I nodded. “Yes, I remember checking the watch when he arrived.”
“And now the watch is gone,” she said. “He saw it, and he must have taken it.”
“Well, it can’t be worth much, so the joke will be on him,” I said. “Anyway, I’m sure it’ll show back up in my pocket soon enough.”
“It should be here now, because the day’s reset,” she said. “Except the pocket watch has a mind of its own, of course, so who knows.”
I grimaced. “Right. The last time the watch disappeared, it went to you, and it made you live Thursday every day. So, we should go and try to get it back from him, because I can’t think of a worse disaster than Wickham being trapped in this with us.”
“We would not bring him along,” she said, aghast. “If he was repeating Thursdays, he could do it on his own.”
“True,” I said. “Hopefully, he is not.”
“Where is he?” she said.
“With the regiment,” I said. “I shall go. It’s no place for a woman. They wouldn’t let you in, anyway.”
She made a face, disliking this, but she acquiesced.
Soon enough, I was traipsing across a dew-covered field towards the encampment where Wickham was staying with the other men. I wasn’t sure which tent belonged to him, so I supposed I’d have to try them all until I found it.
But I was intercepted, instead, by an officer, who inquired if I was seeking someone. When I told him it was Mr. Wickham, he said to follow him, and he escorted me to Wickham’s tent.
Wickham opened the flap when his name was called. He was wiping shaving cream from his face. I had not shaved myself. Damnation. “What are you doing here?” he said to me.
Good. That didn’t sound like someone who remembered seeing me the night before, so I could set aside fears he was going to be repeating Thursdays like Elizabeth and me. I breathed a sigh of relief. “This is going to sound very strange, Mr. Wickham, but I have reason to think that a pocket watch of mine is somehow in your possession.”
“Oh, that’s yours, then?” He ducked back into the tent. He came back out with the watch. “I did not take this, Will. You must believe that.”
“I do,” I said. “It… it’s impossible to explain.” I held out my hand for it.
He gave it to me. “Take it, then, if it’s so important to you.”
“Yes, thank you,” I said.
He shrugged. “You’re welcome.”
“This is all I wanted,” I said, unwilling to engage in any further conversation with him. I would sooner be done with him, in fact. “I shall take my leave.”
“Yes, well, I thought you must have put it on my person last night at Netherfield, and that you were going to accuse me ofhaving stolen it, but I suppose that this is as good a way to begin a Friday as any.”
My heart sank. “Friday, hmm?”
“Yes,” he said.
I had a moment, one of a wild and strange hope, that it was Friday, somehow, after all, that the pocket watch had leapt from us and that we were spared now. So, I called out to one of the other members of the regiment. “Ho there, what’s today?”
“April ninth,” he called back.
“Tenth,” said Wickham quietly.
“Damnation,” I said.
elizabeth
When he came back with Mr. Wickham, I knew the news was bad.
“Now, wait a moment,” said Mr. Wickham as he approached me on the grounds of Netherfield, “I left you here with him last night, rather late, and now you’re still here. I know you agreed to marry him, but the two of you are not married yet. What is going on here?”
