Silence fell.
Richard opened his mouth, then shut it again.
Mr. Philips removed his spectacles and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Mr. Darcy, I understand the instinct. Truly, I do. But Colonel Fitzwilliam is not wrong about the dangers. Payment may not purchase silence. Indeed, with a man like Mr. Wickham, payment may merely teach him that greater threats bring greater rewards.”
“I know that,” Darcy said, though the admission cost him. “But if the document is valid—”
“It may not be,” Mr. Philips said.
“And if it is?”
“Then we examine whether a father may bind a minor daughter in such terms, whether the agreement lacks necessary parties, whether it is void for uncertainty, fraud, improper consideration, or any number of defects. We do not begin by handing the villain everything he asks.”
Richard made a sound of grim approval. “There. You see? The law does occasionally have uses beyond preventing me from doing satisfying things.”
Darcy looked down at the signature again.
George Rupert Darcy.
Even dead, his father had found a way to reach into his children’s lives and harm them. Georgiana had been a child when this was dated. A child. Darcy remembered her at that age: solemn, shy, still small enough to fall asleep against his shoulder when he sat beside the nursery fire. His father had looked upon that child and, if this paper was genuine, promised her to Wickham.
Rage returned, colder now. Cleaner.
“I should have searched everything,” Darcy said. “Every desk, every strongbox, every file—”
“You were nineteen,” Richard said.
“I was responsible.”
“You werenineteen,” Richard repeated, more sharply. “Your father left chaos behind him and a child in your care. Do not rewrite history in order to make yourself guilty for his sins.”
Darcy closed his eyes briefly.
He knew Richard was right. Knowing did not help.
The door opened.
Darcy turned at once.
Elizabeth stood in the doorway.
She had removed her gloves, and there was a tear-stained crease in her gown where Georgiana must have clung to it. Her face was pale, her eyes tired, but there was nothing uncertain in the way she entered the room. She looked first to Darcy, then to Richard, then to Mr. Philips, and finally to the paper on the desk.
“Elizabeth,” Darcy said, already moving toward her. “Is Georgiana—”
“Asleep,” Elizabeth said. “Uneasily, but asleep. Her maid is with her, and I asked that I be sent for if she wakes.”
The relief was sharp enough to hurt. “Thank you.”
Her gaze softened for only a moment before returning to the paper. “Have you learned anything?”
Richard gestured toward the desk. “Only that murder has been disallowed, arson of evidence has been disallowed, and paying Wickham a fortune has been proposed and violently criticized.”
Elizabeth looked at Darcy. “You think it is genuine, then?” she asked, stepping fully into the study and sitting down in the chair next to him.
Darcy’s gaze dropped to the signature at the bottom of the page. For a moment, the anger faded, and something older and wearier replaced it. “I wish I could say with certainty that my father would never have betrothed his daughter to a man like Wickham.”
She reached over and put her hand over his. Darcy stared down at her delicate fingers on his larger ones. “The sad truth is that he might have done precisely that. If it amused him. If Wickham flattered him. If he wished to injure me. If he was deep enough in drink or spite or folly to think Georgiana’s future another possession he had the right to dispose of.”
