She stared at him, tears spilling over.
“Of course you meant them! You could not help yourself if you tried. You said it yourself. You struggled for months to overcome your scruples, to decide whether I was good enough to be Mrs Darcy. I never desired your good opinion, and you certainly bestowed it most unwillingly. I do not blame you for that. You are what you are, and I am what I am. I will marry a tradesman, or a less indolent version of my father, or a clergyman; and I will be perfectly happy. They will see me as thebestthing that ever happened to them, not as something barely adequate and only acceptable in the throes of ill-advised infatuation.”
“I do not—”
Elizabeth stared hard until his words ran out. “In the end, in an odd way, as I said before, I cannot marry you because of my mother, but not for the reasons you might think.”
Perplexed, he asked, “Your mother?”
“You must remember her.”
Darcy nodded, ground his teeth, and dared not say anything.
“Do not fear saying what you are thinking. Every one of my sisters, including Jane, has said far worse than whatever came into your head these last months. But you see—well—you see—”
She took a deep breath. “As you no doubt noticed, she is a woman of mean understanding, little information, and uncertain temper. When she is discontented, she fancies herself nervous. You saw her in full flower at the Netherfield ball. We both remember the conversation, I am sure.”
Uncertain, but wishing to offer comfort, Darcy handed her his handkerchief.
“Thank you. I shall explain. Do you believe my mother wasbornthat way?”
“Of course not.”
“It may surprise you to know she was not that way as a young wife and mother. Lady Catherine likes to ridicule us because we never had a governess, but we all turned out well enough in the end. When I was small, my mother was not as she is now. That came much later… after—”
Darcy held his breath.
“After she, in her own view of the world, failedto produce a son, as if producing 5 live and healthy children was not enough for any woman. As the years without a son piled up, she became nervous about the entail, because simple as it is, it does not make sense to her. Instead of patiently explaining it often enough, my father started teasing her about it. Instead of taking his daughters in hand, he left them all to my mother to raise. Instead of laying money aside for dowries, he wasted it on expensive books.”
She dabbed her eyes a few times, finding an odd comfort in usinghishandkerchief for the first and last time.
“You can rightfully blame her for her mercenary tendencies, but as awkward and narrow-minded as she is,she is doing her very best. She isrightabout what her daughters need. Marriageisthe only route to security for a woman of my standing.”
Elizabeth stared at her feet. “My parents are very mismatched. Maybe they loved each other somewhat when they were young, or at least liked each other, but they were not well suited. My father came to resent marrying a womaninferiorto him, and he made her suffer for it—for decades.”
She looked back at Mr Darcy. “I do not suppose you would do anything so terrible. Frankly, I cannot believe it of you. I do not claim to understand your character, but I cannot imagine you acting as my father did and still does. Youwouldhowever, go into a marriage believing in my inferiority.”
Switching from balling her fists to tapping her foot, she continued.
“I use mathematics to make sense of the world, so think on this. You spent 80% of the words in your proposal speaking aboutyourstruggles,yourconsiderations,youracceptance ofmyfamily,myconnections, andmyinferiority. In what should have been the most important speech of your life,thisis what you chose to focus on, with nary a thought for howImight receive the words. I do not blame you.Nothing you said is wrong. Youshould notmarry below you when you have all the choices in the world. You would notmistreatme, but I will not besecond best—notfor you or any man. I would rather bebestfor a man a tenth or a hundredth of your consequence.”
Darcy looked ready to cry again; it was time to end this debacle. Boldly, she reached across and grasped his hands.
“Mr Darcy, please… please… listen to me. You are not wrong to think of your family legacy. Centuries from now your family will still be well-known and important, while mine will not.That is as it should be. Your ancestors worked and fought for generations to establish your place. It is in your blood. It is in your upbringing. You can no more change your nature than a dog can change its desire to hunt. Do not fight it.”
She squeezed his hands until his eyes met hers and said the last of it.
“You have hidden from the women of your own kind for a decade. I refuse to believe they areallempty-headed flirts with mercenary mothers. Perhaps you need to look to the younger and overlooked sisters, or the intelligent but less beautiful ones, or better yet, the older ones; but thereisa woman of the right station who will make your heart sing. I just know it.”
She stood, pulling him to his feet, for it was well past time for him to be gone. She took his elbow and led him to recover his hat and coat.
At the door, as he turned to go, she faced him. “Pray, do not despair. This is a setback, not a calamity. In a day, or a fortnight, or a month; you will see that I am right. Might I offer one last parting piece of advice?”
Darcy, visibly mortified, sniffled and wiped his eyes.
“I should be honoured.”
“Find the woman you can marry without apology.”
