In the Arms of Mr. Darcy (42 page)

Mr. and Mrs. Bennet were consenting to Kitty disappearing to the home of a complete stranger, no persuasion needed at all. Neither Darcy nor Lizzy were surprised. Mrs. Bennet was faint with happiness, quite convinced that Kitty would return betrothed to a rich suitor, while Mr. Bennet merely anticipated the silence that would fall upon Longbourn for two whole months!

Therefore, three days after recuperating from the Darcy Ball, the two elated young ladies embarked upon their adventure with George Darcy playing protector. Sternly spoken admonitions were given, Georgiana undoubtedly the only one who would hearken to any of them, but the embraces and kisses of good-bye were as intensely bestowed as the instructions.

"Be well, my Georgie," Darcy whispered into her ear, disregarding propriety by pulling her into his arms while standing on the street walkway. "Return to me soon. I love you."

"Quit being a mothering hen, William," George interjected with a boisterous laugh and sunny smile. "She will be far too busy to think about a stodgy older brother. And besides, I have promised to watch over them." He winked at Lizzy, who resisted laughing, and boldly met Darcy's scowl and grunt with a cheeky grin.

The adieus were over after that, the carriage disappearing around the corner before Darcy sighed and turned to his wife.

The second drama was far more serious and extremely enlightening, as it concerned George Wickham.

The discussion that took place the day after Georgiana's departure, three days before they were to leave for Pemberley, was the conclusion to a predicament that had initially arisen during the winter. Shortly after their visitors vacated Pemberley after Christmas, Darcy had received a message via the contacts he had in the Newcastle area that Wickham's gambling and erratic behavior were beginning to spiral uncontrollably. There was nothing Darcy could do about the situation other than to instruct his associates to watch for any harm befalling Mrs. Wickham. However, probably before the dispatch made it to the far northern coastal town, Wickham was dishonorably discharged for insubordination. He barely avoided a court martial for drunkenly assaulting a superior officer, so they were informed.

Lizzy was naturally distressed and wrote to her sister immediately. But that letter, like her last several, was never responded to directly. A brief missive from Lydia sent to Mr. and Mrs. Bennet, mere weeks prior to Mary's wedding, droned on and on about "my poor Wickham's misfortunes," but gave no enlightenment as to their future plans. Mary's wedding was clouded by the scandal, Mrs. Bennet seemingly unable, or unwilling, to relent in her vocal lamentation over "dear Lydia's tribulations." Mary handled the drama with her usual aplomb, refusing to allow her mother's morose attitude to affect her happiness, but it served to alleviate her sadness in leaving the comforts of Longbourn for her new life in London. Lizzy and Darcy were strangely relieved and enthusiastic to quit Hertfordshire for the event of Anne de Bourgh's wedding in Kent. Even a fortnight with Lady Catherine no longer seemed as gloomy a prospect!

After that one short message from Lydia, no other word was heard. It was as if the Wickhams had fallen off the face of the earth. Darcy's contacts reported that they moved out of the shabby boarding house they had inhabited after Wickham's discharge, but no one knew where they were headed.

Obviously Darcy and Lizzy discussed the matter, and she was aware of and appreciative of his attempts to locate her sister. But as always when George Wickham's name arose, as infrequently as that occurred, Darcy was closemouthed. Lizzy did not push the subject, knowing that his hesitancy was not due to a wish to secret a part of his life, but due to his protective nature and grievous memories regarding his childhood friend.

That respect for his feelings was shattered, however, when on the day after Georgiana left for Stevenage, he announced to a startled Lizzy that he personally intended to travel north to see if he could ascertain any hints as to the whereabouts of Lydia and Wickham.

"No, William, you will not."

"I beg your pardon?" Darcy glanced up from his desk in shock.

"You will not go traipsing about risking life and limb for my sister. You have already spent far more money than you should in supporting her horrid choice. For this I am eternally grateful for a host of reasons, but enough is enough! I am certain that if there was anyone left who knew their destination upon fleeing Newcastle, he or she would have been uncovered by now. I will not have you frequenting the types of establishments where Wickham entertained and satisfied his aberrant urges. You did that once and it was sufficient for one lifetime."

"I assure you I can take care of myself," he countered with asperity.

"I do not doubt your capabilities, dearest."

