Page 34 of A Cleverly (Un)contrived Compromise (Love’s Little Helpers #3)

CHAPTER 34

B eneath Mr. Lucas’ handsome features was a curious mind. As the heir who would inherit Lucas Lodge, he was eager to learn estate management. Bingley had quickly befriended the young man and agreed to share what he knew. Darcy was pleased, hoping the lessons he had taught Bingley would not be so quickly forgotten this way.

Bingley invited him and Richard to accompany them to the problematic fields in need of better drainage, but Darcy refused. Bingley could make that decision himself, and there were still things he must say to Georgiana.

She had shown no inclination to leave the room since the arrival of Mr. Lucas. Her gaze followed the young men out to the hall and out of view, where it remained fixed until Darcy stood in front of her, feeling invisible.

“I, too, owe you an apology. I had no right to interfere in affairs of the heart. You are young. While the freedoms allowed an unattached female are few, you ought to be allowed to enjoy them fully.”

She looked down at her hands. “You sound like Miss Elizabeth with her talk of independence and choices. What choice do I really have but to be left behind? You have not yet married, and already I miss you. Whom shall I have when she takes you away?” A tear dripped onto the carpet.

Darcy closed the distance and wrapped his arms around her narrow shoulders, her head pressed against his heart. “I would never abandon you, Georgie. Our family is only growing. When I am occupied with estate business, you will have Elizabeth to keep you company. She will make you a wonderful sister. She has already shared her plans, and they all include you. We shall travel more. When the war is over—for it cannot last forever—we shall go to the continent. Elizabeth has never had a private tutor, and she looks forward to learning new things with you. You can invite your friends from the seminary to Pemberley.”

Georgiana sniffed. “You will allow it? I have not entertained much before.”

“A deficiency for which I take responsibility.” Darcy pulled back to hand her his handkerchief. “Mother loved to entertain. She would be proud to know that her daughter desires to follow in her footsteps.”

A brilliant smile lit Georgiana’s face. “I wish I could be just like her.”

“You already are in so many ways. She was kind and gentle, but there was a firmness to her character that even Father knew not to cross.”

Georgiana picked at her fingers and chewed her lip. “Was she never nervous that other people would not approve of her?”

“You cannot help what others think of you. All you can do is determine what sort of lady you would admire, and aim to become her. Your real friends will continue to seek out your company, and you will intimidate the others away when they see you are unwilling to change yourself to suit them.”

“Elizabeth is not intimidated by you.”

Darcy shook his head. “No, she is not, but there are times she terrifies me.”

“No! Really?” Her shock made Darcy chuckle. He understood his father better now.

“Elizabeth is a self-assured lady with firm opinions. She does not hesitate to tell me when I am wrong… and I have learned that I am wrong more often than I thought.” She had given him an ultimatum, and Darcy had no doubt she meant it. She would rather face ruin than be attached to a man she could not respect. Blast it all! He had bungled everything into a horrible mess.

A loud, rhythmic clap startled him. He had been so intent on Georgiana and his own thoughts, he had forgotten that Richard was still in the room.

Richard continued to clap. “Well done, both of you.” He rested one hand on Darcy’s shoulder. “It is about time you realized that you cannot save everyone, nor is it your business to do so.” He rested his other hand on Georgiana’s shoulder. “You allowed Miss Bingley to tickle your ears with fanciful wishes and self-serving compliments. You do not want to be like her, do you?”

Georgiana grimaced. “She said some cruel things.” She bowed her head. “I have not been very kind to Elizabeth or Jane.”

Darcy reassured her, “You could not have chosen anyone more disposed to forgive than those two ladies.”

She did not look so certain. “In time for the wedding?”

If there was going to be a wedding.

Richard supplied what Darcy could not say. “He and Elizabeth had a… misunderstanding.”

“About what?” The ensuing silence grew more uncomfortable the longer Richard and Darcy stared at everything in the room except the source of the argument. Georgiana was not fooled. “Was it about me?”

“In a way. Elizabeth is convinced her sister loves Bingley.”

“And you meant him for me!” Georgiana buried her face in Darcy’s crumpled handkerchief. “Oh, what a disaster! But”—she peeked from behind the cloth—“if Jane truly loved him, would she not have fought harder for him?”

Darcy sighed. “That was what I argued. I called her indifferent.”

“You did not!” Georgiana cried.

“Oh, yes, he did,” Richard commented. “Dunderhead here claims to have more insight into Miss Bennet’s character than her own sister does. Elizabeth, with three younger sisters, is well-versed in the ways of sixteen-year-old ladies. She contended that your inclination toward Bingley was likely not of the till-death-do-us-part variety.”

Georgiana grasped onto Darcy’s arm with both of her hands. “You must apologize at once, or I will have ruined everything! I beg you not to allow it! Please, go to her and apologize.”

“I shall try.”

“Grovel is the word,” contributed Richard.

“I shall do my best, but”—had Darcy’s arms not been immobilized by his little sister, he would have shoved his hands into his hair and pulled—“she was severely disappointed… to the point of calling off the wedding.”

