Chapter Six

I never did forget that Mr. Darcy was high-handed and far too certain of himself.

He was a man who watched me intensely with thoughts I could not pierce, but which must often be critical.

But I was a young woman, and he was an exceedingly handsome young man with many admirable qualities. Any dislike I held was hard to keep while I watched him amongst his family and those he loved.

My life now that he was present was rather different than it had been before. Mr. Darcy did not make a practice of inviting me to dine like Georgiana had. And Georgiana and Mrs. Annesley were now expected to dine with Mr. Darcy every night. I was often lonely at dinner. Further he often called Cathy to the drawing room in the evening without me, and some nights he did not call to see her at all.

However I was not lonely in general, for Georgiana still came to play with us most afternoons, and every second or third evening I would be permitted to join them in the drawing room.

When Mr. Darcy did call for me, the conversation was principally carried out between us. In these conversations he allowed me to speak as the disputatious gentlewoman I had been born and raised as, rather than demanding that I submit myself to him as a master. I came to consider him as a friend who had a fellow deep interest in the wellbeing of Cathy, and less as the employer who had ordered me to take care of the sweet girl.

As promised by Georgiana and Mrs. Reynolds, Mr. Darcy was a just and liberal landlord, he was active, unceasingly riding to and fro over the estate dictating improvements, and freely spending money if it would improve the running of the estate over future years.

He spent much time with Georgiana, encouraging her to play the piano, praising her, inquiring upon her studies, and showing the affectionate and considerate interest that she had always said he showed for her.

I could not help but like Mr. Darcy, and the more for those rare smiles, and even rarer happy laughs. And usually I was the one who won him to those rare laughs that came from his belly, making his shoulders shake in mirth.

I thought that was perhaps the real source of his high-handed somberness. His servants and family treated Mr. Darcy with a certain awe, as a superior and higher being who it was impossible to challenge or laugh at, while I was aware that he was a flawed creature whose horse could slip on ice, and who could think my management of Cathy as less than perfect.

I confess I too am a vain creature.

Mr. Darcy was possessed of a dry wit, a brilliance at the epigrammatic turn of phrase, and an ample stock of information that showed he had not merely read his newspaper and a few books of science, as any gentleman worth the name had, but that he had also done what was more, and thought deeply upon those books, as I and my father had.

But behind that… behind that… he was a man who though he sometimes forgot to be unhappy, he always eventually remembered. I wondered what pain it was that sat in the back of his memory, that led him to his harsh melancholy moods, and that gave him a biting bitterness, a cynicism about the world ill fitted to one of great fortune and good temperament.

I wondered often, lying in bed at night, huddled against the winter cold under my covers, hugging a pillow to myself for company, what pain it was that led to the one aspect of his behavior that I had not the bravery to speak to him upon.

I speak here of his treatment of Cathy.

The child wished to be loved by her father. She constantly spoke to me of Mr. Darcy, of how much she hoped Papa would be impressed by her new accent in French, by the drawings she made, by her description of some book of history or botany that she read.

Mr. Darcy clearly could barely tolerate being in her presence. And while he did not actively recoil from her childish embraces, he did not encourage her, and I always saw a disappointment in Cathy's eyes when we left Mr. Darcy's presence.

Even if my supposition that Mr. Darcy was not the child's father was true — I could not decide with certainty from tracing similarities — it was not right, not proper for a man to show such disdain to a helpless creature entirely under his protection.

Yes, Mr. Darcy did see to it that she was cared for, educated, fed and raised well. But he in no way acted as a loving father — as my loving father had.

Mr. Darcy remained resident at the estate over the following months. The weather warmed, flowers snuck their careful blooms out scenting the air with perfume, and the leaves budded and began to green, and the grasses launched their thrusting way into the sky, only to be chewed upon by desperate hungry animals looking for forage.

Spring came, and I walked about the great estate with a spring in my step.

I believed that I was happy to be able to explore at my leisure with Cathy the park, now happily bedecked in a new and glorious season. Every twist and turn of the paths revealed new fresh smells, new beauties, and new minutiae.

I had a perhaps eclectic sense of what a girl should learn. I did make my charge to memorize the names of the kings of England, the emperors of Rome, and the most distinguished of the philosophers, since all agree every girl ought to have that as one of her accomplishments. However I also took her out into the park, and encouraged Cathy to dirty her hands digging for beetles, and odd plants, and we would then take our specimens and seek to identify them from those listed in the botanical books found in the library.

