Page 188 of A Question of Character

October had brought cooler mornings and shortening days to Hertfordshire, though Darcy had scarcely noticed either.

Darcy dressed the next morning with the grim purpose of a man going to receive sentence.

The hour was early enough that Netherfield had not yet collected itself into its usual noises. No Miss Bingley’s step in the passage, no Hurst’s complaint over breakfast, no Bingley’s cheerful voice greeting the world as if the world had spent the night arranging itself for his pleasure. The scrape of a brush over superfine, the crackle of the fire, and Darcy’s own thoughts, which had pursued one another since dawn without producing anything resembling peace.

He was going to speak with George Wickham.

No evasion or postponement. No reliance upon the old conviction that had carried him through every disagreement as if conviction were itself proof.

Elizabeth had refused him.

The memory did not strike as sharply as it had the previous evening; it had grown deeper than that. A wound which pain had begun to inhabit rather than merely visit.

I think you are a better man than this.

He stood before the glass while Fletcher adjusted his coat, and for once he took no satisfaction in the correctness of his appearance. What use was a properly tied cravat to a man who had nearly lost the woman he loved because he would not keep a promise? What use were consequence, discipline, reputation, all the instruments by which he had ordered his life, if they made him less capable of justice instead of more?

“Will you ride this morning, sir?” Fletcher asked.

“Yes. To Longbourn first.”

The man’s hands paused a fraction. “Very good, sir.”

Darcy caught the hesitation. Every servant at Netherfield knew something of the tension by now, however discreetly they pretended otherwise. Longbourn, Wickham, Ramsgate, Miss Bennet. Names traveled through a household without anyone admitting to having carried them.

“Mr. Wickham is likely to be there,” Darcy said, more to accustom himself to saying it than because Fletcher required explanation.

“Yes, sir.”

Darcy walked away from the glass. “If any express arrives from town while I am absent, have it sent on.”

Before Fletcher could answer, there came a knock at the chamber door. A footman entered with the morning post upon a salver.

“Letters, sir.”

Darcy reached for them with little attention, then stopped when he saw Georgiana’s hand.

It had been a week since he had last heard from her.

He dismissed the servant, took the letter, and broke the seal while still standing. The first line drew all warmth from the room.

My dearest brother,

By the time this reaches you, I shall be a married woman.

Darcy sank into the nearest chair.

The paper shook once in his hands.

Fletcher said something. Darcy did not hear it.

He read on, each line worse than the last, not because it contained apology enough to comfort, but because Georgiana’s confidence sounded so horribly young.

She begged him not to be angry and not to pursue her. Georgie assured him that all would be explained when she returned with her husband, that she acted from affection and necessity, that she could not endure another season, another round of scrutiny, another year of being treated as a child who understood nothing of her own heart. She had left instructions with her maid that the letter not be sent until a week after her departure, when pursuit would no longer avail.

A week.

Darcy turned the page.