In the weeks after my brother brought me home from Margate, I spent hours at the piano. As if in a dream, I’d move from the drawing room to my bedroom and back again, tolerating company only at meals, during which I barely spoke. Being home at Pemberley was usually a comfort, but I took little pleasure in my surroundings. My brother assumed I was using music to drown out my shame at having nearly eloped, but shame was not all that afflicted me; I was heartbroken. I’d been so gullible and naive. And I regretted how virulently I’d argued with my beloved brother. We’d never before raised our voices at each other. After our parents were both gone, my brother had stepped in as surrogate father. I knew that many found him proud, but to me he was the essence of kindness and care. I still hate how I spoke to him in Margate.
“I don’t care if George is after my money,” I’d cried. “My thirty thousand pounds will be a factor in whatever match I make. Why shouldn’t it go to someone I love?”
“Love?” My brother scowled. “You are an innocent child. What can you possibly know of love?”
“And you know so much about romance, Mr. Darcy?” I knew he despised when I addressed him formally in this way, like a stranger or a servant, but I was beyond reason. “George Wickham may not be perfect, but at least I have known love. You’ll never marry because no one meets your impossible standards.”
Worse, I accused my brother of being jealous of George, whose sparkling eyes, fine countenance, and happy mannersbrought him friends and admirers wherever he went. Everyone at Pemberley adored him, our father most of all.
Now, a rustle of skirts at the door. The governess.
“I beg your pardon, Lady Stoughton, may I take the children outside now instead of later this afternoon? There are clouds in the distance, and I’m afraid it might rain.”
“Of course, Miss Rookwood. You don’t have to ask permission. I trust you to do what you think is best.”
She is still new, so young and tentative. I think she’s scared of me. If only she knew how frightened I am of myself!
In the next room, Miss Rookwood speaks to the children, who clap and squeal, delighted to play outside. When I was their age, I used to roam all over Pemberley, looking for George. The son of the estate’s steward, George grew up alongside my brother and, thanks to my father, was schooled beside him all the way through Cambridge. Though a decade older than me, George devoted hours to my amusement. He’d slip lemon drops into my hand under the table and sometimes tease me by tugging on my bonnet and feigning innocence when I whipped around. “Moi?” he’d say, confusing me with his French. “Mais non!” I loved fencing with him, a cattail as my sword, until he’d pretend defeat so well that I would cast myself upon him on the ground, sobbing only half in jest as I waited for him to lift his head, wink at me, and say something dramatic like “I live to see another day!”
If my brother was the sun of my girlhood, dependable and steady, George was the stars.
A horse whinnies. I go to the window. Outside, Edmund sits tall and straight-backed in the saddle as he prepares to ride out with the estate manager. He bends to adjust a stirrup and, as if he can sense my eyes on him, looks up toward the house. When myhusband spots me, he grins and makes a flourish with his arm, like a court jester bowing to a queen.
I watch as he prods his horse and canters away. How lucky men are to have important things to keep them diverted from whatever rumbles in their minds. And how odd that I can move through my days as if I’m concentrating on a conversation, or the words in a book, or the stitches in my embroidery, while I am thinking only of long-ago moments that, even in memory, make my body vibrate like the plucked strings of a harp. I am thankful that no one can read my thoughts. My husband would be shocked. My brother would be deeply disappointed to know that, after all this time and all that we now know, I am still dreaming of “that wretched man.”
“To think what he might have done to you had I not joined you here in Margate unexpectedly,” he’d said, after I’d confessed our plan to elope. He told me that “Wickham”—he wouldn’t speak his Christian name—was not to be trusted or believed.
“He aims only to satisfy himself,” he said.
“It’s not his fault that he lacks for money,” I said.
“No? Our father left Wickham a living to enter the clergy, but he refused it and asked for money instead. I gave him money, but he squandered it. And then came back and said he wanted to enter the clergy after all, which was patently absurd, as he’d done nothing but pursue a life of idleness and dissipation. He was livid at my refusal, but I never thought he’d stoop so low as to lure you and your fortune into his trap.”
“But he didn’t,” I’d countered. “We met him by chance when we were walking along the seawall.”
I recounted how Mrs. Younge and I had been out strolling when the wind picked up and it started to rain. I was struggling to open my parasol when I heard a man behind us say, “It’s only a mizzle; you won’t melt.” It had been years since I’d seen George,and I was so happy to discover him that I forgot my manners and threw my arms around him like I was still a child.
“Could it be? Miss Georgiana Darcy?” he’d said. “Look how you’ve grown.”
I thought he was teasing me about my height—we were nearly eye to eye—but he spoke earnestly and declared me a proper young lady, which reminded me to act like one and introduce him to Mrs. Younge. He bowed elegantly. I was sure Mrs. Younge was impressed that I was on such familiar terms with a man as pleasing as George Wickham.
George had looped his arm through mine, and we’d walked forward in quick, long strides, soon making a distance between ourselves and Mrs. Younge. When I looked back, he laughed and said, “Have you grown into such a Darcy that you fear even the hint of scandal?”
“With you?” I said. “Of course not. Don’t I call you brother?”
“Do you still?” he said. “I should hope not.” Which would have made me sad had he not looked upon me with such delight.
Listening to this account, my brother had turned red in the face. I think he was too angry to speak. Finally, he said, “This never should have happened. I blame myself.”
That’s when he’d gone into the next room to have words with Mrs. Younge. I couldn’t hear what he said, but his tone of voice alarmed me. When he returned, he told me that there had been a prior acquaintance between George Wickham and Mrs. Younge, in whose character we were cruelly deceived. It was by her connivance and aid that Wickham had come to Margate, where, at his request, she had orchestrated our time together and done everything possible to persuade me to elope with him. The “chance” encounter on the seawall had been nothing of the kind.
This was a blow. I went over all my interactions with George and Mrs. Younge, shocked that they’d colluded to trick me. I’d happily have given all my fortune to a good and honest man who promised me his love and was grateful to accept mine. But George Wickham was not who he presented himself to be. He was duplicitous and insincere. A liar. I learned that then and know it now.
So why—at seven and twenty years and well settled as a wife and mother—am I consumed with thoughts of this unworthy man?
If Lizzie were here, she would tell me to get outside and take a walk. The world is more beautiful on foot, she’s declared more than once, and more manageable, too. I heed her advice and leave the house, thankful that the sky hasn’t darkened as Miss Rookwood feared. I walk briskly, as if I can outpace the thoughts that haunt me. I’m halfway down the grassy slope to the rose garden when Thomas dashes up to me, tears streaking his pudgy cheeks.
“I was only pretending!” he says. “Why can’t I play make believe?”
