Thick London fog covered the great city like a moldy moist blanket the next morning when Fitzwilliam Darcy stepped outside his townhouse shortly before dawn.
He was tired.
Instead of sleep, Darcy's mind had whirled around and around the meeting that would occur with Georgiana and Wickham this morning.
Agreement had been established by notes run back and forth by his footman the previous afternoon.
Time: Ten in the morning.
That was Wickham's modification to Darcy's proposal of nine. It seemed that his old friend did not keep country hours in the city.
Place: The drawing room of Darcy's townhouse.
He was receiving them, and he was sure that Wickham at least was sensible of the honor being accorded to him.
What would happen?
Flashing through Darcy's dreams had been images of Wickham's sneering face, shouts, anger, and then a call for a duel. He'd dreamed the duel twice as well, once where he watched his snickering former friend laughing as the imagined pain in his belly woke him. The next time Darcy dreamed of himself looking sadly over the corpse of Wickham. His aim had been better, but it had taken so, so long to pull the pistol into position.
Darcy disapproved of duels upon general grounds, and further his father would have disapproved of further scandal. He would not shoot his sister's husband.
Perhaps they could be friends. They both loved Georgiana.
Perhaps Wickham loved her.
Wickham was tied to Georgiana in a closer and more intimate mode than the tie of blood that kept Darcy tied to his sister.
His father would have repudiated his daughter if he had lived to see this. He would never have permitted her name to be spoken around him again.
Darcy couldn't.
It… refusing to answer her appeal for a meeting, cutting her off wholly and forever for the sake of quieting the gossips, and because she had cut herself off from the Darcy name and legacy… he could have hacked off his own left hand more easily.
There was ground for some sort of accommodation. Visits to Pemberley. A chance for him to hold his nieces and nephews when they were born. Wickham's blood would then be admixed with Darcy's own.
Blood spoke.
Once he gave up trying to sleep, Darcy went to the mirror in his dressing room and lit a candle. He stared at his bloodshot eyes in the mirror.
He tried to say these words: "Dear brother, let us shake and be friends."
He could not.
It would be like…
Damn Wickham. Damn the scandal. Damn Georgiana. Damn himself.
Demand a duel. Demand it. Shoot the man. Between the eyes.
Kill, or be killed.
Darcy's breath panted out. He closed his eyes, and he forced his breath to come out at a slow, slow pace.
This anger was dangerous. Men could die of it. Perhaps himself, perhaps Wickham. He must manage it.
After that, Darcy watched the dawn from his window. The reddish light from the east slowly created an eerie glow over the artfully arranged piles of yellow leaves in the central garden.
Odd. Life was so terribly strange.
As soon as his valet woke, Darcy dressed quickly into coat and hat, and he stepped out of his building onto the street. The fine square, with a black wrought iron fence, greeted him peacefully. Tall houses surrounded him, and he took in a deep breath of air.
The boulevard was leafy and well maintained. Only two carriages rolled past, though there was a wagon in front of the house of a baronet on the near corner that was being unloaded. The butler stood on the steps of the main entrance, and he occasionally shouted at the workmen, "Caution you dogs! 'Tis fragile."
This butler nodded respectfully and bowed his head as Darcy passed. Darcy inclined his head back to the butler in acknowledgement. Once he was on one of the other streets, Darcy began to almost run.
He had so much energy in his body, and such a need to move.
Long pumping strides, feet moving as fast as he could force them. He swung his arms back and forth for the balance that let him move faster, and he took in deep breaths of the solemn morning air. He'd step out onto the muddy roads quickly to pass the slower pedestrians.
For a full hour Darcy walked, letting his legs carry him as fast as they could until he reached an area of the city that was only beginning to be developed, where the buildings were lower, the smell of the cesspits less obvious. There were many areas of still open land for gardens, or pens where livestock was kept for sale to the city's many butchers.
Darcy climbed up a small hill, and in front of him stretched hedges, fields of grain, orchards, barns, and more small fields set aside for cattle and sheep. Barns and hamlets spotted the landscape.
He'd never walked this far out.
Darcy's feet and legs were tired and sore, but also they felt good and right.
The air here was clean, a rural hint of manure and autumnal decay. It smelled a little like home. He missed Pemberley. For the first time since Georgiana's elopement, the thought of home filled him with longing instead of revulsion.
At a slower pace, Darcy strolled back into London. He hired the first hackney cab he saw on the streets of the city to return him to his house, as he did not think that he'd be able to walk back and still have an opportunity for breakfast before the arrival of his guests.
With breakfast he made some attempt to keep to regular habits, reading the Times of London with his coffee, his usual crumpets with honey and berry preserves, the same selection of cold meats, and the same collection of fried eggs.
