“That is exactly what Mrs. Bennet said. Now, if the interrogation is done, I must go find out if my spies have located Wickham!” With that, the Colonel leaped to his feet, gave his parents a mock salute, and strode out the door.
The Earl sagged back in his chair. “Thank heavens! If she had been with child, there would never have been an end to all this.” He thought for a minute. “Do you think we should have her come to Town and be seen in public so that there would be no question as to that particular issue?”
The Countess shook her head. “Not yet. It is too soon.” She winced, thinking of the unkind comments she still heard from so-called friends. She would remember those who made such comments, as well as those who had been supportive. The Countess of Matlock had a long memory.
***
Colonel Fitzwilliam was not a man who was easily discouraged; nonetheless, his face fell when his small army of men reported that no sight nor sound of Wickham had been detected in the great Capital during his absence.
One of his men said what all were thinking: “Is it even possible to find one man in London?”
“Not if he does not wish to be found,” added another.
“One more week,” the Colonel said. “Just one more week.” He could not help but feel that he was wasting his hard-earned coin on this task, but he hated to give up. The idea of Wickham getting away with harming Georgiana made his fists clench.
Chapter Thirty-Five
November 18th, 1811
Longbourn
The big day was here; Mr. Collins was due to arrive at four in the afternoon.
The Bennet household had been turned upside down in anticipation of Mr. Collins’ visit. The news that he was single and interested in marrying a Bennet girl had almost entirely erased Mrs. Bennet’s long-held grudge against the man. The house was subject to a deep clean, despite Mrs. Hill’s protestation that the house was already quite clean; the girls selected what gowns they would wear for the first meeting; and Mrs. Bennet had a good amount of advice to impart to their daughters as to how to make the very best first impression.
Mr. Bennet watched and listened to all of this with a quirked brow and a small, secret smile playing about his lips. Elizabethobserved his expression and came to the conclusion that there was something her father knew that he had not yet shared.
“What is it, Papa?”
“What is what, Lizzy?”
“You know very well. There is something you are not telling us.”
Her father hesitated, and then motioned her to follow him. He led her into his study, bade her sit, and rifled through a box of correspondence. Finding what he sought, he handed his daughter a letter.
She read it through, her eyes widening and her brows arching. Upon finishing it, she looked up at her father and said, bleakly, “He is a fool.”
“Quite evidently.”
“Why did you not say so?” she demanded.
“I did say that I feared he was not sensible.”
“Not sensible! Ha! No, you should have warned us!”
“What, and miss all the fun of watching everyone scurry about to impress him?”
“No, Papa, this is not fair!” she insisted. “You have all of us thinking of him as a potential suitor, when in fact he is not!”
“Mary would take him,” her father said, defensively.
Elizabeth insisted that this was not nearly a good enough excuse for his deception, and Mr. Bennet defended himself. “I suppose you will rush out now and tell your sisters that they will be disappointed upon meeting him,” he complained.
“Yes, and at once,” she replied. She rose, gave him one last narrow-eyed look intended to convey her disappointment in him, and left.
***
Elizabeth went at once into her mother’s room and explained that she had read Mr. Collins’ letter and the man was not good husband material for any of the Bennet daughters.
