to reality, and his instincts for that were as sharp as ever. It was infallible, his sense of response, from men and women alike. Never before, in George’s experience—and he gave himself credit for having experienced just about every sensation man or woman, or both together, could bring—had he encountered a woman who was both genuinely warm and strictly virtuous. If a woman was truly capable of knowing pleasure, she would seek it out and surrender to it, usually while young enough to enjoy it. It was only the cold ones who held out for marriage.
Yet Elizabeth wanted him very much. She was all aquiver when he entered the room, her animal spirits fluttering like her fan. He could get hard just from imagining her trembling like that beneath him on a bed, or in his lap, in a chair. Or on her knees. Oh God, he had to stop this…
Strange the Netherfield party had cleared off so suddenly, leaving the field to him, despite their having all the advantages of terrain and position, not to mention superior numbers. Unlikely that George Wickham, even in his blazingly fine regimentals, could rout so formidable a force. If only he had thought of going into the military sooner; he’d be a general by now, or at least a colonel. He’d have won all his promotions, with Providence on his side like this; wouldn’t have had to worry about buying his way up the ranks. It was a genuine stroke of luck, not to have his game exposed at the start.
That consideration jolted him out of his complacency. It was a game—it was always a game—and he could not afford to waste any more time in this languorous, love-struck nonsense with Elizabeth Bennet.
“Have you met Miss King?” Colonel Forster said. “Here is Mr. Wickham, a fine fellow, one of my newest officers, eager to make your acquaintance.”
“How do you do, Miss King?” George said. He sighed again, hoping the chit would think it from admiration. No elegance, a merely adequate figure, and that frizzy red hair that always goes with skim-milk skin and freckles. But she had one great charm: ten thousand pounds from her uncle. “I do hope you have this dance free.”
Ten
AFTER HIS FIRST visit, Fitz was unable to deprive himself for long of the pleasures of male companionship. Not just the physical relief, which was considerable, but the rare opportunity to speak honestly. No need at the Brotherhood of Philander for pretense, for lies and half truths. Despite the loose talk within the walls of the hotel on Park Lane, every man was pledged to the strictest secrecy outside, as if his life depended on it. As it did.
“The thing is, Darcy,” Pierce said, “you knew your Charles would marry sooner or later.”
“Well, of course,” Fitz agreed with counterfeit amiability. “Just thought it would be later. Always intended that he and my sister…”
“And you planning to marry Bingley’s sister,” Pierce mused aloud. “Something rather incestuous about that, don’t you think?”
Fitz frowned. “How so? There’s no tie of blood between our families. And it’s traditional in situations like ours, Charles and mine, going back to ancient times. Aristogeiton was betrothed to Harmodius’s sister.”
“Who?” Verney asked.
“Oh, the Welsh,” Monkton said with a sly smile. “Little better than savages. Irregular in their habits. Don’t have marriages and families the way we define them. Didn’t even use surnames until recently.”
“Stop it, Monkton,” Fitz said. “Anyone who’s had a proper education has heard of Harmodius and Aristogeiton.”
“I haven’t,” Witherspoon said. Since acquiring Pierce’s aggressive protection, Witherspoon had become braver about confessing his ignorance, his lack of education, or even, apparently, his ability to read.
“Famous tyrannicides,” Carrington said. “Hardly a felicitous example to follow, Darcy, I should think.”
“What’s a tyr—” Witherspoon began.
“They killed the ruler of Athens,” Pierce explained. “Or rather, his brother.”
“That doesn’t sound very nice,” Witherspoon said.
“They were considered liberators in their time,” Fitz said. “Heroes.”
“They
were lovers,” Monkton said. “The beautiful youth, Harmodius, beloved of the noble and manly Aristogeiton. The grateful Athenians erected a statue of the two of them. Naked, of course, as all heroes were portrayed.” He paused, a sad look softening his sharp features. “With this tiresome war going on, apparently intended to last our entire lifetime, no one dares travel abroad to enjoy such edifying sights, the way our fathers and grandfathers did.”
“The Grand Tour as an excuse to look at indecent sculpture?” Pierce said with a snort.