He could barely eat, and occasionally took desultory bites from a muffin as he stared through the columns of newsprint. Most of what he put on his plate was still there when he rose shortly before the time assigned and went to the drawing room.
He wished Colonel Fitzwilliam was here. Of course, from the way that his cousin had ranted and raved when he'd been forced to take leave from his duties in a pointless attempt to settle matters around Georgiana, he would have told Darcy that he should not meet with either Georgiana or Wickham.
Still, even if Darcy was committed to a course of action that his cousin would fiercely disapprove of, Colonel Fitzwilliam would have been a reassuring and solid presence next to him.
Despite the absence of the master for several months, the drawing room had been thoroughly aired out, and it had a pleasant scent from the flowers that his housekeeper had placed around the room. Collections of blooming roses — his mother had always insisted on fresh hothouse roses in the drawing room, and his father had continued the tradition out of sentiment for her memory once she had died.
The drawing room windows looked over the road outside and the large park in the middle of the square. Darcy settled himself, crossed his legs, and waited. He no longer made the pretense of keeping to regularity, and he made no attempt to read.
He'd had brought out from the safe the bracelet of his grandmother's that had been pawned by them… by Georgiana, in Ramsgate, and which he'd recovered. She had always been fond of it. He spun it around on his finger as he waited. Next to it on the table he had a book of art that Georgiana had particularly asked for, and which he'd acquired while planning to hand it over as a gift when he visited her in Ramsgate.
He saw the cab come up, a hired carriage rather than one kept by the couple.
Sharp and well dressed — Wickham always had been. A Beau Brummel.
And Georgiana?
The dress she wore appeared awkward and ill fitted — she was taller. Only six months since they had seen each other, and she was taller.
They entered the house and disappeared from view.
Darcy suddenly grabbed the bracelet off the table, and hid it in a cabinet in the writing desk by the window. Then a minute later they were announced by the butler, his voice stiff and disapproving. "Mr. and Mrs. Wickham, sir."
"Thank you, Mr. North." Darcy stood to greet them. He opened his mouth to say something.
Nothing came out.
He stared at Georgiana.
She stared at him. Her long yellow hair was kept in a tight bun underneath a muslin mobcap with a simple blue ribbon and no lace. Her eyes were hollow, as though something were missing. And then she flinched away from his study of her and looked down.
Wickham smiled widely and he hurried forward, his hand out to shake Darcy's. He took Darcy's hand, almost without Darcy willing it and gave a friendly and firm grip.
"Hey, ho! Well met. Darcy, my brother! My dear, dear brother!" Wickham grinned widely and looked at Georgiana with a smile. "I told you that he would be happy to see us! You are delighted, are you not?"
There was no possible answer to that which Darcy wanted to make. Darcy had failed Georgiana. He'd failed her so horribly. He deserved this conversation. Those who failed to care for a person who God and blood had placed under their care deserved to suffer.
Darcy did not say anything.
Wickham stepped back from Darcy, his smile not wavering in the slightest.
He turned around to take in the whole room, spinning like a ballet girl. "The roses! You've kept the roses — Mrs. Darcy always insisted, a room with roses in bloom is fit to host a duke. I miss those times — happy times. When both your father and mother were still alive. Your father was dearer to my heart than my own. I like to think he looks down on me from heaven, and he smiles to see us all so happily arranged together."
"I know he looks down on us, from heaven." He judges me, and he weeps to see Georgiana's fate.
Darcy looked at Georgiana. She was trying to pull the too short sleeves of her dress down over her wrist.
Is that what she told herself? That Papa would have approved the match?
Georgiana noted his renewed study of her. She pressed her fingers together tightly and turned her head away from his gaze.
"Well, Georgiana," Darcy asked. "How do you believe Papa sees matters, do you think he is happy with your choice of partner in life?"
She flushed and did not reply.
His poor sister!
Georgiana had always been shy, but she had spoken freely to her brother at least. Now that seemed lost. Her dress had an appearance of being a little worn and faded, and it was too short around her ankles and wrists. Could she not shop properly without the Darcy servants to manage the task?
She did not wear any jewelry, even the family pieces that had gone with her to Ramsgate, and then eloped alongside the girl to Scotland. Pale. There were bags under her eyes.
Wickham clapped his hand loudly on the thigh of his sharp white buckskin breeches. "I am certain that Mr. Darcy looks down on us and smiles. Ha. He always thought of me as his own son — he'd say that to me often."
"Did he?" Darcy replied scornfully. "Is that precisely how he spoke?"
Wickham smiled at Darcy broadly. "More or less. More or less — I always had a notion that he loved me very much. Maybe that he wished we'd been switched, eh? You'd have made a fine steward's son. Don't you agree, Georgie, treasure? — Darcy would have been tip-top as a steward? It'd have been such a joke if I were the son of a great man instead."
