Page 70 of A Prudent Engagement

“I know that my wealth provides a promise of security and freedom from the poverty that you deserve due to your father and mother’s impecunious habits.”

“That is not what I meant.”

“And so then it was your unalloyed preference that led you to accept me? I cast back in my mind, and there are certain expressions of admiration, of affection, of love, that I made frequently towards you that you never reciprocated. I was left to imagine that you were shy, that the way you would let me comfort you, or kiss you, or that the way you smiled at me when we talked—I imagined that meant a great deal, a great deal to you. But you never said that you loved me. But that is d—”

He paused. He pressed his hands together. The pain in his chest was acute, but shouting at Elizabeth, becoming different from the gentleman he strove to be, would offer no lasting relief.

“Please, Mr. Darcy. I do not want to see you in pain.”

He had no reply to that, except that he was in pain.

“What can I say, what can I do to make you feel, to understand—it is useless. You pay no heed to what I say.”

“Elizabeth, how many times must I tell you to not be filled with such anxieties. I made a promise, and I will fulfil it.” Darcy gripped the windowsill until his knuckles turned white. He could not look to see how she would take that.

“But I wish for you to be happy in it.”

“That is impossible. I cannot be happy now that I know the truth. I cannot be happy now that I see you as you truly are.”

Despite it all, even now, even knowing this, he wished to marry Elizabeth, because he loved her.

“How could you still wish me to be your wife?” Elizabeth said softly. She slumped into the chair once more. “You are right. Matters cannot be made as they were. It is impossible.”

Darcy did not reply.

He did not have words to comfort her. Not when she was the cause of his pain.

Elizabeth was silent for some minutes. Then he heard her stand back up.

He turned from the window and the vision of the late afternoon sun.

Her face was bleak, lit by the orange rays.

She curtsied. “Mr. Darcy, I thank you for the kindness that you have shown me. But while your honour requires that you maintain the engagement, mine demands that I end it.” She wiped at her cheek. “Goodbye, and I wish from the bottom of my heart that God blesses you with every happiness and that your pain is of shorter duration than I fear it will be. You deserve only that which is good.”

“Wait, Elizabeth! You cannot.”

She reached the door. She paused for a long time.

Her hand on the latch.

It was the first time since he had entered the room that her posture appeared confident.

She took a deep breath, then looked back at him, still holding the latch. “Just as you would not allow me to mollify you, I shall not let you convince me to overlook my duty.” She regarded him with sad eyes. “I only wish that I had not caused you such unhappiness, but it seems that there was no way I could have avoided that.”

“But—your family. Your mother. You cannot mean to throw them into poverty.”

“Mr. Darcy, I should have listened to Jane on this point from the first. I have never feared it on my own account, and my mother will live, and perhaps in time even become accustomed to the loss of comforts and station. She may even one day forgive me—I only hope you can.”

“Elizabeth, there is nothing to forgive.”

“There is. I have seen that all along. I acted in a wholly reprehensible manner, and I am suffering justly for it.”

“You cannot go. I do not mean to encourage you to do so. I promise, I shall fulfil every requirement you have in a husband and give you everything you expected from me. You have no reason to leave.”

“Ah, but, Mr. Darcy, one of the chief elements of that imagined happy life was that you were also happy in it.”

Before Darcy could collect his thoughts to reply further, she had opened the door, hurried through it, and was gone.