Page 214 of A Question of Character

Darcy left the window at last.

“You will never speak to my sister ever again. That much I trust requires no explanation.”

“No.” Her voice was hollow. She flinched but did not protest. “What will become of me?”

“That is no longer my concern.”

The words came harder than he intended, and something in her face told him they had landed with their full weight. He did not soften them.

“I banished you from my household after the events of the summer. Still, you conspired to ruin a girl of sixteen not once, but twice, for the sake of a man who abandoned her the moment her fortune proved unreachable. I have shown you more patience this morning than the offense deserves. Rest assured, I shall now follow through with my previous threat and make certain you cannot serve another respectable household.” No, he would do more than that.

Mrs. Younge rose unsteadily. “I will trouble you no further,” she said, and left the room with what remained of her dignity gathered about her like a borrowed cloak.

The door had scarcely closed before Wickham exhaled.

“She will find some other situation within the year. Women of her particular talents rarely starve.”

“That is not comfort.”

“It was not intended as such.”

Darcy pressed his knuckles briefly against his eyes. The night’s exhaustion had settled into every joint, and the morning’s revelations sat upon it like a second weight.

“I must go to her.”

Wickham did not ask whom he meant.

Georgiana had risen and dressed by the time Darcy knocked again, though the effort had cost her. She sat near the small window of her chamber, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes reddened but dry. She did not look at him when he entered.

“Mrs. Younge is gone,” she said.

“Yes.” Darcy had given her over to the magistrate for theft. The woman had, while in his service, taken several valuable items from Darcy House, discovered after the Ramsgate debacle. She would spend time in debtor’s prison. He ought to have done so last summer.

Georgiana’s fingers tightened in her lap, but she said nothing.

Darcy drew a chair near hers, close enough for conversation, not so close as to crowd her. He had learned, in the space of one dreadful night, that his sister required room now in a way she never had before.

“Georgiana.”

“I know what you mean to ask.”

“Then I will not make you ask it of yourself.”

She lifted her chin, though her eyes remained fixed upon some point beyond the window.

“You wish to know why I let you believe it was Mr. Wickham.”

“Yes.”

For a long moment she said nothing at all. When she spoke, her voice had steadied into something colder than grief—something nearer to confession delivered on her own terms, rather than dragged from her.

“Because it was easier.”

Darcy waited.

“You came into that hall so angry, Fitzwilliam. So certain. You said his name before I had drawn breath enough to correct you, and for one moment—one dreadful moment—I understood that if I let you believe it, none of the rest would matter. Not Mrs. Younge or George. Not what I had done. You would simply be angry at a man you already despised, and I should not have to watch your face while you learned the truth of me.”

“The truth of you.”