Wickham grabbed Georgiana's hand and kissed it. "My dear wife. Sit down. Let's all sit." He patted the cushion of Darcy's deep buttoned Chesterfield and pushed Georgiana down into the cushion before plopping next to her, with one leg pressed familiarly against Georgiana's knee and the other spread out, draped over the arm of the couch. "Sit down, Darcy! You too. You look remarkably stupid as the only standing man in a room full of people who are seated — do you mean to give a lecture upon public morality? Preach a sermon? — ha, imagine how our lives would all be so very different if you'd given me the living at Kympton? I'd never have run across my Georgie-treasure at Ramsgate then."
Darcy's jaw tightened.
There was something in Wickham's jocular grin, a sort of eagerness to see his reaction.
The damned man, he was as imprudent and impudent as ever — Wickham's eyes shouted that he hoped, at least a little, to goad Darcy to anger, just to see what he'd do.
Even though they had come here, presumably desperate for money, Darcy recognized the dress that Georgiana wore at last. It was the same one that she'd worn the last day before she departed for Ramsgate.
Despite receiving more than seven hundred pounds between the two releases of Georgiana's quarterly income, they hadn't purchased any new clothes for Georgiana since the wedding. And despite his obvious need for Darcy's favor, Wickham could not resist needling Darcy.
Like a large bucket of freezing water on a sleeping man, that shocked Darcy into his senses.
He'd failed to protect Georgiana, and now she was the prey of a man who would not provide her clothes from her own income.
Darcy sat down, as Wickham had asked him.
He would bend himself, and make himself, for a little time at least, to be Wickham's equal. Darcy forced himself to smile. It was not a good smile. He was sure his face was a rictus that would concern a medical man. "We both love Georgiana. Do we not? I want us to be friends once more."
Georgiana looked up at these words. She stared at him at last. Her eyes held some message that he could not decipher.
"Ahhhhh." Wickham smiled widely. "Yes, yes — marital bliss. I tell you, Darcy, I've never been so happy. Never so happy as I've been since I married. Ah, the joys of married life! What joys are to be had! You ought to marry as well. I recommend it to all my bachelor friends."
"I shall take your suggestion under advisement," Darcy replied, forcing himself to not respond with raw anger at Wickham. Elizabeth Bennet passed through his head. How she had counseled him to accept and acknowledge that anger. Darcy's chest loosened.
He was above Wickham.
"Did you not always wish that we could be family in truth? You and I. Brothers! Brothers at last!"
"Yes." Darcy made himself smile again. "We are brothers."
"And I am so happy. It is ridiculous that we ever were enemies — Georgie-treasure, tell Fitz how happy we've been."
Georgiana's cheek was pale, and she now stared down at her fingers pressed together. The whole of her thin wrist bone was exposed by the too short dress. Darcy felt something sick in his stomach.
"Come on, Georgie," Wickham wheedled. His hand fondled her knee. "Come on, Georgie-treasure. Say how happy we are."
"We are…" Georgiana's voice cracked. "Very… happy."
She did not raise her eyes.
"See," Wickham exclaimed cheerfully, but there was a note of falsity, and an edge of anger. "Happy. We are happy."
Darcy did not respond.
One bunch of the roses sat by Darcy's chair, and the happy candied scent of the flower incongruously clashed with the tension in the room. None of them had anything to say to each other, though they were all connected in the most intimate manner.
It was his duty. He needed to be the first to speak, no matter how much he despised the need to patch his relationship with George Wickham.
Before he could summon the ability to speak, Wickham began talking again, with his head lolled back. He studied the fine woodwork in the ceiling. "Recall that summer when we camped for a week on the grounds? Old Martin selected a deer from the park for us to shoot, and we dressed and cut him up, roasted the meat on the fire, and lived like kings and slept in our blankets beneath the stars? You remember? — finest week of my life."
"It was not quite so rough," Darcy said without smiling. "The servants brought us tea and biscuits when you begged them for it."
Wickham laughed, showing his teeth. "I always had the proper spirit, did I not? — live as you wish, no matter what they intend you to do. We were friends. And you are a friend I can trust. I hope I'll be able to trust you. We've had these times when we were unhappy with each other, but surely you must wish to see Mrs. Wickham as happy as I wish to see her."
"I do. I want nothing so much as for Mrs. — as for my sister to be happy."
Georgiana sat stiffly against the back of the sofa, and she said in a clear soprano, with a nearly motionless face, "I do not deserve to be happy."
Her eyes were dry, she pressed her hand against her mouth in a gesture that anxiously reminded Darcy of their father's habitual gesture when he was unhappy about some matter.
