Hissing in frustration, Darcy ceased his pacing and flung himself on the small bunk of his chamber to think. His wealth seemed the most obvious objective, but before anyone could lay claim to a farthing of the Darcy fortune, they first had to deal with… his heart seized every time he thought of it.Georgiana!He daily cursed himself for an imbecile that he had not placed some legal barrier between her and her potential inheritance, but never could he have imagined that her fortune might have endangered her.Damn you, Richard, you had better guard her well!
Richard was no fool, surely. He would understand her vulnerability and would not leave her—unless recalled to his regiment. Heaven only knew what might then be arranged for her! Certainly, the entire Fitzwilliam family would rally to her—the poor child!
Again, he tormented himself, imagining what they believed had become of him. Did they know where he had been when attacked? What speculation must arise fromthatcircumstance! And what of his appointment the following day—had Wickham done the honourable thing and wed Lydia Bennet? Good Mr and Mrs Gardiner, what were their thoughts when he had not appeared? Had Bingley ever reconciled himself to Miss Bennet? How everyone must have thought he had failed them!
His head in his hands, he allowed his heart to wander back to the reason for it all.Elizabeth. Does she believe I could ever have abandoned her?He scarcely permitted himself to think on her, for when he did, a fury such as he had never known welled up within him. Fool that he had been, he had done himself harm enough in her eyes! To be now robbed of his chance to make things right, to lose all hope of ever winning her favour, was surely the greatest wrong ever perpetrated against him. Would he ever see her again, and would she have wed another by the time that day came?
Darcy’s fists clenched, his fingers tangling painfully in the tousled hair at his brow.Elizabeth!His chest heaved, his heart raging at the injustice of it all, until he could no longer remain seated. A cry of anguish and hatred for his captors ripped from him and he leapt to his feet, his arm slashing the air as if it were a man.
Inspired, he repeated the motion.Slash. Parry. Thrust!Again and again, his body rehearsed the well-schooled manoeuvres.Parry. Retreat. Advance—Thrust!Darcy spun and slashed, his sword hand gripping the empty air with a ferocity he had never brought to his exercise.
Half an hour later, wrung with sweat, he sank to the cool stone of the floor. What he would give to have Wilson there with a towel and a basin of fresh water! Yet, despite the exhaustion, he felt the best he had in weeks. Would that he had a face to attach to his enemy, that deplorable figure on which to focus the full measure of his just wrath!
Darcy mopped his bearded face with his under shirt, his chest heaving as he contemplated the light from the grate above. Truly, he had a better face than his enemy’s to fill his imagination. It was the very one that faded from his eyes each morning when they opened to take in his solitary chamber—the one face that had awakened in him all to which true manhood might aspire, and the one that had the power to soothe and comfort him in the darkest places. He closed his eyes, his heart beating a little more evenly now.
Heavily, he lowered his tired body to his cot, draping his arm over his face. This night, at least, he would have rest, and his dreams would be of his own making.Elizabeth.
Chapter eight
Longbourn
Elizabethraisedatremblinghand to her brow, shading her eyes. Yesterday’s head ache had returned, and with it, an unreasoning irritation with all surrounding her. Perhaps no room in the house might have brought her peace, but this one least of all. “Kitty!” she snapped, “must you hiteverysour note?”
Kitty dropped her hands from the pianoforte with a petulant little huff. “I play just as well as you do, Lizzy, and I daresay I am nearly better.”
“Perhaps you must choose pieces better suited for your abilities then, for this one is a torment for the rest of us,” Elizabeth groused.
Kitty’s eyes widened in offence. “Mama!”
“Oh, Lizzy, let her play! Goodness knowsyouare making no efforts to improve yourself. Kitty at least has a thought for her poor mama when your father dies, for I shall not remain here to see Charlotte Lucas take my place!” She finished with a frown that was meant for Elizabeth’s benefit, but that young lady was already shielding her light-sensitive eyes once more.
“It behooves us all,” Mary observed, “to practice as diligently as Kitty, for a woman of noble and chaste character has but few opportunities to exhibit her worth. Gentlemen value these feminine accomplishments far more highly than… lessmodestmeans of attracting notice.”
“Aye, and where should we all be if Mary or I flirted with all the starving officers, or made ourselves offensive to wealthy gentlemen by engaging them in topics of masculine discussion?”
Elizabeth felt her cheeks heating beneath her hand. Lydia, who had seated herself beside Elizabeth and was attempting to learn a new embroidery stitch, gaped at her formerly favourite sister in betrayal.
“Oh, Kitty, you know very well that all the officers are not starving!” Mrs Bennet was seated too near the fire, and was constantly obliged to fan herself as she spoke. “Mr Wickham has a fine share to his name, does he not, Lydia? What can have kept him from writing, my love? Surely, he has procured an establishment for himself by now. It has been above three months!”
“Perhaps he has forgotten the direction,” snickered Kitty.
“More likely,” Elizabeth muttered toward the floor, “he has been on assignment with his regiment and unable to look to his domestic comforts.” She ground her teeth as she spoke—oh, what it cost her to defend that man! But for Lydia’s sake, she could not allow the conversation to continue as it was.
“There, I am sure you have the right of it, Lizzy,” seconded her mama. “Dear Wickham, he takes such prodigious care for his family! So good of him to allow my dearest girl to remain with us while he settles, and certainly no mean establishment will do! Lydia, love, when you do hear from him, you must direct him to examine the attics, for a house with low attics does not give half the room for keeping the space well-tended and for storage of an infant’s things, but it does make more than ample room for rodents.”
Elizabeth’s eyes were pounding by now, and she could bear no more. With a mumbled excuse, she rose in such haste that she dropped her own needlework from her lap. Righting it, she sped out of the room to the stairs, and did not slow until she had regained the sanctuary of her own bedroom. She dropped to her bed, clasping her pillow over her face to block out all light and sound. Oh, when did the world become so harsh and jaded that it cut and bruised her merely to look upon it? Even the softness of her own bed was no longer welcoming, but a trap, for she could go nowhere else but that the cold hardness of her days soon drove her back to it.
She meditated some while in solitude, brushing a stray drop or two from her cheeks onto her pillow. What she would have given to sense Jane’s tender hand caressing over her shoulders then, and to hear her sister’s soothing tones lovingly in her ears! Jane was too good, too cheerful to enter in to the dark places plaguing Elizabeth’s waking hours, but her compassion would have been most welcome. Jane, however, had another now to whom she must devote all her gentleness, and so Elizabeth must go on without.
Well… perhaps not entirely without. Elizabeth propped her chin upon the pillow as a light tapping sounded at her door. She stared at it, knowing full well who the owner of the knock was. It sounded again, and Elizabeth’s brow twitched as her steady eyes held the door. With a little sigh of resignation, she rose and opened it.
“Lizzy, what was that all about?” Lydia demanded. “I have never known you to be so missish as to run to your room like you have done of late. Are you ill?”
“It is not missish to retire when one is indisposed. My head pains me again today, that is all.”
“La, it ought to be I who complain of such things just now, not you.” Lydia crossed her arms over her middle.
Elizabeth sighed and stepped back from the door. “You may as well come in, for I do not expect you intend to go away.”
