“What is he thinking? He would still have only three hundred or so pounds to live on if he sells his commission.”
“He intends to marry well.”
Comprehension dawned. “Hester has not said a word!” Elizabeth and Hester were faithful correspondents, but they had not seen each other since she married Darcy. “When did he ask her?”
“His letter was sly, but I suspect your friend did the asking. Aside from hinting strongly as to his wishes and proving his constancy over the past year, I think Fitzwilliam left the choice entirely in her hands. If you do not approve of him selling his commission, I know you at least heartily approve of the match. I do, since it is what Fitzwilliam has wanted for two years.”
“She is sensible, full of information, and without a particle of affectation, and will devote herself to making him happy.” With her talents, Hester could be a brilliant leader in the fashionable world, but that wasnot in her nature. “But why did he leave the Foot Guard? He loved his career, and Hester loves the army and the officer’s wives, and has friends amongst them all.”
Darcy gave her a sad look. “Hadfriends, you know. She cannot bear to return to London, Fitzwilliam says. They will live a more retired life, and so he resigned his commission. She gave up her house after the Lent assizes and intends to stay in Haddingtonshire. Hyde House is hers, after all,” he added quietly.
Darcy had gone to the Derby assizes, given evidence, and was there when the verdict returned guilty. It was the judge’s duty to pass a sentence of death, and Mr Balfour’s father influenced him to recommend a reprieve to the King and Privy Council. Darcy had waited in Derby until they learnt if it might be transportation or imprisonment instead of execution. He had intended to remain until the last, but when it was time to stand in front of Friar Gate and await the prisoners being led to the gallows, Darcy had been unable to bear it and came home.
“Fitzwilliam wants to come next month,” Darcy was saying, drawing her back from her reflections.
“Your cousin need never ask,” she cried. “He ought to know he is always welcome.”
“He wants Mrs Lanyon to join him here, to marry from Pemberley.” His voice raised in uncertainty. “Her father is dead from grief, and his father does not approve of her family. My uncle—indeed, most people—believe that after what Balfour did, every person of character must be divided from Mrs Lanyon forever.”
“They certainly can come,” she said firmly, “but why did Hester not write to me to ask?”
“Fitzwilliam wrote that she wanted to know for certain if she was welcome—ifIwould welcome her,” he corrected. “She did not want to put you in an awkward situation if I refused, which of course I would not.”
Elizabeth thought back to the morning after the incident in the gunroom. “She did not mean the things she said to you, Fitzwilliam.” Hester had not believed her brother was guilty, and had railed and cried, and rather than face the truth—and the pain—of what herbrother had done, had finally insisted that Darcy must have made it up.
“I know,” he said softly, “and there is nothing to forgive on that score, but you know her manner.” He was quiet for a long time. “She will need assurances that I do not hold it against her, and I hope I can give them in person, but... Elizabeth, how do I look her in the eye?” His expression was pained. “She is marrying my cousin, my closest friend, but how can I face her? Her father dead from grief, and her brother—” He lowered his eyes and swallowed. “I did right in having charges brought against him, he murdered someone, but?—”
“It is not your fault he was guilty,” she said quickly, “or that the punishment had to be death, or that the hanging cabinet chose not to reprieve it.” When the whole truth was laid bare in court, the stealing, the murder, what happened in the gunroom, it was too much to expect that mercy would be granted. Three other men guilty of only robbery were also hung that day. “It was plain to anyone who knows you, anyone who saw you this spring, that there was no triumph for you in what happened at the Derby gaol.”
Darcy’s public demeanour was at all times dignified. Even his movements and gestures seemed composed, but still graceful. But when he had returned from Derby, Elizabeth could see that he was not himself for a long while. To know that nothing but time could improve his situation, that there was nothing she could do for him, was a trial to her.
Although she doubted that Darcy realised it, as the truth of his actions for Carew became generally known, Elizabeth saw that the respect and admiration that the neighbourhood felt for Darcy intensified. He might have not been like himself, but everyone at Pemberley knew he had seen his friend hang for what Balfour had done to Molly Carew. Between that and how he had managed the tragedy of the flood, none could say they doubted Darcy’s dedication to Pemberley.
After a long silence, he said, “I spoke to Balfour, briefly, before... before I left.”
“You never said that,” she said slowly.
“It was after the verdict but before a reply was returned from London, and I convinced a guard to let me have a few moments withhim. I hardly know what I expected, or what he could say for himself. Elizabeth, we stood in that small, brick, windowless cell, and Balfour was his usual, engaging self.” He sighed heavily. “I could not say if he was putting me at ease because he harboured me no ill will, or if he thought he would be reprieved and it was all a joke. But as I left, he said, ‘My dear Darcy, I die hard, but I am not afraid to go.’”
Darcy was a man whose decisions were seldom if ever shaken, but she still asked, “Do you regret pursuing Carew’s death?”
“No,” he said firmly. “In contempt of all decency, Balfour murdered someone he feared would expose him, he pillaged the dead”—he stopped walking and looked at her—“he threatened you. But then why do I regret that I could not save his neck from the noose?” His voice broke, and he scoffed, shaking his head. “How is that rational, Elizabeth?”
“Because he was your friend,” she whispered, blinking away a tear.
He shook his head again and resumed walking. “It is unacceptable.”
“It is acceptable to admit that he hurt you.”
“He betrayed my trust, my friendship, but he killed Molly Carew, and I could never have let him go unpunished.”
“You have had a difficult year or so, but are now happier?” she asked, trying to cheer him. “Bingley now lives twenty miles away, you shall mend your friendship with Mr Utterson, and your cousin is uniting with a woman he has long loved, one you respect highly, and your tenants are recovered from a disaster.”
Darcy laughed wryly. “Whilst you are accounting for my year and a half, you may also add a rejection to a terrible marriage proposal, a complete change of my self-belief, and the disquiet that goes along with wondering if the woman I love might ever admire me after all.”
Any one of those things—the uncertainty of her regard, the storm, the burden of how to provide for hundreds of people, the murder of his servant, the betrayal by his friend, the financial travails—would have distressed the spirits of any man. “It was enough to break anyone’s heart to pieces.”
He gave her a significant look. “If it was, then it is a good thing Ifound someone to help me put it back together again even stronger than it was.”
