She hurried downstairs and into the library. As soon as she saw him, she felt a rush of affection, and went straight into his arms, grateful she no longer had to disguise or try to suppress her feelings. After a minute of enjoying the blissful feeling of being with him again, she noticed he was holding her more tightly than usual and a new tension in his body.
Recalling his note, a sense of deep misgiving filled her. They had been intending to announce their engagement at breakfast; had he, as she had long feared, changed his mind as soon as she had capitulated? A painful tightness in her throat, she stepped back and said, “Tell me, what is the matter?” She bit off the endearment which had come naturally to her lips; if he was to reject her, she did not want to humiliate herself any further than she already had.
To her great relief, he immediately pulled her back into his arms, but not before she had seen the look of strain on his face. “It is Georgiana—by misfortune, she saw me leaving your room last night, and she is quite distraught. I told her we were engaged, but I think she hardly heard me. She will not leave her room, and she will not allow me to speak with her; her maid tells me she has been crying ever since she first went in this morning.”
It was a moment before she could take in this new intelligence, but she quickly realized how deeply distressed he was over this. “Is she troubled about having seen you, or our marriage, do you think?”
“I cannot be sure, but I suspect it is what she saw.” Darcy’s feeling of guilt was evident in his voice. “She has a tendency to view me as being without failings.” It was a view that was far from accurate, he thought. If Georgiana knew half of what was in his mind, she would never trust him again. He was to blame for her present suffering; he should never have allowed his uncontrolled side to emerge. He had spent the last few hours ruminating on how he had lost control of himself, step by step. From the time he had learned of Elizabeth’s engagement, each new transgression had paved the way to another, until now his conduct of the previous summer, which had so appalled him at the time, seemed minor in comparison. Well, it was time to put an end to it. He would learn to contain himself again; he had done it all his life. It would be difficult, given the temptation of Elizabeth before him, but if he could only hold himself in check until their wedding, hopefully his animal nature would be satisfied by the more traditional relationship Elizabeth would no doubt expect. His dreams would have to remain just that.
Elizabeth could feel his tension, and worried for him. “My poor love! Is there anything I could do? Would you like me to try to talk to her?”
“Would you?” His relief was clear.
“Of course—I do not know if she will speak to me either, but I will try.”
“Thank you,” he said. “But let me hold you for a little longer first.” He took comfort in the security of her embrace and her love, grateful beyond measure to know she was finally his.
***
A few minutes later Elizabeth knocked at Georgiana’s door.
“Who is it?”
“It is Elizabeth,” she said, although she and Georgiana had not reached the point of using Christian names yet. “May I come in?”
There was a hesitation. “Just a minute,” said Georgiana reluctantly.
Elizabeth heard rustlings within, and then finally the door opened. Georgiana was still in her dressing gown, and, despite her womanly figure, looked younger than her years with her hair in a braid down her back. Her eyes were tearstained and she looked as if she had slept little, if at all.
Elizabeth smiled warmly at her, recalling how important it had been when she was sixteen to feel as if others were treating her like an adult, and decided to pretend she had seen none of her signs of distress. “Good morning,” she said. “I trust you are well?”
Georgiana bobbed her head. “Yes, thank you, and you?”
Without waiting for an invitation, Elizabeth took a seat in the nearest chair. “I am well, although I cannot say the same for your brother. He is very worried about you,” she said gently.
“Truly, I am fine; please tell him there is nothing to worry about,” she replied quite formally.
Elizabeth could see that the girl was determined not to admit to any weakness, and decided to challenge her. “Well,” she said pragmatically, “he feels you were quite distressed earlier, and he does not tend to imagine these things. It seemed to me if you were upset about my engagement to him, it would be best for you and I to talk right away to see if we could come to some understanding.”
“Oh, no,” she cried, her eyes wide. “Please do not think that—I am very happy he has found someone he cares about, and that you will be married. Please, I am not at all upset about that; I am sorry, I should have said something earlier.”
Now we are seeing some real emotion, thought Elizabeth. “I am relieved to hear it. I care for your brother a great deal, and I know how much he loves you. I would not want to see him unhappy because of any difficulties between us; I had hoped we might be friends.”
“Oh, yes, I hope so too,” said Georgiana, clearly still worried lest Elizabeth think her against the match. “I am sure we will be. I am so sorry you thought I was upset about that—I would never be, never.”
“I am glad, then, that we have cleared that up,” she said warmly. “But tell me then, what was troubling you so, that you would not speak to him?”
Georgiana looked away. “It was nothing; I was merely tired after a bad night.”
“It had nothing to do with seeing your brother come out of my room last night?” she asked gently, wondering what Darcy would think of her raising such a subject with his protected younger sister.
“I…” Georgiana looked around her like a frightened deer hoping for a way to escape. “No, I…” Without warning she sat down on the bed and burst into tears.
Elizabeth looked at her sympathetically, then sat beside her and put an arm around her. “I’m sorry—this must be very difficult,” she said.
“I just… never thought he was… like that,” Georgiana said between sobs. As she realized what she had said, she added almost frantically, “Please, I didn’t mean to say… I know you would not… Please, I did not mean that, I just thought he would not… risk compromising… anyone.”
