“Ah, that…” she began. “Yes, there is a simple explanation. Only…” She grimaced, tugging at one finger as she winced. “Perhaps it is not that simple. After what you said last night, I knew I needed to speak to Mr Darcy, and…”
Her father’s deadpan look and raised brow stopped her. “I cannot think why you found it necessary to dabble in politics, child. Running off to speak with a gentleman, accost that man as he was about to step into his carriage?”
“Because it was personal, Papa. I…”
Darcy raised his hand, shaking his head. “I ought to explain. Mr Bennet, you and your daughter have been used, and your entire community set up like so many chess pawns.”
Mr Bennet frowned. “The specifics, if you please, sir.”
“The specifics…” Darcy thinned his lips in thought. “Perhaps I will first advise you that I am the nephew of Lord Matlock. I understand you are familiar with that name.”
“I am.” Mr Bennet crossed his arms and levelled a stern look at Darcy. “As is anyone who has ever met my cousin Collins, I imagine. I was aware of your connection to bothLord MatlockandLady Catherine de Bourgh.” He followed this with a significant glare and a flick of his gaze at Elizabeth.
Elizabeth’s heart pounded a frantic beat that echoed in her ears. Papa had heard too many half-truths and assumptions, and Darcy had no credit in his eyes yet. She had to be the one to speak. Besides, Darcy was hardly in any condition to do so. Her voice trembled, but she forced it out, the words tumbling over one another in her rush to explain. “Never mind that now. Papa, we overheard them this morning—Wickham and Sir Anthony. Wickham’s job was to win the community’s favour so that he could sway the vote for Sir Anthony. He was given money to do it. He has been manipulating everyone, playing us for fools.”
Mr Bennet’s eyes widened, a look of disbelief crossing his features before settling into something more weary, more resigned. His shoulders sagged slightly, and he was silent for some ten seconds as a battery of thoughts played over his face. “Well, that could explain it. I thought that weir looked like it had been intentionally damaged,” he muttered, almost to himself. “I never imagined...”
Elizabeth’s gaze snapped to Darcy, who was staring at the floor, his face ashen and drawn. Her heart clenched painfully in her chest as she watched him. He looked so small, so broken, and the urge to go to him, to wrap her arms around him and shield him from the world, was overwhelming. But she couldn’t move, couldn’t think beyond the terror that gripped her at seeing him like this.
Her father’s voice cut through the haze again, sharper this time, more demanding. “Mr Darcy, what is the matter with you?”
Darcy’s eyes flicked up, meeting hers for just a heartbeat before turning to her father. The pain in his gaze was almost unbearable to witness. “I... have been diagnosed with a brain tumour, Mr Bennet,” he rasped out, each word seeming to cost him a great effort. “It is likely I have only a short while to live. I had hoped...” His voice cracked, and Elizabeth’s breath caught in her throat, a sob threatening to break free.
Bingley gasped. “No, it cannot be true,” he stammered, shaking his head in denial. “You cannot be ill! I would have noticed… I—”
Darcy’s voice, strained but steady, cut through Bingley’s frantic protest. “You did see it, Bingley, though perhaps not for what it was. All those times I disappeared into my room, the moments I was out of sorts, the megrims—did you think nothing of them?”
Bingley’s face crumpled. “All those times… when you left the dinner table early, or took long walks alone, or seemed distant… How could I have missed it?” His voice wavered, thick with self-reproach. “How could I have been so blind?”
Elizabeth’s chest felt as if it might cave in, and she was staring, gap-mouthed at Darcy. She had known something was the matter, but that it could be this! He could not be dying! Just when she had come to feel she could not exist without him… but everything made sense now. Some of the odd things he had said, his worsening symptoms, and that horrifying episode in the Netherfield servant’s quarters…
Darcy met her gaze, and his eyes looked as though they might brim with tears. But then he blinked swiftly, and his attention drifted to Mr Bingley, who looked stricken anew. His complexion was mottled, and he was raking his hair with a shaking hand, his entire body trembling. “How could I have missed it?” he kept mumbling.
Elizabeth smiled gently at the mournful gentleman, trying to offer some comfort even as her own world crumbled around her. “Mr Darcy is… quite skilled at hiding his private troubles, Mr Bingley.”
Darcy let out a bitter laugh, the sound raw and jagged. “Not skilled enough, it seems. She saw.” His gaze found hers again, and this time, it lingered, filled with a mixture of pain and something deeper, something that made her chest tighten with emotion.
Then, Darcy suddenly drew himself up, a spark of clarity igniting in his eyes as if seized by a moment of inspiration. He let his hand fall from his temple and, with a steady breath, turned to face Mr Bennet. “Sir, I ask for your permission to marry your daughter.”
The world tilted on its axis, and for a moment, Elizabeth couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. Had she heard him correctly? He wanted… tomarryher?Now?A fierce surge of hope welled up inside her, and she knew, even before her father glanced at her, what her answer would be.
Mr Bennet, however, did not appear surprised in the least. He looked at Elizabeth with a warm smirk, then shook his head with a chuckle. “I had been wondering what took you so long, Mr Darcy.”
Elizabeth’s heart pounded in her chest as Darcy turned to her, his expression softened by a vulnerability that she had never seen in him before. “I would have spoken sooner,” he admitted, his voice low and thick with emotion. “But I thought I had little to offer you. Who would want a dying husband? But now... now I want to spend what time I have left with you… if you will have me. I promise, Elizabeth, you will be a rich widow when I am gone.”
Widow. The word echoed in her mind, a dark shadow that threatened to snuff out the light that had sparked at his proposal. No! She would not accept that. Shecouldnot. Not after everything.
“No,” she whispered, shaking her head. “Widow? How could you think I would be satisfied with that?”
He blew out his breath and tried to force a smile. “Well… I suppose I cannot be blamed for asking, after…” His smile broke, and then he lifted his shoulders, swallowed, and tried the smile again. “But perhaps I ought not… you deserve better than—”
“That is not what I meant.” She slid forward and reached for his hand, caring not a bit that Mr Bingley was staring in pale astonishment or that her father was pouring himself a glass of brandy and watching with detached interest.
“No, I want nothing more than to belong to you.” The words were a vow, a promise that came from the deepest part of her soul, and as she spoke them, she felt a strange calm settle over her, a certainty that this was right, that this was what she was meant to do.
Darcy’s hand closed around hers, and she could feel the slight tremor in his fingers, the way his grip tightened as if he was afraid to let go. His eyes closed briefly, a shuddering breath escaping him as he murmured, “Thank you.”
Elizabeth shook her head again, more firmly this time, her heart aching with a love so fierce it frightened her. “You had better not leave me, Fitzwilliam Darcy. I do not want your thanks—I wantyou. There must be something to be done, some doctor who can help…”