“It’s only your provincial, brutish Englishness that leads you to the blasphemy of equating the ideal of masculine beauty with lewdness,” Monkton said, rousing himself to the intense hostility he reserved for attacks on what he called his “religion.” “And if it’s so indecent, what are you doing here, nuzzling in Witherspoon’s admittedly beautiful lap? Oughtn’t you to be over at the Society for the Reformation of Manners, informing on us all?”
“I only mean,” Pierce said, “that there’s a vast difference between what was admired in pagan times and what’s acceptable now.”
“You don’t have to be so pleased about it, though,” Verney said.
“Oh, Pierce is never happier than when expressing his superior virtue,” Carrington said, “even when it’s in obvious contradiction to his actions.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Pierce said, standing up.
“What do you think?” Carrington drawled through barely parted lips. “Hypocrite.”
“I don’t wish to start another war,” Fitz said. “All I was trying to say is that when two men love each other, marrying the sister of one’s friend is the best way of maintaining the sacred bond.”
“Actually,” Monkton said, “there is a long tradition, sadly neglected these days, of sworn friendship between men.”
“True,” Fitz said. “But since, as men of property and position in society, we have a duty to marry, choosing one’s friend’s sister seems the ideal way to unite the two families.”
Monkton, indignation blazing from his eyes, sat up very straight. “I have never, in my entire life, been accused of committing such a vulgar, mercantile error as conforming with duty.”
“Well, in this case, Monkton, you can’t claim any extraordinary virtue,” Verney interposed. “As younger sons, you and Pierce are exempt from that duty. The rest of us, however, must eventually accept the obligation of matrimony.” The stern voice, ordinarily reserved for his official capacity as justice of the peace at home in Sussex, added to the comical effect of his words, emanating as they did from a muscular and gleaming half-naked man sitting among other casually attired club mates. “But unlike women, we men have the advantage of being able to put off marriage until our middle years,” he added, generously commuting a death sentence to life at hard labor.
Carrington, looking for some reason distinctly uncomfortable, turned away from the glowering Pierce, the affronted Monkton, and the splendid form of Verney, and addressed Fitz. “But that, I think, is the core of unpalatable truth at the center of this apple of discord. Doesn’t it give you pause when you contemplate lying with the man one night who’s been doing the same thing with your sister the night before?”
“Thank you,” Pierce said. “I shall take that observation as an apology.”
“Take it any way you like,” Carrington said. “Preferably red hot and up the arse.”
“Do you know, Carrington,” Pierce said, “if you didn’t have such a notable skill with pistols, you’d have been called to account long ago for all your abuse.”
“Yes,” Carrington said, “I remind myself of it every morning at Manton’s when I put another ball into the bull’s-eye. In fact, it’s the reason I developed the skill in the first place. So much more enjoyable than having to watch every word. The way you must, Pierce.”
“At least, as Verney says, we have time before making any irrevocable decisions.” Fitz addressed Carrington’s earlier question to turn attention from the quarrels always bubbling below the surface of this ingrown and homogeneous society. “Charles has been of age less than two years. Georgiana’s barely sixteen. Let her at least enjoy her debut in society, and a season or two of freedom.”
“But what’s your Charles supposed to do in the meantime?” Pierce asked.
Fitz shrugged. “What do any of us do?” The loud guffaws almost made him blush, like a first former admitting in front of upperclassmen that he touched himself. “I don’t see what’s so funny.”
“Oh, use your other head for a change, assuming it still functions,” Monkton said. “The one on your neck. You’ve a reputation as a ladies’ man. Can get a Lady Finchley or a Lydia Waring with little trouble but the expense—although from what I’ve heard, now that she’s Mrs. Swain, Lydia has given you your marching orders, and Caroline Finchley prefers a ducal crest. But your Charles isn’t so practiced, as I recall, nor do I imagine you’ll want him risking his health—and yours—by consorting with whores, even the superior merchandise at Madame Amélie’s. No, Darcy, if your Charles can’t marry the lady of his choice he’ll simply mope, or worse”—Monkton lowered his voice to a whisper and looked cautiously around the room, as if spies might be lurking behind the sideboard—“take to writing poetry. You’ll have to watch him every minute, lest he leave ballads or even sonnets all over your house. And you know what that leads to.”
“Odes,” Verney said, in a similar ominous tone. “All dedicated to a certain unnamed lady.”
