“We appreciate the grace you showed in receiving us when we arrived here uninvited and unannounced, Mrs Gardiner.” Darcy then faced Miss Bennet. “For the part I played in separating you and Bingley, I apologise, and I promise you that Miss Bingley will not be allowed to slander you.” After bows and curtsies, the two friends departed.
“I think they have much to discuss,” Maddie opined after the front door closed.
Chapter 12
“Darcy, what did you mean when you said you knew you may have been wrong about her feelings for me, and you had your own reasons for separating me and Miss Bennet?” Bingley asked as soon as the coach pulled away and headed back towards White’s.
“Let me begin by saying that I should never have given my opinion because I was not sure. The best explanation I have is connected to how Miss Bingley behaves around me. You have seen the way she has never made a secret of her desire to be my wife. She attaches herself to my arm, uninvited, in a most possessive manner. She bats her eyelids at me, and I could say the sky was purple, and she would agree with me. I hate to say this, but the way she behaves only highlights the fact she was not gently born. I suspected that the reason Miss Bennet acted the way she did was because she behaved with propriety. Until the man speaks or invites that sort of familiarity, the woman has no choice but to wait for him to speak. That is how I believe that Miss Bennet acted; in fact, I now know it. At the time I used the fact she did not behave like your sister as proof she did not care for you. It was what I told myself to justify my actions.
“Now, as to why separating you from Miss Bennet also benefited me. I was falling in love with Miss Elizabeth, and, at the time, I felt I needed to put as much distance between her and me as possible. If you had married Miss Bennet, I would have been thrown into her path too often, and at the time, I would have gone against what I believed I owed my name and station and offered for her.”
“You, who claim to abhor disguise, were dishonest with me?” Bingley verified.
“I was. I am mortified by my own behaviour, and I compounded it with a lie of omission when I failed to inform you of Miss Bennet’s call to Hurst House. If my father were alive, he would not be proud of the way I behaved.”
“Wait, you were falling in love with Miss Elizabeth? All you two did was argue, and I can tell you, unlike Caroline, who agrees with anything you say or do, Miss Elizabeth dislikes you.”
“Well I know it. Not just dislikes, more like hates me. Detests me. Sees me as ungentlemanlike.”
“How do you know that?”
“I offered for her, and Miss Elizabeth refused me, but not just a refusal, an excoriation. It was how I learnt that Miss Bennet had loved you, or, as Miss Bennet said herself, she believed she loved you. There were other things Miss Elizabeth accused me of that were misguided, but there was some truth in what she laid at my door. Evidently I stoked her dislike when she heard what I said to you at the assembly in Meryton.” Darcy did not mention Wickham. He trusted Bingley, but he could not bring himself to say anything connected to Anna’s almost ruin.
“So much for Caroline’s assertion the Bennets are mercenary.” Bingley shook his head. “Is there anything my sister says which is true?”
“Not very much,” Darcy mused. “You should know I am in good company. Do you remember that idiot cousin of the Bennets, the one who is the heir thanks to the entail and who is parson to my aunt in Kent? Miss Elizabeth rejected him as well, though she told me my proposal was worse.”
“What Miss Bennet said is true. I do not stand on my own two feet. I do allow Caroline to lead me about by the nose,and while I am admitting my faults, I have raised expectations before and then left the women without declaring myself, have I not?”
“You have. That was not well done. I should have spoken before, but while you are able to walk away freely, it can damage the reputation of the woman. People wonder what her defects might be that a man who paid her close attention withdrew all of a sudden.”
“Is that all you have to reveal to me?” Bingley enquired.
“There is something else. When Miss Bingley left she did not close the house as it should be and took the funds you left to pay the staff and servants with her. None of them could afford to go without their wages; hence, Miss Bennet and Miss Elizabeth made sure they were all paid. I have already sent Mr Bennet a draft in your name to make him whole,” Darcy revealed.
“Then I must repay you. I should be surprised at the depraved manner in which my younger sister behaves, but I am beyond that point and I am sure there is nothing she can do to shock me any longer. How much to I owe you?” Bingley enquired.
“It is a trifling sum. It is the least I could do after I misled you and hid Miss Bennet’s presence from you,” Darcy responded.
“By all rights, I should pummel you for giving me advice you were not confident in and withholding information from me. However, I am ultimately the one who chose to listen to you. Miss Bennet has the right of it; I need to grow up and become my own man.” Bingley cogitated deeply for some moments. “It is too easy to rely on you to make decisions for me, so I need to break from you, for now. I will go to Scarborough, and once I am my own man, I will be happy to continue our friendship again.”
“I will miss you, but I think that is a wise path for you to take. On Monday, I will make for Pemberley because I too have much on which to cogitate.” Darcy paused. “What will you do with your sisters, especially Miss Bingley?”
“Caroline will have her dowry released to her; at least what remains after I deduct all her overspending and the breakages I have had to pay for when she destroys items during one of her tantrums. The Hursts will have to live on their own money; I will no longer fund their lives.” Bingley looked out of the window as the coach slowed arriving at White’s. “Warning Caroline that she has angered many of society’s leading lights will be a waste of time. She will ignore me; hence, she will have to learn the hard way.”
When the door was opened and the step placed, Darcy shook Bingley’s hand, wished him well on his quest to mature, and alighted.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
“Jane, dear, Mr Bingley’s presence did not discompose you, did it?” Maddie enquired after Jane’s chosen suitor, Lord Hadlock, departed.
“‘Now that I have seen him again and the conclusions you helped me reach have been confirmed, I feel perfectly at ease. I know my own strength, and if I see him again in society, it will never embarrass me. Surely, Aunt Maddie, you could see that I regard him as an indifferent acquaintance. Thanks to you and Jamey, I am no longer so weak and not in any danger as far as Mr Bingley is concerned.”
“Yes, Jane, I can see that. I think Mr Bingley realises that he will never be able to make you think you are as much in love with him as you were before. In fact, I believe that Mr Bingley intends to try to follow your advice and develop a backbone.” Maddie paused and then smiled. “To me, it seems that your Jamey does not want for resolution. He knows what he wantsand why, and nothing he does not decide himself will divert him from his chosen path. I dare say that neither your father’s sport nor your mother’s nerves will succeed in making him doubt his attachment to you.”
“I think you have the right of it, Aunt Maddie. We have not known one another for long, and I know I am not in love with him yet; however, I am developing tender feelings. I love the fact that when we talk, it is about far more than my looks, which he hardly ever mentions. He sees me for the person I am, and unlike Mr Bingley, I am not just a pretty bauble on his arm.”
“What are your plans for when to inform your parents?”