"Course you do! Course you do, darling." Wickham's hand clenched and his jaw tightened. But then he smiled again. "The thing about wealth, one finds that one's friends are not as you thought they were. Soon as I married your sister — intent upon using all our income to support her, to make a happy home for the two of us, and eventually to find a nice place for our children. Do you not look forward to when we have children? There is nothing so sweet as a little finger eater who coos and giggles. Well — you see. One's friends often prove to barely be friends. And I had expectations. It was a hard thing — learning that those expectations were violated. You understand what I mean?"
"Not precisely," Darcy replied coldly. Here it came: The inevitable demand for money.
"I'll say it out simply, I am rather in debt — to my dear friends. But while they are the finest of people, they just do not care that Mrs. Wickham and I have a certain station to maintain — clothes, footmen, carriage. The comforts of life. A household of our standing must maintain a certain consequence. You understand, Darcy? She is your sister — but I can't do that at present, maintain Georgiana the way she ought to be. You see, these fellows — fine fellows — they wish to be paid back for a few debts I owe them, and my chief creditor is a fellow who rather expects to be handed the ready sooner than later — we'd taken on my expectations apartments here in town, you see, and with my debts there simply has not been sufficient money to pay these friends back."
"This sounds like a great difficulty for you."
Wickham shrugged. "Look at Georgie here — she wore that dress the day we were married — we've pawned all the jewelry she had. We keep only two servants, no carriage, just a horse and my valet. Every one of our affairs are in a tangle — each and every one. The butcher even stopped sending us meat. He is done waiting for the next quarterly — and look how Georgie suffers under this poverty."
Darcy looked at his sister again. Her hair was in a simple style, and her hands were wrapped together, her lips pressed tight, and the only movement visible was that her knee bounced rapidly.
"Georgie," Darcy asked softly. "Do you at least have a piano to play on?"
She shook her head silently: No.
"A piano?!" Wickham exclaimed. "Have you any notion how expensive they are — I'd made plans to buy a fine Broadwood. I had even spoken with their London agent. We'd selected the model I would purchase for Georgie — nothing is too good for my dear wife. And then…" Wickham smiled ruefully and spread his hands out. "Everything we had in the house was demanded of us — that's why I asked you to send round the carriage. We'd have had to walk otherwise. Walking! And when Mrs. Wickham is the daughter of one of the greatest families in the land — The Darcy name will be worth nothing if people see how we live."
Wickham began to speak again, but a sort of denseness in Darcy's mind made it impossible for him to listen as Wickham gabbled about how friends were not true friends who would not aid a friend in need, and how everything he did, everything, was for dear Mrs. Wickham, and—
"Stop." Darcy raised a hand, like he was signaling a halt to a hunting dog. "For God's sake cease to speak for a little minute." Darcy pressed his hand against his mouth. "What do you want? Precisely."
"Well of course my Georgie-treasure and I simply want what is owed to us, what we deserve — which is her fortune. Dear, is that not right, do you not want to have your fortune released to you?"
Georgiana stared at her husband.
"Tell him! Georgiana, tell your brother how much you want to have access to all your money."
She looked at Darcy. "Present matters for us would be enormously simplified if you were to hand all my fortune to my husband without delay."
This was a tone and some flicker of the Georgiana he remembered. "But only present matters? You do not think it would be beneficial for you in the long run."
"No," Georgiana said. Flat voiced, not looking at Wickham.
"For — fuck." Wickham opened and closed his hands repeatedly into fists. He glared at his wife, an ugly expression on his face. "Sometimes, sometimes, little Miss Darcy, I want to—" He clamped his mouth shut.
Fear spasmed in Darcy's chest. Much as a part of him enjoyed seeing the clear marital discord between his sister and Mr. Wickham, as Bingley had said, he ought to hope for the opposite.
Further, were they to go away empty handed, and if Georgiana was blamed for their failure to gain any portion of her fortune, Wickham would find a way to vent his displeasure upon his wife, who was legally and morally fully under his control.
"Wickham, how do you intend to prepare for the future?" Darcy asked in a reasonable voice. "You once already spent in a matter of a few years a fortune of four thousand pounds, what would—"
"Fortune? Ha! Four thousand pounds is a pittance. A nothing. It is barely enough for a man to properly live on for a few years. I deserved more. Your father meant me to have more — he loved me more than you."
"Is that?" Darcy spoke slowly, "Is that truly what you believe?"
Wickham gaped for a moment. "Damn you, Darcy. I thought you said we would be friends. You are now a liar as well."
"If my father had wished you to have more, he was fully capable of settling a greater sum on you in his will. He did not."
"He gave me the living at Kympton, the living which you denied me. You despised your father's will, and—"
"I have not forgotten that you received three thousand pounds in exchange for giving up the expectation of preferment."
"Three thousand pounds! A mere pittance. That living can likely with effort turn a thousand, or nearly so, each year."
"You considered the sum to be fair at the time the transfer was made. I still possess the papers we signed. And then you spent that whole sum in a very short span of years—" It was now Darcy's turn to stop himself from speaking.
