Chapter Four

CHAPTER FOUR

"ELIZABETH."

SHE DIDN'T recognize the voice. It was some male voice, and that wasn't right, because no male voice ever wakened her. It was almost always Mrs. Hill, but sometimes it was Jane or even her mother Mrs. Bennet, but it was never a man.

"Elizabeth, there's someone here. We need to wake up."

Right. Mr. Darcy. The burnt house. The overturned carriage. The wound. Her eyes opened, and she had her cheek pressed into Mr. Darcy's bare chest. She jerked back and now they were looking into each other's eyes. He had his arm around her.

"I heard horses," he whispered.

"I'll get up and go look," she said.

He nodded.

"There's no one here. We need to move on to the next house, I think," came a voice. "Besides, it's dark now, and we need to get home."

A light spilled through the doorway of the room, illuminating the face of a man with a dark mustache. He saw them, on the couch, entwined, and his eyes widened.

Elizabeth got to her feet in a hurry.

"Alex?" said Mr. Darcy in a wondering voice. "Alexander?"

"Good God, Fitzwilliam," said the man, coming closer. "It is you."

Mr. Darcy let out a helpless laugh. "Oh, you're a sight for sore eyes, Alex."

The man—Alex, Elizabeth supposed—raised his voice. "I found him! He's in here." He turned back to look at Darcy and then his gaze settled on her.

Mr. Darcy groaned. "This is Miss Bennet. She's been assisting me."

"What's happened to you?"

"Oh, I was shot by a band of ruffians," muttered Mr. Darcy. "It's a story. What took you so long? How is Richard?"

"My brother is fine, just a big lump on his head," said Alex.

"You're Colonel Fitzwilliam's brother," said Elizabeth in understanding. "That must make you Viscount Banvolk." That was one of the Earl of Matlock's lesser titles, given as a courtesy for the use of his heir.

"Yes, that's right. But I'm afraid I don't know nearly as much about you," said the viscount.

"She's been doing everything she could for me. Likely saved my life. I was going to bleed to death otherwise," said Darcy.

"Well, then, thank you," said the viscount to her, but there was something in his voice that Elizabeth thought didn't sound much like gratefulness. "Thank you for looking after my cousin."

"Oh, he got shot because he was protecting me," said Elizabeth. "This is really all my fault."

"Don't be foolish. It was not your fault at all," said Mr. Darcy, shutting his eyes and lying back against the couch. "I want the laudanum before they move me, though, if you don't mind."

"Oh, yes, I'll fetch it," she said, scurrying off.

When she got back with the bottle of laudanum, someone took it from her. The search party was all men. It was Banvolk and a number of male servants from the Matlock household. They escorted her to the carriage they'd come in, and then Mr. Darcy was carried out, crying out in pain the entire time.

He fell asleep, though, sprawled out in the carriage, almost as soon as they took off.

This left her in the carriage with Banvolk and the other men, who didn't speak much to her at all, talking amongst themselves mostly. They were speculating on what might have happened, and she had the answers but the one time she did speak up, she said, "Oh, no, I could not keep going that way because I found the bandits again."

And then Banvolk gave her a look. "What were the bandits threatening to do to you that my cousin intervened, anyway?"

She felt her face turn bright red and she sputtered, "They were going to kill us both." Which was the truth. Why was she embarrassed?

Banvolk tipped his head back, surveying her.

After that, she decided to be quiet.

She had questions, of course, questions that—as it happened—would never really be answered. She knew that yes, as she had surmised, someone had come and taken away the overturned carriage, and brought back the Lucases and the colonel to London. She did not understand, however, why it was that no one had come to seek them at the burnt house, which seemed to her to be the obvious place to look. She did not know if perhaps Maria Lucas had indicated that they'd walked off in the opposite direction than the one they'd gone or if they had simply taken far too much time to get a search party together. She did not know if they simply could not find the spot where the carriage had overturned and had been seeking them in the wrong place. She would never find this out, because she didn't ask now, and there was no discussion of it later.

