It was not mere commentary anymore. These were real people.Recognizable.Too recognizable.
“I have one!” the younger daughter cried. “This one is my favorite.‘Mrs. B has a remarkable capacity for declaring catastrophe before the tea is poured.’”
The laughter broke like glass.
Darcy sat very still. His spine rigid, the room swimming before him. They were closing in. Names were appearing. Parodies thin as paper masks. Elizabeth had written in jest—in confidence. And she always said she did not use names. But Caroline Bingley had dressed it up for the slaughter.
He could see it now. Line by line. Just enough truth to stain her.
It was only a matter of time.
He glanced at Georgiana. She was seated with unassuming posture, hands gently clasped in her lap, eyes scanning the room with mild curiosity. But when she looked over at him—caught his expression—her brow creased. Not recognition, not alarm. Just a quiet question she would not voice.
She could not know what those words on the pamphlet meant. She could not guess who they had once belonged to.
He looked away.
Protecting a woman’s reputation—he had always thought it a matter of silence, vigilance, the right connections applied at the right time. But what defense could there be when the enemy was her own voice, bent into new shapes and hurled into the drawing rooms of strangers?
He had not saved Georgiana from everything. He had not saved Elizabeth from anything. And now—
Laughter again. The youngest Ashford daughter held up another slip, eyes sparkling with anticipation.
Darcy pressed a hand briefly to the back of his neck.
Miss Ashford stepped beside him. “Mr. Darcy. You look rather… pained. Is something the matter?”
He did not trust himself to speak at first. He cleared his throat. “Only the heat.”
Her look was sympathetic. “You are quite pale.”
“I assure you I am not.” The smile came, brittle but practiced. “If you will excuse me.”
He turned, made for the decanter table.
It was not distance he needed, or wine. It was time. It was an answer. And he had neither.
27 December
The paper cut herthumb.
She had not noticed until the blood welled up, a thin, stinging crescent at the edge of the page. Three letters, opened and brutal, lay in her lap like small knives. They had arrived with the midday post. She had known they would come.
She had just not realized they would hurt like this.
Mary’s letter had no salutation. No sign of hesitation or grace.
Now I know what you were always scribbling.
You might have told us. Or better—burned it.
Father says it is wit. I say it is cruelty dressed in cleverness, and I do not see the difference.
Elizabeth gripped the page tighter.
You laughed at our manners, our talk, our visitors. Even Mr. Denny. And now all the county is laughing, too.
Mama will never recover. I daresay you think that is amusing.