There was a fine microscope that Mr. Darcy owned which we could use to study the tiniest features of the animals, and a telescope which we used on nights that were warmer and clearer to study the skies above.

One day Georgiana and I convinced Mr. Darcy to take a spring walk with us. It was a delightful day, filled with the smells of flowers, cut grasses, and rich wet earth. The sort of day that made the heart of any girl to leap up with joy, at least any girl who loved the sublimities of the natural world as much as I did.

Mr. Darcy and I stood more together talking, while Cathy ran around, chasing Captain, and laughing happily when the fine animal allowed her to catch him. Georgiana also ran with them, getting Captain to run to and fro fetching sticks.

Mr. Darcy looked to be in a particularly good mood this day, smiling at Cathy as she hurried up to us, holding out a centipede a bit more than an inch long that she had found. "Look, Miss Lizzy! Look, Papa! Look what I found." She grinned broadly and quite happily.

I bent down and examined the little bug. "So, Cathy, can you tell me what this kind of centipede is called? Do you remember — we've found two of them already."

"Uh." She screwed up her face and glanced at Mr. Darcy, to make sure he was attending, which he was. "Uh, a stone centipede?"

"Very good!" I exclaimed, and clapped to show my enthusiasm. "It is also known as the brown centipede or the common centipede, and do you remember the Latin name?"

Now Cathy frowned and she stared rather annoyedly at the orange strip of scales along the length of the mostly brown creature climbing on her finger. "Latinicus Brownicus."

I laughed, though it made me rather nervous for my charge to make a display of her occasional ignorance right in front of her father, but when I glanced at him, he was smiling more than was his wont when Cathy was near.

"Now, dear, you know that is not the answer."

She frowned again. "Lith… obius… fortunatus?"

Mr. Darcy now knelt to examine the creature. "Near correct," he said in a serious voice. "Lithobius forficatus. Remember it next time, but an excellent effort."

Darcy ruffled the little girl's hair, and she beamed at him.

He then said, "Now go return your centipede to where you found him. That is only polite."

She ran off to do so, and I smiled at Darcy. "You remember the Latin names of centipedes?"

He replied by saying something, but I fear I cannot report what he said, for it was Latin to me. At seeing my quizzical expression, he laughed. "So your father did not teach you Latin?"

"He barely understood it spoken himself. I can stumble through an easier text when reading — but I credit that more to my knowledge of French and Italian than anything else."

"So we have found the limit of your accomplishments."

"But not the limits of yours. I have been told that you concern yourself with the fate of every frostbitten shrub on your lands."

"Not every one, but I do concern myself with the management of the land. Knowing the creatures that swarm around it, even the littlest, and their proper names and behaviors is valuable."

Cathy returned to us, but soon she and Georgiana began to play another game of fetch with Captain. We continued to stroll together, almost as though we were a courting couple, examining the blooming roses and bluebells while Georgiana and Cathy played. I bent to smell a newly blooming rose bush, and then given confidence by the smile that scent elicits, I said to Darcy, without any preamble, "Cathy is delightful. I could not have wished for a finer pupil. She does you credit, and thinks very much of you. I liked to see you teach her just now."

I had determined that I ought to make an effort to convince Mr. Darcy to play the proper fatherly role with his daughter, and perhaps I thought, if he simply saw that she was a delightful child, he would be more likely to shower her with actual affection rather than the cold dutiful manner he tended towards.

Mr. Darcy was silent for a while after I ventured that comment, frowning.

I determined, once more, that it was a subject upon which he simply did not wish to speak. And while I was sure he would not punish me for venturing upon it, I considered it rejected as a topic for present. I would await another opportunity to hint to Mr. Darcy that I considered his manner of parenting to be deficient.

I confess as I write these words that it strikes me again that I was poorly equipped in spirit and mind to be a governess, and that I was exceedingly fortunate to have stumbled across one of the few gentlemen in England who could have enjoyed having such a person as myself as their dependent.

As I accepted the need to change the subject for the present, I made a commonplace observation about the niceness of the weather, and the earliness of spring this year.

However rather than replying something like "Yes, the weather is very nice," Darcy remained contemplative and silent. He studied the oak and willow trees, sprouting spring leaves.

When he turned his eyes to me he said, "You have without doubt observed the coldness with which I often treat my… daughter. Miss Catherine. That I am not as caring of a parent as I ought to be."

"It is contrary to your general character, Mr. Darcy. With your sister, with your servants and with your land, you show an exemplary and never ceasing care," I replied. I paused, swallowed, and added, "I have wondered sometimes why you treat Catherine with such a different manner."