They were all taken to the Fitzwilliams' house in town. She was given a room and a bath and a maid to wait on her, and then supper was brought up for her, and she ate every bite of it. She collapsed on the bed in the room afterward, still dressed, and fell immediately to sleep. She had ever so many questions—where were the Lucases, for instance?—but she was too exhausted to seek the answers.

Sometime later, she awoke to hear the door opening.

She sat up in the bed and realized the lamps were all still burning.

"Oh, dear," said a woman's voice as she made her way into the room. She was tall and severe, older than Elizabeth's own mother, and the smile on her face wasn't quite a smile. "I should have realized you'd be tired."

Elizabeth got off the bed. "You must be Lady Matlock." She curtsied. "It's a pleasure, madam, and I must thank you deeply for your hospitality. I am ever so grateful."

"Prettily done," said Lady Matlock. "But let's be frank with each other, my dear. We both know what it is you've attempted to engineer here."

"Excuse me?" Elizabeth drew back.

Lady Matlock shrugged. "I don't think you wanted him shot. I don't think you counted on bandits. But here are the facts, as I understand them. After the carriage was overturned, you were quite keen and insistent, even though many people protested to the contrary, that you and Mr. Darcy must go off together alone. Do you deny that?"

Elizabeth blinked at her. "I… I can't even remember, to be honest. After the carriage overturned, I wasn't rightly myself. You can't imagine what it's been like, going through all of that."

Lady Matlock only smirked. "He changed his plans for you, so you've clearly made some impression upon him. I daresay you're a pretty thing, but it is troubling, turning a carriage over, getting my son Richard knocked unconscious, and Sir William badly hurt besides. And I don't think you meant it, but Fitzwilliam—that is, Mr. Darcy—he was shot. He could have died. You didn't think this through when you put your little scheme into motion, I don't suppose."

Elizabeth was very, very confused. She gaped at Lady Matlock, trying to put it together. Eventually, she grasped it. "You think I turned the carriage over? Me?"

"Richard says he can't be sure how it happened, but he couldn't rule you out as the cause. He was quite concerned that his cousin had changed his plans for a chit of a girl with relatives in Cheapside. It worried him. Then… this… I can't say that I don't applaud the effort in some ways, my dear, but it's all too far, truly. You hurt people. You might have gotten by with it, even so, but the way you two were found, all wrapped around him in that indecent way, well, we see what you were attempting, but you have failed. You will go home to your family, to your sad country house, in disgrace."

"You think I did it so that I could be alone with Mr. Darcy, to engineer a compromise," said Elizabeth. "You think I could claim he compromised me? He could barely walk. He was in such pain, there is no way he laid a finger on me. Furthermore, I don't even like him. And he… well, I don't think he likes me either, though he claims otherwise, and I suppose we did grow somewhat closer while we were almost dying together, but you're wrong, is the point."

"Oh, don't protest your innocence. I haven't the patience for that. Simply understand this, girl, you shall not marry my nephew. Never. Do you understand?"

"I don't wish to marry him," said Elizabeth, furrowing her brow. "If he were the last man in England, I could not be prevailed upon to marry him. He's arrogant and snobbish and he orders me about in such a way that is unbearable!" Elizabeth had begun to gesture with both hands, partly because she was appalled to have been accused in such a way and partly because she really wished to explain to the countess her error. This was all wrong.

Lady Matlock only laughed. "Well, then, good, we understand each other. You sleep. You have been through an ordeal, of course. Someone will convey you home in the morning. You won't see Mr. Darcy, so don't ask."

"All right," said Elizabeth. "I do feel it's a bit rude to simply disappear. Could I leave him a letter?"

"No. Definitely not."

"I really don't wish to marry him. He doesn't wish to marry me. You're not seeing this clearly, my lady, I swear it to you."

"I see it quite clearly," said Lady Matlock, and with that, swept out of the room without a goodbye.

