Page 5 of The Widower of Pemberley

Even at the best of times, Darcy preferred country to town, but of late he had an additional cause for antipathy towards London: Mary had almost certainly begun her intrigue with Wickham while he stayed in their town-house as the particular guest of Darcy’s ailing mother.

At the time, Darcy had already given up hope of marital harmony and finding true similarity of mind or soul in the woman he had foolishly tied himself to. Instead, he had busied himself with being useful to Wilberforce’s circle of abolitionists.

As a father, Darcy had decided that he ought to involve himself more deeply in the great affairs of the nation and the arrangement of a future which was a little kinder than the one he had inherited from his own father.

And he had wanted to avoid his wife.

Mary had complained and complained about his neglect of her and demanded that he perform for her friends and play attendance on her. Yet, when he had generally done so during the first years of their marriage, she had always been dissatisfied with how he spoke to Lady such-and-such or how he was rude to Lord so-and-so. He had not even known himselftobe rude. She also wanted him to make, on occasion, a show of gambling when the stakes were high enough to be interesting, and he never did that.

He never drove a fast gig, he never nearly ran over six ladies and three children in Bond Street, and he talked too long and with too much dullness.

She expected him to be easy in conversation, to fill her ears with sweet gallantries, as regular as a metronome. Yet when he did so, using his watch to remind himself to say somethingaffectionate, she was dissatisfied with the mechanical nature of how he praised her.

None of it was how he had foreseen marriage to be.

Mary had expected him to be…a different sort of man from what he in fact was.

His mother and Mary had died within six months of each other, and at least his mother never knew that the woman she had encouraged Darcy to marry had cuckolded him with dear little Wicky.

Darcy could not guess which betrayal—that by his wife, or that committed by his childhood friend—would have made his lady mother more miserable. For Darcy’s own part, this behaviour was exactly what he had expected from Wickham, and by the date of his discovery of her unfaithfulness, nothing that Mary did much surprised him.

Entering the Meryton assembly, Darcy studied the crush with a critical eye.

A grummy place—the music was sawn out by the violins, the vinegary stench of spilt wine assaulted his nose, the chattering of a hundred people whom he neither knew nor wished to know besieged his ears. His coat and shirt seemed uncomfortably tight. The cramped room was cheaply decorated, lit with few candles, and had a low ceiling.

Thank the Almighty that at least he was not in London.

That thought made him smile, or at least not frown deeply, at the clamour.

Georgiana looked small and terrified by the crowd.

Rather than beginning his quest to find an ugly, sensible, affectionate, and penniless woman to be the mother of Emilyand his yet-to-be-conceived son, Darcy led his sister to the line and partnered her for the first set.

Alas, that pleasant dance ended too soon.

Bingley had kindly agreed before they arrived that he would step out with Georgiana for the second set, and Darcy was left to arrange for himself an introduction to a suitable woman to judge as his first candidate for the high and exalted post of Mrs. Darcy.

Unfortunately, this presented no difficulties.

Within a minute he was introduced to the children of a Sir William Lucas. From her appearance, his eldest daughter was exactly the sort of woman whom Darcy insisted to himself he would marry: sensible, not pretty but not so unpleasant to look at that he would be unable to father an heir with her, and even two months his superior in age.

She had only the smallest dowry, and her family had been in trade before her father was made a knight. Darcy was conscious of his great fortune in finding such imperfection so quickly.

His conversation with Miss Lucas proved of little interest, but that did not bother him. His conversation with Mary had once been of great interest to him, and that had brought him no happiness in marriage. To embark upon an opposite course was wisest. Darcy decided he would ask Miss Lucas for a second dance later.

He then stood up with a Miss King, who was an attractive enough girl, he supposed.

Darcy was forced to agree with the young miss that she did have a great many freckles after she referred to them twice as the great tragedy of her life. He had not noticed them before that. Also, she attempted to impress Darcy by informing him abouther sad, yet great, hopes of soon inheriting some ten thousand pounds.

Miss King very, very much did not wish for her grandfather to die, but since he inevitablywould, it was a good thing that someone in his family whom he loved would inherit the money, was it not? She had no reason to feel guilty about the expected accession to fortune. Did not Mr. Darcy agree?

No. Nothing further with Miss King.

More dances followed in forced succession—mixed with returning to Georgiana to confirm that she was well and not too scared of the crush. His sister insisted, with some tone of truthfulness to her words, that she was happy.

Halfway through the night, Georgianadidseem happy. When he approached, she was immersed in conversation with Miss Lucas and a smiling and particularly pretty and well-dressed young woman who, from Darcy’s recollection, was the first girl that Bingley had danced with that evening.

Georgiana exclaimed eagerly, “Brother, you must meet Miss Elizabeth! She has been so kind as to sit out with me for the past set.”