"And have you formed a theory? — I imagine you have. I think, Miss Bennet, I fancy that by now I have a decent grasp on the workings of your mind. You certainly have formed a theory, one similar to my own — do look at her. Look at her closely."

"I have looked closely at Cathy many times since she has become my charge. She is a delightful young girl, loving, sweet and in need of care and concern."

"Which is lavished upon her by you and Georgiana, she does not lack—"

"A girl needs a father."

I felt a sudden catch in my voice, remembering my own father, the years we spent together, the conversations, the ways of being together. Seated on Papa's knee as a small child, a large tome in front of us, surrounded by books and the rich scent of his snuff, and occasional brandy.

There was a flash of frustrated emotion in Mr. Darcy's face. "A father you say?"

I bit my lip, but looked at him steadily. "She has no one else who she can turn to for that station."

Mr. Darcy sighed. "No, I dare say Catherine does not."

He looked down, studying the ground. I could not help but put a brief comforting hand on his wrist.

He smiled at me. "You did love your father dearly."

"And he always showed concern for me — and took effort with my education, and to encourage me. There was always warmth from him — to not see that. To wish for it… I see how Cathy observes you, and how you… Do promise me that you will treat her as… as she ought to be treated. Whatever… whoever… Cathy does not deserve any spite."

Darcy sighed. His face became a hard, bitter mask.

He looked towards Pemberley, his eyes falling upon that tall tower that rose above the rest of the estate, the tower from which the eerie laughter came.

His eyes were bleak, and full of pain. And full of something else… what was it? I studied his face.

Anger.

It was there in the way his jaw then clenched, and his hand tightened into a fist. In a man as self-contained as Fitzwilliam Darcy, such behavior was like when my mother screamed in rage at me, as she had when I refused Mr. Collins.

But then Darcy looked at me. He unclenched his jaw, he released his fist and his inhaled breath. He smiled at me.

"I apologize, Miss Bennet… at times I remember… and at such times… such times when I recall how the world has dealt with me, how I am placed in such a situation as this… at such times I grow angry, and it takes an effort of will to remember also the good there is, and that the generality of mankind is not deserving of spite and anger. But when I look on you, on your smiling face, still innocent, it awakens happy thoughts I have not known since… It makes me wish, wish for something I can never have, not honestly, and yet… yet…" His voice trailed off, but his eyes stayed on mine. Suddenly he looked aside and said gruffly, "What do you know of Catherine's mother?"

I blinked at the sudden question. "Very little, she looks rather… small in the wedding portrait which hangs within the gallery. Georgiana always speaks poorly of her — she told me of terrible ways that Mrs. Darcy treated her."

"Yes… such a woman. Mad. She was already mad. I think… She had been mad even before our marriage, but it was hidden from me, and I had not the sense to look." Darcy rubbed his smooth shaven chin. "But that is all you hear — what Georgiana has to say? Then the servants must not gossip over much, for some of them know details beyond that."

"Mrs. Reynolds says that the days when she died were dark and unpleasant."

"Those days when she died…"

Darcy looked again back at the estate. Seemingly lost in memory. The tall columns of white smoke from the chimneys rose merrily high into the sky. A hawk circled high above us, in widening circles.

I added almost nervously, "Perhaps the servants do gossip, but if they do, they do not do so with me."

The hawk high in the sky that Mr. Darcy watched saw something on the ground, and tightening its wings against its body it plunged from so far above, plummeting at great speed towards the ground, till it fell behind the line of the hills and was lost to view.

"Yes, I forget that," Darcy said. "Just as I sometimes seem to forget you are a dependent, I forget also that you are also not one of them. You were born well, not so high as me — but of course there is distance and discomfort, and they would not be greatly more likely to confide in you than in me. So I am left to wonder how much of my business is known, how widely… I was not happy with my marriage."

"I know."

Mr. Darcy laughed at my simple reply. "I was but nineteen — a callow youth. Younger than you at present in years, and younger by far in experience and knowledge of the world. But I had been raised with a deep sense of duty… to always do my duty."

"I admire that in you."

"I do not. Not anymore — I would… I would like to simply look, and see what I wished… and take. By Jesu, I would for once in my life act solely for myself, and to the devil with the consequences." He looked at me intensely as he said this, in a way that made my face feel numb, and my stomach to swoop. "Yet it is hard… so hard."

"Mr. Darcy," I breathed out. "Your story… Mrs. Darcy?"

