Page 46
“The first night we can be entirely alone,” she answered, her cheeks aflame but her voice calm and determined.
“I shall come to Hertfordshire with you tomorrow and stay at Netherfield until we can leave for Pemberley, free to marry,” he said.
“Why do we not go directly to Pemberley?” she suggested, watching him smile at her determination.
“Because my family now suspects we are engaged. Lady Catherine will almost certainly write to our clergymen and tell them of the dispute. She knows the law cannot compel me to marry Anne. The clergymen are their only hope. But my new solicitor will also be in Hertfordshire in a few days. He has sent word that he has some important information.”
“So you will travel to Hertfordshire with us tomorrow?” Elizabeth asked eagerly.
“Yes, my love! With you! Remember your promise! As for this evening, I cannot stay for dinner. I must first speak to my relations about their interference in my life. Then…nothing shall keep me from Hertfordshire any longer.”
Her worried face distressed him to the point of physical pain. He gently drew her into his arms, unable to bear her unhappiness.
“I love you, Elizabeth Bennet, and nothing shall ever part us,” he declared.
“Tell me you have no regrets,” she murmured in his embrace.
“Regrets?” he replied. “Indeed, I have…some! I regret not telling you tenderly how much I loved you in Kent. I regret that you were such a shrew,” he teased, searching her eyes.
“I regret that we are not yet married…”
“Is that all?” Elizabeth asked.
“And I regret every night I have spent apart from you!” he confessed, looking at her and trying to suppress a smile.
Chapter 17
The following morning, Darcy’s carriage conveyed them to the green countryside of Hertfordshire. This time, the party consisted solely of Elizabeth, her dear father and Darcy. It felt as though ages had passed since she had left Longbourn. In that time, her life and her family’s had changed greatly. Lydia had brought misfortune and trouble upon them. Nevertheless, their fortunes had taken a happier turn when Mr Darcy and Mr Bingley stood by them during the crisis, regardless of their families’ wishes or society’s opinion of the Bennets.
The love and joy shining in Jane’s face as she welcomed them, and the delight of her mother and sisters, lessened Elizabeth’s vexation with Wickham and Lydia. However, she agreed with Darcy’s decision to avoid Wickham’s company. That man was a scoundrel, and she deeply regretted that he was now married to one of her sisters.
“Pray, Mama, do not invite Mr Darcy to dine while Mr Wickham is here,” Elizabeth pleaded.
“You are so unjust and unyielding,” her mother replied, making Elizabeth wonder whether she understood what had happened in London. She was furious with her mother, who behaved just as Lydia did, as though nothing had happened and the future held only happiness.
“We very nearly lost the respect of society. Lydia almost ruined our good name, and it is a miracle that Jane and I are still engaged to be married.”
“You always exaggerate, my dear Lizzy! After all, Lydia is the only one of you who is married!”
“Mama!” Elizabeth cried in despair. “She is married because Mr Darcy paid Mr Wickham’s debts and gave him a considerable sum of money. With the help of Wickham’s commanding officers, he compelled him to marry Lydia!”
Mrs Bennet waved her words aside. “Mr Darcy is rich enough to do this for your sister, and it does not matter how they came to be married, so long as she is his wife!”
Elizabeth’s frustration was complete. She finally accepted that Jane and she, and most likely Mary, resembled their father, whereas Lydia and Kitty were very much like Mrs Bennet. It was peculiar how nature distributed the qualities and faults of parents among their children. She loved her mother, but at that moment she longed to leave home and allow time to soften her resentment. Most disagreeable of all was hearing Mrs Bennet praise Lydia’s marriage so effusively in the presence of Darcy and Bingley.
Darcy thought, amused, of poor Bingley, who would live only three miles from their future mother-in-law, and was glad Pemberley was three days’ journey away.
Elizabeth hoped her mother would lavish praise upon Jane once she was married and forget Lydia’s supposed success.
∞∞∞
Despite the problems with her mother, the following days passed joyfully for the Bennet family and the two engaged couples. All Meryton seemed to have forgotten Wickham’s misconduct, and the whispers about the elopement faded after the marriage. Mr Wickham was congratulated on his new commission in the North and soon left with his new wife to take up his duties.
Jane and Bingley enjoyed their peaceful engagement, awaiting a wedding a year after Charles’s first arrival in Hertfordshire. Their happiness differed from Elizabeth and Darcy’s, for they seemed to live in a dream, scarcely touching the earth, in a world into which no one else could enter.
Elizabeth tried to remain cheerful for Mr Darcy’s sake, though her fears persisted. Scotland offered a solution, though hardly the one she wished for. She thought it grossly unjust that her intended marriage must still be concealed when Lydia already had a husband.
At home, she devoted herself to reading, yet often ventured along the paths surrounding Longbourn, seeking solitude or perhaps an encounter with Darcy.
