He followed her.
In the room, he was aware that it was just the two of them, that they were alone in a room unchaperoned, and that Miss Bingley was unmarried. He sighed. “We should have your sister present.”
“Oh, yes, I suppose,” said Caroline, shaking her head. Now, she didn’t look furious anymore. She looked on the verge of tears.
In spite of himself, he felt pity for her. He hovered in the doorway instead of going for Mrs. Hurst. “I should have been plain with you when I first could see that you were interested in me,” he said. “It has been cruel of me not to tell you that whatever it is you imagine for the two of us will never happen.”
She looked up at him, her eyes wide. “What are you speaking of, sir?”
He considered. She wanted to deny it to maintain her self-respect. He could press things, force them both to acknowledge it, or he could grant her that little nicety. He gave her a nod. “Nothing, I suppose. That is not what we should speak of.”
She eyed him. “Miss Bennet went and sought you out?”
“No, she went seeking food because you are not feeding her,” he said, and his pity for Caroline was draining away again.
“She is not starving,” said Caroline. “What were you doing up there with her?”
He thought about it, wondered if there was anything to be gained by lying, and then decided it was more straightforward if everything was on the table. “I was trying to convince her to be my mistress.”
Caroline’s lips parted.
“She’s not interested, and now she says that you will no longer help her. I suppose you only wished to do whatever this was because of proximity to me?” He furrowed his brow. “Of course, how does that work? I suppose the cottage itself must have been part of the plan, and you thought you would be near to Pemberley and therefore close to me—”
“Stop,” said Caroline, and her voice was agonized.
“I do not see how this situation continues in this manner, of course,” said Mr. Darcy. “But if your sister is still willing tocarry out this charade, then I shall do my part to facilitate it, I suppose.”
It was quiet.
Mr. Darcy spoke again. “Are you intending to abandon her here on her own now?”
Caroline looked up at him. “Why?”
He furrowed his brow. “Why?”
“Why her? What does she have that I do not have? Even now, when she is gone with Mr. Wickham’s child, you are—”
“What?” He lurched, going sideways into the door frame, unable to keep his balance.
“I simply don’t understand it,” she said. “I am not exceedingly plain, I do not think, and I know that I understand the ins and outs of proper behavior better than she does. She is the daughter of a gentleman, true, but no one would consider her better connected than I am. So, what is it, Mr. Darcy, why do you want her?”
His voice was insubstantial. “Go back.”
“I assumed she told you, since you said you wanted her as a mistress,” said Caroline, blinking at him. “Did she not tell you?”
“Wickham,” he said. “Go back to that.”
“Oh, she left that part out,” said Caroline, laughing. “That’s odd, truly, because she swears up and down it wasn’t even of her choosing, that he put laudanum in her drink, that she was asleep for most of it and only woke at the end. But she concealed that from you, so I suppose that tells us everything we need to know.”
He coughed.
“Do you want her as a mistress now?” Caroline was smiling a particularly awful smile.
He felt physically ill, as if every one of his major organs had flipped inside out. He was having trouble breathing. “Pray excuse me, Miss Bingley,” he managed, and he staggered out of the room and out of the dower house and got only six feet outof the front door before he found himself doubled over, casting up his accounts, vomiting next to the bushes that lined the front walk.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
ELIZABETH WAS SITTINGin her chair by the fire while the woman named Mabel was working a bit of oil into the snarl in her hair, gently using the tines of the comb. It stung, pulling at her scalp, but Elizabeth could tell the woman was having better luck with it than she had.