Much as I despise the necessity of now asking for help, I do hope to get a little from you.
Before I write on, permit me to make this clear: I do not wish for you to give me any money, and I would refuse any that you send me. I shall not allow my mistakes to take from my sisters that which ought to be theirs.
I am presently serving as the sick-nurse for a gentleman who is recovering from a gunshot wound, and this is not the first time that I have worked in the position of a sick-nurse. The wages for this form of work can become quite substantial once a person has a reputation in the field. My current plan is to take as many such engagements as I can over the next years, and by doing so I think I can accumulate enough funds to have George set up in a respectable profession and to provide Emily with a modest dowry sufficient for our situation.
The chief difficulty with pursuing such employment is that it is impossible to keep the children with me at such a time.
I hope that I might return home once my current duties are done and stay for a few weeks. Once I have done that, I would like to leave little George and Emily to be raised by you while I am in employment. I shall have no fears upon their account then. Perhaps I should mistrust your capability in raising children, sincemyeducation went so badly amiss, but I do not. I remember my childhood as being a time of happiness, and I fullybelieve that a great deal of the adult is produced by the innate character of the person, and that the education can only modify matters a little.
This consideration frightens far more than it comforts, since both of my children have Mr. Wickham’s blood, and I would wish for neither of them to have his defects.
In any case, if you are amenable, I do not worry that it will place an insupportable burden upon your resources or harm the interests of my sisters. The food for the both cannot reach five pounds per annum, and their clothes cannot be more than twice that sum, even if they are to be dressed very well. I would seek as much as possible to avoid having talk of my being in employment from reaching the neighborhood. I could, if necessary, wholly avoid returning to the vicinity of Meryton, and only meet the children in London at times when they visit the Gardiners.
I am, however, absolutely determined to not be a burden. If you wish me to pay for their lodging I shall be able to manage that as well.
Elizabeth stared at the paper.
She was half tempted to wholly throw the paper away and begin again. It was quite likely that Papa would be deeply offended by what was written there.
This was why she did not wish to write to him at all. This was why she did not wish to have anything to do with him. Because her mode of life was so utterly different. And there was also a resentment.
Longbourn was supposed to be worth two thousand a year. It could in no way be difficult forhimto save for respectable dowries, apprenticeship fees for George, and everything else, and still maintain their consequence. Just a little economy would be necessary.
Damn him. Damn all men.
All useless, awful, terrible.
Maybe Mr. Darcy was not so bad, so far as she could perceive. His chief defects were a propensity to hate himself and to shoot useless husbands.
Elizabeth crossed out the last sentences. Thoroughly, with several lines through them. It would take Papa some work to read what had been there before.
She finished the letter:I miss you, Papa, and I wish I had not married against your advice.
After that Elizabeth signed her name, packaged the letter up, sealed it with the fine wax kept in the desk, and gave it to the footman to be mailed out. There was no question ofherbeing the one to pay the postage, so she said nothing about that matter.
Mr. Darcy was looking at her, and his manner was approving.
A week later Elizabeth received a reply. A short letter, fitting her father’s habits:
Elizabeth, I miss you. I want to see you again, and the children. We will talk about other matters when you come home. I deeply regret having impressed on you the sense of your responsibility to your sisters more firmly than I should have. It is my duty to care for my daughters. For all of them. For you as well. I see you adopting a mulish and proud expression when you read that. So, I shall write no more, you know I do not take pleasure in writing long letters.
Lizzy, please come home as soon as you can.
Your loving father
Chapter Eleven
About three weeks after Fitzwilliam Darcy had shot Mr. Wickham, he found himself acting once more in an impulsive manner.
Elizabeth—he had slowly stopped referring to her as Mrs. Wickham in his mind—had been preoccupied with some thought for the past few days. He thought it was since she had received a letter in return from her father.
She had not spoken to him of the contents of that letter, though he hoped that she would eventually.
In the middle of that day the doctor attended on Darcy, and he at last received permission to try standing up and walking about a little.
It was not asurprise, but it was unpleasant to find that he could barely stand up and walk around the room once, and that with support from both Colonel Fitzwilliam and Elizabeth.
Darcy had again the thought that he wished he could give some money to Elizabeth. What she wore today was not quite so fine as what the servants wore. She only had one decent dress, and while she carefully kept it clean so that she might wear it every day, a mess that Emily had made the previous day had necessitated it being sent to the laundry.
