“You saw a girl, then?” Mr. Darcy cried, his heart pounding. “And you took her to Horsham?”
“Yup. To the ?ouse.”
A sick feeling came over Darcy. Had Lydia been taken to a brothel? “Which house?” he demanded.
“Work’ouse. Methody ?ouse. Wouldna’ take ?er to the parish, as ?ems no good I ?ear.”
Darcy’s sick feeling continued unabated. The difference between a workhouse and a brothel was not significant enough to relieve his mind. “What is your name?” he demanded.
“Parch.”
Darcy wheeled his horse around and galloped back to Brighton. He careened into the stable at the Old Ship Hotel on King’s Street and shouted for his coach. It was late afternoon already, and he wished to be in Horsham looking for Lydia Bennet first thing in the morning. For half a second, Darcy considered sending an express to Mr. Gardiner, but he was too conscious that this lead may prove to be false and crushingly disappointing.
Darcy arrived in Horsham well after midnight. He tossed and turned and thought of Elizabeth in a state of horrible agony. How could he tell her that her youngest sister had been languishing in a workhouse all this time? He was aghast and twisting in the trap of his sheets. If only Mr. Bennet had alerted Mr. Gardiner sooner. No. Darcy never would have spent those few precious days with Elizabeth. If only…if only…
If onlycame down tothe one thing,no matter how many times Darcy tried to reason otherwise. If only he had done something about Wickham when he meddled with Georgiana. If only he had not been so proud and protective of his good name—a name that had been more important than anything Wickham would do to someone else’s sister. “This,” he said to the air above his head, “is surely hell I am in.”
***
In the morning, Darcy dressed as if he would soon face judgment, and in a state of both dread and determination, he instructed his driver to the place the innkeeper said the Methodists dispensed charity. When they got to Clarence Lane, the coachman pulled to a stop for further instructions, but Darcy, seeing a brick building of some size at the end of the street, stepped down and said, “Walk the horses if you must, but do not go far. I may be some time, or I may be back directly.”
“Very good, Mr. Darcy,” his coachman said.
Darcy walked along and considered the advantages of wealth as he went. Comfort was one thing, but competent people was another benefit altogether, and he felt the enormity of his luck in having a legion of highly capable, discreet, and professional people to support him in his desperate search. Never once had anyone raised an eyebrow or looked askance at him. They followed him to Mrs. Younge’s disgusting lodging, stood to the ready to buy Wickham brandy or to roust out a sweeper or drive around and around a tavern while their master prowled London. And now they were wandering around Horsham and waiting outside a workhouse, and Darcy never once worried that even a word of his business would be talked of.
He greeted the porter. “Is this the Methodist Workhouse?”
“Yes, sir. You’d be wantin’ to see Mr. Perkins?”
“If he is the master here, yes.”
Darcy entered the place and followed the porter to an office. A quarter of an hour later, after a closed-door conference, he followed Mr. Perkins to a large, gloomy room filled with four long tables. Women dressed identically hunched over their work, and when Mr. Perkins entered, they all stood and curtsied. Darcy scanned the multiple faces to no purpose—he did not see Lydia Bennet among them.
“Bennet!” Mr. Perkins called. “The rest of you may go back to your work.”
The crowd all sat but for one lone figure. Mr. Darcy slowly walked forward, and he saw the girl’s eyes widen as he went.
“Mr. Darcy?” she whispered. “Have you come to visit me, sir?”
For a second Darcy’s throat closed up, and he was forced to blink back the moisture in his eyes. He cleared his throat and spoke gently. “Miss Bennet, I am very glad to see you. I have been looking for you for a while now. Your family is desperate to find you, and I would be so happy to take you home. Will you come with me?”
She looked bewildered and turned to look at the upturned faces of the women who worked at the table beside her. “Go on, Bennie,” one woman said. “I always said they’d come fer ya.”
And so, Lydia took a few halting steps forward, and as she did so, many more voices called out encouragement and even mumbled expressions of joy. One woman reached out her hand, and Lydia clasped it gratefully before she turned back to the women at the worktable and said, with her face aglow and her eyes sparkling with tears, “Oh, I shall miss you all so much!”
“Ya daft girl, go back to yer Longbridge! Send us a note to let us know’s yer well once in a while. We’ll not miss yer fancy ways, though.”
“Oh, Carver,” Lydia cried, hugging the woman who spoke. “Thank you for being so kind to me. I will not forget you or anyone here.” She turned to Mr. Darcy, who held out his hand, and she looked up wonderingly into his face.
“Is it really you, sir?”
“I am sorry I am not your father or your uncle, Miss Bennet.”
“Oh, but you will do just as well,” she said.
“I intend to take you to London today if that is acceptable to you.”
“London?”