They stared at each other.
Darcy finished quietly, "I do not wish to argue. Not with you. Not about the past. The future is what matters."
"Ah! I understand your hesitation. You are thinking of our dear future children. But surely you do not think I would be so irresponsible with a second fortune? Ridiculous, I have learned my lesson! I see that doubt in your eyes, but I have. You can transfer the dowry to me without fear — I'll not waste it. Not when I am married and have every hope for this pairing to be fecund."
There was a twisting and turning in his stomach. Darcy had a sort of revulsion at the thought of his sister, her marriage, and the fact that Wickham had full marital rights over her — but matters were what they were, and there was nothing he could do with regards to that.
"If you should sign a settlement," Darcy began, "I would be happy—"
"Settlements! Fah. Fah — they are ways that a man is limited, henpecked, trimmed back. But I'd sign a settlement — there is a simple problem though. You see, as I have already said, there are a few paltry debts which I owe. To friends, friends who were kind to me in my less prosperous days, and who now expect some recompense for their kindness to me."
Georgiana suddenly shuffled to the side, away from Wickham and the leg he pressed against her. As he shifted, following her, she shoved herself stiffly against the armrest. The tight wrap of her hair pulled the skin back on her forehead, giving her look a severity matched by the blue ribboned muslin cap that marked her as a wife.
Darcy felt his father's ghost. As always Papa watched him, and as always Papa judged him. He had been insufficient. The pains Papa had taken with his education had not turned to profit.
That ghost was there, and it despised his weakness.
"Before we speak upon matters further," Darcy said firmly, "I wish to speak privately with my sister."
Wickham's face caught weirdly for a few seconds between his usual agreeable charmed smile and a grimace. Then he shrugged, smiled, and leaned over and pinched Georgiana on the knee. He whispered something into her ear, which made Georgiana press her pale lips together tightly.
She did not nod, either in agreement or disagreement.
Wickham stood, patted her on her head, and said, "You must have much to speak upon — I would never wish to stop that. I want my Georgie as close to her family as possible. Like your father always said, blood speaks — eh, so you both talk. Just remember what I said, Georgie-treasure! I'll go resume my old acquaintance with Mr. and Mrs. North."
With a chirpy whistle, Wickham strolled out of the room, striding in a manner as insouciant as the Prince Regent.
Georgiana and Darcy studied each other in silence.
"You've grown taller."
Georgiana seemed startled by his soft words. "Oh." She looked herself up and down, and then pulled again at the short sleeve of her dress. She frowned. "Yes, yes. That. I did."
"But no piano. You must miss it so much."
She wrapped her hands together and didn't say anything.
"Oh," Darcy said, "When I came to Ramsgate, I'd bought a copy of that book with all the plates from David's paintings. The one you had asked for. Smuggled from France and all." Darcy stood and picked up the volume from the table and he shoved it into Georgiana's face.
She made no move to take it and just stared at him. She made a small moan and pressed her fist against her mouth.
"Go, take it. Take it. Take." With every word Darcy's voice rose louder. He clamped his jaw shut. Calm. No anger. In a completely controlled, yet bitter voice, he said, "It is worth some little money — you can give it to Mr. Wickham to also pawn off if you wish. And here—" He went to the writing desk and flung open the cabinet so hard that there was a sound of wood crackling. "Here's Grandmama's bracelet! The one you begged me for." He held it out. "Take it! I'll not redeem it this time when it's pawned, though."
The expression on Georgiana's face made Darcy want to punch himself.
Her arms hung to the sides, and she turned away from him and hunched. Her chin trembled and tears leaked down her cheeks.
"Oh, Georgie, Georgie — I — I am angry. Lord! I ought not be." Darcy sat next to her. He tried to put his arm around his sister's shoulders, but she flinched away from him. He stood again and paced. "I have no right to be angry. Not at you, not at even Wickham or Younge. I only have the right to despise myself. I failed you. I failed Father. I — am a worthless, useless human. No value if I can't protect those who I love. I — oh."
Darcy pressed his hand hard against his mouth to prevent himself from swearing at himself like a rabid, drink addled sailor in front of his sister.
"What?"
Georgiana looked at him, her eyes wide.
It was likely that he had never lost control of his own emotions in front of her so far as he had in that little speech.
"It is of no moment," Darcy said slowly. "What is done is done. I only wish to now aid you in your life and see to it that your choice of partner in life does not lead to more ruin than it absolutely must."
"Don't. Don't. I don't deserve any help." She gnawed on her knuckles.
"So, I must strive to think of Mr. Wickham as though he was a good man," Darcy calmly said as he paced, not having any sense of how to reply to what she had said. That anger which lingered inside of him said that yes, she did not deserve his help. It was his duty to help her. "My lawful brother, that will not change. You are still my sister, and—"
"Fitzwilliam, I am so, so — I was stupid, stupid, and a fool, and — oh, it is not your fault!" She started crying.