“The smudged sheet of paper,” Pierce said, a sobbing tremolo distorting his clipped speech, “with a couple of tearstains placed just so, beside the words lost and never.”
“And he’ll act the part,” Carrington said. “Drooping about with limp wrists and long hair, one uncombed lock tumbling negligently over a noble brow to signify a sensitive nature reduced to desolation.” He rested his head on his hand and slumped his shoulders in an exaggerated posture of despair.
Monkton clapped a soft, lily-white hand to his own brow. “Oh Lord! Your sister’s living in your house, isn’t she? You’d better hare on home, Darcy. Just hope you’re in time to prevent poor Charles from corrupting her with his loathsome practices.”
Fitz glared at Monkton. “I’ll thank you to leave my sister out of your low japery.” He had a hazy memory from a week ago, finding a crumpled sheet of writing paper containing a few lines of feeble, incompetent verse with the name Jane smudged and blotted over…
“I don’t see what’s so terrible about writing poetry,” Witherspoon said, interrupting at a fortunate moment. “I think it’s romantic.”
“George, my dear, you know we’re just joking,” Pierce said.
“Do you think my painting is silly, Davey?”
“Of course not. You’re a genuine artist, always have been from the moment you could hold a brush, I imagine.”
“Well, yes, Davey. That is, I always wanted to paint.”
Witherspoon had quite a reputation among the members of the Brotherhood for his portraits. Fitz had almost agreed to sit for him, until he had gone to Witherspoon’s house and seen his works—all the subjects portrayed unclothed, and all standing, some in more ways than one…Still, even Fitz had to confess the man had a gift for catching the essence of a person’s character in what appeared at first glance to be a mess of disorderly paint and wild brushstrokes.
“But you see,” Pierce continued, “sometimes when a young man is thwarted in love he takes up pursuits he showed no previous inclination or talent for.”
“Like conversation,” Monkton said. “That is the root of the problem, isn’t it, Darcy? Now that he’s seen the other side, your Charles has lost his interest in conversation?”
“SHE’S HERE,” CAROLINE Bingley greeted Fitz in a voice of doom when he returned to his house.
Why was she always here? Fitz wondered. Surely Georgie had other friends. “Who is here?” he asked.
“Miss Bennet.”
Fitz startled and glanced over his shoulder like O
restes being hunted by the Furies. He despised himself for the lack of control, but he was more afraid now than he had been at the beginning of this dangerous charade, and the shock was truly immense.
“Not here,” Caroline said. “In town. Fortunately, she’s staying with her relations. You know, the ones who live in Gracechurch Street.” She let out one of her contemptuous snorts, reminding Fitz unpleasantly of his aunt de Bourgh.
“I fail to see anything fortunate about that,” Fitz said.
“Do you?” Caroline said. “Think how much worse it would be if she were living in a more fashionable neighborhood, closer to us. As it is, I barely managed to sit still during her call. I kept worrying that Charles would stop by.”
“Why would he?” Fitz asked. “He seems to have developed an altogether healthy fear of the torments that two idle ladies can inflict on a defenseless younger brother. From what he tells me, the minute he walked through your door he’d be hustled off to Bond Street or pressed into escort duty for an Almack’s assembly.” He paused, taking in the full implications of Caroline’s statement. “Wait a minute—you mean Miss Bennet called on you?”
“Yes, Mr. Darcy, that’s how it is in society, you may remember. A lady pays morning calls, then her acquaintances return the visits.”
“What a damnable business! Pardon my language, Miss Bingley.”
“Yes, very tedious,” Caroline said, waving her hand amiably at the apology. “But don’t worry. I shall stretch it out as long as possible. She’ll take the hint soon enough, and that will be the end of it.”
“But what will you say to Charles?”
“Nothing, of course. Goodness, how silly do you think me? No, don’t answer that. But I am not silly about something as important as this, I promise you, Mr. Darcy.”
“And what if—that is—did Miss Bennet ask about Charles? What did you say?”
“She can’t, not without sounding like one of her whorish younger sisters. All she can do is inquire after his health, which of course she did, as soon as was decently possible. I replied that he is well, and that’s all that can—and will—be said on the subject.”
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