by Meg Kerr
“I was appalled when I read your note,” said Mrs. Gardiner in place of the usual salutation on their arrival. “Can it really be true?”
Elizabeth with Darcy’s assistance proceeded to give her aunt and uncle a fuller recounting of the tale that Mrs. Hurst had told. When they had been acquainted with all there was to know, Mr. Gardiner asked, “How can we assist you? what would you have us do?”
Mrs. Gardiner was a woman of excellent sense, honesty and integrity, and despite being correct in her own conduct had an inborn capacity to understand human nature. Mr. Gardiner possessed a rational mind, and the experience of one who had long been in the commercial sphere. Darcy and Elizabeth had the strongest reliance on their discernment. “What advice would you give us in these difficult circumstances?”
“I am almost of Jane’s opinion,” said Mrs. Gardiner after consideration (for Elizabeth had included Jane’s plea for optimism), “for I can scarcely believe that any man would violate decency in this manner and then publicly parade his guilt. What benefit does he gain thereby? From what you have said he is a man who would guard assiduously his own interest. There is something peculiar here.”
“Will you speak to Georgiana? No one has seen her this morning, and Darcy and I are quite at a loss what to say to her.” In this she acquiesced, and Elizabeth escorted her as far as the door of Georgiana’s bed-room and then retired.
Mrs. Gardiner knocked and was admitted. She had debated with herself how to broach such a delicate topic with Georgiana, for she felt that she knew so little of what relations actually existed between Georgiana and John Amaury that she could by inadvertence speak tactlessly. She did not want to take Georgiana unprepared, either, and she planned to make her way towards her topic gradually. But when she first set eyes on the young lady she was thrown aback and the ideas with which she had entered the room were turned on their heads, for Georgiana had overnight regained the bloom and spirits that she had lost since her return to England. Her radiance most explicitly instructed Mrs. Gardiner that she had been last night with the person whom she most valued in the world.
Georgiana’s affection for the Gardiners equalled that of Elizabeth and Darcy, and she had learned to call Mrs. Gardiner Aunt Gardiner as they did. She greeted her visitor with both surprise and pleasure. Mrs. Gardiner asked her to dismiss her servant, and was then silent a moment collecting her thoughts.
“Georgiana,” she began, “I have hardly words to tell you what is being said this morning, about certain events that took place at Lord and Lady Metcalf’s ball. I must tell you, my dear, that you have exposed yourself to some very disrespectful comments, which have given your family heartfelt concern. I know you would not purposely do anything to give rise to vulgar gossip; I have never had anything but the highest estimation of your prudence, and therefore I do not attribute any share of these remarks to your misconduct, but I fear that there may have been a little carelessness on your part, that has led to consequences that are rather disquieting.”
Georgiana began to look very conscious, and to blush, for she truly had been unaware of the attention she and Amaury had attracted the previous evening.
“I can see that you have some idea of what I am talking about,” said Mrs. Gardiner. “Shall I tell you what is being said this morning?”
“That I danced with a man whom my family does not know?” said Georgiana, her temerity quickly rising to the occasion. “May no one ever be introduced in a ballroom?”
“But my dear, that is just the difficulty. Darcy does know him, as do many people in town. He is very generally given a bad, an immoral character. Whether or not it is deserved I do not presume to say for I have no knowledge of him myself. But you must be aware that it is the duty of your family to decide the fitness of individuals to be your companions in order to protect you from any taint. When you form a connexion with a young man who has not been approved by your family, you run a risk of harm. And a gentleman even of the most contracted understanding must sense that he is hurting the honour of a young lady whom he approaches in an irregular fashion. His intentions cannot have been generousdid you not feel the indelicacy of them? Moreover, a lady cannot be too cautious in observing the rules of decorum, yet it is said that you showed him a degree of favour most incompatible with propriety.”
Georgiana was most unreceptive to awakening from her blissful dreaming and she made a spirited reply. “Mr. Amaury is a respectable gentleman. I am not sensible that he has done anything wrong, and I have not either. People saying spiteful things about him or me do not prove anything, except their own malice.”
“Your brother and sister summoned Mr. Gardiner and me this morning to hear what had been related to them by Mrs. Hurst, and Jane and Bingley. Lady Catherine de Bourgh had heard it too, and came to the house to castigate you. Mr. Brooke wrote a note to Darcy asking for an explanation of your conduct. So you see, Georgiana, that the accounts are proliferating; scandal never stops after the first word. You have too much good sense to degrade yourself by a foolish prepossession for a stranger, and one who is of illegitimate birth at that.” Georgiana’s slight gasp, which she had been unable to suppress, informed Mrs. Gardiner of her previous ignorance of the fact. “He is, it seems, the natural son of a Lord Marlowe, now deceased. The name may perhaps mean more to you than it does to me.” Georgiana shook her head. “The germane issue, however, is this young man’s reputation, of which I believe you should be made aware. I will not deliberately abuse him, I will only tell you what is widely said of him.” Mrs. Gardiner then proceeded to repeat what she had heard from Elizabeth and Darcy.
