Chapter 3

Darcy could not broach the subject of Miss Bennet until he was sure that the others had no chance of overhearing their conversation. He unnaturally slowed his pace; Elizabeth removed her eyes from her sister and Bingley. The silence between them became unbearably thick.

Remembering how sad she had looked earlier, he sought his courage and spoke, "Was something troubling you before our walk, Miss Elizabeth?"

She startled, and he inwardly berated himself for being a thoughtless, taciturn blunderbuss.

"My youngest sister was invited by Mrs. Forster to accompany her to Brighton. It is where the regiment will encamp soon," said Elizabeth. "My father denied me when I asked him to reconsider allowing her to go."

Darcy grimaced.

"That is alarming," he agreed. "Unfortunately, there is little to be done. You have done more than your duty by applying to your father."

He wanted to say more, but refrained himself. She noticed. Her eyes on the ground, she whispered, "You are not wrong to judge him."

"I cannot be too critical when I had allowed my sister to visit Ramsgate."

"You went to see her there. That was the act of a responsible guardian, and subsequently, you saved her."

She spoke with feeling, and Darcy, who did not expect the defence of his character, thought that his heart might burst out of his chest. He was so overwhelmed that he forgot, for several long moments, to speak. When his mind recovered, it informed him that he did not have enough minutes to be as quiet as he was. Bingley and Miss Bennet were out of sight; therefore, it was time to share with Elizabeth the despicable letter.

He ceased walking. Elizabeth glanced curiously at him.

"I am sorry," he said, "but—do you recognise this writing?"

He was rather awkward when he handed her the papers from his pocket. It was not the first time he presented her with a letter, yet it was almost unbelievable, given what the former situation had been, how his nervousness from then was exceeded.

Elizabeth took the letter, and her brows immediately furrowed.

"This is in Jane's hand," she said. She looked up at him, frowning. "I do not understand."

He implored her to read the letter. With immense sympathy, he watched as her face changed from bewildered to disbelieving to angered to utter shock. Her hands shook and her lower lip trembled.

"I do not understand," she repeated when she finished, staring at the letter as if it were a stranger.

Sensing that it pained her to look at it, Darcy took it and placed it out of sight in his pocket.

"I am sorry to bring you distress," he said. He was truly sorry to be the messenger, but he blamed her deceitful sister more for causing her such torment!

"I—oh, I do not understand!"

She tightly closed her fine eyes, and when they opened again, they were almost resigned.

"I am so sorry for this ill-conceived action by my sister. You would be right to be greatly offended to receive such an improper note, and further right to hate me for sharing with her the secrets I now know she could not be trusted with. I had not the slightest idea that she planned to write to you at all." Her voice was scarcely heard when she continued, "However, if your feelings are opposite of that, and you wish to return the sentiments I have just read, you will have no obstacle in me. I cannot speak for your friend, Mr. Bingley, but I will not hold the past against your happiness, or that of my sister's."

It was Darcy's turn to not understand. When he finally comprehended her words, his eyes widened and he vigorously shook his head.

"No!" cried he. "I assure you, I am deeply offended by the actions of your sister. What she did was truly appalling, and my opinion of her has drastically fallen to abhorrence—"

Perhaps that was not the correct thing to say, for he saw Elizabeth cringe.

"Forgive me," he said. "I should not have been so open about my unkind thoughts. I did mean to dispel you of your latter notion. I am not a fickle man, Miss Elizabeth. My feelings for you are ardent and true. They have not changed, and will never—"

Perhaps that, too, was not the correct thing to say. He did not want to disgust Elizabeth again with his unwelcome sentiments. Until he knew of a great change in her feelings, he wished to respect her refusal; yet there he was, making them both red with embarrassment.

"Forgive me," he said once more. Finally, he spoke simply, "I came to you today so you would have the truth."

"You were right all along about Jane and Mr. Bingley," said Elizabeth. Tears welled in her eyes. "If it were only that! I have been so blind! About you, about Mr. Wickham, even about Charlotte—and now about my own sister! Of her, my blindness is the worst!"

Darcy wished to cradle her in his embrace; so anguished was he to see her in misery. He was limited to handing her his handkerchief. A small part of him gloated at seeing her make use of his particular item, and he chided himself for feeling such a thing when she was completely suffering.

Then, he registered what she had said. She had declared that she had been blind about Wickham, and blind about him. Could he hope? Elation ran through him, and it took him a little longer to scold himself for his happiness. It was not the time to be pleased.

"I am sorry," said Darcy. "You must be in considerable hurt. Yet you must not disparage yourself. I have been as blind as you—perhaps more so, when you acknowledge that I am a man of eight-and-twenty and you are a lady who has not yet reached her majority. I was unaware that my sister's former companion could not be trusted. I was blind to my sister's propensity for elopement. You spoke of Mr. Wickham, and I believe that your realisation about your sister is excruciatingly similar to my realisation about him, my childhood friend whom I grew up with. Your blindness is through no fault of your own, as I have learned about mine."

"You are kind to say so," spoke Elizabeth, "but I still cannot fathom what I have learned today. I am not surprised to know that my sister esteems you. There is not one man in the world she does not esteem. Even in her seeming admiration of you, she could scarcely comprehend that Mr. Wickham was wicked when his crimes were unfolded to her. Yet for her feelings for you to go beyond that, when there exists Mr. Bingley—I am all astonishment. She even took particular care of her penmanship; she must like you very much to have done so."

