I see through your scheme! Through your pretended engagement. You were clever. I did think much upon what might have been after receiving the news of your engagement to this Miss Bennet. I have met the girl, and I knew that she was too low, too impertinent, and too scheming to be fit to take Anne’s place as the mistress of Pemberley. I had feared that your good sense had been rotted by the disease that led you to keep HER and her spawn with you. But your scheme is now unfolded to me. It was an art to induce me change my mind and seek you out desperately once you were “free” once more.
You have failed. So long as your estate is despised by the world entire due to the presence of that false claimant to the Fitzwilliam blood. That girl who was no doubt substituted at birth with an impressionable peasant creature instead of my true niece. So long as this state continues, you shall never marry my Anne. Eject G, remove her from your presence, remove her from your life,thenI shall allow your true bride to join you. Not until then.
Your Loving Aunt,
Lady C de B
Darcy wanted to show the letter to Elizabeth. This was outrageous and bizarre.Shewould appreciate the laughability of his aunt.
But by God, was he grateful Georgiana remained with him. He didnotwish to be descended upon by Lady Catherine and her sickly spawn — daughter. Her sickly daughter. The deuce, why had she needed to stick that word in his head?
Shaking his head, Darcy looked at the letter again with an amused chuckle. His eyes caught the line:The very shades of Pemberley are polluted by the presence of G.
The phrasing was familiar, and distinctive. Who could possibly have used those particular words recently? Darcy frowned and paced around his room, looking out the large windows that oversaw his noble domain and massive park. Who would someone speak about polluting Pemberley? Maybe when Mr. Peake asked after the tenants and estate matters he worked upon when he was employed at Pemberley. They had spoken about lead mining works set up in a hill owned by a neighbor which released substantial dirt and unhealthful fragments of lead into a stream which flowed through Darcy’s fields.
Darcy remembered. Elizabeth’s harsh face, filled with anger. “You will make your sister miserable to avoid offending your ghosts?”
It felt sick, like something wasn’t right, as though he’d made a mistake. It was the first time he’d felt anything of the sort since she had thrown his ring at him.
He’d said the shades of Pemberley would rebel against Georgiana’s marriage to a tradesman. He’d used Lady Catherine’s words to explain why Georgiana could not possibly be allowed to marry Mr. Peake.
A knock sounded on Darcy’s study door. He stood and called out for the door to be open. It was opened, and before his butler could announce the guest, Brigadier General Richard Fitzwilliam stepped lightly into the room.
The two men stared at each other while Darcy’s butler withdrew and closed the door.
“The deuce, Darcy. Upon my word! Tall as ever.”
“Richard!” Darcy grabbed his cousin and embraced him, and Richard embraced him back. The two men then separated, with wide grins.
“You laughing fool — what happened with Miss Bennet? But notnow. Not at all. Zounds, I am glad to see you happy to see me.”
“And you a general. I haven’t even seen you since the promotion.”
“Mainly means more salary, and I can’t sell my commission any longer.”
“No extra responsibility?”
“Eh, I have that. You’d think they could hardly find work for me to do with the army shrinking since the end of the war but I impressedhim” — Richard pointed to the ceiling — “at Waterloo, so he keeps me busy.”
“Do you mean God or Wellington? I heard from your father that your regiment had been involved in the worst part of the fighting.”
“Damned close run thing. Damned close run. And now I’m punished for holding firm by being kept busy, even though the army has nothing to do. Darcy, you look both hale and hell burnt. And Georgie? I must apologize toher. Deuced, damned fool. What sort of man would throw a fit to force a crying child of fifteen to marry a cold, dead stick like Carteret — worse, I had no reason beyond spite. But zounds, I am glad to see you again.”
“I too…I am…” Darcy nearly teared over, he was smiling so hard. “It isgoodto see you.”
The two men grinned at each other.
Georgiana was delighted to see RIchard. She accepted his apology, and she broke out of the sullenness she’d shown, even after their conversation. She had been quiet, though no longer resentful in the way that she had been the first day.
The three talked and laughed, and little Anne slowly warmed up to Richard, and in turn he was charmed by the little girl. In the afternoon they went outside and fought an epic snowball war in the park which lasted nearly till dark.
Shrieking and laughing, they returned to the house, warmed up with chocolate and hot punch, and talked for hours, while Georgiana played for them several times.
Darcy could see Richard’s curiosity about Georgiana’s manner towards Darcy. That there was a tension between Georgiana and Darcy was clear, and he must want to know what had happened between him and Elizabeth.
After Georgiana retired for the night, the two gentlemen made their own shift to the billiards room for a game of snooker and a decanter of fine cognac.
Darcy told Richard how he met Elizabeth — somehow his ill mood and incivility when introduced to her had been transformed by the passage of time from an embarrassment to an unbearably touching and tender memory, and he could not speak the story without tears.