"Mrs. Darcy? I must remember Mrs. Darcy? Yes. Yes, always Mrs. Darcy. Never allowed to forget her. She was my cousin. We were born less than a year apart, and my mother and hers had always considered that it would be a delightful thing if we were to marry. This thought sharpened into a particular desire when it became evident that Anne would be the heir of Rosings Park, it is a great estate. Not so pretty or well situated as Pemberley, but with extensive lands and an income of more than eight thousand a year."

"I know of it, my cousin had been the vicar of Hunsford Parish before he inherited the estate from my father. He spoke highly of your aunt."

"A worse, more distasteful gentlewoman I do not know than my aunt." Darcy grunted. "It speaks ill of your cousin that he could find preferment from her — I shock you, do I not, that I speak so openly about my ill will towards my aunt? It is easy when I am near you to forget that I must hide parts of myself… I tire of pretense, of hiding truths. There is nothing I despise so much as every form of disguise. And especially… especially when I am near you. It is always so easy to speak with you…"

I swallowed, feeling as though there was more in the air, and more in my stomach than simply a spring conversation. "You are surprisingly open for a man who I expected to be opposed to any form of gossip." I laughed, unable to help it, releasing a little nervousness. "But as for my cousin, I do not like him at all — I could be Mrs. Collins today, ruling over my father's estate. I have not regretted that choice once, not for the time it takes to drink a cup of tea. No matter how much my mother railed against me."

"You had once told me of an eligible offer of marriage — but your father's heir. That is even more." Mr. Darcy looked at me sharply. "And you refused."

I shrugged and smiled. "A rebellious child. You know I do not easily take orders."

"A worse sort of employee I could hardly imagine." Darcy smiled at me. "I merely keep you for your affectionate care and concern for Catherine — I am certain you chose well. The sort of man who would find preferment from my aunt is likely to be intolerable in any intimate situation — I like you the better for having spurned a connection to my aunt."

"To the great Lady Catherine de Bourgh? But her chimney pieces, and not only the ones in the main room, can cost as great as eight hundred pounds." I laughed and smiled flutteringly at him. "But your story, your story — do not forget the story. You know I am a curious sort who cannot stand to have knowledge hidden from her."

Darcy frowned again. That gloomy melancholy mood which chased him returned. "Well then let me tell you the tale simply. I was nineteen and a deuced fool. Green, callow, wet behind the ears, and not good for very much. My father was dying, and in his illness my mother convinced him to order me to marry her niece. I had been raised as a fool and a dutiful fool. So I agreed, though I had never cared for her person, nor her personality, that I would be amenable to such a connection to Anne if it was the particular will of both my parents. She was brought up forthwith from Rosings to Pemberley with Lady Catherine, to see if we would make a match of it."

Darcy sighed. "I had never liked her over much, and never thought much of her. Mama had always suggested that we ought to marry, and the thought had been in the back of my mind, but she was not a particularly pretty girl… Papa dying. Georgiana sent away to school. I was never close to more than a few men, and those who I cared for had no advice to give to me. Bingley too young, another cousin, Richard Fitzwilliam, away in the army. And… Anne was prettier than before. She made an effort to smile and dance, and we all drank and spent a great deal of time together, and she tried to talk intelligently. I liked the pretense, even though she had no real thoughts — not as you have — and… Papa was dying. I could not disappoint this last wish of his, that I marry before he passed, and marry a woman where the connection would consolidate the family estates and add greatly to the glory of the Darcy name."

He looked contemplative, his eyes wandering the spring decked blooming fields of his home. He watched Cathy run after Captain. Her dark hair flapped in the wind. The spotted dog laughingly waited for the girl until she had almost tagged him before hurrying away. Darcy watched his sister laughing as she wove a wreath from flowers.

And then his eyes wandered back to the great manor house. Back to that tower that drew his eye, like a lodestone draws metal.

With an effort he forced his look back to me. "The grand mistake of my life, the blight that has turned all else to brown curled husks — we wedded and bedded three days before my father breathed his last. A gloomy, dark occasion. Both the wedding and the bedding — I speak too freely to you again, such disclosures are not fit for the ears of a gentlewoman. Once she had secured her position, Anne changed. Lady Catherine, your Cathy's name sake and grandmother… Lady Catherine is difficult. So Anne had no choice but to behave so as to impress me enough that I would swallow the bile in my throat and marry her. But she liked me no more than I liked her."

"It is a sad tale," I said. "Though not one so strange."

"You showed more wisdom, more perspicacity than I."

