Page 4 of Under Such Circumstances (Desperately Seeking Elizabeth #1)

MR. WICKHAM THOUGHT he was quite clever arranging it all the way he did. He had a bit of a plan, of course, before he got into it, but there were elements of it all that he didn’t anticipate.

For instance, the women wanted to bring along a manservant to carry the picnic basket, and Mr. Wickham had to put a stop to that, for it would not do to have another man along, truly, because that would mean that he could be left with the servant, and Mr. Wickham needed to be alone with Miss Bennet.

So, he managed to evade this by offering to carry the picnic basket himself, flashing his most charming smile at both of the ladies and asking if they did not think he was capable of doing it. “I am not some weakling dandy, you know,” he told them. “I can quite bear the small load of our lunch.”

So, they agreed, and then they all set off.

The place he took them to was a place he’d gone often as a child but usually on his own, when he was alone and had no one to play with except perhaps Darcy, who he’d called Fitzie then, and who’d hated that.

Darcy’s father had thought it great fun, however, and insisted that Darcy bear the nickname.

He’d been subjected to Georgie in return, which was not quite as bad, he had to own.

He didn’t like it either, but he endured it for the joy of getting under Darcy’s skin.

Darcy had come out here with him a time or two, but then Mrs. Darcy, his mother, who’d been alive at that point, had found out all about it and had forbidden it in stern and harsh terms, her voice rising with anxiety.

That part of the wood? The part in which there is a low gully, sometimes with a stream, sometimes not, depending upon the rain?

The part which is only accessible by that raggedy little footbridge?

No, I forbid it. If anything happens to that bridge, we must go round miles to fetch you back.

You shall not go there again, is that clear?

And even the late and elder Mr. Darcy was ruled by his wife in such matters, so the younger Darcy, little Fitzie, did not go.

But Wickham had gone by himself, anyway.

There was a set of falls out there, though only he knew how to find it, because no one else ventured over the rickety wooden rope bridge, which swayed back and forth when one walked upon it.

He half-hoped that Mrs. Collins would simply be too reticent to cross that bridge, letting him easily get some alone time with Elizabeth.

That would have been quite simple, truly.

He expected Elizabeth was quite as innocent as most unmarried girls of gentle birth.

He didn’t think he had to entirely ruin her, just make her think he had.

He would eventually entirely ruin her, of course, was looking forward to it, in fact, though he was also sometimes a bit wistful it was this Bennet sister with the inheritance and not the stout and well-formed Lydia, who was so stupid that he could have made up anything and gotten her to marry him.

Elizabeth was witty, though. She was funny. She was also pretty enough. Perhaps there was a little less to her bosom than her sister’s, but she was not badly endowed. It had been quite some time since he’d had his hand on a woman’s skin anyway. He was excited.

Mrs. Collins crossed the bridge easily, however.

Well, she did make quite a lot of protestation about the look of it, and Wickham had to admit the bridge itself was in disrepair since the last time he’d seen it.

But the rope he’d strung between two trees himself, years ago, to use as a handhold, was still there, still strong, stronger than the bridge itself, in fact.

So, both women made it across by clutching onto the handhold rope with both hands.

He had considered simply falling into the gully on the first go-round over the bridge, but then he decided that might seem too contrived. Furthermore, he would have to spill the uneaten picnic lunch, and this seemed a frightful waste of perfectly good free food.

Though Mr. Wickham had never known true hunger, he knew what it was to value food. There had been times in his life when he had been concerned over his next meal, it was true, but he had not often had to actually go without.

So, they ventured through the woods. The trail he’d made years ago was rather overgrown.

Furthermore, it had been made by a child, so it had not been what anyone might term wide in the first place.

He went first, hacking at the greenery that overtook the path with a small knife he carried, and still holding the picnic basket, and his efforts brought merry accolades from both Elizabeth and Mrs. Collins, both of whom seemed in fine spirits at this little adventure he had brought them on.

When they finally reached the waterfall, he had to admit it was not nearly as majestic as he remembered it when he was a boy.

It seemed so small now. That was the way with age, though.

Everything that once held wonder had it all leached out by this or that, or simply the passage of time.

