“Then how came she to be at Pemberley?”
More silence.
“I cannot tell this part, Darcy!” Fitzwilliam said with exasperation. “In case it escaped your notice, I only arrived today. I do not know what happened last week.”
“Neither do I!” he snapped, turning around to glare at his cousin. “She was here, she was perfect, and then she was gone. Would that somebody could explain it to me, for I sure as the Devil do not know what went wrong.”
He knew that would not satisfy them, thus he stationed himself in the nearest chair and yielded grudgingly to a stream of questions as they wheedled out of him all his dealings with Elizabeth the previous week. He disliked the discomfort of so personal a disclosure but held on to the hope that his cousins might perceive some motive or justification he had overlooked himself. Regrettably, they were both singularly unforthcoming in that regard.
“Most odd,” Linseagh said.
Fitzwilliam agreed. “It is, considering that Miss Bennet is not exactly backwards in coming forwards. If something had upset her, she would have told you, I think, would she not Darcy?”
Darcy could not help but chuckle slightly at that. “Probably.”
“But not to leave word—even for Georgiana? That seems unkind.”
“If she was offended by something I did, I would not expect her to give greater consideration to my sister’s sensibilities than her own.” Except Darcy could not help but think that she would.
“And you are absolutely set on her?” Linseagh asked, immediately holding up a hand to convey his sincerity. “I ask with no ulterior meaning. Only to confirm that you do want to find out what has happened. Because you could walk away from this now without a spot on you.”
“I have walked away twice already. I keep coming back to it, one way or another.” He twisted impatiently in his seat. “Linseagh,mywishes are not in question.”
“Quite right. Though I hardly know how you ought to proceed when you do not know what hers are.”
Darcy closed his eyes and wished he had gone to bed when the others did.
“You could write to Mr Gardiner,” Fitzwilliam suggested.
“Do not be ridiculous,” Linseagh interjected. “You would have the grandson of an earl write to a tradesman, begging to know whether his niece holds a candle for him?”
Darcy could not deny the prospect was unappealing, though he might have done it anyway had he no other reservations preventing him. “Mr Gardiner has not written to me, either, which I can only presume is because he—or his niece—would prefer to drop the acquaintance.”
“Wouldhe write?” Linseagh queried. “He sounds clever enough. I doubt he would presume to take the liberty.”
“Or, more likely, he is ignorant of his niece’s interest in the matter,” Fitzwilliam opined. “Could not you ask Georgiana to write to Miss Bennet?”
“That would be unfair, if it turns out Miss Bennet did leave to get away from him,” Linseagh argued. “What a disappointment it would be for our poor cousin to write to a lady she thought might become her sister, only to have her olive branch spurned.”
“Or for the lady who left to get away from me to be hounded by all my relations,” Darcy added quietly.
“Well then,” said Fitzwilliam, decisively. “You must go to Hertfordshire and speak to Miss Bennet in person.”
Darcy discarded his glass on the nearest table and rubbed his face with his hands. “I cannot go to Hertfordshire. Not yet, in any case. Miss Bennet continued north when she left Lambton. I have no way of knowing when she will return to Longbourn, and with things as they are at Pemberley, I cannot spare the time to sit about in Meryton awaiting her return.”
“But she cannot travel forever—and you said yourself Gardiner has warehouses that require him to be present. So, go in a few weeks.”
Linseagh gave a murmur of ambivalence. “I do not know. What if Miss Bennet really does not want anything to do with him?”
“Then I ought not to mortify her by chasing after her,” Darcy replied.
“Well, what do you propose to do, then?” Fitzwilliam cried.
Darcy gave a bitter bark of laughter, retrieved his glass, drained it, and put it back down. “I have no idea, and you two have been no help whatsoever.”
* * *
Jacobs arrived at the end of the week as planned and delivered the verdict that by now was a surprise to no one: Pemberley’s east wing was subsiding and must be underpinned in its entirety to prevent a catastrophic collapse. Furthermore, the architect recommended that the exploratory trench be extended to determine whether whatever was causing the problem posed a threat to the rest of the building.