Elizabeth sat down on the bed. It did not feel good to be accused of something one hadn't done. What a preposterous thing to accuse her of! How very horrid.

It was not as easy to fall back asleep after that, even though she had the benefit of changing into something clean and comfortable and slipping between the sheets of a luxurious and comfortable bed. She lay awake for a time, blinking at the ceiling, thinking through the conversation with Lady Matlock, thinking of twenty other things she could have said which would surely have convinced the woman!

Finally, though, she did sleep.

Morning dawned, but she had no chance to speak to Lady Matlock again, nor any of the family in the house. Instead, she was packed away in a carriage and taken back to Longbourn.

MR. DARCY WAS given as much laudanum as he liked in the Matlock household, where he was convalescing. This meant that the next two weeks passed mostly in a haze.

On a few occasions, he asked after Miss Bennet, but he was gone on the laudanum and said ridiculous things, things about ruining her, he thought. Anyway, he supposed this was why he got responses from his aunt Lady Matlock that he would never see that dreadful woman again or from either Richard or Alex that he certainly hadn't ruined anyone and not to worry, he was safe from social-climbing manipulative chits.

He might have protested about these things, but he didn't suppose anyone would take him seriously, not while he was essentially drugged.

It was in the midst of the third week, when he was healing more, that he had a lucid moment and began to think about how it might be dangerous to be taking so much laudanum. He'd heard of people who had terrible wounds who became dependent upon it, and he'd always vowed he didn't want that to happen to him.

He knew, however, here in this household, he would not be able to accomplish it. He needed to get back to—well, ideally, Pemberley, because Mrs. Reynolds would see to it that he would never develop a dependency. She was God's gift, that woman.

But, failing that, and he could not make such a journey, he could rely on the butler at his house in town, Mr. Briggs, to do his wishes.

So, the first thing he did was to ask someone—he thought it was Richard—whether or not he could go home to his own house. Richard went and spoke to others and reported back that Darcy was far too wounded, even still, to be moved, so Darcy knew he would have to take control of this in his own way.

He composed a letter to Mr. Briggs and had a servant here deliver it. Within a day, an army of Mr. Darcy's own servants, including all of his footman, appeared and carried him out to his own carriage, even over the protests of Lady Matlock.

Lady Matlock was his aunt and he loved her, but he had to admit the woman had a tendency for involving herself in matters that did not concern her. He knew she couldn't be reasoned with, not when she'd decided on something. It was best to go around her.

Back in his town house, he was still eager for laudanum. He began to suspect that he wasn't even in as much pain as he was feeling, for it was horrid—just as bad as when he'd first been shot—and he thought some healing should have occurred by now. But he'd heard of this. Laudanum could deceive a man's senses, make him feel such pain that he would beg for the stuff, even when he was physically unhurt. It was powerful.

He had to be half-drugged on the stuff to have any conversation with Mr. Briggs at all, but he told the man in no uncertain terms that he wished to go off of it.

Mr. Briggs suggested that Mr. Darcy should ease down off the laudanum, that he should take a bit less day in and day out.

"No," said Mr. Darcy, "no, that will only prolong the agony. I should like it very intense but quick. So, tomorrow, you will not give me any, and you will instruct everyone to comply to this order."

Mr. Briggs nodded. "Very good, sir."

"I shall change my mind," said Mr. Darcy. "But you won't listen to me then, you will listen to my edict now."

Mr. Briggs nodded again, but he looked worried.

"You will tell me, this future me, this maddened, laudanum-dependent me, that I have already given orders and that these orders cannot be broken. You will tell me that no matter what I say or do, there shall be no more laudanum. You will do it, and I shall reward you for it on the other side."

Mr. Briggs swallowed, looking nearly ill.

"You don't want a master who is dependent on laudanum," said Mr. Darcy. "You must do it for your own sake, for the sake of all the servants I employ."

"Yes," said Mr. Briggs, as if this had spoken to him in another way. "Yes, sir, I see what you're saying. You can depend on me."

