Page 5 of A Maid of No Consequence (Pride and Prejudice Variation)
GUIDED BY REASON
I t took him a moment to understand her. “Lady Pollard? I had not thought her as horrible as that!”
“You are much too vocal, sir, you are calling attention to our conversation.” She looked around, noticing a few passers-by who had slowed to stare in their direction.
Mr Darcy lowered his voice. “You must leave that house. Elizabeth, you are not a maid! You are a gentleman’s daughter.”
It did not escape her attention that he took leave to call her by her Christian name.
She glanced at him before answering. “No, I was at one time, and I am no longer. I have already explained my change in circumstances. You freely share your guidance of what I ought to do, and yet you speak of what you do not know.”
It felt like a switch or a lever had been pulled, and Elizabeth lost her ability for prudence.
With the dam cracked, she let the waters spill forth.
“I have no one, sir. No husband, no champion, no family to speak of. We were left with nothing, not even the five thousand pounds that had been settled on my mother. All my sisters are being cared for, but only just. I went into service to support myself, to eke out a living. You, a man of wealth and property, cannot know how it is to be a woman with nothing, and no one.”
“That is hardly fair. I, too, have known loss, deep loss. And uncertainty.”
His words made her recall what she had known of him; he had lost both of his parents at a young age, and became guardian of his young sister while simultaneously becoming Master of Pemberley, responsible for a vast estate and its farms, tenants, and their families.
She had spoken rashly from deep emotion, fear, and frustration, and regretted it.
“Of course, you know loss, and uncertainty,” she said apologetically.
Elizabeth knew she should stop there, after acknowledging his own experience, but after five years of holding her tongue to employers and strangers, she found she needed to say more.
“Yet, Mr Darcy you are in no one’s employ, you have a roof over your head, one might say a grand roof, and you have never had to work for your supper.
You have those that are dear to you, near you.
And I dare say you have not had to suffer bruises at the hands of one who hates you. ”
“I cannot know what you speak of, and yet the bruises I have suffered cannot be seen.” He paused, took a breath, and his voice took on a less defensive tone.
“I am deeply sorry. I did not know of your situation. If I had known, I could have helped you, perhaps even prevented this.” He gestured towards her, and she felt very self-conscious of how she looked as a maid, even on her half day .
If anything had made her feel even lower than a gentleman’s daughter, it was this; she winced slightly before she could school her features. “Then I ask this: Where were you, Mr Darcy?”
He looked stricken and confused. Before he could respond she continued, “I understand you did not receive my letter, but if you had truly cared for me, enough to offer me your hand, why did you not seek me out when I disappeared?”
There was silence long enough to cause Elizabeth some degree of discomfort. She knew she should take her leave. Then came his reply.
“Because I believed I was the last person in the world you would want to see.”
My own words, used as his reason. Well, I deserved that. After a long moment, she finally found her voice, though there was little strength in it. “And yet, here we are.”
What was there to say now? Each had been disappointed by the other in profound ways. She could see no way of going past it.
“I thank you, Mr Darcy. I will take my leave now, as I have letters to post before returning to my residence.”
She turned slowly as he was bowing to her. Evidently, Mr Darcy had nothing to say. She walked slowly, careful not to limp, even with the ache in her ankle. She felt the space between them grow, and with it, her own heart felt emptier than it had in many years. Elizabeth felt utterly alone.
Darcy walked through the park, to find his carriage waiting where he had left it.
His heart ached more now than it had ever done, worse than those first few days after Elizabeth quit Kent so abruptly five years ago.
Even when his cousin, Fitzwilliam, had tried to console him with distractions, he would have none of it.
He had returned to Pemberley and closed himself off for nearly two months.
Even his sister had worried for him, as he took his meals in his rooms, and barely spoke to the servants. He had never felt so utterly alone.
But seeing Elizabeth for the first time, even if she was in reduced circumstances, was a gift, was it not?
He could not just walk away. Especially if she was being mistreated and harmed by the hands of a spiteful woman!
Miss Bingley’s—as she was then—hatred for Elizabeth was his fault, he knew.
She had held a tendre for Darcy from the day they met, even though he had never given her cause to hope, not once.
When Elizabeth tended to her ill sister at Netherfield, Caroline Bingley had seen his attention turned to the lady’s ‘fine eyes’ and her ire had been stirred, her spite born. It all came back to him now.
How was it Elizabeth was in the home of that cruel, vicious woman? What could be done?
What can I do?
Though his feelings were a muddle after seeing Elizabeth after all of this time—she had written to him, replied to his letter, and whatever chance he had had to gain her affections had been lost when the letter went astray.
As a result, five years had passed—unhappily for him, but filled with grief and suffering for her.
Elizabeth had fairly laid this at his feet: a woman without fortune or connexions could be made powerless in this world.
Darcy rubbed his eyes as he stared out the window of his carriage .
Five years ago, Elizabeth Bennet had not been a good match for him.
Now, having been in service to someone who would much enjoy destroying them both with gossip?
It was an unimaginable, likely ruinous, connexion.
Yet how did that matter? Hearing of her ordeal and seeing her in physical pain, Darcy knew he could not walk away.
He must swallow his hurt and his pride and put his efforts into helping her, no matter her feelings towards him.
There was one certainty: he still loved her with every fibre of his being.
If she left town, as she said the family soon would, he would lose his chance at helping her.
Staring blindly out the window, with London streets a blur before him, he announced to no one, “My dear Elizabeth, I will fix this!”