Not confusion. Not disbelief.
Recognition.
Bingley’s breath escaped like it hurt to keep it in. He stepped back, then forward again, fists clenching and unclenching at his sides.
“And you said nothing to me?”
“What would you have had me say? That your sister took a friend’s private words and dressed them for slaughter? That your drawing room has been a stage for theft and spectacle?”
“You knew my sister did something so heinous to others and you said nothing to me? You… you what? Thought to ignore it long enough for it to go away? And what about your 'friend,' or whatever she is, Miss Elizabeth? You let her be humiliated rather than speak to me!”
Darcy’s hand slammed against the mantel with a crack. The glass shuddered on its rim. “Do you think I did not know that?” he hissed. “Every hour I did nothing, I saw her humiliated again—stripped and hung for sport while I smiled at guests and let it pass as gossip! I sought to check its spread before it caught fire.”
Bingley stared. “And what does that mean? What did you do?”
“I helped her prepare a quieter exit. Someone whose name would not draw attention. A future lived beyond the reach of the worst of it.”
Bingley’s expression twisted. “Marlowe.”
Darcy gave a single, grim nod.
“You were arranging her escape.” Bingley’s voice dropped. “Before the truth was even spoken aloud.”
“She never had the chance to deny it,” Darcy said. “The city had already made up its mind.”
Bingley’s arms dropped. His jaw shifted once, then again, as if something inside him had to be physically swallowed.
“And Miss Jane Bennet?”
Darcy froze. “What about her?”
“You think I have not noticed?” Bingley stepped closer. “She does not laugh the same. She does not meet my eye the same. Ihave been writing the words in my head for weeks—how I would ask her to marry me. And now—this? Darcy, why in Heaven’s name did you not speak sooner?”
Darcy’s shoulders drew back, spine locked. “Because the only way to stop it was to expose it. And by the time I knew what she had done—by the time Miss Elizabeth told me—it was too late. The first had already circulated.”
“But still! You could have said—”
“Could I? If I had come to you then, what would have happened? Miss Bingley would have denied it, of course. But not quietly. She would have taken offense—publicly, vindictively. You know how she is when cornered.”
Bingley opened his mouth, but Darcy did not let him speak.
“She would have published again. Not from Elizabeth’s words—those would have been already spent—but from her own. With names this time. With implication and venom. She would have made it a campaign. And if I had warned you quietly—do you believe you could have stopped her? Do you believe she would have obeyed you?”
Bingley recoiled—just slightly. But he did not answer.
Darcy met his eye. “You would have tried. But I judged—wrong or right—that the quieter course might buy us time to end it before it reached what it has become.”
“And now?” Bingley asked, voice raw.
Darcy’s mouth opened, then closed again.
There was no answer that would make it right. He probablyshouldhave gone to Bingley, despite his pride, his expectation that he and Elizabeth could manage alone. Perhaps blasting the top off this thing might have let in some air and light, kill the festering decay before it spread further. But it was too late for such regrets now.
Bingley’s breath left him in a slow, shaken exhale. He stepped back, as if needing space to think—and then seemed to decide something instead.
“Then she can explain herself.”
Darcy looked up sharply. “Miss Elizabeth? I think you—”