She ought to cry.
That resentfulness in his soul was hard to ignore.
Darcy let out a deep breath. He imagined that Elizabeth watched him. What would she think?
"Oh, Georgie, no. No. Not your fault. Poor, dear girl." Darcy sat next to her again, and he embraced her once more, and this time she let him. She sobbed into his shoulder, like she had the day their father died.
"Fitzwilliam. I am the evil one! I was the fool. I am the one who married him. I have become a Wickham. I am no longer a Darcy. You don't owe anything to me. Nothing. I know my duty now. I swore my marriage with him. I knew it was a mistake, but I was too… it was too late for me. And now… oh — I hate myself."
"No, no. You shouldn't. Do not say that."
Georgiana blubbered as she looked at him.
"I was supposed to protect you. I never thought I could fail so thoroughly. I'd promised father, and—"
"It's me! Not you. You see me. The way I am. You shouldn't feel sad. The fault always was with me. I never wanted to be — oh, it is not your fault. I just was not meant to be the perfect Miss Darcy Papa raised me to be. I wasn't right." She tapped her head. "Not right."
"Georgiana, listen you—" He did not know what to say. He was not a man who was well equipped to comfort her now.
He again tried to imagine what Elizabeth might say to Georgiana.
"Listen," Darcy spoke slowly. "You must not dwell on guilt and misery. It will not do you any good. You must live the life you have. Even though it has its many, many deficiencies, you can only live in it. You have no other life to live inside of. I wish nothing more than to see you restored to tolerable comfort."
She looked at him. Lips pressed together.
"Promise me, Georgiana, look at me—" She did. "Promise me you will not dwell on guilt and misery. Neither of us ought to."
She nodded.
"You made a mistake. You must live with that mistake, but do not think you are worthless or deserve to be unhappy because of it."
Georgiana let a long breath out. She started sobbing again.
Darcy held her and felt odd and confused. He had always been uncomfortable with physical touch. It was odd to him. Neither Papa nor Mama had often embraced them.
He once again drew on the internal thought of Elizabeth Bennet and asked what she might do.
Squeezing Georgiana tightly, he whispered nonsense little phrases, and began to sing a nursery rhyme to her that he had sung with Mama to her when she had been a thriving little baby who cooed and cried.
Slowly she stopped crying and then she pulled away and wiped her hands with a kerchief that Darcy handed her.
She took deep shuddering breaths and blew her nose into it. "You are much too kind to me," she said, "I do not deserve it."
"You do. What you do not deserve is — No, I must not prejudge. And he can be charming. Are you happy with your… husband?"
Georgiana instantly shook her head: No.
With a sigh Darcy stared at the window for a minute. After the sunny morning, thick clouds had gathered.
He pressed his hand against his mouth. "Georgie, you must — is there any way in which I can help? You are married to him, legally and before society and God. There is no force in the world which I can use to loosen you from him. However, if you wish sanctuary from him, I will provide it, and—"
"Oh no! You must forget about me. I am not worth worrying about anymore."
Darcy studied her again. Her eyes were clear and serious.
"My sister, you are always worth worrying about."
She made the same little shake of her head that she had when Darcy asked if she was happy with Mr. Wickham. "I am no longer a Darcy."
"I've missed you. I cannot listen to the piano played without great emotion. I have spent the last months — at a loss with myself. Georgiana, we are still family, and whatever Wickham is, I must accustom myself to being his friend. That is what I owe you. My principles can allow nothing else."
"Papa was much deceived by Mr. Wickham," Georgiana said. "He will never really be your friend."
"I know."
"Do not worry about me — I am now a Wickham. I understand what that means. I made a vow before God, I learned enough from you and Papa to know that such vows are serious matters. I will fulfill my duties as a wife." Georgiana's voice was firmer than it had been at any time before now in the conversation.
"You have an additional tie," Darcy said. "But the tie of blood cannot be undone. You are always my sister."
Georgiana stared at him.
A great swell of emotion that tried to make him cry in front of his sister began to claw up Darcy's throat. Don't cry.
"That is what—" Georgiana's voice cracked. "I disappointed you. So very greatly."
"I only was ever disappointed with myself." Darcy knew that was not strictly true, but the words felt true now.
With a sudden convulsive motion Georgiana embraced Darcy, and she began whimpering apologies again and again.
He held her until she quieted, not quite knowing what to do, nor what to say.
At last, he asked her, aware of the passage of time, "Now tell me, what does Mr. Wickham hope to gain?"
"Money. What else has he ever wished?" She sighed and tugged at her cap as though to lower the brim over her eyes. "I must tell you to give it to him. I did promise to obey him, and he has ordered me to."
