Page 75 of Out of His Wits (Pride and Prejudice Variation)

T he fire had burnt low in the grate when Mr. Skinner entered the study with the afternoon post. Darcy turned from his correspondence—or rather, from where he had been staring at the same letter for the better part of an hour.

“A message from Hertfordshire, sir,” Skinner said, placing the sealed letter on the desk. “The boy waits for a reply.”

Darcy broke the seal and read. Mr. Harding, the Meryton magistrate, conveyed that the Lent Assize would include proceedings related to the events at Netherfield, and that, as a principal party, Mr. Darcy was accordingly notified. The trial of George Wickham was set for the fifteenth of March.

He read the letter twice. It was not a summons. He was under no obligation to attend. Yet if Miss Bennet were to be present—as she might well be—he could not remain in London. Not when there was even the slightest chance of seeing her again.

“Tell the boy there will be no reply,” Darcy said. “And send Fletcher to me. I shall need my travelling case prepared.”

“Yes, sir. For how long shall we expect you to be away?”

“Two days. Perhaps three.”

Skinner bowed and withdrew. Darcy folded the letter and placed on his desk, then rose to pace his study with the tension of a man seeking distraction.

A soft knock interrupted his search. “Come.”

Georgiana entered without announcement, a small tray in her hands. “I hope you will forgive the liberty,” she said, setting it carefully upon the table. “Mrs. Annesley suggested some tea and this tisane may be of some benefit.”

He looked at her with his brow quirked. “I am not unwell.”

“You have scarcely left this room since Thursday,” she replied, without reproach. “Even Fletcher begins to glance at the clock with unease.”

“I have had business to attend to.”

She glanced at the neglected papers strewn across the desk. “It appears to have left little trace.”

Darcy let it pass. “I am to travel into Hertfordshire. Only a few days. I am to attend the Assizes.”

Georgiana stood quite still. “This concerns Mr Wickham?”

“It does.”

She hesitated. “Will Miss Bennet be there?”

He took up the letter and smoothed its creases. “I cannot say.”

She nodded. After a moment she said, very gently, “I remember after Ramsgate. You always knew what to do for me. Now I cannot seem to say anything that is right for you.”

He looked at her then and truly saw the worry she tried to hide. “You need not say anything, dearest. Your care is enough. I have not made it easy for you. I am grateful.”

“I hope the proceedings will not prove too disagreeable,” she said.

“They are said to be a formality. I do not look forward to them.” He attempted a faint smile that did not quite hold.

She straightened the tray though it did not require it. “If you should see any of your friends there—”

“Yes?”

“I hope they may remember you kindly.”

She faltered. “Only that … I hope they may remember you kindly.”

His reply was quiet. “I do not deserve their kindness. But if she is there—” He stopped himself.

Georgiana waited.

“If she is there,” he said at last, “I shall not intrude. It is not my place.”

Georgiana tilted her head. “Even so … I think she may be glad to see you.”

He crossed to her then and briefly placed a hand on her shoulder. “Thank you.”

She reached up and touched his hand lightly in return. “I shall pray for a fair outcome.”

“I expect to return by Wednesday,” he said.

Darcy’s eyes closed for a moment.

When he opened them, Georgiana was still watching him, her expression composed but gentle.

“I thank you, Georgiana. I apologise for my preoccupation. I shall write, if there is any news,” he said quietly.

She gave a small, grateful nod. “That would ease my mind.”

He offered a faint smile. “You need not be concerned—I have survived worse than an Assize Court.”

Georgiana did not smile in return. “You should not always have to survive things.”

He looked at her then, surprised—and something in his expression softened. She clasped her hands more tightly. “It is only—I shall be thinking of you. That is all.”

Darcy touched his sister’s hand. “I thank you. That is no small comfort.”

She curtsied and left the room.

Darcy turned back toward the fire, one hand resting lightly on the mantel. The letter lay tucked in the desk behind him, its weight no longer in his fingers, but in his chest.

Outside, the streetlamps had begun to glow against the encroaching dusk.

The morning was overcast, the parlour quiet but for the ticking of the clock and the muted clink of china. Charlotte sat across from Elizabeth and set her teacup in its saucer.

“The wedding preparations advance with great vigour, I see. Now that your mother is engaged in wedding planning, has she ceased castigating you regarding Mr. Darcy?” she said.

Elizabeth grimaced. “It is a less frequent refrain, but she still trots it out whenever I cross her.”