Darcy blanched. The thought of Miss Bennet's handwriting being more awful horrified him.

"However, what surprised me most of all," continued Elizabeth, "is her betrayal in writing to you. It is a recklessness which ignores me, our family, and yours. I have never known a worse feeling."

She did not need to say more, for they both understood. It was silent but for her sniffling.

Minutes later, they saw a smiling Bingley and Miss Bennet coming their way.

"Thank you, Mr. Darcy," Elizabeth whispered before they were ambushed.

"Lizzy, what has happened?" cried Miss Bennet. Her smile had fallen upon seeing Elizabeth's distress, and she displayed every part of a concerned sister. She and Bingley glanced between Darcy and Elizabeth.

"I fear I have a headache," said Elizabeth. She was unable to meet anyone's eyes.

Bingley frowned at Darcy, evidently believing him to be at fault. Gallantly, he offered, "Allow me to escort you to the house, Miss Elizabeth—or to the bench over there, if you prefer."

Elizabeth said that she would like to return to the house. As Bingley had determined that Darcy was not to be trusted with the sensitive female, he arranged it so that Elizabeth would take his own arm. As a result, Darcy was left to walk beside Miss Bennet. He did not offer her his arm, no matter how pointedly Bingley looked at him.

"I apologise, sir," Miss Bennet said so that only he could hear. "I fear I have caused more harm than good."

Anger filled Darcy. Her audacity!

"I hope to only say this once," said Darcy, attempting to control his tone. "I am disgusted by your presumption. I knew not what you were thinking of, writing a letter to a gentleman so wholly unconnected to you. To be clear, you do not know me, and I care not for you. If not for Miss Elizabeth, your existence would mean absolutely nothing to me, and I would not be speaking to you now. You are nothing compared to your sister, yet you dare insult her, and me, by your insolent actions. My good opinion once lost, is lost forever. Whether or not your sister will be more generous, let it be known that any further offense against her will be an offense against me. If I am fortunate enough to remain in her circle, it will behove you to cease such offenses."

Miss Bennet remained in her appearance serene, and did not, or could not, form a response. Darcy did not regret his words; even if he had endeavoured to be more gentlemanly, he believed that certain matters required hard statements.

Soon, they were at the house, and Darcy watched, forlorn, as Elizabeth escaped up the stairs to her room. Bingley did most of the speaking as they made their leave of the others, and a promise was made to attend a dinner at Longbourn with some officers.

Once they returned to Netherfield, Bingley was quick to question him about Elizabeth.

"What did you do to the poor girl?" he asked. "You were supposed to be apologising, and she looked as if she had been crying!"

"We were discussing a difficult subject," said Darcy, wincing. He hoped that Elizabeth would be well, and that he would see her smiling soon. He knew her to be resilient, but the unveiled perfidy of a once beloved sister would be most difficult to overcome. "I do not think that I was the object of her distress. I have improved in that regard—at least, that is what I observed, and what I hope to be the case."

"What were you discussing, then, to make her so unhappy?"

Darcy grimaced. "Betrayal."

"Goodness. I will try to give you some advice, Darcy, and tell you that there are times where the weather is a much better topic of conversation."

"Jane?"

"Yes, Lizzy?"

"Did you really write the letter to Mr. Darcy?"

"I confess I did."

"How could you, Jane?"

"Oh, I did not mean for you to ever find out! I did not expect him to be so angry, especially after he had written to you."

"He had reason to."

"I know."

"What was yours?"

"I wanted to be bold for once, Lizzy. I thought that you might never see him again, so I figured that only good could come out of my actions. Perhaps I was too forward, but I truly did not mean to cause a disturbance."

"What possible good could have come out of it? You wrote a letter to a single gentleman, who was an unwilling recipient and of no relation to yourself. Mr. Darcy, at least, handed me his letter with discretion. You sent yours, with no thought of your reputation! I would never have expected you to do such a thing!"

"It was thoughtless of me, I know now."

"What you wrote of me—did you mean to be so indirectly cruel? Do you truly think so little of me?"

"It is all a misunderstanding. You are my dearest sister, and I have the highest opinion of you. Yet you are my younger sister, and there are times where I feel as if you have been involved in great confusion, and misplaced feelings."

"I do not deny that I have been wrong about many things, but to imply that you have always known better is simply false! You have never accepted that parts of the world might be less than good."

"I do like to believe that there is a good reason for everything. People cannot be so evil. If they act otherwise, then it must be because of some sort of misconception. People are not, in essence, bad."

"I trusted you, Jane."

"I am sorry that you think that you cannot still trust me! I assure you that you can! I shall never act so carelessly again."

"I do not know."

"Mr. Darcy has already admonished my actions, so you need not repeat his scorn. Oh, I admit it was quite awful. I felt so terrible, Lizzy, and I have given up any hopes I had for him after his rebuke. To be sure, his words were cruel, but I might have deserved it; I daresay he is still a good person. His defence of you was certainly admirable, so I shall focus on that more than anything. The worst of it is over, and we may all forget it and move past my brief foolishness."

"I do not know if that is possible at this moment. You hurt me, Jane."

Up next: Woes, anger, and a dinner.