Chapter 4

It was, Jane thought, perhaps for the best that the following day they were to join an evening party at the house of their aunt and uncle Philips, which Mr Bingley had declined due to a previous engagement. Mr Wickham, however, was to be there.

Having added a red coat to his many charms, Mr Wickham was much in demand at the party, smiling agreeably at all the ladies and with comradeship at the gentlemen. It seemed he was as eager to be pleased with all the company as they were to be delighted by him. It was at Elizabeth’s side, however, that he finally settled. Jane was seated close by, and observed them with great interest. Mr Wickham made some light comments on the company, and Elizabeth replied in kind. To her surprise, however, he did not linger long on pleasantries.

“You were in Meryton yesterday with an old acquaintance of mine,” Mr Wickham said. “Do you know Mr Darcy well?”

“Only a little,” Elizabeth said, her face fleetingly betraying the anger she had expressed the day before. “He is a good friend of Bingley, who is engaged to my sister.” She glanced towards Jane, standing next to her.

“Of course,” Mr Wickham replied, acknowledging Jane with a brief incline of his head. “I had heard as much from my friends in the militia. My congratulations, Miss Bennet.” Turning back to Elizabeth, he lowered his voice. “I am sorry to discuss such a distasteful subject in such pleasant surroundings, but if I may, please allow me to offer a word of caution about Darcy. I fear he has not always acted the gentleman he appears to be.”

“Oh?” Elizabeth asked eagerly. Jane frowned to herself; she remained firm in her conviction that Mr Darcy’s intentions were good. Mr Wickham, in contrast, she found entirely cold. She listened uncomfortably as he unfolded a tale of Mr Darcy’s proud, callous rejection of both a childhood friend and a father’s promise. Her disquiet only grew as she saw the bramble thicket surrounding her sister begin to thin as small, questing branches reached outwards. Mr Wickham, in contrast, betrayed no reciprocal interest. As far as Jane could observe, he had no inclination or warmth towards anyone present. No shoots or branches grew from him, not even fading into the mist formed when a pair were separated. Mr Wickham showed no sign whatsoever of any tender feelings towards anyone or anything.

“My greatest sorrow,” Mr Wickham finished his story with a decidedly sentimental sigh, “is that I have been torn not only from Mr Darcy, but from all in Derbyshire I know and love. I rarely go back there now, and I feel almost as though a part of myself has been taken from me. There was one, in particular… But no, I say too much.”

Elizabeth looked as if her sympathy overflowed, although the questing branches extending from her had receded at his hint of an existing attachment in his former county.

“How cruel!” she murmured. “Surely Mr Darcy cannot force you from Derbyshire—your friends there must support you.”

“I believe they would better support me if I were able to support them,” Mr Wickham said, sorrow etching his features. “But alas, I am reduced to my current state of penury and cannot afford to love where I choose.”

“It is unfair, is it not? That those of us who do not have the wealth of one such as Mr Darcy are denied the freedom of choice,” Elizabeth agreed. “We do not all have the luxury of a certain future.”

As Elizabeth spoke, Jane observed a change in Mr Wickham’s expression. At the implication that she was not as wealthy as Mr Darcy, he seemed surprised. Then a sneer briefly curled his lip, quickly replaced by blandly charming countenance he had worn all evening. Elizabeth, looking about the room, did not seem to have observed it, but Jane frowned. What was Mr Wickham’s purpose?

“Indeed,” he replied shortly.

Turning her attention back to him, Elizabeth laughed. “You need not fear raising any expectations in me, sir. We are after all so newly acquainted.”

“Indeed. Yes, of course,” Mr Wickham acquiesced politely.

He seemed to lose his appetite for further conversation, for not long after this he excused himself and moved away to another part of the room. Jane took the seat he vacated at Elizabeth’s side before anyone else could do so. Her sister seemed momentarily disconcerted by the loss of the gentleman’s attention.

“Jane,” Elizabeth asked quietly after a moment. “Does Mr Wickham love a lady from Derbyshire?”

“I cannot say for certain. I have never seen feelings that are accompanied by a map,” Jane replied.

Elizabeth laughed and adjusted her seat as her tension left her.

Jane touched her hand. “I can see no signs of admiration or affection in him,” she observed. “If he had a sufficiently strong attachment, there would be some evidence of it no matter how far apart he is from its object. I do not know what it will do to a less certain love, but I cannot see any proof of one.”

“I wonder why he chose to feign otherwise,” Elizabeth said. “His eagerness to depart was very sudden.”

“It seemed to coincide with your admission that, like him, you are not wealthy. Perhaps he had sought to engage your pity, and through it your affections in order to court you,” Jane replied softly.

“If he wished to engage my pity, he had done quite enough with his tale of Mr Darcy’s perfidy,” Elizabeth said frankly. “But if he is willing to mislead me with talk of an attachment that does not exist, perhaps I ought not to trust him. Yet all he described is precisely what I would expect from Mr Darcy! Oh, I do not know what to think!”

Jane did know what to think. She had learnt to trust the evidence of the attachments she saw, and her thoughts were not favourable for Mr Wickham. If he could so easily tell such a tale of Mr Darcy, she had no difficulty believing there might be good reasons for Mr Darcy to wish to protect people he loved from him. Now was not the time to broach the question with Elizabeth, however; Mr Wickham had through his tale achieved what Jane could not, for he had sown a seed of doubt in her sister’s mind.

Jane was grateful when Bingley next called that their courtship was proceeding with such ready simplicity. He was as eager as she was to be together, and as she slipped her hand into his, the rose between them seemed almost to glow.