Darcy looked away from her humorous smile, gazing out the window in thought as his fingers tapped a rhythm on the polished wooden surface of the desk. Lizzy waited. Finally, he continued, "I have an uncontrollable yearning to wrap my bare hands around that man's neck and squeeze. I have never felt such hatred for another human being, Elizabeth. Never. And it rather frightens me."

"Considering all he has done, I judge your sentiments normal. Yet, that is partially why you cannot go north. I fear you may act upon your inclinations, ridding the world of a worthless scoundrel, but harming your kind heart in the process. Despite some evidence to the contrary, vengeance is not normally in your character."

Darcy released a harsh bark, rising abruptly, and pacing with caged energy before the window. "I am not as certain as you. You know very well, Elizabeth, that I will protect my family at all costs without losing an iota of sleep. It seems, for years now, that Wickham has circled the fringes of my existence. Waiting for another opportunity to strike, to harm those I love, as he has not the courage to attack me directly. I have tried to convince myself that he is merely a pathetic excuse for a man, simply searching for the easy way in life and naturally latching onto the Darcy wealth as the most convenient. But I do not think it is that. Like pieces of a puzzle, it begins to fall into place with the clarity of hindsight."

"What do you mean?"

He paused, fingers again tapping and flicking as he stared sightless out the window. When he finally spoke it was in a low, contemplative voice, "Small, insignificant episodes from my youth. Wickham sidling up to Father and presenting an innocent face when I knew he was not. Pretending to be pious when he hated attending church. Charming, always charming. Using that gift he possessed to great advantage, knowing that I did not possess it myself. His wittiness and dazzling smile enamored everyone. Except my mother," he reflected with sudden wonder. "She could not abide him, now that I think upon it. Said he was too noisy. Hmm."

He shook his head, turning toward Elizabeth. "I will not go so far as to say he consciously plotted to supplant me. I believe it was primarily jealousy. You see, my father and Mr. Wickham had met at Cambridge. Mr. Wickham, the elder, was of modest means, the third son of a country gentleman from Sussex. Their friendship was genuine, but it was Mr. Wickham's intelligence that won him a position in our household. I am absolutely positive that Mr. Wickham never resented the arrangement, recognizing his good fortune in being steward to a grand estate while also working for a man he respected and held affection for. George Wickham, however, thought otherwise."

He sighed, running one broad hand over his face. "He is a born manipulator. Quite impressively skilled at it if one looks at it in that light. I was far from stupid as a child, but somewhat naive, as I have told you before. Sheltered. It was easy to bait me, if one knew how to do it, and Wickham did. He well understood my nature for adventure, the typical wildness of a boy coupled with a healthy dose of pride and arrogance." He looked at his wife with a crooked grin. "Yes, even then, Elizabeth, I confess."

Lizzy laughed softly, nodding.

Darcy continued, the smile gone, "Still, I did not go out of my way to inflict injury upon my person. I was cautious for the most part, not one who particularly relished physical pain. Buried deep under the need for excitement and the desire to push myself physically was a sense of restraint. I was sensible and serious, as Mrs. Reynolds would always say. But Wickham knew how to circumvent that. He masterfully, as I now see it, dared and taunted me into recklessness. Such as climbing that ridiculous tree."

He touched his left rib cage, fingertips absently massaging the palpable bump. "I never gave you all the details, Elizabeth. Do you know it was the massive oak in the private garden, the one that grows over the nymph fountain? I had climbed trees before--what boy doesn't?--but that tree is enormous. The lowest branch, even now, I can barely touch with my fingers. At twelve years of age, I needed to scale the statue, stand on a nymph's head, and jump to the branch."

Lizzy gasped, knowing the scene, and her blood ran cold at the vision of a young Darcy, or Alexander, performing such a feat.

"Indeed," he agreed with her exclamation. "Utterly foolish. Of course, I was momentarily filled with conceit as I attained my goal, standing on the limb in all the glory of a conqueror. Then Wickham said he did not think I had the nerve to go higher." Darcy closed his eyes in remembered embarrassment. "Idiot! Headstrong, foolish, imbecilic, cocky. And, as it turned out, incredibly lucky or protected by God, I know not which. I deftly climbed to the next limb and then the one above it before slipping. I hit the lowest branch on my way down, cracking the rib and scraping through my clothes to the skin." He extended his left arm, one fingertip tracing where the long scar on his inner forearm remained. "It was that impact and the naiad that saved me, I think. Or her hair, more precisely, as my arm caught on the upswept end of her marble tresses, cutting deep, but slowing my descent and flipping me over so that I landed on the mossy ground rather than the fountain edge. I fainted, or was knocked unconscious, I am not sure which, but when I awoke it was to the gardener bending over me. Wickham had fled the scene, leaving me. The gardener found me accidentally."

