Darcy groaned, and then smiling and seeing that he had finished with his bread she said, cheerfully, “And now that you have suffered the farworse experience of such a meal, Mr. Darcy, it is time to change your bandage.”
Elizabeth went over, and immediately undid the knot, and opened it so that she could see. The first sight of the wound caused her to call out, “Oh, excellent.” It was hot, red, and raised, and the hole had almost closed over with the beginnings of a white and yellow sack underneath. There was some leakage of creamy yellow pus into the bandage.
She sniffed the bandage and then put her nose close to the wound. There was not much scent, just a faint odor like old cheese.
“Milk and bread,” Elizabeth said. She went to the kitchen. As ordered, Sally had kept a large pot of water heated. The servant was in fact busying herself with scrubbing pots in the scullery when Elizabeth entered, and Elizabeth thanked her for that.
Elizabeth heated a small jar of milk by placing it in the hot water, and she tested the temperature with her fingers. She soaked a piece of bread in the milk and then wrapped it in a clean cloth.
However, while Elizabeth was in the process of removing Darcy’s previous bandage, the doctor arrived. Elizabeth rather thought ill of him for not having kept a closer eye upon the wellbeing of the patient, but she nonetheless was eager to hear him confirm her impression that the wound was showing signs of having a ripening abscess.
The doctor was as sanguine as possible at this stage. After he inspected the wound, bled Mr. Darcy of just an ounce, and inquired of Elizabeth about what types of poultices she had used, he specified that Mr. Darcy was to be given no thickening foods. Then he was off with a promise to return the next day to see if the abscess had ripened properly.
Elizabeth then was able to place the hot compress against Mr. Darcy’s wound and wrap it up again.
After giving Sally instructions to by no means leave Mr. Darcy alone with the children, she set off to the church with Miss Darcy.
Chapter Six
Elizabeth had walked half a block in silence with Miss Darcy when the younger woman exclaimed suddenly, “But you ought to hate me.”
“You and your brother seem to share a general expectation of arousing great disdain in others,” Elizabeth said with a little amusement. “Do you know where this tendency came from?”
That was rather like how Darcy had declared that henceforth he would only attend to his own conscience and not care for respectability. She rather suspected that he had always behaved in such a way. She respected this.
The sun glared at them and sweat started to trail down Elizabeth’s back before they’d gone two blocks.
As Miss Darcy made no reply to her, Elizabeth took the younger woman’s arm. “If you think that I, as the offended wife, ought to be profoundly bothered by Mr. Wickham having paid court and made love to you, I must inform you that his previous misdeeds towards me—assisted by the substantial passage of time—make it so thatIfeel no jealousy.”
“It is my fault that he is dead,” Miss Darcy said in reply.
“You do sound like your brother.”
“If I had known. If I had not let him touch me. If I had not been such a fool. If I had not believed his lie that he had reconciled with Fitzwilliam. If I had not believed him when he said that we would marry. If I had not believed him when he said that we would be happy.”
“I am afraid that as much as you might wish to be despised due to your susceptibility to Mr. Wickham’s charms,Ilike myself despite having acted on that same susceptibility.”
Miss Darcy wrapped her arms around herself. “He took my maidenhead! He must have known that you were alive. He lied to me. He…made me briefly feel as though I did not need to be a different, more confident person. And then, he shot my brother. He tried to kill Fitzwilliam. He wanted my brother to be dead, just because…why? Fitzwilliam never harmed him. I hate, hate, hate him.”
Elizabeth put an arm around the other woman, and Miss Darcy embraced her and sobbed.
Elizabeth rubbed the girl’s back. “There, there, there.”
Several persons passing by on cobblestoned streets looked at them sidelong, but fortunately none of them offered assistance.
“We should be almost to Scotland. I thought...I cannot even understand how I had been so stupid. And he shot Fitzwilliam.He shot first. He tried to kill my brother! And why—I can scarcely believe what he said to me and to Fitzwilliam when my brother found us in bed. I thought that he loved me. But he did not care anything about me.”
“No, he did not,” Elizabeth softly said. “Your brother told me what he said. It was most unkind of him, but he was very unhappy, I think.”
“He lovedyou. D-d-d-d...he lovedyou. Why could he not have also loved me?”
“Miss Darcy, I am so, so, so sad for you.”
“Just three days ago, I was happy. I never will be happy again. Ishouldnever be happy again.”
“Might I, as someone whose heart has been broken, and by the same man, say that it is quite likely that things will appear to you very differently in a few months.”
“And if Fitzwilliam dies? He is fevered. I know that fevers always kill people after they are injured.”
