Page 163 of Bitterness of Spirit & The Painting

“Thank you so much and please forgive me for all these questions. Please convey my best wishes to your uncle.”

“Are you leaving already? Will you not come in and greet him yourself? He told me he would like to speak to you if an opportunity arose. Please?”

Darcy was lost for words. He had just decided to step back from the past, but how could he refuse such a plea?

“I would be delighted to introduce myself again, more properly,” he said.

Hesitantly, he followed Julia along the hall. His steps sounded loudly on the floor with no carpet. He glanced around, looking at the paintings again.

“Uncle? Mr Darcy is here. He came to greet you.”

“Mr Darcy. I recognised your steps, sir. Yesterday you left in a hurry; I hope I did not upset you.”

“No, not at all, sir.”

The man hesitantly stretched out his hand and after a moment of confusion, Darcy accepted the handshake.

“Julia darling, would you bring us a drink, if Mr Darcy would be so kind as to join me for a moment?”

Darcy nodded, then pulled up a chair, while studying the man with much curiosity.

“I am not handsome; I never have been,” Samuel Fitzroy said when Julia had left the room. “Do not worry, I shall not detain you any longer than a glass of wine. I just wished to speak to you, in case you had something to ask me.”

Bewildered, Darcy searched carefully for the right words.

“What might I ask you, Mr Fitzroy?”

“Actually it is Sir Samuel. I was made a knight for my bravery, like that would matter to anyone,” he said bitterly. “If you have a question, do not leave it unasked. I feel I do not have much time left.”

Darcy breathed deeply.

“I have no questions. But there is something I wish to tell you. A month ago I found a painting of my mother and in the back of it I found a pile of letters, from more than thirty years ago.”

“Did you?” the man asked weakly, his hands suddenly trembling in his lap.

“Yes. As much as she loved that painting, my mother asked me to burn it when she passed away. I forgot about it until recently; her wish has now been finally complied with.”

Julia entered with a tray, a bottle and two glasses.

“Please leave us alone a moment longer,” her uncle said.

Darcy filled two glasses and handed one to Sir Samuel. As soon as Julia’s steps faded away, her uncle began to speak again.

“Thirty-three years, one month and twelve days ago, I was on the beach, recovering after an injury and wondering why my sight was blurry and shadowed at times. In full day light I was struck by a vision—the most beautiful woman my imagination could have conjured. I found out that she was the daughter of an earl and had rented an entire cottage, where she was staying with her companion. For weeks I watched her without daring to address her. I finally found the courage to speak to her a month later, when she approached me to look at the painting I was working on. If you must know more, I will tell you. If not, I shall only add that for two and a half years—three full summers—God blessed me with more happiness than a man could imagine and certainly more than most men deserve. I was allowed to admire, to worship, to share my passion for music and drawing and reading with the most wonderful woman. I knew I was not worthy of her, even though she allowed me to write to her and even answered my letters. My beloved late sister was part of our correspondence, but never asked any questions and nobody else suspected our bond. How could anyone even imagine a poor, wounded soldier, with little fortune and a ridiculous title, could be blessed with the love of such a woman?”

He finished his glass and Darcy took it from his hand. “Please fill it again, Mr Darcy. I need it.”

Darcy obeyed and moments later, the story continued.

“Then the day I knew would come arrived. She told me while we played together on the pianoforte, her tears falling on her fingers and mine. She was engaged to be married soon. She was ready to refuse, she was ready to abandon everything for me, she was ready to leave with me, far away from everything.”

Darcy stopped breathing while the man took another sip from his glass.

“But my love knew no selfishness. My wishes meant nothing to me compared with her happiness. I knew she believed she would be happy with me, but I was wise enough to know better. There was nothing I could offer her except my love and devotion—and that was not enough to fight the world, to defy her family and to put her future in danger. I had too little and I was too little for her. So I begged her to prove her love for me by making the right choice. It was the only time that we argued, and her words of disappointment for my weakness still hurt me. She left the next day, but a month later I received a letter—the last one from her—and I wrote back one last time. I knew she would marry a worthy man, of whom everyone spoke highly and who could make her happy if she allowed him to.”

His emotions made his hand tremble so violently that he spilled some of his drink. Darcy tried to take it, but Fitzroy refused.

“I left Brighton after her wedding was announced in the papers. I knew she might return here one day and I could not stand to see her. My sister wrote to me about her regularly, without me asking. I found out she had returned to Brighton with her first child—a handsome boy she adored—and with her husband, who seemed to be the image of affection and devotion. I was told she seemed happy and content. And I was at peace.”