Georgiana had taken in only a part of the story before her aspect changed and tears filled her eyes. But she listened with absorption and attempted no vindication of Amaury. Mrs. Gardiner thought that her weeping and passivity showed an encouraging conviction of his transgressions, but in fact her words were operating very differently on Georgiana. What she felt was the cruelty to which Amaury had been subjected; her own sufferings were nothing in comparison.
“By your tears you seem to show that you are now coming to regret your lack of discretion.”
“No!” said Georgiana almost savagely. “I regret nothing.”
Mrs. Gardiner’s alarm rose. With his standing in the world now before her, Georgiana appeared as sympathetic to him as she had been before. She was uncertain how to comprehend it, and troubled what it meant. “Do you have anything to tell me of Mr. Amaury, that would open his character further? Let me hear it. For as matters stand now, the injury of his attentions last night, and your reception of them, may be the destruction of your reputation.”
But after her outburst Georgiana was silent. Mrs. Gardiner said, “I am speaking with all gravity to you now. It is my duty to have no reserves with you, and I want you to answer me in the same way, and very truthfully. Had you formed an acquaintance with Mr. Amaury before last night? Did you make an arrangement to meet him?”
For a countable number of seconds Mrs. Gardiner did not think Georgiana intended to say any thing. But then quite suddenly she blurted, “I did not know he would be there, but yes, we had met before, many times! He has asked me to marry him, and I have accepted him. We were going to marry in Brussels, but my brother came and took me away.”
This disclosure was not by now absolutely and entirely unanticipated by Mrs. Gardiner, yet she was astonished how far the truth had outrun the imagination of Georgiana’s family, and was filled with dismay. That Georgiana Darcy with such claims to birth, goodness and beauty, had been prepared to throw herself away on a notorious rogue! The disgrace of a clandestine marriage, and perhaps of much worse! “Georgiana,” she said very sternly, “has Mr. Amaury betrayed you?”
“I have nothing to reproach him with,” said Georgiana boldly.
This would have been a point of relief, but as it was evidently far from the wider reality, Mrs. Gardiner was not perfectly disposed to give it credence. Howeve
r she thought it wisest to touch on this area no more for the present.
“Your secrecy has been most ill-judged. I had thought much better of you. You would have married him there and brought him home with you? How did you intend to live then?”
“My fortune is my own. I have thirty thousand pounds. That is more than enough to live on.”
“But what is wealth without integrity? I do not mean to preach stuffy morality to you. I simply ask you to look at the milieu in which you live. Ladies of rank and fortune have fallen, and when they come into society no woman will speak to them or take notice of them. Or else they are forced to retire to some secluded villa. Look at Mrs. Rushworth, Sir Thomas Bertram’s daughter, who has never been received anywhere since she made a most foolish error. Your whole life lies ahead of you; do you wish it to follow the pattern of hers? It would be madness. Do not deceive yourself that the Darcy family is raised so high as to be above public denunciation.”
“I do not care what people think. I do not care if no one ever speaks to me again. They all have wicked tongues anyway.”
So great now was her apprehension that Mrs. Gardiner made a rash attempt to reason Georgiana into different feelings. “Of your present affection I have no doubt, but you must check it. Do not let it carry you any further into danger. Can you really be so lost to every thing but love as to see no defect in this young man? He is an outcast in impecunious circumstances, whose only intention is to deceive you. His ultimate and sole object is to put his hands on your fortune. Do you believe he has real regard for you? Put that idea out of your silly little head directly. He is thinking only of himself, and he will abandon you without a qualm now that he has discovered you are protected against him.”
Common sense was staring Georgiana in the face, but there are situations in which common sense has very little authority. Georgiana’s heart was devoted to Amaury, and her feelings contradicted every thing Mrs. Gardiner had said to her. “To me he is faultless. My affection is his, and his mine, forever.”
Mrs. Gardiner experienced a powerful desire to stamp her foot. “But have I not shown you how far he is from faultless? On what do you base such a belief?”
“I trust my heart.”
“How many women have repented trusting their hearts! Georgiana, if you wait to learn from your own experience, rather than from the experience of other women who have gone before you, you will suffer grievous distresses.”
“I am of age to marry and may choose for myself. I am Amaury’s in honour.”
Mrs. Gardiner could now see that opposition was only attaching Georgiana the more to her opinion. She therefore withdrew and returned to her husband, Darcy and Elizabeth. She had to take a seat before she could speak of the interview, for there was a tremor in her knees. “I am almost afraid that the mischief is irremediable,” she said without preamble to buttress her audience. “Georgiana has been very sly. She and John Amaury became acquainted in Brussels, and I cannot doubt that some kind of engagement has been made between them.”
Her listeners exclaimed in stupefaction.
“This may be only the prelude to something worse,” added Mrs. Gardiner. “I do not want to make mischief; but I am suspicious.” Elizabeth and Darcy had by now used up all their resources of horror, and neither was able to turn paler at this implication.
“I had not previously thought her deficient in either morality or sense,” said Mr. Gardiner, “yet she has acted like the greatest simpleton in the world, and a scamp besides.”