“I am not offended,” said Elizabeth comfortingly. “I know what happened in my room last night, and which rules were broken and which were not, and I have no concerns about it. I fear it looked worse than it actually was to you, however, and I am worried about that.”
“But how can you trust him, when he does that?” Her voice was so hopeless as to make Elizabeth feel quite protective of her.
“Trust him? That is not difficult,” she replied. “Your brother certainly has his faults, but in all the essentials I have found him to be quite trustworthy. He is, however, perfectly willing to break rules if it suits him, and if he feels they are unimportant.”
“Men are always willing to break the rules, because it is only the woman who pays for it,” said Georgiana with a bitterness that shocked Elizabeth. “What do the rules matter, if they cannot be hurt by them? We are the ones who are destroyed by one mistake.”
There was more to this than her disappointment in her brother’s behaviour, Elizabeth thought. “I should hope not,” she said gently, wondering how she could encourage her to talk further. “I have made far more than my share of mistakes, and not been destroyed.”
“Not the kind of mistakes I have made,” the girl whispered miserably, and began to sob once more.
“Perhaps you should tell me about those mistakes,” said Elizabeth gently.
“There was a man… and he told me he loved me, and I believed him, but it was not true, he only wanted my fortune,” she whispered, then stopped, all but her tears.
Hoping she was not pressing her too hard, Elizabeth said, “Mr. Wickham?”
Georgiana’s head jerked up. “You kn
ow about that?” she said, horrified. “He told you?”
“Georgiana, did your brother not tell you about my sister and Mr. Wickham?”
“No,” she whispered, the frightened deer eyes back.
“He should have—you should not have been unwarned; the subject might have arisen here. Mr. Wickham convinced my youngest sister to run off with him, promising to marry her, but having nothing of the sort in mind. It was already too late by the time they were found, but fortunately, he was willing to be convinced to marry her in exchange for a substantial sum of money. For that matter, I myself had met Mr. Wickham some time before that and found him quite charming. He told me some stories which I believed implicitly, to my later regret when I found out they were quite untrue. Your brother knows all of this. So you see, my dear, I am hardly likely to think less of you for believing Mr. Wickham’s lies, when I did as well, and my sister did far worse.”
Miserably Georgiana said, “I did worse, too.”
Oh, dear, thought Elizabeth worriedly. “I am sorry—but you know, you were very young, and cannot be blamed for believing his blandishments.”
“But I let him kiss me,” she said, clearly in agony, yet wanting to confess. “And he wanted to… touch me, and he said if I loved him, I would let him.”
Elizabeth felt a surge of fury at Wickham, but pushed it away in order to do what she must. “Just to touch you, or was there more?” she said, trying to put every ounce of understanding and acceptance she had in her voice.
“No, nothing more—he wanted to, but I would not…” She was weeping openly again.
Elizabeth, profoundly relieved, kissed her forehead. “You should be proud of that.”
“How can I, when I allowed so much else? I knew better!”
“And you believed you were in love, and that you could trust him,” she said soothingly. “Surely you do not think you are the only girl to have made such a mistake? My dear, it is far more common than you think. We all have made mistakes of one sort or another. I had to end an engagement to another man last year, you know.”
“You did?”
“Yes, and I will relate the whole sad story some day if you like, but I will tell you this now, if you can keep a secret—I let your brother kiss me while I was promised to another—does that not equal any of your sins?”
Georgiana’s eyes grew wide. “Did he know?—that you were promised, that is?”
“Oh, yes, he knew,” said Elizabeth with a smile. “So you see, my dear, it is not all as simple as it sounds in romances. Love is not pure happiness, but more of a two-edged sword, I have found—there is no happiness that can compare to it, but it can also bring terrible pain. When you let yourself love someone, you take on the risk of losing them, to change of heart, to circumstances, even to illness and death. Love and heartbreak go together; you cannot have the one without the risk of the other. You were very unlucky; you learned about the heartbreak very early, but it was just that: ill luck, to encounter a man so well positioned to take advantage of you.” It was ironic, she thought, to be presenting lessons she herself had only just learned to Georgiana as if they were well-known wisdom.
“I want to have the happiness your sister and Mr. Bingley have—it just shines out of them. It will never happen for me,” said Georgiana sadly.
“Oh, my dear, you see the final result. There was a year, after they fell in love, when Mr. Bingley felt he had to put her aside for a variety of reasons. My poor Jane suffered sadly that year; had you met her then, you would not recognize her in her present happiness. And you will have that happiness yourself in time, because to balance your ill fortune, you have the good fortune of having a guardian who is in absolutely no position ever to push you into a marriage you do not desire, nor to deny you the chance to marry for love.”
There was a knock at the door, followed by Darcy’s voice saying, “Georgiana?”
Elizabeth, with a conspiratorial smile at an anxious Georgiana, called back, “Go away, William. Georgiana is telling me all your secrets. I had no idea you had such a misspent youth.”
Georgiana listened with an astonishment bordering on alarm. Elizabeth held a finger to her lips.
