Lastly, you told me that I had, in defiance of various claims, and ignoring honour and humanity, ruined the immediate prosperity and blasted the prospects of Mr Wickham. You said that I wilfully and wantonly threw off the companion of my youth, the acknowledged favourite of my father; a young man who had scarcely any other dependence than on our patronage, and who had been brought up to expect its exertion, would be a depravity, to which the separation of two young persons, whose affection could be the growth of only a few weeks, could bear no comparison.
This last charge is the one which has the most fallacies in it. I will address each in turn.
My sister, Georgiana, we call her Anna, turned 16 on the 4th day of March this year. She is not out, and due to circumstances I will mention in this epistle, I doubt she will want to come out before she reaches her majority.
Although Miss Bingley, and to a lesser extent, Mrs Hurst, have long hinted (often none too subtly) what a good match my sister would be for their brother, Ihave neverconsidered planning such a match for Anna. If one day, some years from now, Mr Bingley was to offer for my sisterand she accepted him, I would not object. Nothing has been done to further that as a possibility.
Hence, whatever Miss Bingley wrote to your sister about mine is nothing but pure fiction. Miss Bingley will not be pleased when she finds many doors in society closed to her. I intend to speak to my aunt, Lady Matlock, when I return from handing you this letter. She will not be amused by Miss Bingley’s lies (someone she dislikes and has always refused to be introduced to), and she will know how to act.
You can accuse me of acting with dishonour in separating Bingley from your sister. However, as I have never been engaged to anyone, let me guess how you came upon this assumption. You heard my aunt, her lackey (your cousin), and Wickham speak of an engagement.
Lady Catherine claims it was my mother’s dearest wish—she passed away when I was but 12—but my father never mentioned it before his passing, and no one else in the family has mentioned it either. Aside from that, my Cousin Anne is not long for this world. It is why the rest of my Fitzwilliam relatives are here.
Elizabeth was shocked to her core. However, when she thought about what she had seen that first night those from the parsonage had gone to the manor house for dinner, it should not be so very surprising. She dreaded what was to come because Mr Darcy had accepted responsibility for where he was wrong and refuted the charges of which he had spoken.
Next would be Mr Wickham, and Elizabeth had a feeling that the judgement, she liked to believe was never faulty, was about to be proved very wrong. There was nothing for it; she continued reading on.
Now I will address that final, more serious accusation, of having injured Mr Wickham. I can only refute that accusation by laying before you the whole of his connection with my family. Of what he hasparticularlyaccused me of I am ignorant; but of the truth of what I shall relate, I can summon more than one witness of undoubted veracity. If needed, I will provide for you, through either my uncle, Lord Matlock, or my cousin, Colonel Fitzwilliam, a copy of my father’s will to prove what I am about to say here. You may apply to my cousin, his parents, or my eldest cousin to verify the veracity of my words.
George Wickham is the son of a very respectable man, who had for many years the management of all the Pemberley estates. Due to Mr Lucas Wickham’s good conduct in the discharge of his duties and the way my father trusted him, naturally inclined him to be of service to Mr Lucas Wickham, as well as to his son, George. After Wickham’s late mother manipulated my father into becoming her son’s godfather, my father did, up to a certain point, liberally bestow his kindness on George Wickham. After Mr Lucas Wickham saved my father’s life, he decided to provide an education for the steward’s son.
My father supported him at school when Wickham was sent to Harrow, and afterwards at Oxford. Seeing that his own father was always poor from the extravagance of his late wife, he had not the funds to spare. Hence, he would have been unable to give his son a gentleman’s education. My father was not only fond of this engaging young man’s society, but he had also, as I saidearlier, up to a point, the highest opinion of him.
As for myself and my cousins, it is many, many years since we first began to think of Wickham in a very different manner. The vicious propensities—the want of principle, which he was careful to hide from my father’s eyes—could not escape the observation of young men close to an age with himself. We saw him in unguarded moments, which my father did not. Here again I may give you pain; to what degree, only you can tell. But whatever may be the sentiments which Wickham has created, a suspicion of their nature shall not prevent me from unfolding his real character. In fact, if they are tender, it gives me another reason to tell you the following.
