Chapter 8

Every day, Elizabeth looked for Mr Darcy, hoping, even expecting, that he would accompany Mr Bingley when he came to Longbourn in time for breakfast. She listened carefully for any mention Mr Bingley made of his friend. There was nothing. At first, she thought little of it. It was disappointing, very much so, and she missed him dearly, but he had been uncertain about the length of his absence.

But a week became a fortnight and then longer still, and there was no sight of Mr Darcy, not even an offhand remark from Mr Bingley about him being held up in town for some reason. Any excuse would do; Elizabeth did not care what it was, she just wanted to know that their prolonged separation was unavoidable and would soon end.

She thought of him constantly, seemingly more so each day, and she felt herself becoming increasingly unsocial. Fortunately, the weather did not preclude walking, and she spent as much time as she could on her own, imagining her reunion with Mr Darcy and holding ever more frantic debates with herself about why he was staying away so long.

Mr Bingley and Jane had selected a date for their wedding in early December, which was six weeks away, and Mrs Bennet was managing to find a way to occupy every waking hour with planning the event and preparing Jane for her life as Mrs Bingley. Jane was understandably eager, but Elizabeth sensed her own heart had gained another crack by the time she crawled into bed each night. How could it be otherwise, when she had expected to be an engaged lady too?

No longer able to bear the growing uncertainty, at the end of October, she asked Mr Bingley about his friend. They were at a soirée at Haye-Park, and she seized a chance moment alone with him. Her heart thudded so loudly that the sound filled her ears.

“I understood Mr Darcy planned to return. Have his intentions changed, or-or do you expect to see him soon?”

Despite the dim light in the drawing room, Elizabeth thought Mr Bingley’s cheeks darkened, and she sensed that he was not happy with his friend. Only then did it occur to Elizabeth that his absence could be taken as a lack of support for Jane and Mr Bingley’s betrothment. Mr Darcy had been uncertain whether Mr Bingley would forgive him for his previous interference; surely he would not want to give him reason to question whether he had been wise to do so.

“Yes…that is, I do expect he will be here sooner or later. I hope he will be here for the wedding. I want him to stand up with me, but he would give me no promise. In truth, his explanation for why he might not was not at all clear, which is unlike him. I think he thought he might come sooner, but then he had to go to Pemberley, if I recall correctly. The harvest and what have you. Oh, there is Mr Stuart! I have been wanting to ask him something. If you will excuse me.”

He hurried away. Elizabeth hardly noticed. She was too empty, too numb to feel anything. There was no mistaking that Mr Darcy had made an excuse to avoid returning to Hertfordshire—to avoid returning to her.

Elizabeth did not speak to anyone for the remainder of their time at Haye-Park. When her mother remarked on how stupid she was being, she claimed a headache and, upon reaching Longbourn, immediately excused herself. No doubt her emotions would soon overtake her, and she would not let them show until she was alone.

Mr Darcy had decided against proposing again; there was no other explanation. Really, she ought to have realised it a fortnight or three weeks ago, but she had not wanted to admit it to herself. Mr Bingley’s words meant she had no choice but to accept it. Her heart shattered into a million pieces, and once she was in her room, she threw herself onto the bed and buried her face in the pillow, hoping it would muffle the noise of her sorrow.

Although she eventually fell asleep, the next morning, Elizabeth felt as though she had been awake for a week. She was still in her night clothes when Jane came into her bedchamber. A malaise had settled over her, and despite wanting to seek the comfort of the open air, she could not find it within herself to put on a day dress and go out.

“Oh, Lizzy, you look very poorly. Is it your head?” Jane caressed her cheek and sat beside her on the bed.

The only answer she could offer was a slight shrug. Attempting to do more might end with her sobbing.

Jane wrapped an arm about her shoulders. “I wish you would tell me what troubles you. I have seen that you are not your usual self this last fortnight, but I do not know why.”

“I am sorry if my mood has caused you anxiety. This is such a happy time for you, and I would not have you worry for me.”

“Of course I worry for you!” Jane gave her shoulder a brief squeeze. “If you truly do not wish to, I shall not force you to confide in me, but…does it have to do with Mr Darcy?”

Elizabeth started.

“Bingley told me you asked about Mr Darcy returning. He was supposed to be here weeks ago, but now he writes that his plans are uncertain. Bingley is confused, and I admit to you alone, I think he is injured by his friend’s manner.” Jane paused before saying, “Bingley told me you saw each other a great deal when you were in Lambton—that you and Mr and Miss Darcy were often in company. Why did you never tell me?”

Knowing she would be unable to control her response if she spoke, Elizabeth only shook her head.

“He believes you and Mr Darcy have become friends, which gladdens him, given how little you liked each other last year. Knowing what passed between you in the spring, I wonder whether there is something more we do not know.”

An involuntary whimper escaped Elizabeth.

“Lizzy, please, I beg of you, tell me.”

Elizabeth’s impulse to keep the truth to herself, to not disturb Jane’s felicity by admitting she was desperately unhappy, crumbled when confronted with her sister’s sympathy. “Before I say anything, you must promise to tell no one, not even Mr Bingley. I know it is asking a great deal, Jane, but it will make sense once I have told you.”

Jane hesitated. “Very well. I shall keep your secret, so long as it does not cause you injury or keep you from being happy again.”

Elizabeth stood and went to the dressing table. There, she found a handkerchief and wiped her eyes; she had not realised she had begun to cry. She kept her back to her sister as she began to tell her of the days she had spent with Mr Darcy in Derbyshire.

