“What if he heard something?” said Georgiana. “What if he found about Mr. Wickham?”
“He did not. Mr. Wickham is dead,” said Mr. Darcy, firmly.
“Yes, but what if he did?” she nearly wailed.
And this went on, in various permutations, all afternoon. Eventually, she worked herself up so badly that she declared that she would not come to dinner and that she must spend the evening in her bedchamber.
Mr. Darcy retired early himself that night.
He had his valet come and undress him and he spent the evening near an open window, wrapped in a banyan, reading a book and gazing out as darkness stole over the countryside. He hadn’t had the chance to relax like this in some time.
Of course, he was not certain what to make of Houseman’s strange exit, or what the man had said about Sulles. But since he could not puzzle any of it out, he determined not to think about it, and he was mostly successful.
That was, until there was a knock on his door.
“Yes?” he called.
Her voice was a whisper. “Mr. Darcy?”
He set down the book and hurried over to open the door to let Elizabeth inside. “Everyone cannot be abed yet. It is but quarter to nine. You are risking discovery coming here.”
She darted inside, looking guilty. “I know, I know. But everyone knows I’m married now, which makes it much less scandalous.”
“How so?”
“Well, it’s just… married women aren’t quite protected in the same way, you know.”
He considered and determined she was right, that it was one thing to bed your cousin’s wife—very bad, of course—but it was another thing entirely to bed an innocent virgin and take her virtue when it wasn’t yours to take. He sighed. “All right, I see what you mean, but we still oughtn’t be doing this. I don’t like either of us in each other’s bedchambers, and I am not even dressed.”
Her gaze flitted over him. “I can go?”
“No, no, you’re already here. What is it?”
She took a deep breath and then related being awakened in the night the previous night, the marriage license, the discussion with the duke, the invitation to breakfast, then only meeting the dowager duchess in the wood, all that had been said there, and finally, her realization that there were too many things that didn’t line up, that she must be missing something about the situation. “And I have to know what it is,” she finished. “I cannot do it alone, and I feel as if there is only one person who I can trust to assist me with this, and it’s you. You have always put me first, Mr. Darcy. I don’t understand it, and I don’t deserve it, and I shouldn’t take advantage of it, but… please help me.”
“Of course I shall help you.” He crossed to her. “And you do deserve to be put first, of course. You do.” He smiled at her. “But I think it will have to be your husband who does that. I do not put you first, Elizabeth, not truly. I have merely put you into my responsibilities. They are sorted differently at different times, though. You are not the chief of them.”
“Well, good,” she said, smiling. “That would be far too much pressure on me. I should disappoint you.”
“Never,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s not that way. I shall adjust to be what you need. I shan’t expect anything of you at all. You must just continue to be Elizabeth, and I shall do what I can for you.”
Her eyes shone. “That is… you are… I am grateful. I don’t mean to rely on you, but—”
“No, rely on me,” he said. “Please. I wish to do what I can for you.”
“Why?”
“We are not doing this again,” he said, chuckling.
“But even if you are in love with me, sir, I can’t see why. With Richard, yes, I love him, and yes, I have some resentmenttowards him, but he did… there are things that happened that caused that love. There is a mixture of good things and bad. With me, what is there that has been good? Have I not caused you only misery?”
His lips parted. He was struck rather deeply by this question, though perhaps he oughtn’t be. He had chided himself for his stupid and irrational obsession with this woman, and he had told himself over and over that it didn’t make sense, but now he wondered.
Whydidhe love her?
“When I become set upon something, you see, Elizabeth, it is difficult to get me away from it. I commit to things. I am invested in things. It is simply the way I am.”
She was thoughtful. “Do you not do things because they make you feel good, sir?”