"It was easier for me to refuse Mr. Collins, as I had the support of my father and… perhaps this is much the opposite of you, but I was never raised to have any great respect for my mother's judgement."

Darcy laughed bitterly again. "I would that I had had far less respect for my honored and respected parents — Mrs. Darcy turned into a vile woman… she had strange habits. I learned this when she had a cat, one who had been Georgiana's pet since she was a kitten. She placed the cat in a small container, and then pressed the lid down until it suffocated, all the while claiming that she merely played. Georgiana was ten, and Anne screeched at the servants who wished to stop her that they would be dismissed if they interfered, as the cat meowed desperately… I did dismiss the servants — it was not good for the household for there to be such tension, but I made clear then that I was the one who controlled the estate, and the purse. Mrs. Darcy hated Georgiana… perhaps… perhaps because Georgiana was kinder than her."

"Surely that could not be the reason."

"So I sent Georgiana away." Mr. Darcy sighed. "And I… I did not know how to control Mrs. Darcy. She screamed at me. I was often scratched by her, and I feared to hold her tightly enough to prevent her from attacking me. It was… there was a madness in her. She had been ill often as a child, and bled frequently by Lady Catherine. She had a weak mind from the first… and then she was subjected to her mother's controlling ways… and now for the first time she was free from her tormentor. And in this freedom she refused any guidance, and let loose the worst of impulses."

There was another pause. There was that past present in Darcy's eye. He looked terribly like the still portrait on the wall of the gallery, looking down at his wife with a desperate need to escape.

"And then?" I asked. I knew there was more.

"And then, my mother died while she was in town. And I was obliged to travel to the south to be present at the funeral… or perhaps I leaped at the chance as Mrs. Darcy said she did not wish to travel with me…"

Darcy was silent again. A longer time.

"Perhaps," he said. "Perhaps I deserved this — I was not devastated by my mother's death… I blamed her for my unhappiness. I already was bitter. And Mama… Mama would never admit that she had brought me to marry a woman who I should not have. As I said, I was young. I had not yet learned that each of us, every one of us is responsible for our own choices."

"You were not responsible; you were a young man who obeyed his parents. That is nothing to be ashamed of."

Darcy shrugged. "So I returned home to Pemberley, once more without Georgiana, for I wished to protect my sister from Anne… I went ahead of the carriage by horse, for though I did not wish to see her sooner, I preferred my own rooms to those of a hired inn. The summer sun had already fallen, a warm still day. Quiet except the soft chirping and buzzing of the insects. The squeaking of nightingales. I came in quietly. I did not wish to hear renewed greetings from the staff or face the company of my wife before I must. I went directly, half on tiptoes, through the house to my private bedchambers."

I had a presentiment about where this story tended.

"My father had a godson named Wickham, the son of our steward, a particularly handsome young man with a facile quick tongue, and an easy way with women. I knew of his poor habits from living near him at university as we had been educated together, and while my father had intended for him a living in the church, the two of us had agreed he would receive money instead for the study of law. Despite his failings I considered Wickham to still be a friend, and he had a nearly free right for admission to Pemberley, based on long familiarity with the house and servants."

"I can guess the purpose of introducing this new personae to your story," I said softly, wishing I dared to touch and smooth Darcy's hand to comfort him. Or to smooth out the troubled brows.

"I daresay you do. They were in the very midst of the conjugal act when I reached my rooms, loudly and… but you are so wise, and have experienced your own hardships, so I forget again that I ought not speak directly of such things to a maiden. Suffice to say my wife proved herself to be lacking in every moral virtue."

Darcy picked up a stick from the ground, and then with a rough angry gesture split it in half down the middle, before tossing one side off. "So I did what was necessary, and challenged Wickham to duel, winged him and honor was satisfied. He decamped promptly for the Germanies, for all the good it did him. A half a year later the news came back to us that he was killed. A duel, again. Over the honor of another woman whose bed he charmed his way into. Anne… Anne took that news hard. Perhaps that was… perhaps that was part of why… She blamed me for his death. She insisted I had sent a bravo off to kill her love, the one good man she knew in all the world entire. And she was close to her lying in then. Her water broke as she ranted madly to me about my murderous choice."

"Oh!"

"Yes. So you see why if I am not so affectionate of a father as you think I ought to be, perhaps where my reticence comes from."

"She is not your daughter?"