My father’s feelings towards him changed in Wickham’s first year at Oxford, where he forced himself on a maid. My father withdrew as his godfather, ceased augmenting his allowance, and gave him one last chance to complete his education with my father bearing the cost of said education.
It is true that Fatherhadhoped the church would be his profession. In an older version of his Last Will and Testament, he intended to provide for him in it. George Wickham was not aware that my father then changed his will and removed his name from it altogether.
Before the end of his second year at Oxford, Wickham was sent down for cheating, among other offences. It was then my father told him that all support for him had been withdrawn.
Mr Lucas Wickham was called home in November of 1803. There was no proof discovered, but the physician believed Mr Wickham wasmurdered. After he was sent down, George Wickham lived with his father, so it was suspected he was to blame.
My excellent father died, in what was at first seen as a riding accident, while I was on my tour of the United Kingdom. Some years back, his horse had almost stepped on an adder. When the viper bit at the horse, he bolted. That was when the senior Mr Wickham saved Father’s life. I mention this because some weeks after my father’s demise, a sack was found near where he perished. It had been cut open. The suspicion is that he was murdered by none other than George Wickham who had been riding with him that day, which was the day before Wickham was to leave Pemberley forever.
There is no definitive proof, but we suspect that George Wickham has committed two murders.
A few days after my father was interred, Wickham came by to collect his bequest which he believed he was due. When he was told there was none, he was not happy and swore revenge.
If his aim in murdering my father was to stop him changing his will (his local solicitor said he had an appointment with my late father to sign a revised will the day after his passing) then Wickham was a few years too late. As I mentioned before, Father made the change after the incident with the maid at Oxford.
About two years ago Wickham had the temerity to write to me requesting financial assistance. His circumstances, he assured me, and I had no difficulty in believing it, were exceedingly bad. As I knew him to be a gamester and seducer ofinnocents, you will hardly blame me for refusing to comply with this entreaty or for resisting every repetition of it. His resentment was in proportion to the distress of his circumstances—and he was doubtless as violent in his abuse of me to others as in his reproaches to myself. Much to my pleasure I did not hear from him again for some time. That was, until last summer when he was again most painfully obtruded on my notice.
Again, I apologise if the following occasions you pain. George Wickham is a vile seducer of young ladies, more like girls. He targets those 15 years of age or younger who are not as protected as they could be. He makes love to them, proposes marriage, and tells his victims that the proposal needs to be kept secret. Then, he tells the girls that if they truly love him they will anticipate their vows. He uses them, and when he has had his fill, he abandons them to the shame and in some cases the consequences. You may ask how I know this. I am caring for four of his victims and their children at Pemberley, and they told all.
The other way he damages communities who show him nothing but welcome, is to run up debts, and then, as soon as the merchants clamour for him to pay, he disappears like a thief in the night. This I know because I have bought up all of the debts I know of so that honest men will not be beggared by an unscrupulous blackguard. As of the writing of this letter, I hold over £2,000 in his debts.
“Then why have you not had him thrown into debtors prison? Also, why did you warn no one in Meryton?” Elizabeth asked aloud. Her eyes slid back to the gripping letter.
Knowing you, you are asking why I have not moved against him. Following is something very hurtful to me that I must relate. Until this occurred, I had never caught up to Wickham, so I was not able to consign him to debtor’s prison where he belongs.
As much as it pains me to have to do so, I must now mention a circumstance which I would wish to forget myself, and which no situation less than the present should induce me to unfold to any human being. Having said this much, I feel no doubt of your secrecy.
My sister, who is more than ten years my junior, was left to the guardianship of my mother’s nephew, Colonel Fitzwilliam, and myself. About a year ago, she was taken from school, and an establishment formed for her in London; and last summer she went with the lady who presided over it, to Ramsgate; and thither also went Wickham, undoubtedly by design.
After the fact, it was discovered that there had been a prior acquaintance between him and Mrs Younge, in whose character we were most unhappily deceived. With the companion’s cooperation and aid, Wickham recommended himself to Anna, whose affectionate heart retained a strong impression of his kindness to her as a child. She was persuaded to believe herself in love and consented to an elopement.
She was then but 15, which must be her excuse; and after stating her imprudence, I am happy to add, that I owed the knowledge of it to herself.