"A compelling argument for why I ought to," Darcy replied dryly. "Cicero himself did not argue more clearly against the Cataline conspiracy."
Georgiana giggled and she pulled herself up to sit straighter. She smiled at him. "I know that you won't give him a shilling out of my fortune that you are not required to by law, no matter with what eloquence I speak upon the subject."
"I do not know that for sure. I can conceive of there being an argument which might convince me otherwise."
"Mr. Wickham will be most unhappy with me, and with you, but there is nothing to be done. It can't be helped. Lord! It can't be helped. But I am glad, brother, I am dearly glad that I saw you this once, and that I could apologize for what I did to you."
Georgiana held her hand up to stop Darcy's words. And she smiled, looking a little like a Madonna. "You wish to say it was your failure, and that I was just a girl, etcetera, etcetera — we both know how ridiculous that notion is! It was me, and you cannot rob me of that guilt, any more than you can dissolve my vow to God taking him as my husband. But I am a Wickham now, not a Darcy. So do not say anything."
She rose and pulled the servant bell, and when the door was opened, Georgiana said in an almost cheerful voice. "Do have my husband called."
After the passage of a few minutes during which neither Georgiana nor Darcy said a word, Wickham strolled into the room with a jaunty air.
He walked to Darcy and put his boot familiarly on one of the tables, with a manner as though he owned the room. "Well, brother, well? You've enjoyed the talk with your sister? Eh? — we must be friends! Christmases at Pemberley? What is your thought on that? — Soon enough there will be children." He winked at Georgiana. "Every effort that might be made in that direction is."
Neither of them said anything to him.
Wickham clapped Darcy on the shoulder. "You know what I mean! You do. The blood must right. Eh?"
Darcy returned Wickham's cheerfulness with a pained smile. "I am to understand from my sister," Darcy said, "that you hope to receive a portion of Georgiana's fortune in cash with which you can settle financial matters with your 'friends' who showed you 'kindness', and then you will be willing to sign a settlement that ties the remainder of Georgiana's fortune to her person?"
Wickham grimaced. "If you would simply give me the whole, I could invest it better than in the funds. I have a friend who has a most promising venture, and—"
"No. The funds are reliable." Darcy smiled thinly. "Friends with most promising ventures are not."
"Reliable! Why look at how they have wavered in value with the fortunes of England in the wars! Should Napoleon's venture into Russia show profit, who knows how little the profit in your consols might be? My dear Mr. Darcy, you trust the promises of statesmen and the parliament far more than you ought, and I'd even say that—"
"Wickham, what is the sum of your debts?"
"My dear friend, my father was a steward, and Pemberley prospered under his care. And I certainly learned a great deal at his knee. What if we were to wish to buy an estate? If all of Georgiana's capital is locked up in perpetuals, not permitted to be sold under any circumstances, that would be impossible. Do you not want your nephew to rule over a small estate, proper to a gentleman's standing?"
"The sum of your debts, Mr. Wickham. The sum. What is the number? In pounds. Or guineas. Or French francs or American dollars. A number."
"I—"
"A number. Wickham. This conversation will go no further until you announce a number."
"Do you really mean to offer me the sum?"
"A number, Wickham."
His father's old favorite stared at him gape mouthed. Wickham looked young in this moment, and Darcy was forcefully reminded that for all his charm, and for all the damage he had done, Wickham was still two years his junior — and ten years older than the young girl he had seduced, ruined, and married.
"Ten thousand," Wickham blurted at last. "No, no — twelve thousand."
"You mean," Darcy said sharply, "that you owe ten thousand, and you hope to have two thousand piled on top as your own private fund."
Wickham flushed, hesitated, and then he said, "No it is twelve thousand."
Darcy leaned forward in his chair. Here was the moment. He was going to give a man he despised a large reward for his vileness.
This was what it meant to love someone, to love Georgiana. He thought that his father's ghost was finally looking on… and he was not sure if it was with approval or yet deeper disappointment.
"I will give you ten thousand from my own fortune, and you will sign a settlement that my solicitor has drafted tying the thirty thousand of her dowry irrevocably to Georgiana's person."
"You will?" Wickham's jaw gaped. "You in truth will? From your own fortune?"
"Yes."
"My friend! My dear friend! My patron's son! You are truly a man deserving of the name Darcy! You are your father's son — but my debts truly do amount to twelve thousand, and—"
"I am certain your creditors will be satisfied by receiving the bulk of what is owed them and accepting the remainder on installment from your income."
"But Darcy, surely you want—"
Darcy slammed his hands down on the low oak table that sat between them.