“At least daily, then?” Charlotte teased. “How do you regard the matter now?”

Elizabeth set down her teacup. “I realise I am far from the discerning paragon I thought myself. I took umbrage where he meant honour. I saw condescension where there was care. I let my pride speak louder than my judgement.”

“Your pride,” said Charlotte mildly, “has always boasted admirable force. Louder than most choirs.”

Elizabeth laughed, then covered her face with one hand. “I was so certain he believed the match beneath him. I mistook my own mortification for disdain. I was furious—furious, because I cared. And because I could not bear to be pitied.”

“Then perhaps it is not too late,” Charlotte said.

Elizabeth sighed. “I sent him away with nothing but scorn. It is entirely too late.”

Charlotte smoothed her skirts and smiled. “Then I suppose we must see if a man of character is also a man of persistence.”

Charlotte was silent a moment, then added with dry irony, “Now that Jane is to marry Mr. Bingley, the neighbourhood appears entirely restored in its opinion of the Bennet family.”

Elizabeth arched a brow. “How gracious of them.”

Charlotte allowed a smile. “There has been a thorough alteration. No more mutterings about assignations or forward behaviour.”

Elizabeth coloured faintly. “It is fortunate that ambiguity makes such an effective chaperone.”

Charlotte took a sip of tea. “I thought you might wish to know that Lady Lucas now claims to have always thought him ‘a young man of singular rectitude.’”

Elizabeth did not reply.

“I believe,” Charlotte said, examining her glove, “I may have once suggested that an honourable man with ten thousand a year ought not to be lightly dismissed. An intelligent, honourable—and undeniably handsome—man.”

Elizabeth gave a half- laugh. “You did. And I, in all my discernment, dismissed him entirely.”

Charlotte looked up, her expression unreadable. “What is your discernment now?”

Elizabeth met her gaze. “Now I see I was a fool.”

“Ah.”

Elizabeth sighed. “I thought it was presumption—when he offered protection, and I would not see it. I thought him cold when it was I who was ungenerous. I was angry at everything—at him, at myself, at the circumstances—and I struck out in anger.”

Charlotte paused for a moment, then quietly commented, “I take it, then, that you are no longer indifferent.”

Elizabeth gave a dry smile. “I do not think I ever was.”

Charlotte nodded once, her gaze lingering on the garden beyond as she lifted her cup.

Elizabeth paused at the crest of Oakham Mount, the ground soft beneath her half-boots and the evening breeze stirring the loose curls about her face.

Netherfield’s chimneys rose in the distance, dark against the pale sky, yet her gaze fixed not on the house but inward, toward the tangle of doubt and longing she could no longer suppress.

How often she had recalled that long ago night: Mr. Darcy’s voice low and unguarded, words of devotion spoken with candour that disarmed her . “I ardently admire and love you.” The memory of it still set her pulse to flight.

She had recited each failing—her mother’s shrill displays, Lydia’s heedless conduct, her father’s scathing jests—as though to spare them both the pain of future regret. Every reason he might have had to withdraw, she had supplied herself.

For months, he had observed a scrupulous distance, marked by patience and tenderness she scarcely deserved. And then, without warning—without a word to her—he had gone to her father.

That morning had left her shaken—angry, uncertain, exposed. She had felt a stranger to her own life. Her wishes were overlooked, her judgement made secondary to a decision already presumed. She had answered with heat, refusing his offer not with dignity but with wounded pride.

She sighed, her hands curling at her sides.

Why had she persisted in defending him from a match he had never sought to escape?

His every action had contradicted the objections she had once placed between them.

The quiet inquiries after her family’s comfort, the efforts to shield her from gossip, the deference he showed—even when her father’s wit approached incivility, all belied her assumptions of his presumption.

She had decided his nature—honour-bound, proud, too certain of his own judgement. But beneath it all, he had acted from love. Could she still pretend her fears had been for his sake, when in truth they had been the bulwarks of her own pride and uncertainty?

Charlotte had once remarked that Mr. Darcy seemed the sort to love once—and firmly—though without display.

Jane had inquired gently whether resentment might yet colour her view of what she had once misjudged.

And Colonel Fitzwilliam—blunt and unsentimental—had opened her eyes to a steadiness she had never thought to find in a man.

How she wished she had held her tongue!

If he still loved her—truly, unwaveringly—then what did it signify if her family fell short of society’s expectations? His affection was no passing fancy. It had been constant, evidenced in every quiet act of consideration.

But he was gone.