She tried to summon the strength to write to her sisters, but it was a struggle. She would not live to meet Jane or Mary or Kitty’s new children, she would never have a child of her own, and she would never be loved in return by her husband.
I will not even see the Lakes if he cannot abide being in close quarters with me.
What had happened that night was a tender assurance of Darcy’s regard for her, but it was ill-conceived because his conscience would not allow him to go farther. Elizabeth sighed and found her silver knife to mend her pen, muttering under her breath about his damnable integrity. This heartache was the price of caring for him, this pain different from any heart affliction: that for all their friendship, she was married to a man who could not love her.
Biscay wasa challenging animal who often tested his authority, but even with the effort required to attend to his mount, Darcy’s mind wandered to Elizabeth. He had once thought that being in a marriage of unequal affections might be the most unendurable trial. How awful would loveless incompatibility be, and how destructive could it be for a couple forced to suffer one another until the end of their days?
It turns out that a match lacking affection is nothing to a passionate but unconsummated one.
He could still feel the imprint of her lips on his from that one marvellous encounter. Her eager touch had the effect on him of a fire to a gown’s train, but he would be damned before he injured her or broke his promise and mentioned her fatal disease.
His bay cleared a stream, and Darcy nearly did not loosen his reins and shift his balance in time. He tried to attend to the terrain, but his relationship with his wife reclaimed his attention.
He had confessed his worst, most damning secret: his initialthoughts on Georgiana’s child. Confessing that had freed much of his guilt, as did telling her of his intentions toward Wickham, and Elizabeth had not judged him. He still hated Wickham with an all-consuming fury, but Elizabeth had not even faulted him for that.
But my final secret may be too much for her to forgive, and I have waited too long to confess it.
Elizabeth knew Fitzwilliam Darcy’s character—to his delight—but not all that was attached to that name. She might hate him for having lied to her for so long. And now he could not even tell her that it was not a lack of respect, or desire, or love that kept him from her bed. He could never say that he feared the act would tax her heart, not when any mention of her dying robbed the light from her eyes.
Heaven forbid I tell Elizabeth why I left and she compels me to agree by admitting it is a risk she is willing to take.She would try to argue him out of his opinion—assuming she still wanted him after the way he had left her. He could imagine her well-reasoned arguments, he could imagine being tempted by them, and he could imagine the guilt he would feel for the rest of his life if he did anything that might shorten the time Elizabeth had left.
Darcy’s stomach dropped as Biscay bolted, and Darcy almost paid a terrible price for his inattention. His poor riding and tense manner were to blame for his bay’s deliberate disobedience. He almost pulled back on both reins to give the galloping horse something to brace against to throw him off. Instead of panicking, Darcy settled his mind and used one rein to draw Biscay’s head to the side to slow his motion forward.
He rode the gallop and slacked the opposite rein to slowly bring Biscay back under his control, turning the horse in a wide circle and then a few smaller circles. “Feeling disrespectful today?” he managed to say when his breathing returned to normal.
He cursed himself for his lack of concentration.I might have been thrown and killed!
Even the most able horseman met with accidents; even the most careful driver could lose control of a team. Nothing had been settled respecting his marriage to Elizabeth. How would she live for the nextmonth or two with no money if he died with no mention of her in his will?I must settle matters for her, and soon.
He would arrange their trip to the Lake District and do whatever he could to care for her—to be her dearest friend—without mentioning her heart. Their relationship, however one was to define it, was not without affection or esteem. The force of his own love for her was nearly ungovernable, and—whether or not she loved him—Elizabeth certainly desired him, respected him. But her impending death, and his lies of omission, were the impediments to their happiness, and they were insurmountable.
He enteredthe dining room and found Elizabeth still writing her letters. He said a quiet “Mrs Darcy” in greeting as he sat across from her with his writing box. She hardly looked at him, and since he knew not what to say, he began writing.
Monday August 10
Dear Bingley,
I appreciate how you continue to feel for me and say my loss seems to make those of every other person you know nothing. It is all the more a comfort since I know how wide and varied your acquaintance truly is. My loss is terrible, as you are kind to still remember, however I am not so lonesome as you presume, and I am able to think in moderation of my grief since having disembarked in Portsmouth a fortnight ago.
You might wonder at my not writing to you sooner to say I was in England again, but I have been so preoccupied that I only now have the time to share news that I have no power of breaking the surprise by which it will take you. In the fortnight since I returned, I met and married Miss Elizabeth Bennet. Her sister was in Portsmouth until her husband took command of theBellerophon, and while Miss Bennet visited her sister, we met and married privately, and are now in Hertfordshire on a wedding visit to her family. We soon intend to travel to the Lakes, and you may direct further letters to me in Grasmere.
I have no doubt that your steady friendship with me will result in a speedy letter of your congratulations and not a word of your concern at the hastinessof my nuptials will be put to paper. Allow me to disavow you of your fear that I have made an unfortunate match. Mrs Darcy is an earnest, energetic, intelligent young woman, and she does not defer to me or favour me with officious attention. You would likely say that Mrs Darcy is “very pretty” once you meet her, and I would add that her face is animated by brilliant brown eyes that show her spirit and intelligence.
Any other descriptions of Mrs Darcy would not do her justice, and I have already surpassed the bounds of delicacy in what I have put to paper. I wish that I could commit to when we might meet again, but you may be assured that when our trip to the Lakes is concluded, there is no one else whose company and friendship I desire to have with me at
He needed a new quill, but he gave his second quill a critical glance and the third a quick bend to see if it had dried or was still soaked with ink. Elizabeth had looked up from mending her pens and, desperate for anything to say to her, he said, “I am writing the same news to several friends and relations. Within a few days, everyone will know that I am in England, that there is a new Mrs Darcy, and that we will soon leave after visiting her mother to tour the Lakes.”
Her penknife slipped, and she took a larger gouge from the tip than she likely intended. “You told your friends and family that you have a wife?”
“Of course, my—yes, I wrote that I arrived in Portsmouth at the end of July, I met and married you within a week and we are visiting your family, and that I cannot tolerate to share you and suffer their wedding visits because we are soon to be at the Lakes.”
She smiled softly at her handiwork and returned the quill to its place. “We are still going to the Lakes?”
“I shall have the particulars arranged as soon as these letters are sent. Shall you accompany me on a walk to Meryton to post them?” But perhaps she no longer wished to travel with him after their ill-fated embrace. “That is, if you still want to travel with me.”
“I do, if ... if you want to.” She smiled a little. “We shall have a pleasant time.”
He heard the “we,” and it brought a smile to his lips before it pierced him. She could not love him after he refused her, andcertainly not if she ever learnt that he had lied about who he was. They were not truly “we”; and however close they came to it, it would not last.