Georgiana’s reaction stupefied Darcy. He had expected a gasp; instead, she grinned at him and squeezed his arm. She finally let go to cross her arms and tilt her chin. “I am told that Elizabeth is disposed to forgive.”

Impertinent lass! Darcy shook his head, a smile breaking through his gloom.

Richard roared.

They did not hear the ruckus out in the hall until the door burst open and Bingley’s butler stepped inside. The poor man was so flustered that Darcy thought to offer him a chair.

The cause of the butler’s shaken appearance brushed past him. “Darcy, I shall have a word with you,” snapped Her Ladyship, Aunt Catherine.

Uncle Hugh entered next. “Not now, Catherine.”

Anne came in next, rolling her eyes, her voice dripping with exasperation. “I wanted to return to Kent, but Mama insisted we come here.”

Aunt Catherine stabbed the Aubusson carpet with her cane. “You do not know what is best, Anne. Your engagement to Darcy has been a long-standing arrangement since you were infants. I shall not allow a country chit to make a fool out of my nephew and ruin your future.”

Uncle Hugh looked heavenward. After a deep breath, he spoke with strained forbearance, “Darcy is a grown man, fully capable of making his own decisions without your interference. It is about time you got that through your thick skull.” With that, his patience had reached his limit. It took Richard and Aunt Helen’s intervention to separate the quarreling brother and sister.

Darcy was frozen in place. It struck him like a lightning bolt: he had very nearly done to Bingley what Aunt Catherine had been doing to him since birth. Had he really expected Bingley to wait years and then marry the lady of Darcy’s choosing? How arrogant and high-handed! Granted, he had taught Bingley a great deal and had made no official claim on him for Georgiana, but Darcy had hoped it would happen and did everything he could to make it happen.

Richard had challenged him; so had Elizabeth. Although Darcy had heard their words, had thought he understood them, it was not until this instant, seeing a glimpse of himself reflected in his most unreasonable aunt, that Darcy finally recognized how right they had been.

He had been ridiculous, arrogant, and nonsensical. That Elizabeth saw this in him and still favored him at all was a miracle that infused Darcy with hope. If Elizabeth might love him, even just a little, with these terrible faults, he could not let her go without a fight.

Taking his aunt Catherine by the shoulders and stopping her mid-rebuttal, Darcy did his best to adapt Bingley’s pretty speech to his present circumstances.

Aunt Catherine slapped his hands away. “Have you gone mad?”

Clasping his hands before him, Darcy replied, “Thank you for believing me to be the best match for your only daughter and wanting to entrust Anne’s happiness to me. However, she has made it plain to me that she does not wish to marry at all, and I am in love with a lady whom I do not deserve but shall marry on Monday, if she will still have me.”

“Harrumph! I would sooner convince the overreaching miss to release you from her clutches. Two thousand will do it.”

Richard shook his head and clucked his tongue. “You should have gone with the mad argument, Darcy. There will be no shaking her now.”

“Elizabeth cannot be bought. Nothing you can tempt her with will persuade her to change her values to suit you,” Darcy said proudly.

Aunt Catherine blustered and quibbled, but Darcy had to return to Longbourn.

Rising from the fainting couch, Anne kissed him on the cheek. “Allow me to wish you and your Elizabeth happy. You will not be received at Rosings before a twelvemonth, but I pray that does not prevent you from inviting me to visit you at Pemberley.” Her gaze flickered over to her irate mother. “She will refuse to accompany me, I am sure.”

“I shall disown you if you go without my blessing!” Aunt threatened.

Anne shrugged. All her mother had brought to her marriage was a title and a dowry. The fortune and estate would pass to Anne from her father whether Aunt Catherine approved or not. “I shall spend a merry time at Pemberley with Darcy and his new bride. It is your choice to persist in this stubborn manner, Mother.”

“And watch you willfully cast away your birthright? Foolish child! Until you are capable of making advantageous decisions on your own, I see no alternative but to choose for you.”

“I am hardly a child, Mother. I am twenty-seven and firmly shelved.”

“Another imprudent choice!”

As mother and daughter flung “poor choices” back and forth at each other, it occurred to Darcy that he should give Elizabeth what she most wanted: a choice.

Caution told him the risk was too great to proceed with his idea. Despite that, he realized that caution may have served him well in his lifetime, but if he were to make amends with Elizabeth, he must accept the possibility that she could refuse him.

However, if it worked…

He would need Anne’s permission. “Anne, might I have a word with you and Richard?”

Both looked at him agape, but they agreed.

After a quarter-hour discussing his plan, they parted ways from Bingley’s study—Richard with Darcy, and Anne with a warning. “This had better work, Darcy. Not only will Mother make you miserable, but I shall make you pay if you fail.”

Richard unlodged the ball of nerves lodged in Darcy’s stomach with a firm clap on the back. “I cannot believe you are doing this. It is madness. It is perfect madness.”

Darcy could hardly believe it either. Perhaps he had gone mad.