Page 65 of Elizabeth and Caroline
The servant wanted Elizabeth to write out a reply to send with him.
She didn’t know what to say.
She told the boy to wait for her, and then she got herself ready and had the carriage take her across town to the Matlock household, where she arrived in the midst of breakfast, shown in to where the family was dining and Lady Matlock looked at her with sheer horror at the intrusion.
“I wonder if I might speak to Colonel Fitzwilliam alone?” said Elizabeth, all in a flutter. This was all highly irregular. “It’s a matter of some urgency, I’m afraid.”
The colonel had been smiling at her arrival, but his countenance went grim as he took in the state she was in. He got up from the table and escorted her into a nearby sittingroom.
“I understand that you and my husband share guardianship of Miss Darcy,” she said, for her husband had indicated this to her. “He would have sent word to you, I’m sure, if he’d had the time, but he left in a rush very early to go after her.”
“After her?” said the colonel. “Oh, Christ, it’s not him again, is it?”
“Mr. Wickham?” she said in a small voice.
“It is,” said the colonel, looking even grimmer, if that were possible.
“It’s all quite strange, sir,” she said. “We have had two letters arrive within hours of each other, both indicating that Mr. Wickham has eloped with a different girl. One of them my sister-in-law and the other my own sister.”
“What?” said the colonel, drawing back.
She explained it all as well as she could. She produced both letters. He read them, looking more alarmed by degrees as he did so. He looked back and forth between the letters, shaking his head, flummoxed.
“What do you think it means?” she said. “He cannot have taken both of them, can he?”
The colonel handed one of the letters back to her, still gazing down at the other. “I suppose your husband has already gone in pursuit of him?”
“Yes,” she said.
He handed back the other letter. “Well, he can only be bound for Scotland, I suppose, whichever girl he has with him. I shall go after Mr. Darcy and Mr. Wickham and get to the bottom of this.”
“But if you find him, and he only has Miss Darcy, what will that mean about my sister Lydia?” said Elizabeth.
“He will know what he has done with the other girl and I shall get the information out of him,” said the colonel, and there was something hard in his tone.
Elizabeth had a realization that this man was no stranger to violence, serving in the army as he did, and it settled into her. She gave a quick nod. “Well, good, then.”
“You did the right thing to bring this to me, Mrs. Darcy,” said the colonel. “I shall be off immediately. You must go home and wait for the return of myself and your husband once we have gotten to the bottom of this.”
“Oh, of course,” she said. “I must stay here.”
“This is not a task meant for gently bred ladies,” he said.
Except, of course, it involved gently bred ladies, two of them. But she only nodded.
The colonel lifted a finger. “However, would you be so good as to tell Miss Bingley that I shall not be able to call upon her today? I think she may be expecting me.”
“Yes,” said Elizabeth. “Certainly.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Darcy,” said the colonel. “Try not to worry overmuch, if you can. Between myself and your husband, we shall get to the bottom of this.”
“ELIZA, WHAT ISthe meaning of this?” said Caroline.
Elizabeth was in the drawing room of the Hurst household, and it was still quite early in the morning, far too early for calling upon anyone at all. Caroline was dressed, but hastily, and her hair was in a braid, and she was fiddling with the collar of her morning dress.
“I am here primarily to bring you a message from Colonel Fitzwilliam,” said Elizabeth. She had first gone back home and written a letter to be delivered back home, saying that her husband had gone after Mr. Wickham, but that the situation was quite puzzling, for he had seemingly also abducted Miss Darcy. She worried about setting this information down in a letter, but she thought, if it were delivered by a servant, not in the regular post, it must be safe enough. Besides, her family must know what was happening, how strange it all was. She did not feel right about keeping information from them, not when it concerned Lydia.
“Oh?” said Caroline. “At this hour of the morning?”