“I cannot describe what it was like. At first, seeing him again was awkward. We had been so angry with each other at Easter, but then, he was polite and…oh, I do not know! It was as though I was encountering someone new, yet also someone I already considered a dear friend and whose company I valued. In the days afterwards, I discovered he was everything I had ever imagined I might find in a gentleman. More than that, because he was real, not someone I conjured with my imagination. Aunt and Uncle Gardiner extended our stay in Lambton, and I know it was to give Mr Darcy and me more time together. They could see that we were forming an attachment.”

She turned and faced Jane but did not move closer to her. Her sister’s lips were parted, and her brow was arched. Elizabeth swallowed heavily before taking a deep breath and continuing her story.

“I was alone at the inn the morning your letters telling me of Lydia’s elopement arrived. As I was reading the news, Mr Darcy arrived. We had arranged to…I do not recall what. I think he might have proposed that day, or at least asked whether I would consider— Well, that does not matter.”

“Does not matter?” Jane cried, springing to her feet. “Lizzy, are you in love with Mr Darcy? I suspected your feelings had changed, but I-I did not think?—”

“Please, Jane.” Elizabeth held up a hand to prevent her sister from approaching. She also shook her head and bit the inside of her cheek, which oddly helped to control her stronger sentiments and keep her from openly weeping. “My feelings do not matter. Obviously. Reading of Lydia, I was distressed, and I confessed the whole of it to Mr Darcy. You must never tell anyone, but Mr Darcy was involved in finding Lydia and Mr Wickham and arranging their marriage. He does not wish it to be generally known.” Elizabeth supposed he did not want to draw attention to his connexion to Mr Wickham. She also understood him well enough to know he would consider it a private matter.

Jane gasped.

“I was not surprised when he and Mr Bingley returned to Netherfield. The last thing Mr Darcy said to me in Lambton was that we would see each other soon. I assured him I would understand if Lydia’s actions prevented him from continuing his association with me, but he said it would not. He did not use those words exactly, but everything he said and everything about how he acted that morning and when he was here in September led me to believe he would soon renew his offer.”

“But…” Jane sputtered, evidently sharing Elizabeth’s confusion about what had changed.

Elizabeth shrugged. “Evidently, something has altered. When he went to town, he told me he would return in a week or thereabouts, but now it is clear he has no intention of furthering our connexion.”

Jane paled, and Elizabeth continued, trying to infuse her words with humour to alleviate her sister’s growing unease. “I was mistaken about the strength of his regard. I have been mistaken about a great deal this past year, most especially his and Mr Wickham’s characters when we first met. Perhaps Lady Catherine talked to him and convinced him he was being outrageously foolish to consider making me his wife, given my many inexcusable failings, chiefly being poor and not having a duke for a father.”

“How can you jest about this?”

“Because I am tired of being unhappy!” Elizabeth exclaimed. “What more should I say? I cannot charge him with breaking a promise to me. If I am embarrassed or sad that the man I admire does not return my feelings, I shall simply have to talk myself out of it, I suppose.”

They had not spoken any vows to each other, not even admitted to being in love, but in so many ways, they had exchanged promises. In her worst moments, Elizabeth believed his abandonment was her due for so foolishly misjudging him in the past. She did not intend to confess how deeply injured she felt even to Jane.

They were silent for a long moment. Several times, it looked as though Jane would speak, but she did not.

“I will be well, Jane,” Elizabeth insisted. “I have been bewildered precisely because I allowed myself to have certain expectations. Now that I know they will not come to pass, I can put him out of my mind.”

It would not be as simple as that, not when she harboured such a deep love for Mr Darcy. I am, once again, mistaken when it comes to him, and I cannot hide it from myself. If he was the man I thought he was, the man I wanted him to be, he and I would be engaged and planning our wedding alongside Jane and Mr Bingley. If only I understood what has changed! If she did, she was certain it would help her overcome her tender feelings all the quicker.

“Bingley was going to beg Mr Darcy to be here for the wedding and to stand up with him, but knowing all of this, I shall find a way to convince him not to,” Jane said.

Elizabeth stepped towards her. “No, you must not!”

“I shall not ask you to see him and act as though he has treated you as he should!”

Elizabeth grasped her sister’s hand. “You promised you would not tell him! You know his friendship with Mr Darcy is important to him, do you not?” After Jane nodded, Elizabeth continued. “If you tell him even a small part of what I have disclosed—if you even hint that Mr Darcy has injured me—Mr Bingley would sever the connexion. I am absolutely convinced of it. I would hate that to happen. As I said, it is not as though Mr Darcy has actually jilted me.”

She was not certain how much Mr Bingley had told her sister of his friend’s interference in their affairs—or that of his sisters’—but she suspected it had been little to avoid upsetting Jane.

“I do not like this.” Jane’s eyes were red, an indication she was close to crying.

“It is for the best,” Elizabeth insisted. “I am absolutely certain of it. The brief period of conviviality he and I shared will one day be nothing but a pleasant memory. Little will be served by distressing Mr Bingley or anyone else, which is what would happen if they knew.”

Elizabeth held her sister’s gaze steady until she saw that Jane acquiesced. Some of the burden she had been carrying eased; unfortunately, she suspected she had imposed it upon Jane, but with the wedding approaching, she hoped it would soon be forgotten.

And I hope I can find a way to hide my feelings when I see him—should he actually come to the wedding. I have five weeks or thereabouts. Surely by then, I shall have talked myself out of loving him and wanting to be his wife above all else.