My aunt also wrote that Lydia has become increasingly difficult. My first thought upon reading this report was that my sister was as self-absorbed as she has been known to be. It seems I am still too quick to judge. Upon hearing that Mr Wickham was lately married and learning the disgraceful terms by which he was wed, Lydia has fallen into melancholy. I understand my uncle wrote to you, and the arrangements for her removal to your estate in Ireland are underway. I have no doubt of your success in Bath, and once Mr Wickham openly acknowledges his child, we might put this affair behind us. Lydia may not be able to return home, but there is now reason to hope that the rest of my family may again be received by our neighbours.
I believe you are capable of everything great and good and that you will do all that is possible for Lydia, and thereby my entire family, to preserve us from infamy. While you likely do not want it, you have my gratitude.
Know that I love you and remain forever yours,
E. Bennet
To read that Elizabeth had the utmost faith in his ability to ensure her family’s respectability disheartened him. He was certain that never in his beloved’s wildest thoughts did she imagine he would challenge George Wickham to a duel. He could still hardly believe it of himself. He had waited for hours with no small amount of trepidation for Colonel Fitzwilliam to return with Wickham’s answer.
Darcy was staring into the empty fireplace, his arm slung over the mantel, when his cousin strode in. Without looking up, he asked, “What was Wickham’s reply?”
“‘When and where you please.’”
He had suspected that Fitzwilliam’s being gone for so long meant that Wickham had declined to resolve this peaceably, but hearing the truth was still a blow.
When Darcy failed to respond, Fitzwilliam continued, “I had to wait two hours before Wickham would see me, though I heard his carriage arrive and suspected he was only just coming home from whatever hole in which he passed the night. Can you believe that, when he came in to see me, he was carrying a walking stick and flipping open his gold watch? And I swear to you that the clothes he wore cost more than my commission. Such overt signs of imagined superiority were mortifying to witness. He has confused opulence with elegance. I know his calm demeanour was an act because, before he met with me, I overheard him cry out in alarm when his man handed him my card.” He laughed at the memory.
Darcy could make no reply, and Fitzwilliam schooled his features and tone to fit Darcy’s sombre mood. “Wickham told me in no uncertain terms that he would tell anyone who asked that Miss Lydia Bennet was a fallen woman and he would not acknowledge any connexion to her.”
“And what of Elizabeth?”
“He said he would be proud to take out a notice in the newspapers advertising the supposed lax morals of the Bennet girls. The man is determined to ruin your reputation and your future wife’s. He is eager to confront you.”
He could scarcely believe that Wickham refused to apologise for his lies and insults. Darcy was still staring into the empty grate while he thought of that man’s cold-hearted viciousness.In order to preserve my family’s honour and settle this dispute, I will actually have to engage in a duel.
“Darcy, do you hear me? I am confident Wickham wants to kill you.”
Darcy ground his teeth and was deep in silent contemplation. That he needed to engage in the most elaborate and dangerous form of conflict resolution was no less astounding this morning than it was last night.
Fitzwilliam sat near the fireplace and said, “It shocked me that Wickham chose to defend his conduct. I was confident that he would withdraw rather than meet you. Instead, he seemed delighted by the idea of staring at you over the barrel of a pistol. He wants you ruined, and if he can kill you, then he will leave the field a happy man.”
Darcy finally looked up, his determination to face what had to be done back in place. “One fights a duel in order to say that one has done so. It is for a moral purpose, to defend one’s honour. I am not fighting to kill.”
“Tell that to George Wickham! You are the only one who considers this an affair of honour.” Fitzwilliam sighed as he sank into his chair. “What in heaven did you say to each other?”
“How do you mean?”
The colonel flushed but met his eye. “You are a loyal friend, a liberal master, an honourable man…but you are used to having your own way. You are not always at ease with people. You do not have a welcoming way with them.”
“Do you suggest I walked into the card room intending to challenge Wickham to a duel? That my disdain for him and my reserved nature are the reasons I find myself here?”
“No, I want to comprehend how your conversation unravelled into a quarrel that resulted in you having no other honourable option but to call the man out. I do not doubt he deserves it. I simply am surprised. You did not challenge him last summer after Ramsgate,” Fitzwilliam added quietly.
“I could not risk exposing Georgiana. It was for her credit and feelings that I did nothing but write to Wickham and persuade him to keep his silence and his distance. But in this instance, the damage is already done. He has taken worse liberties with a girl who will be my sister, and then he defamed the character of my future wife.”
“What did he say of Elizabeth Bennet? You cannot fool me, Darcy. You would not be in such a state if Wickham only refused to acknowledge his responsibilities to her ruined sister.”
“He insinuated to all who could hear that Elizabeth entrapped me, that she was with child by another man, and that this was the only reason I was engaged to her.”
“But there is no truth behind what Wickham claimed.”
“Such claims do not need to be absolutely proven. That they are suspected will cause gossip, and innuendo will be accepted as evidence. I will not have my wife’s reputation called into question by that poor excuse of a man.”
“Did you not consider that, when there is no Darcy child born early, there would be no reason to give credence to Wickham’s claims?”
Darcy turned away and hoped his cousin would presume he was embarrassed for not considering such an obvious fact in the middle of a heated moment. Their near relationship and constant intimacy made that an unlikely expectation. Seconds ticked by before Fitzwilliam cursed quietly under his breath.
Darcy heard his cousin rise and take two steps closer. “Miss Bennet is not the sort of woman to ensnare you in order to provide a name for her child by another man. I am forced, therefore, to conclude that there is genuine reason to fear that Pemberley’s heir will arrive less than nine months from the day you marry her?”
