Page 66 of Elizabeth and Caroline
“But it is more than that,” Elizabeth said. “It is all very bad and very confusing, and I do not wish to be alone right now.”
“Sit down,” Caroline urged her. “Tell me everything.”
So, Elizabeth did.
Caroline reacted with shocked gasps to each new wrinkle in the tale, shaking her head, fingers to her parted lips. When it was all out, Caroline was entirely silent.
Elizabeth let out a breath and sat in the silence with her friend.
“What can it mean?” said Caroline. “He cannot have both of them, can he?”
“I don’t know,” said Elizabeth. “He certainly can’t marry both of them. I think, if he wishes to marry, he must prefer Georgiana to Lydia, so it makes me worry that he abducted Lydia, for she was taken earlier, and that he used her ill and then abandoned her and went for Georgiana instead. Lydia could, then, be anywhere, all alone, having been ravished and with nothing, no money, no way to get home, and I am frightened that neither my husband nor the colonel will give as much worry to her safety as to Georgiana’s.”
“Yes, I can see why you would worry,” said Caroline. “But Mr. Darcy will protect your sister, I am sure of it.”
“Yes, but if she has been abandoned God knows where, then how shall we ever even find her?”
Caroline nodded slowly. “All right, all right. Let’s assume that you are Mr. Wickham, and you have decided to debauch two young girls in succession. Well, perhaps it did not go that way at all. Perhaps, you—as Mr. Wickham—tried something with Lydia, ended up unsuccessful, and then decided to take Georgiana as a consolation prize.”
“Do you think Lydia escaped him, perhaps? Ran off on her own?”
“I don’t know,” said Caroline. “What I am getting at, though, is that you would want a place to carry out said debauchery, would you not?”
Elizabeth nodded slowly. “All right, I suppose. But you, as Mr. Wickham, could do it in a carriage.”
“Perhaps,” said Caroline. “Perhaps you could. But if you do that, you are going to have to convince the girl with you to allow such liberties there, and you have gotten her to go with you on the promise of marriage, undoubtedly, and she may resist such a thing. It would be better, easier, to make her comfortable, and that would probably facilitate someplace with a bed.”
“An inn?” said Elizabeth. “But he would have to pay for such a thing, and does he have the money for that?”
“Maybe he won it in cards?”
Elizabeth was remembering something that her husband had said about how Mr. Wickham had gotten Georgiana’s companion to assist him in attempting to elope with her before. “Or maybe you know someone who currently runs a boarding house in London, and maybe you get her to give you a room with a bed for free.”
“What?” said Caroline.
“Mrs. Younge, the former companion to Georgiana, is disgraced and turned out and my husband told me she runs a boarding house here in town.”
Caroline nodded, eyes bright. “He must have taken Lydia there. Maybe she’s still there, in fact. Maybe he left her there and went after Georgiana.”
Elizabeth wanted this to be true. It was so much better than Lydia wandering the roads on the way to Scotland, ruined and ravaged and frightened. She would still be in a very awful state, of course, but she could be indoors, safe enough, perhaps… though alone in a boarding house was still very bad. She shot to her feet. “I have to go and seek this place out. I have to go now.”
“Yes,” said Caroline, also getting to her feet. “You came here in your carriage. Let me but get my pelisse, and I shall accompany you.”
“Oh, Caroline, you do not have to do that.”
“I most certainly do,” said Caroline. “I shan’t let you go off to that part of London on your own.”
Elizabeth considered this quickly and only nodded. “Thank you.” A pause. “But your sister and brother willprevent it.” If Mr. Hurst was a different sort of man, he’d likely offer to go himself, but she well knew that if he found out, he would only stop anyone from going anywhere.
“Likely, yes, so we shan’t tell them that is where we are going,” said Caroline. She marched across the room.
Elizabeth followed her.
Caroline went directly to the front door and asked one of the servants to fetch her pelisse and reticule. “If my sister inquires, tell her I have gone to spend the day with Mrs. Darcy. Tell her we are scheming a match, and it will take us quite some time. I may not be home for dinner, even.”
The servant hesitated, and Elizabeth knew that this was rather irregular, that unmarried women did not announce their leaving, but usually asked permission. The servant might bear the brunt of bringing these tidings.
“We are in a bit of a hurry,” said Caroline, imperious.