Darcy shook his head again, Lizzy spellbound and feeling ill at the story. "He apologized later, saying that he had panicked." Darcy shrugged. "I was young and forgave him. After all, I was not truly hurt all that badly and in the silliness of adolescence such exploits are deemed exciting, worn as a badge of honor while basking in the glow of womanly soothing. But it was just one of many such incidents that I gazed upon years later with discerning eyes and wondered."

"What sort of incidents?" Lizzy spoke in a bare whisper, almost afraid to ask.

Darcy, in all his revelations of his youth, a part of his life that was no longer a mystery to Lizzy, never mentioned George Wickham. She knew that they had been childhood friends, although certainly not on par with his friendship to Gerald Vernor, Albert Hughes, or Richard Fitzwilliam. Yet, in relating their daredevil deeds and boyish capers, he ignored Wickham's existence. She did not press the issue, knowing that memories of Wickham caused him pain and anger. In the end, she had assumed it was not all that important. Now she experienced a shiver of fear, unsure if she was resilient enough to learn the brutal truth about the man her sister was married to.

Darcy obviously wondered the same. He hesitated, studying her closely. Finally, he crossed the thick-carpeted floor, sitting onto the sofa and taking his wife's hands. "I have no proof for the most part, Elizabeth. As a child it was primarily the aforementioned baiting of me, and his false wooing. Falling from that tree was the worse injury I sustained, but there were other times that I could have been wounded due to bizarre accidents or foolish risks. But he acted my friend convincingly with his innate charisma. I confess that we were all taken in by him, me included. I remember wishing I possessed the easy personality of Wickham, and Richard and Gerald for that matter. I tried to emulate them but could never pull it off."

He smiled ruefully, Lizzy reaching to stroke his cheek, her eyes tender. He kissed her fingertips gently, understanding the unspoken words behind the gesture: his wife would never wish for him to be other than who he was, reserved and taciturn with a mellow playfulness and wit seen only by those most intimate.

He continued, holding her eyes, "I do not believe that Wickham was born a villain, but came to use his natural gifts for the negative, all due to an unrelenting resentment. As I wrote in my letter to you, Father assisted with Wickham's education, an education he never would have been capable of under normal circumstances, and Mr. Wickham was grateful. Yet, he continually reminded his son of the disparity in our stations, emphasized their dependence upon and indebtedness to Mr. Darcy. This rankled Wickham, to put it mildly."

He sat back into the sofa, holding tightly to Lizzy's hand as he resumed his narrative. "Again, it is hindsight. Comments he would make, expressions on his face, actions that varied depending on who was present. Subtle aspersions against me, impudent interactions with Georgiana, and inappropriate impertinence to the servants. I increasingly felt uneasy in his presence as we aged, but did not begin to see the full truth of his character until we were older, after mother died. Father was distant, often lost to his grief, so Mr. Wickham assumed more responsibility. He did it gladly, but Wickham resented it. Plus, he interpreted the adults' abstraction as carte blanche. He was bolder, more reckless in conveying his disdain and imperiousness."

He shook his head, eyes locked with Lizzy, but his thoughts looking inward down the passages of time. "Who can ever say with conviction how events may have unfolded if time turned down a separate path? If Mr. Wickham had not rigidly reminded his son of the gap in our stations. If certain comforts and privileges had not been denied. If our parents had not been consumed with other affairs." He shrugged, eyes clearing as he smiled grimly. "However, I do not hold with the opinion that a person is exclusively the product of outside influences, to be pitied or excused for their behavior and choices. Wickham was given opportunities far above most men in his place and he abused them all. During those years, there were numerous thefts about the manor. Trinkets, odd pieces of jewelry, silver utensils, and the like. Nothing of great worth, but losses nonetheless. We never were able to discover the culprit, assumed it was a servant although that seemed unlikely, as they have always been largely trustworthy. I have since come to believe it was Wickham."