“I bear it because I understand it. Iama complete stranger in his house. Really, love, you know nothing about it and have built up some ideas. That is all.”
She looked downcast, interlacing her fingers this way and that.
“What is it?” I gently pressed. “Do my assurances mean nothing?”
She darted a few looks at me before she spoke. “There is gossip below stairs…”
“Oh well.” I spoke bracingly and with a wave of dismissal. “There is always gossip below stairs. What does that have to do with me? I do not care what is said of me by people who do not know the truth of my situation, my character, my aspirations, much less the truth in my mind and heart. I wish you would not listen to it.” I paused and changed tack altogether. “But do you really believe Mr Darcy would forbid us our company?”
“I do not rightly know. I hope he will not.” She looked up with a little fire in her eyes. “Indeed, I pray he does not because if he interferes with the most pleasure I have enjoyed in a very long time, I will be furious with him.”
I considered this and at last knew what to tell her about her letter. “In that case, send your letter and take the blame for our musical mornings. I will write to him today as well, and inmyletter, I will own to contriving our Sunday dinners. Or,” I said with mischief in my voice, “we could throw the blame for both schemes on Mrs Annesley. He could hardly argue withher.”
My new sister finally released her tension and allowed a small chuckle to escape. “You did not even notice how well Ipretendedin my letter,” she said.
“Oh, I noticed and with something like alarm. You pretend he will congratulate you, pretend he will approve of all your newly won social confidence, and pretend he will be overjoyed to find his quiet house overrun with guests. ’Tis apower, I grant you, this skill of pretending. But I caution you to use it with finesse and rarely. Honesty is much better in all cases.”
“But honesty does not work in all cases.”
“Sadly,” I said, my light of amusement fully doused, “it does not. Some people will not hear the truth even when it is told to them.” I stood and looked at my image in the mirror. That stark, pale face of catastrophe would not do. I took a breath, turned to Georgiana, and said, “What do you say to driving out with me in your phaeton to collect greenery for the house?”
She leapt to her feet and clapped in glee, still a child when joyful. I envied her this and loved her more for it.
31
FITZWILLIAM DARCY, THE GREAT NORTH ROAD
I sat in a dark corner in my coach and brooded my way out of London. I had Miss Bingley to thank for this decision to return to Pemberley in time for the festivities, and once we turned onto the Great North Road, I was glad to be away from town.
I really should not have gone to visit Bingley. We had not seen one another since Hertfordshire. But after reading my correspondence, perceiving that my sister and wife were building a merry life in the north of England without me, and feeling a complete outcast from the world, I sought solace with someone who could always be counted on to hold me in esteem.
Bingley greeted me warmly as ever, but there was an awkward hesitancy beneath all his effusions. He seemed not to know what to say. Were it not for his lease of a property in Hertfordshire, he would never have invited me to that county. Once I arrived at Netherfield, my friend insisted we mingle with local society so that he could establish himself in theneighbourhood. This idea had been distasteful to me. Country society was really notsocietyat all, to my way of thinking, but I had gone stoically in support of a friend.
Thus, Bingley had been present at the assembly in Meryton, had heard all the vulgar detailsas they happened,and he had witnessed firsthand my disgrace and fall. Bingley was not a man who knew how to commiserate without wounding, nor could he act as though things were as they had always been. I recalled that painful visit with unwelcome clarity.
Our conversation floundered, sputtered, and fell to the floor between us. We took turns at reviving the old ease between us, as if lifting a corpse and trying to shake it to life.
In the midst of this grossly uncomfortable meeting, Bingley’s sister Caroline arrived. She, too, had been at the fateful assembly, and she smirked at me and spoke with practiced condescension.
“Mr Darcy!” she exclaimed in accents of pity. “Did you bring your new wife to town to be presented?”
This was pure spite and said without preamble! My power to subdue her with a mere look, however, was now gone, for when I directed a cold stare at her as I used to do to quell her pretensions, she only smiled sweetly in return, expectant of an answer.
“Mrs Darcy is at Pemberley with my sister.”
Bingley squirmed in his chair like a boy of fifteen, and though I thought everyone would be grateful if I made my excuses and left, a stubbornness arose in me. I settled in my chair for a long stay.
“Is she? I would have thought—well, I am only surprised.”
“What would you have thought, madam?”
“Oh well,” she said with her slyest look, “I only wonder that you leave your sister in her care.”
“She and my sister are good friends, I believe.”
“Truly? I congratulate you for your sanguine attitude, sir. If you were to ask me, I would not want dear Miss Darcy to be pulled down by association, but?—”
“Caroline!” Bingley weakly admonished.