"From the dates…" Darcy sighed. "It is possible she is mine. I had before I found her with Wickham. I had always assiduously done my duty while I was present at Pemberley, though I took no pleasure in the act. But is it likely that Catherine is my true daughter? I do not think so. Look at her. Any uncertainty, combined with the lack of similarity in features — this amounts nearly to a positive disproof. And should you see a portrait of Mr. Wickham… but I have destroyed them all. No, Catherine is not mine. At least I do not believe she is. She has some of my blood, since my grandfather is her great grandfather. But…"

It hurt me in my soul, the sadness in his voice.

"You do not ask once more, with that soft compelling tone that makes me say more than I say to most — more than I ought — you do not repeat now, 'and then?' And has your ready tongue no joke to make me laugh at my misfortunes?"

"I am hurt for you, Mr. Darcy. Hurt for you. I cannot laugh, and I cannot make you laugh. I have no joke for you. You deserved better."

"Desserts have no place in expectations. We all deserve better than what we receive — so since you do not ask, 'and then' I must continue without such prompting. There is not much left to the story — not much that I can say. She had a fever, a terrible fever after the birth. Her skin burned so hot… she ranted and raved, and was full of delirium and anger… and then…"

Darcy looked again towards his house. Towards the tall tower. I did not think anything then of the way his eye returned again and again to the tower. I noticed, but I merely thought it was an absent mindedness pulling his eye. Later though I would remember and understand.

Darcy's jaw stiffened again and at last he finished. "And then she ceased to scream."

I again ached to take Darcy's hand. To comfort him. I longed to see him smile again.

"And after I went to the continent to escape England. To leave these scenes where I had faced such a wife. And in so doing I left her child behind. I wished to find a way to live a happier life, but I have not… I have not found a way to be satisfied with myself. I am not proud to admit this." His voice went lower. "In my seeking for a form of happiness I did find comfort in the arms of foreign women of pleasure. For a month, or a three month even, but never longer. I always moved on, pursued by a guilt, and a—"

"You must stop. You must choose, Mr. Darcy, you must choose to live a better life than you have till now."

He looked at me. Those intent searching eyes. It was as though he pierced through the surface of the eyeball, and burrowed through the nerves into my brain, seeking something. Some knowledge from me.

"And, even…" I stumbled in my speech. "Even if she is no child of yours, Catherine is innocent of all the wrongdoing of her mother. She does not deserve this."

Darcy smiled unpleasantly. It lacked all warmth. "Have I not already said that just desserts have nothing to do with the matter?"

"What if she is — Mr. Darcy, what if she is yours? Or suppose, suppose by some accident your own child was cared for by another? How would you wish her to be treated? Would you wish that childish desire for your affection to be spurned or ignored, or would you prefer that girl be shown affection by her guardian?"

"And what if she is mine?" Darcy said sharply. "She is yet her spawn — but you speak rightly. I know you speak rightly. But it is hard." He punched his hand against his chest, in a more dramatic gesture than the usual of Mr. Darcy. "I swear to you, Miss Bennet, it is terribly hard to love a creature who is the spawn of such a story. Though I ought, the heart is not so easily commanded, it demands what it demands, and listens not to any voice of reason, nor to any voice of human compassion."

"Let your heart… let your heart be opened to… to love. To warmth, to growing happy again. Do not… do not let this bitterness consume you. You are too young, too good, and your soul is different from the angry man you become when you speak of Mrs. Darcy. Forget her — forget that she ever existed. You have a duty to yourself… and to Cathy and Georgiana, and to… to all who love you. You must choose to be happy, to take happiness whatever it requires."

Darcy looked at me sharply. It was in a different way from how he had ever before looked upon me. "You say I ought to take happiness, no matter what it requires? But what if it is wrong to be happy?"

"It can never be wrong to be happy."

"Ah, but I am certain it can. What if it were wrong? Would you counsel happiness upon me — I have in mind a scheme, a scheme that might achieve my happiness, but I know it would be wrong."

"Mr. Darcy… you speak in mysteries. But I trust in your goodness. I trust in your ability to find happiness."

"But were I to break my honor, if I were to choose something society would condemn… if that was the only way to be happy, ought I be happy?"

"If it is merely a matter of defying society, then yes. Yes you ought to choose to be happy… But I cannot advise you rightly, knowing no particulars."

"Yet I will take your advice. I think I shall. The determination to embark upon this scheme… it grows in me. Yet — no. No I shall not. I ought not… and yet… yet I cannot shake the thought of this scheme."

He looked at me, and I felt we discussed something of great import. And there was something different in his eyes. They were soft and warm, and for the first time I think, the first time yet, I saw something like beautiful hope in them.

Then Cathy and Captain ran up to us, and broke our gaze.