Another long pause.
“Do you think he will prevent my taking the child?” said Louisa. “My husband would be quite, quite out of sorts if so.”
“Well,” said Elizabeth, “I think I have some sway with him.” He was rather ruinously attracted to her, after all. “I shall do my best, when he returns, to convince him to do what is best for everyone.”
“And what is that?” said Caroline.
No one had an answer for her.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
MR. DARCY KNEWthat the regiment was in Newcastle, because they had passed by on their way north. He did not strictly follow Wickham’s whereabouts, but if he heard tell of them, he made note of it.
So, he knew.
It was to the north, a journey that could easily have been four days in a carriage, but he did it in two, switching out horses often, sleeping only a few hours at night, not stopping in inns, but bundling himself up with a fire on the ground and eating only what he’d brought with him.
He spent the entire time in a kind of incandescent, maddened rage.
He did not know who he was more angry with, however, himself or Wickham.
For he did not like to examine his behavior with Elizabeth. She was ravaged, a victim of violence—perhaps not physical violence, but a violence against her will and agency. It was horrible. Who could imagine it, waking from sleeping to find oneself being invaded in that manner?
He thought of her, so vulnerable, so confused. He had held her in his arms in that bed, and she was small. She was tiny and graceful and her wrists were small and her neck was small and she was this precious, perfect, beautiful—
HowdareWickham?
How could he do it?
How could he treat her like she was just some thing for him to use in that manner?
But in the end, Darcy hadn’t been much better, truly. He had discovered her, and he assumed—and perhaps she had made unflattering assumptions abouthischaracter, but he had made assumptions as well—that she’d had a tryst (or a series of trysts) with a man, that she had wanted it, that she had thrown caution to the wind and spread her legs for some other fool.
But this was only because he wished her to spread her legs for him. He wanted her to be that sort of woman so that he could take advantage of her.
The number of people who had taken advantage of her, the sheer force of it, it made him want to weep.
And yet she was standing. Yet, she was still even capable of making jokes from time to time. Yet, she was ever so strong.
Well, he had to fix all of it, because there were other elements of this that were all his fault. He knew what Wickham was. He knew what Wickham had done to his own sister. If there had been questions about the extent of things with Georgiana before, this had answered them. And questions or no, it hardly mattered. Darcy had known for some time about Wickham, and Darcy had concealed it. He knew that man was walking amongst women of all walks of life, that he had access to them, and he knew that Wickham was the sort of man who thought only of himself, who would use women as if he was entitled to them—well, truly, perhaps there were a number of men who were this way.
Perhaps I am this way,he thought.
No, no, he was not. He had restrained himself. It had not been easy when it came to Miss Elizabeth Bennet, but he was not the man who planted that child in her womb. He had neverinvaded her in that manner, though he had treated her as if she was his personal whore, he supposed, assumed she would warm his bed, made all sorts of plans for it, and been adamant that she agree to it.
And all along, this woman, this innocent and aggrandized woman, who had done nothing wrong, nothing at all, who had been the victim of that blackguard Wickham’s villainy, had borne his treatment of her, simply borne it, as if some part of her thought she deserved it.
It made him want to retch again, as if purging his stomach could purge him of all the things he’d done to bring this about.
One thing that Mr. Darcy knew was that he had responsibilities. A number of responsibilities, more responsibilities than many other men might have, but such was the burden of being a man like himself. He had estates, he had servants, he had investments, and there were people, a vast group of people, who depended upon him.
It had been his responsibility not to loose Wickham on the world.
And what had he done?
He had been a coward, a wretched coward, and he had felt soft on Wickham, because they had been boys together, and he had let him go, and he had not told anyone to steer clear of him. Of course, warning people off him would have been insupportable, as he could not have done anything to damage Georgiana, but it was not any excuse. He had let this man run roughshod over the countryside, and this was the consequence.
Wickham was his responsibility.