“Why do I suspect you are quite encouraging this behaviour in my sister, Miss Bennet?” Darcy said in an amused voice. “I hope I have some redeeming qualities left by the time you are done with me.”
“Not a one!” called Elizabeth cheerfully. “But have no fear; we will not tell a soul. Well, perhaps only a very few. You could make yourself useful, though, and have some breakfast sent to us—I have to find out a great deal more detail yet.”
“Your wish is my command,” he replied with a laugh, clearly relieved to find her in good spirits. “However, if you are going to persist in impugning my good name, I will feel obliged to ride to Longbourn and inform your mother that you are giving me trouble and that I want her to speak to you straight away.”
“Is it threats, now? Did you hear how he treats me, Georgiana?”
“I delight in tormenting you, Miss Bennet. But to show my forgiving nature, I will have breakfast sent to you in hopes it will sweeten your temper. In the meantime, please try to avoid corrupting my sister too much.”
Elizabeth laughed, and Georgiana went so far as to giggle a little once she had heard his footsteps retreat down the hall. She said in an amazed voice, “I would never dare to speak to him in such a manner!”
“I will tell you a secret, then: your brother enjoys being teased. It is, I am convinced, why he first noticed me—because I was so impertinent to him. But now, you must tell me at least some little secret I can tease him with, some misbehaviour or other.”
Georgiana looked at her seriously. “But I cannot—William never does anything wrong. That is why it is so hard to know I failed him.”
Elizabeth looked at her sympathetically. “You poor girl! What a standard to live up to! But let me assure you, your brother makes quite his share of mistakes; he apparently has had the good fortune to shield you from knowledge of them. He is not without his faults.”
“But he would never have behaved as I did…” Her voice trailed off as she evidently recalled that the previous night he had done rather worse. “At least I did not think so—oh, I do not know what to think anymore! I know I should not have done it, but he…” She clearly could not go so far as to say that her brother’s behaviour was less than perfect.
“Well, I wish I had an easy answer for you. Certainly there are very good reasons for following the rules of propriety, and I recommend them, though I obviously have my own faults in that regard. Still, it is possible to be too restrained, you know—when your brother first noticed me, he was so proper that I had no idea he admired me until he shocked me by proposing to me. I was very rude to him,” she said with a laugh, “and I think he learned a lesson about the necessity of showing his feelings. He has, perhaps, overcompensated, but I have no complaints. I hope you will remember, too, that I had already accepted his proposal of marriage—it was not the behaviour of a rake.”
Georgiana looked anxious. “You will not tell him, I hope, about what I told you?”
“I see no reason for him to know, or anyone beyond the two of us,” she replied comfortingly. She would, in fact, far prefer that he never know; what his reaction would be to knowing what Wickham had done to his younger sister was something she preferred never to discover.
***
Jane’s joy when she learned of her sister’s engagement could not be expressed with mere words, and her husband’s congratulations to Darcy were of the warmest nature as he expressed his happiness that they would soon be brothers. Neither, however, seemed particularly shocked by the intelligence, leaving Elizabeth to wonder just how much had been guessed already. Colonel Fitzwilliam’s welcome of Elizabeth to the family likewise seemed heartfelt, although she could not help but think his reception of Darcy to be a bit cooler. She ho
ped this did not particularly signify difficulty for the future.
With all the stir, she only had a few brief moments alone with Darcy, just long enough to assure him that her discussion with his sister had proved fruitful and that she seemed on the road to accepting her shock of the previous night. Darcy, although seeming somewhat withdrawn, was touchingly grateful for her assistance in the matter; and expressed several times that he did not know how he would have handled Georgiana without her.
Even with this reassurance, Elizabeth could see his spirits were still somewhat disturbed, and when she saw the opportunity, she suggested that they take advantage of the lovely day to walk to Longbourn for dinner, and then ride home with the others afterwards. He was readily in agreement, and all of the rest of the party forbore to suggest joining them, knowing that the couple would appreciate some time to themselves.
For Darcy, this time alone was a test, a measure of whether he could limit himself to the conduct he felt appropriate to a gentleman with his betrothed. He in fact had little doubt he could accomplish it, having a long history of powerful self-restraint, but controlling his thoughts was a different matter. He despised himself for feeling that he was losing something valuable in making himself return to fitting behaviour, and not that he was following the only acceptable course open to him.
They began by discussing Georgiana, with Elizabeth sharing as much as she felt comfortable of what had been said that morning, and trying to help Darcy understand his sister’s guilt and shame over the incident with Wickham, and her fears that she would never be able to love or trust again. He listened with concern, though he appreciated Elizabeth’s confidence that she would be on the mend now that she had the opportunity to express some of her worries.
“I hope it will be helpful for her,” he said. “It has distressed me to think my improper behaviour has caused her such unhappiness. Had I merely behaved as I should, and never gone to your room, none of this would have happened. And although you have been kind enough not to mention it, I am well aware there are other things which should not have happened, and I regret if my lack of self-control should have caused you any distress as well.” He glanced at her with some embarrassment to see how she responded to this.
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