Elizabeth heaved a weary sigh and turned away in search of a chair to sink into. “Oh, I do not know. I suppose my mind has conceived all manner of paranoid fantasies. I know very well that my... my former husband’s name and inheritance are suspect—”
“The legality of your marriage as well.”
“What?”
Mr Darcy offered a weak smile and carefully took the nearest seat. “If anyone wanted to contest it, that is. The parson was none too happy with the proceedings, and it was not later legitimised by... well. I think that ought to be the last of our concerns at the moment.”
Elizabeth groaned and dropped her face into her palms. “You still think George Wickham is at the root of all this?”
Mr Darcy cleared his throat, all business again. “Yes. I have sent riders out to every coaching inn and farmhouse for fifty miles. They will have fresh mounts, and they will cover the ground quickly. However, I doubt they will find our elusive couple. Wickham gains nothing without making demands, sending threats. He will be hiding somewhere nearby, and I should be astonished if we do not have a note from him before dawn.”
“And then what? They discover my sister ruined in some cottage?”
He closed his eyes, and when he opened them, they were filled with such pain and empathy that she saw, for the first time, the depth of the man within. “Let us pray it has not yet come to that.”
Eighteen
Thenotecamepreciselyat midnight. The young lad who had received a shilling to carry it could not tell the present whereabouts of the sender, but no one needed to ask him the man’s identity. Darcy took it from the footman with a grim scowl and read it at once. His expression never flickering, he passed it not to Colonel Fitzwilliam, who stood by like a seething ogre, but to Elizabeth.
“It is certain, then. Wickham has the aid of either Mrs Younge or his mother, likely both, and has secured Miss Lydia against potential escape. Richard, did not the riders who returned from East Orchards report that the former Mrs Wickham’s abode was vacant?”
“Yes, as well as that of the erstwhile ‘Mrs Brown,’ or Mrs Younge as was. They would know we would search there first for that vermin.”
Elizabeth had finished reading Wickham’s note and was swaying slightly, her features pale like glass. “He offers to marry her if I deed Corbett to him? How can I not agree? And yet, if I do, to what sort of fate have I consigned my sister? She is but fifteen!”
Darcy put a hand on her shoulder, his thumb nearly grazing her soft cheek. “You will do no such thing. I’ll not have Wickham established nearly on my front lawn, and I will not see him ruin yet another young woman or turn you out of your home.”
“But it is too late! He as much as said in the note—” She wrung the offending paper and crushed it to her forehead as loud gasps shook her. “She is lost! I know very well that nothing good can come of this.”
Darcy’s hand lifted hesitantly from her shoulder, and he glanced at Richard. It was only they three in the room, for everyone had been persuaded to bed, save for Elizabeth who had adamantly refused. Richard caught Darcy’s look of frustration and deliberately turned away. Darcy followed the sound of his heavy steps as he left the room and barked out orders for his horse.
“Elizabeth.” He touched her back, coaxing her to draw near until her bowed head leaned against his shoulder. “We will find her. Even should it be as we suspect, we may yet be able to restore her. Come, my dear—”
She stiffened, raising her head and staring at him as if he were a stranger. “Mr Darcy, do not speak thus. Pray, be rational about this, as I have come to depend on you as a man of reason. I cannot bear false hope at such a time.”
All the warmth of feeling welling up in his breast crashed into icy pain as he lowered his hand once more. “You are perfectly right,” he confessed, though his voice cracked slightly.
“Do we even know how to search for her? Can there be any way of knowing?”
“We have men searching the entire countryside. Fitzwilliam and I mean to ride out at once, now that we have a hint of his intentions. We both have our grievances to settle, but Wickham had better pray that I find him before my cousin does.”
She swallowed tightly and dashed a few tears from her eyes before offering him the rumpled note. “Will this help?”
He took it, but his attention was all for her. “Elizabeth, we will find her. Your mother will have her daughter again.”
She hugged herself, her shoulders hunched as she attempted a brave smile. “I hope so. Thank you, for all you have done. You owe us nothing, sir, but it will be a great comfort in the years to come when I look back on our time here in Derbyshire. Few are those who would do so much for someone so unconnected with themselves.”
Darcy stiffened. “You are not ‘unconnected,’ you are… good heavens, you are my brother’s wife, and mine to care for. Unpack that bag I know you have ready and get some sleep, or I will send Mrs Reynolds in to watch you every second.”
She lowered her head, but a twitching, reluctant curve appeared at the edge of her lips. “I dare not disobey my employer. God speed, Mr Darcy.”
“Nogirlhere,”seemedto be the common refrain for ten miles around. Darcy and Richard had started off on different routes, but their paths crossed later in the afternoon and they completed the circuit together.
“Foolish strumpet,” Fitzwilliam hissed after their last stop proved fruitless. “Stupid, thoughtless girl!”
“If she is,” Darcy answered mildly, “others have been more so. She is but fifteen, Richard.”
“Precisely! She ought to have been learning her embroidery or practising an instrument. What the devil could her mother have been about, not watching her every second?”