The crack shocked Wickham into silence. "This is not a negotiation, just as we are not truly friends. Perhaps we one day may be. If you care well for Georgiana, and if she is happy, I will eventually learn to not hate you. But I give this money because it was my failure as a guardian that put Georgiana in such a position. I will not see her fortune diminished for that cause. And because a properly written settlement will ensure her interests are cared for. Ten thousand, and you sign the settlement upon the rest of the fortune."
Wickham studied Darcy, then he shrugged and smiled with all the charm he'd practiced for years in front of the mirror. "Eh, better than I ever expected, I'll accept that and—"
"No!"
Georgiana rose from the settee. "I'll not — Fitzwilliam… you cannot… it was me. All the mistake was mine. I'll not see you throw away your own fortune… I do not even know what you wish to achieve."
"I—" It was simple, Darcy knew what he wanted to achieve. Beyond any hope of aiding Georgiana, improving her position, and ensuring that she was well cared for, his true hope was to expiate his guilt by giving the man he disliked most in the world a large fortune. "Georgiana, you cannot prevent me from aiding you and your husband in this way."
"I'll not permit it." Georgiana's voice suddenly had the same confident tone as Lady Catherine's. "The whole purpose of this conversation is that Mrs. Younge's husband has gravely threatened Wickham so that he will give her the promised third of my fortune. I would stab my own eyes with a thousand needles rather than see her get a penny if I can prevent it. It is not right, and I'll not permit it. I will not. You shall not give Mr. Wickham a penny of your own fortune. I will find some means to stop you."
"You damned bitch." Wickham spat. "You damned bitch." He strode towards his wife, his hand raised high to slap her.
"Wickham!" Darcy's sharp voice cracked through the room.
The command in Darcy's tone stopped his childhood companion.
"If you strike my sister in violence, if it should ever come to my ear that you have, I will see to it that you regret that act."
"Oh? How would you protect the bitch? — she is my wife. My right — I read enough Blackstone to know that I have the right to discipline her as I please. Any stick no wider than a thumb. Fuck you. Darcy, she is fucking mine. Brother. And I'll fucking kill her if I want."
A rush of fury went through Darcy. It was unlike anything he had ever felt. Yet it left him cold, with a preternatural sense of clarity.
Wickham's height. The presence of the pokers around the fire, vases that could be lifted and smashed over heads, the penknife in his inner pocket, the strength of his own fist. Time seemed to move slowly.
He had a perfect sense of why he could not duel Wickham: Wickham might kill him, and then be free to do with Georgiana as he wished. Or he might lose, without even being seriously injured.
Darcy stepped towards Wickham with a sort of smile that he had never known he could give. "I will have you killed. It is simple: Should I ever hear of such a thing, I will wait outside your house, and I will shoot you dead. I will, and I swear this before God, I will put a bullet through your head."
Wickham stepped back, and he stumbled over the footrest behind him, and barely managed to catch himself. "You wouldn't. You—"
The eyes. Darcy's eyes told his childhood companion the truth. "No duels. No game of honor. Just a bullet through the head."
"They would hang you!" Wickham shouted. "And then they would — they would—"
Wickham broke off.
Darcy only stared at Wickham, hoping his eyes convinced Wickham of the truth. The truth that he would see Wickham dead if he ever struck Georgiana.
White faced Wickham at last nodded. "You'll never hear. You'll never hear of me doing such a thing."
Darcy tilted his head. He felt full of a sort of deadly power. Wickham suddenly seemed to him to be less of a person, and more of an object. A thing whose brains might make an interesting pattern against the ground as they splattered out the back, behind the exit wound.
"You can't!" Georgiana exclaimed. "You can't, you can't! Brother, don't—"
"I will." Darcy's voice was low, but something in the tone cut across the room. "But do not worry. Wickham understands his situation." Darcy stepped to the door, and he opened it. He smiled thinly at the footman on the other side. "Fred, will you see Mr. Wickham escorted from the house."
Wickham studied Darcy. His pupils were very wide, as though he'd just come into a brightly lit building from the darkest night of the year. He then walked to the door in a motion that still showed that he had practiced how he walked many times in front of a mirror, to gain the best possible effect from his deportment. However, the jauntiness, the impression that he owned every space he entered, that was gone.
"Come, Mrs. Wickham." He turned to Georgiana. "We must go to our humble home, wife."
Darcy opened his mouth.
He wanted to beg Georgiana to stay. To tell her to ignore her husband and to abandon him.
But he couldn't.
She was married. She had made her vows before God and man. And he was a Darcy. He could not beg his sister to act in an irreligious and socially repugnant manner, no matter how much he wished to wholly remove her from the control of Mr. Wickham.
With an almost meek air she followed Wickham to the door, but then she turned around, and looked at Darcy.
Their eyes met for a long time. "Fitzwilliam, I am a Wickham now, I am no longer a Darcy."
And then Wickham said, without touching her, "Come, Mrs. Wickham."
And she went.