“That part at least is over now,” said Darcy attempting with imperfect success to speak in a firm voice. “Once she is made aware of Amaury’s degeneracy she will renounce him.”
“Do not deceive yourself. I talked to her most soberly about his reputationand hers, and I represented to her the course of her future if she does not give up him up, but I am positive she did not listen to me. Her understanding seems diseased. She is determined to act for herself.”
“Are you saying that she is lost to her friends?” cried Elizabeth.
“I do not know; but I fear it. You had better examine what you mean to do now.”
“That at least is obvious,” said Mr. Gardiner. “That there has been some carelessness here is evident, but now there will be caution. They must be separated. Put an end to his addresses immediately. Bring about a permanent rupture between them. This is less difficult than it might at first appear, for I do not think that even one such as he could now hope to win through with her. Then let things take their own course.”
“You are probably right,” said Mrs. Gardiner. “It will cost her great pangs to relinquish him, but if he deserts her and leaves England and if you, Elizabeth and Darcy, do not injure your cause by unwise speech or actions, if you multiply your affectionate attentions to her, in six months she will have forgotten him, or better yet, turned against him.”
“This seems a rational policy,” said Darcy, “but what then? I am not such a novice in affairs of the world as to think that six months will establish Georgiana’s respectability on its previous footing.”
“I see no insuperable obstacle,” said Mr. Gardiner thoughtfully. “I know enough of men and manners to believe that in time this will blow over and be forgotten. You have the resources to convince your circle of the untruth or at least inconsequence of the report. The less said and done about it, the better. There must be no coolness toward Georgiana on your part. Do not take her away from town before the end of the season unless it be necessary, for that would create an irresistible argument against her innocence, and lead those who do not yet believe the gossip to conclude that it must be true. Appear as much as possible with her in public. Maintain the smooth appearance of family unity. The actions that gave rise to this rumour are such a wide departure from her known manners that if she is manifestly upheld by her own relations, she will soon recover her footing. The rumour will come to be discredited.”
Such a topic could not be left without a great deal more discussion, that added nothing to the views already expressed; and after it had taken up the proper time, and everyone was satisfied of having had his or her proper say, the plan proposed by the Gardiners was unanimously adopted. Mr. Gardiner was commissioned to locate John Amaury and persuade him by whatever means available to repudiate Georgiana and vanish. Darcy believed that he would be likely to find him at Mrs. Younge’s house in Edward-street, or to secure his address from her through the application of five or ten pounds; and Mr. Gardiner therefore set off immediately to perform his appointed task.
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CHAPTER
22
London, June 1816
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Mrs. Younge, overcoming with a struggle her angry exasperation that Amaury had failed to bring his courtship of Georgiana to the appropriate conclusion, had yet agreed to receive him into her house when he had come to London. There was a chance still, she judged, of playing the hand. The accommodation she offered him however was a small and dark room at the top of the house. Amaury on seeing it allowed to himself that he had lived in meaner rooms, and that it had many advantages over a spunging-house, or the underside of a bridge.
When a gentleman of evident means enquiring for Amaury succeeded his arrival with reasonable promptness, Mrs. Younge applauded her wisdom in not turning her erstwhile accomplice away, and sent a servant for him. Amaury descended the considerable distance to the parlour and found Mrs. Younge herself on the threshold. She said nothing but gave him a very weighty look, and then closed the door on him and his visitor. To listen at the keyhole was beneath her dignity; and although the temptation was compelling to lower that dignity by a few degrees, she found herself unequipped to allow it to sink any further than a withdr
awal to the apartment across the hall, which belonged to the first floor tenant, who was not in.
Amaury received his caller with polite self-assurance. “I was informed that you asked to speak with me, sir.”
The caller was of course Mr. Gardiner, who would have given a great deal to be able to stamp Amaury’s manner of greeting him as insolent, but in all honesty he had to acknowledge that it was correct. And his doubts as to Georgiana’s folly in choosing Amaury were set wholly at rest when he surveyed the young man, so handsome that it required but a slight effort of fancy to connect him with the one whom Milton described as ‘cloth’d with transcendent brightness’4 an observation metaphorical in this case for it must be stated for strict adherence to truth that Amaury was clad in a rusty black coat.
After a short interval Mr. Gardiner said, “I will not detain you long, or keep you in suspense of the reason of my visit. My name is Gardiner. I have had a commission given me, by Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy. Mrs. Darcy is my niece.”
The surprise of finding himself with an emissary of the Darcy family did not deprive Amaury’s manner of its usual aplomb. But he had not anticipated so quick and direct a confrontation with the Darcy – she had presumed on Georgiana’s secrecy; and he stood analyzing how he ought to behave and speak.
Mr. Gardiner had not depended on Amaury providing him with any assistance in his task, and he continued, “I am charged with requesting that you release Miss Georgiana Darcy from her purported engagement to you, and give up all further communication with her.” When Amaury did not respond, Mr. Gardiner added, “I need hardly tell you that such a marriage is impossible, and most fiercely opposed by her family.”