Less promising was Elizabeth’s meeting with Mr Darcy. His affections were unchanged; hers, however, were a confused and tangled mass of prickly, woody stems. She greeted her admirer coolly, and when he attempted to engage her in conversation grew unusually taciturn, although she answered with a ready smile when Bingley greeted her. Not noticing her reticence towards his friend, Mr Bingley proposed a walk.

The day was mild for November, and as neither Jane nor Mr Darcy were at all unwilling, Elizabeth was unable to find an excuse adequate to avoid joining them. Jane could see she was agitated by the manner in which she marched quickly ahead, all but ignoring Mr Darcy as he strode to keep pace with her. Jane and Bingley trailed behind them, Jane worrying that her sister might refuse to speak with Mr Darcy at all.

Happily, when he enquired after her health, she replied in clipped tones. “I am quite recovered, thank you.”

Mr Darcy stiffened at this continued coolness and he glanced at her in consternation, although his admiration remained steady.

“I am glad,” he replied seriously. When Elizabeth continued silent, he ventured. “Have I offended you in some manner? If so, it was most unconsciously done, and I would have you charge me with my offence so that I may remedy it.”

“I am sure you would,” Elizabeth replied acerbically. “I imagine you are accustomed to being able to arrange everything after your own satisfaction.”

The consternation on his face became astonishment at this accusation. “I regret I do not understand your meaning.”

Elizabeth stopped and turned to her companion with a glare. “What can you tell me of Mr Wickham?”

Jane, not wishing to intrude on the moment, tugged on Bingley’s sleeve and they, too, hung back to allow the other pair some privacy.

Mr Darcy’s brow had instantly furrowed at her words, and after pausing with her he strode on, forcing her to take hurried steps to catch up with him. Sharing a look, Jane and Bingley resumed walking behind them.

“Of course Wickham is at the root of it,” Mr Darcy growled.

“Unlike you,” Elizabeth declared, “he is not above sharing his thoughts or his history! He told me a great deal about your past dealings when we met at my aunt’s yesterday.”

“I am sure he did,” Mr Darcy replied, his voice rising to match hers. “He has never been known to hold back when he thinks there is something to be gained from it. He is all charm and flattery, yet he cares for nothing except for his own interest!”

“So little sympathy for one who by his account has suffered so much, and by your hand!”

“By his account indeed—tell me, what manner of ogre did he make me?”

“You denied him the living he had been promised!”

“I did—after he had already requested and been granted compensation in lieu of it. He is a profligate and a rake, and he is not to be trusted.”

“And so you sought to keep me from him and deny me the right to make my own choices!” Elizabeth retorted.

Mr Darcy stopped again and stared at her. “I did nothing of the kind.”

“But you meant to!” Elizabeth replied, fire in her eyes. “Your—your feelings sought to separate me from him, to build a wall to divide us. You have no right to such interference in my affairs! You have no claim over me.”

“I fail to understand your meaning.”

“I saw it! Jane touched me, and I saw through her eyes. You were creating a fence between us.”

Jane and Bingley had inevitably lapsed into silence by this time, neither of them able to be at ease when their companions were so evidently at odds. Jane met Mr Darcy’s eyes as he turned his head sharply to her. She nodded slowly. He turned back to Elizabeth.

“I cannot deny that I wished to separate you from Mr Wickham,” he said, his voice growing grave. “I certainly wish to protect you from him.”

“Protect me!” Elizabeth exclaimed. “We had just that moment been introduced! You merely wished to take command.”

“I assure you, I did not.” Mr Darcy’s voice was strained, but a swift glance at Elizabeth’s fiery expression seemed to affect him, for he stopped and faced her, continuing in a softened tone. “Mr Wickham will not have been insensible to my presence as your escort, and he certainly could not fail to see your beauty. You would not be the first lady he has sought to interfere with because of her importance to me—although the other is no rival of yours, but a very dear relation of mine. I am glad to say he failed entirely in that instance. You are right, I have no particular claim to your affections—although I hope in due course to be granted that privilege—but that will not matter to him, if he sees a means of using you to gain some means to hurt me.”

Elizabeth was not often rendered speechless, but Mr Darcy’s words had silenced her very effectively. She gazed up at him in breathless astonishment. He waited, holding her gaze, the branches of his admiration stretching out towards her.

“I…um.” She paused again. She dropped her head, her brow furrowed. “His interest in speaking to me waned rapidly when I mentioned I was not wealthy.”

Mr Darcy frowned, then sighed. “I suspect he thought my interest in you was as mercenary as any attempts he will make to find a bride and he meant to steal your affections from under my nose. Discovering that you are not wealthy will have disconcerted him, but I doubt it will hold him off for long. Marrying you would only be the most honourable way he could use you to harm me; it is not the only way.” Jane and Elizabeth gasped in unison. Bingley placed a comforting hand on Jane’s arm. Elizabeth, in contrast, paced anxiously away from Mr Darcy, before turning back towards him.

“I suspected after our conversation that he was not entirely to be trusted, but I was too angry at what I saw in Meryton to question his story. I mistook your feelings for your intentions or actions.” She lifted her chin with a defiant tilt. “I am quite capable of guarding myself against the attentions of a rogue, but it is a great deal easier to do so if I am made aware when a gentleman is not to be trusted. The most effective protection I could have is to not be left in ignorance, so that I may know how to act. Will you tell me your history with Mr Wickham?”

Mr Darcy nodded solemnly. He turned to walk again, and looked down in surprise when Elizabeth took his arm. She smiled penitently at him, then fell into step as he began to speak. The bramble patch around her had receded, and a single fern, tightly coiled, began to unfurl towards him as they walked.

Jane smiled at her own companion and, hanging back long enough to be out of earshot, they once again began to follow. How glad I am that harmony comes easier to us!