“No what?” Richard asked. “No penny, no crime, or no murder? Be precise, Darcy. A solicitor is present.”
“No crime. No murder. No convenient disappearance of Wickham, however much he deserves it.”
Richard’s expression darkened again. “You were a soldier not so long ago. You know better than most that some men are a danger every hour they continue breathing.”
“I was militia,” Darcy said.
“Ah, yes. A gentler species of martial glory. Inspections, uniforms, and terrifying the local chickens.”
Darcy looked up then, not offended but grave. “Yes. It was gentler. I was not exposed to the horrors you were. I know that.”
Richard’s teasing faded.
For a moment, the only sound in the room was the faint crackle of the fire and the distant murmur of servantssomewhere below stairs. Richard looked away, his jaw working once before he spoke.
“I would keep it that way,” he said quietly. “Your heart is too soft, cousin, though you do an admirable imitation of a marble pillar when strangers are present. I would rather you keep that soft and honorable heart than carry what comes of seeing the worst men can do and learning how easily one may answer them in kind.”
Darcy held his cousin’s gaze.
There was more in those words than Richard usually allowed anyone to hear. Weariness. Pain. Perhaps warning. Darcy had read enough in his letters from the Peninsula to know that his cousin’s jokes were often bandages wrapped over wounds he had no wish to display.
“I am sorry,” Darcy said.
Richard waved it away at once, as if sincerity had become an intruder. “Do not be. It was an excellent speech, and I dislike ruining my own effect by receiving sympathy.”
Mr. Philips cleared his throat gently. “As moving as this is, gentlemen, the paper remains.”
“So it does.” Richard clapped his hands once and rubbed them together, his manner deliberately brisk. “Well then. If Darcy will not allow Wickham to be murdered, and he will not allow us to commit fraud by burning the paper, we are left with the dreariest possible solution.”
Mr. Philips looked over his spectacles. “The law?”
“Worse. Outwitting him.”
Darcy looked again at the document. “That is not the only option.”
Richard’s posture sharpened. “What do you mean?”
Darcy forced the words out, though they tasted like defeat. “We can pay him.”
“No.”
“Georgiana’s dowry as forfeit, or part of it. If he seeks money rather than marriage, perhaps—”
“Are you mad?” Richard said.
Mr. Philips’s expression did not change, but his eyes moved quickly from Darcy to Richard.
Richard stepped closer to the desk, fury rising again. “You cannot be serious. You would hand him Georgiana’s dowry?”
“If it keeps her from him, yes.”
“And what then? You think the matter ends quietly? Wickham walks away richer than he deserves, and the world never hears a whisper? He will have a story ready before the ink dries. A betrothal broken, a poor gentleman denied his promised bride, an heiress bought out of an engagement. Georgiana’s name will be dragged through every drawing room he can reach.”
Darcy’s hands curled around the back of the chair before him. “I will not allow him to take her.”
“Nor will I,” Richard snapped. “But stripping her of her dowry and leaving scandal behind is not rescue. It is sentencing her to another kind of prison. Do you imagine anyone will court her after that? A girl publicly claimed by George Wickham, her fortune gone, her name tied to breach of contract? You would condemn her to life as an old maid.”
Darcy’s reply came at once, hard and low. “Better a life as a spinster than as Mrs. Wickham.”
