I do not expect forgiveness. I have no right to it. But I remember that you were kind to me at school, even when others were not — and I find I cannot forget it, even now.
Your devoted friend, Annabelle Sempill
Elizabeth sat for a long time after she finished, the pages resting in her lap, looking out at the garden without seeing it.
What Annabelle had attempted was wrong. It could have destroyed Fitzwilliam's happiness entirely, bound him to a stranger through malice and calculation, and he would have borne it because his honour demanded no less. That Elizabeth had disrupted the scheme did not diminish what it was.
And yet.
She thought of Fitzwilliam. Then, against her better intentions, she thought of Jane. Of Lydia. Of any of her sisters placed in Fiona's position — compromised, abandoned, their future erased by a man who had walked away without looking back. What would she do? How far would her own principles hold if it were Mary depending on charity that might vanish without warning, if it were Kitty facing ruin with no recourse and no time left?
She could not know. She had never been tested by any such extremity. But she had enough honesty to admit she was not certain what she would be capable of, if she were.
She rose and moved to the writing desk. Paper, ink, quill — all waited in neat arrangement. She sat down, drew a fresh sheet forward, and dipped the pen.
Then stopped.
What could she offer? She had no independent means — none whatsoever. She could not promise Fitzwilliam's money, could not in good conscience even raise the subject with him. Not for this. Not for the woman who had tried to trap him. And yet silence felt equally impossible — to ignore such a letter, to turn away because acknowledging it was inconvenient, went against something too fundamental in her to be set aside.
She thought of what Fitzwilliam had said about partnership. About decisions made together. She had not yet found the courage to apply that principle to anything genuinely difficult. This was as difficult as anything she could imagine.
She could not promise money. She could not promise his forgiveness or his charity or anything that was not hers alone to give. But she could promise not to look away.
She began to write.
My dear Annabelle,
Your letter reached me this afternoon and has given me a great deal to think about, not all of it comfortable.
I will be honest with you, as you were with me. I cannot offer financial assistance — and I want you to understand that this is not careful evasion. It is the plain truth of my situation. I am newly married with no independent means, and what you are asking would require my husband's knowledge and consent. I think you understand why I cannot seek that on your behalf, given what passed at Castlewood. I will not dress that reality in softer language than it deserves.
I do not forgive what you attempted at the garden party. I am not certain forgiveness is mine to extend in any case — it was not I who would have borne the worst of it. But I find I cannot condemn it as simply as I expected to when I began reading your letter. Desperation is not an excuse. It is, however, an explanation, and I have enough honesty to admit I do not know with certainty what I would do in your position, with my sister's ruin advancing daily and every other avenue exhausted.
You asked me, if nothing else, to write back. To confirm that someone from your former life remembers who you were before all of this.
I do remember. You were quick and funny and rather formidably certain of yourself, and half the girls in our year were somewhat in awe of you, though few would have admitted it. That person existed. Whatever has happened since does not erase her entirely.
I make no promises beyond this letter. But I have not closed the door.
Elizabeth Darcy
She sealed it before doubt could stop her, and sat for a moment with the letter in her hands.
She would need to tell Fitzwilliam. Not today — she did not yet have the words in the right order, and the thought of his face when she explained what she had done made her chest tighten uncomfortably. But soon. Whatever their marriage was becoming, it could not be built on a secret kept because the truth was inconvenient.
She had written this letter without consulting him. They had spoken of partnership not a fortnight ago, of decisions made together rather than alone, and here she was already making one unilaterally, for reasons she was not sure she could adequately explain even to herself.
She looked at the sealed letter, and then at the window, and then at nothing in particular for a while.
The knowing she ought to tell him and the finding of the courage to do it were, she was discovering, two rather different things.
Chapter Nineteen
Elizabeth
The sealed letter rested in Elizabeth’s palm, bound together with red wax. She turned it over, feeling her resolve waver with each passing moment.
What was she doing, writing to the woman who had attempted to trap Fitzwilliam into unwanted marriage? Offering assistance to someone who had orchestrated a compromise?