"Good," said Mr. Darcy.

Darcy went to sleep that night in an opium haze, and thought to himself that it likely wouldn't be as bad as all that, anyway. He was a very strong man, and he was capable of imposing his will, and he wouldn't even ask for laudanum, likely. He'd suffer through the pain silently. Feeling confident, he drifted off. He dreamed dreams of Elizabeth Bennet in his arms, her head upon his shoulder, her small, sweet body in his arms.

Then morning came, and it was awful.

It was so much worse than he had imagined. The pain, it was not simply the pain of his gunshot wound anymore. Now, it was as if his entire body was on fire, as if he was burning from the inside, and he knew—oh, yes, he knew—that a dollop of laudanum would cure it all.

He began to think he'd been hasty. Perhaps it was too soon to get off the stuff, and perhaps he should delay a few days or perhaps a week. Perhaps Mr. Briggs had been correct, and to ease off it would be best.

It was only mid-morning before he had a servant come in and he explained to the man that he would rather ease himself off the laudanum and that he could not do it this way, that it was agony, and if some could be brought forth.

The servant nodded and left.

Mr. Briggs was the one who came back. "I made you a solemn vow last night, sir," said his butler. "I do this for your own good and for the good of your whole household. The answer, Mr. Darcy, is no."

Mr. Darcy was outraged. He sacked Mr. Briggs on the spot, and went on a rampage throughout the house, going through every nook and cranny he thought might hold some laudanum. Every servant that he came across who looked at him crosswise, he also sacked.

When the house proved empty of any of the drug, he went to the stables to have a carriage take him to the apothecary.

But Mr. Briggs was there and prevented this, with the help of the stable hands, who folded their burly arms over their chest and refused to follow his orders.

"I sacked you," he said to Mr. Briggs.

"Well, sir, let's get you free of this laudanum and we'll see if you still feel that way." He gave Mr. Darcy a small smile.

Mr. Darcy hated him.

He wished he'd stayed with the Matlocks. With the Matlocks he'd be given as much laudanum as he liked.

"Back to bed, sir," said Mr. Briggs. "You've still a hole in your belly, one that's not quite healed. Don't want to damage yourself. Don't worry. I have everything well in hand."

"I hate you," Mr. Darcy seethed at him. "I want you out of my house."

"Yes, quite, sir. I understand that, yes indeed." The man was entirely unruffled.

To the depths of the deep with the man!

Mr. Darcy raged a bit longer, but he was obliged to go back to bed, after all, and there he stayed, as the desire for the laudanum grew worse. He began to sweat and shake. He had chills, as if he had a fever. There was one unfortunate incident when Georgiana came down to see him, and he was half dressed and alternately yelling and alternately blubbering.

Mr. Briggs came along and ushered Miss Darcy away, telling her that her older brother was ill.

But in the end, it only lasted—well, the very worst of it, anyway—lasted for about three days. By the third day, he was feeling much better, and he was himself enough that he was able to give his thanks to Mr. Briggs and to assure him he was not, in fact, sacked.

It was a week before he felt entirely through it all, and he wasn't sure of his capacity to avoid the laudanum, even still. He felt as if he'd just been through hell itself. Laudanum, like most things, was too good to be true. It solved every problem in the world, even the worst pain, but because it was so good, it extracted a price. He would weigh all things heavily before accepting its gifts again. They were not gifts, not in the end. They were loans against the future. All the pain he'd avoided? He'd got it back in the end, hadn't he?

It was only at this point that he began to turn his thoughts to what had happened to Elizabeth Bennet. Where was she? Was she all right? And he owed her a debt of gratitude, of course, not to mention the fact he had been alone with her for one and a half nights and he wasn't sure what that might do to a woman's reputation, but he must do whatever he could to make sure that there was no detriment to her because of it.

So, he contacted the Matlocks, and the letter he got back from his cousin Alex was preposterous.