What he wouldn’t give to be a boy again, his whole life ahead of him, and to still have real hope that he might be able to make something of himself.

No, no, George old chap, he said silently to himself. This is the opportunity here, right in front of us. Elizabeth Bennet, and her inheritance. We shall have it.

Except, truly, what was the inheritance but a pittance? He’d had sums of money that had seemed large in his past and he knew how quickly the money could all go.

Perhaps this time he could do it all differently.

He would be married, after all, and married to a pretty and witty wife who might prove very distracting.

He could spend all this time with her, doing things that didn’t cost a cent, and perhaps it would all be enough.

Perhaps he could make himself into something staid and responsible yet.

Mrs. Collins and Elizabeth were both quite charmed by the falls, however.

“To think, this has been out here, so close to our rectory, and I never knew,” said Mrs. Collins. “I should think we could get a better bridge built, widen these paths out here, and then we could walk here much more often.”

Wickham wanted to protest that this was his own private little space, and that he didn’t wish everyone to come and see it. But he was no longer a guest at Rosings, and he was no longer a boy who needed his own private little spaces. He only smiled.

“Yes, I think it’s quite beautiful,” said Elizabeth. “And there is something relaxing about the crashing of water on rocks, isn’t there? It’s so rhythmic, somehow.”

“Truly one of God’s gifts to his children,” said Mrs. Collins, tilting her head to the side and smiling.

Elizabeth guffawed. “You have become quite the parson’s wife, I see!”

Mrs. Collins snorted. “Oh, I did sound as if I was twice my age, did I not?”

They clutched each other and laughed.

He made no overt advances towards Elizabeth at this point.

They shared the picnic lunch, which was a nice spread of leftover cold chicken and thick sliced bread and some sweet pickles with several pieces of a lemon custard tart for dessert.

They spoke together of trifles, and they all laughed together.

It was on the way back that the conversation took a bit of a turn.

“I must thank you,” Elizabeth was saying. She was right behind him. Though the path had been quite cleared of any stray thorn branches on their way in, he was still going first and the ladies were bringing up the rear. “This was quite what I needed to get my mind off what happened to me yesterday.”

“What happened?” he said, all solicitude, though his mind was on the task ahead, believably falling off the bridge and taking Elizabeth with him, and how was he to make sure that he didn’t take Mrs. Collins as well. He must get himself and Elizabeth on the bridge together. How to do it?

“Oh, it was the most unbelievable thing!” said Elizabeth. “When I tell you, you will be all agog. Mr. Darcy proposed to me.”

Mr. Wickham stopped walking.

Elizabeth nearly ran into him. She giggled. “I did surprise you, then! Charlotte and I cannot make any sense of it.”

Wickham turned round. “You’re engaged to him? You didn’t say anything.”

“Oh, be serious, Mr. Wickham,” she said, throwing back her head and laughing. “Accept that man?”

He was stunned. “You refused him?”

“Obviously.”

He blinked at her. He cleared his throat and turned back around and started walking. “Just so. You do not like him, and I did know this.” Everything was all right, then. She had refused Fitzie Darcy, which meant she was daft, likely just as daft as Lydia.

He didn’t understand, however. Why would she do that? Was there someone else? If there was someone else, it was going to make it materially more difficult to ruin her, but he was up to the challenge.

“You have gone so strange!” cried Elizabeth behind him.

Damn it all to hell! He had been too noticeable. “Any mention of that man unsettles me,” he said.

“Of course,” she said, very concerned. “It must, after the injustices he visited upon you. I told him, of course, when I was refusing him, that this was one of the reasons why I could not marry him.

He stopped walking again, turning to look at her. “You brought me into it?”

“I’m sorry,” she said, furrowing her brow. “Ought I not to have done that? It’s not as if he wasn’t already aware of the injuries he has done you.”

“He sees it all differently,” muttered Wickham, walking again.

Could it be him? Could he be the someone else?

They had been friendly in Hertfordshire, and he had flirted with her, rather mercilessly, but then he flirted with positively everyone mercilessly, and she had surely noticed that, hadn’t thought anything of that.

He remembered their last meeting before she left for Kent, and he’d been certain she was not expecting anything from him.

It was always tiresome when women were expecting things from him, after all.