Page 47 of Knowing Mr. Darcy
“Maybe because of money,” muttered Darcy. “But you wouldn’t want a woman like that—”
“All women are like that!”
“No, they are not. Not everyone cares about such things.”
“You mean, some people are resigned to being lesser. Some people have decided it’s too painful to dream of having abundance. Some people think there is no hope of worrying over such things—”
“Some people realize it is as much a burden as a blessing!”
Bingley laughed. He threw back his head and laughed and laughed. Then he collapsed into his chair again. “Oh, damnation, you really believe that.” He laughed some more.
Mr. Darcy was feeling more and more annoyed here. “I didn’t come here to speak about Elizabeth Bennet. I came to speak about how you are going to stop your sister Caroline from inflicting pain uponmysister.”
“Go and ask her, then,” said Bingley. “If you think that she would choose you over me, go call upon her at her aunt’s and uncle’s house in Cheapside and ask for her hand and see what it is that she says.”
Darcy allowed that scenario to play out in his head a little too vibrantly. He imagined her shy acceptance. He imagined taking her into his arms. He imagined asking for permission to kiss her. “I have said that I can’t marry her,” he muttered gruffly.
“Yes, because you know she’d accept you.”
Darcy didn’t say anything.
“Any woman you asked would accept. You can’t even dream of being turned down.”
“I don’t know why we’re harping on this same subject. Iwish to speak about Caroline.”
“Yes,” said Bingley. “Yes, indeed.” He shrugged. “Well, you needn’t worry about that. I had a long talk with her after we returned home last evening. I told her that if she ruined you, she ruined us by extension, for nearly all of our connections were made through you. I told her that you would weather it. Your sister wouldn’t, but you would. And we would not. It would paint us with the brush of scandal, and we would never escape it, but you would shake that stain off in time. I told her she was mad to do any of it, and that I would not allow her to destroy everything we’d built.”
“She simply saw reason?” Mr. Darcy knew Caroline better than that.
“She saidIwas destroying everything we’d built going after a woman you wanted for yourself. She hadn’t known that wrinkle before, you see. And she said that it was one thing to be your friend, but it was quite another to marry your ruined sister. Of course, I pointed out that I couldn’t marry both of them, which she didn’t like. But I shouldn’t worry about that conversation, for a man called on her today. He left just before you arrived, in fact. Mr. Higgins. He danced with her last night and he’s intrigued and she is entirely distracted by that. I doubt she’ll spare you a thought until he jilts her. And maybe he won’t. Maybe someone will find Caroline charming. Or, failing that, perhaps she’ll manipulate him into marrying her. We can only hope for such a thing.”
“Higgins,” murmured Mr. Darcy. “Not the elder Higgins.”
“The elder Higgins is Lord Thatchley.”
“So, the younger Higgins.”
“No one calls the elder Higgins by his last name.”
“I suppose not.” Darcy didn’t like Higgins very much. Darcy might go so far as to call him a dandy. He had inherited some land from his late father and he was well off enough. He might do for Caroline, he supposed. He thought she would be distracted by the idea of a prospective suitor, but he wasn’t sure that was the end of the matter.
“You must leave my sister to me,” said Bingley.
Darcy didn’t know if he could trust Bingley to keep Caroline in line.
“And if you are serious about relinquishing any pursuit of Elizabeth to me, then I suppose our business here is concluded.”
Darcy lifted his gaze to Bingley’s. “I’m being dismissed, am I?”
Bingley had the decency to look abashed.
“We’re not friends anymore?”
“I don’t know,” said Bingley. “You… if I marry her and the two of you make eyes at each other like that? I can’t be married to a woman who looks at you in thatway.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Darcy. “She didn’t look at me any way at all.” He was firm on this. If he denied it enough, perhaps it would become true.
Bingley eyed him, considering this. “You swear this? Maybe I was mistaken. Maybe I saw something that I thought…”
