Page 23 of Wickham Likes 'Em Young
She hurried to do so, murmuring to him, “Are you certain you will be safe even on the short ride to Netherfield, Mr Darcy? Would not a meal or a nap better serve you right now?”
He smiled and looked sidelong at her. “I imagine I look quite poorly, then?”
Elizabeth blushed. “Oh! No, I was not attempting to….” She sighed. “You do look tired, but I am concerned because of your journey these past few days.”
“I will be well.” He stopped on the front steps and said, “I wished to tell you, as I informed your father, that I would like to formally call on you, court you with the goal of, hopefully, marriage. However, I feel that I must focus on Wickham first. He has been a thorn in my side for years, but I do not wish him to be a thorn in every Bennet’s side as well. I have consulted with your father, and I have learnt what steps your father has taken to alert the good folk in and around Meryton. But it will take some thought to plan the next steps, and it may take time to accomplish those steps. In the meantime, if you need to reach me for any reason, your father has agreed to send messages to me at Netherfield, or to my valet, Wilkins, who will best know how to get word to me. I will be merely three miles away.”
Elizabeth could not convince her body to respond correctly. She trembled and grinned rather than curtseying and murmuring warm words of understanding and acceptance. She opened her mouth in an attempt to say something—she rather hoped to say somethingappropriate, and if not that, perhaps something witty. But instead she just gave a little gasp while her warming cheeks must have been blushing quite vividly.
Watching her with one of his most inscrutable smiles, Mr Darcy said, “I believe I have robbed you of the ability to speak!” He reached out and took her hand, giving it a little squeeze.
Somehow that gesture reactivated her brain, and Elizabeth arched one eyebrow. “I imagine, sir, that you enjoyed that prospect, but I assure you that I generally do not remain silent for long.”
“I would not have it any other way,” he murmured, and he brought her hand up to his lips for a kiss. “Goodbye for now, Elizabeth.”
“Goodbye, Mr Darcy.”
“Might you call me Fitzwilliam?” he asked. “At least when we are alone?”
“Good night, Fitzwilliam. And thank you for rescuing me from Mr Wickham. Again.”
That night, Elizabeth went to bed quite early, curling up with her father’s copy of Walter Scott’sThe Lady of the Lake. She felt quite different about bedtime of late because she still shared a room and bed with Jane—but now that she was seeing Jane with a different perspective—in part, through Darcy’s perspective—she no longer felt comfortable telling her sister her every thought and dream.
Before reading the poetry, Elizabeth contemplated the fact that she had apparently misunderstood Jane’s motivations and, indeed, her character…her entire life. After giving it some thought, she realised that when she was very, very young, just toddling around in a gown and leading strings, Jane was already wearing miniature dresses, behaving beautifully, and being incessantly praised by both parents for her pretty speeches and perfect manners.
In contrast to Jane, young Elizabeth had been louder, bolder, and far more active. Those characteristics seemed designed toearn parental scolding, not praise. She was too young to interest her father with her wit, certainly way too young at that point to indulge her father in all his favourite activities—literary analysis, debate, chess—and her mother seemed to be continually vexed with her. So she hadneededher older sister’s affection.
She had viewed Jane as practically perfect because she used her admiration for her sister in exchange for Jane’s attention. She had believed Jane to be steady and kind because she had needed her to be so.
That night, as Jane climbed into bed, her face was lit in a smile that seemed as gentle and loving as ever. “Good night, Lizzy. I hope you have the sweetest of dreams!” she said, her voice sounding affectionate. Jane pinched out her own candle and turned with her back towards Elizabeth, apparently assuming that she would stay up to read as usual.
“Good night, Jane. I hope that for you, as well,” Elizabeth whispered, and, lying on her side so that her book lay in the circle of light from her own candle, she began to read:
The rose is fairest when 't is budding new,
And hope is brightest when it dawns from fears;
The rose is sweetest washed with morning dew
And love is loveliest when embalmed in tears.
That night Elizabeth did not have the sweetest of dreams. Instead, she had another disturbing dream about Mr Wickham. This time she was not trying to protect her sisters from him, but Mr Darcy. Somehow, Mr Wickham had locked both of Mr Darcy’s wrists behind his back using metal rings, and had bound his ankles tightly together using rope.
Mr Darcy was saying her name, quite calmly, “Elizabeth. I need your help, please, Elizabeth.”
But Elizabeth was a victim of the strange physics only found in dreams. She could hear Mr Darcy, and unfortunately she could hear Mr Wickham, as well, who was taunting him by calling him “Fitz” in the most juvenile manner. She tried to move towards Darcy, tried to speak to him, but her legs were slowed down as if she was moving through jelly, and her voice was distorted and made so quiet she was certain that the men could not hear her. She watched in horror as Mr Wickham approached his prisoner with a large knife—and as she made one more valiant effort to aid Darcy, she woke up.
The feeling of her heart hammering almost distracted her from an odd sound—odd, at least, in the dead of night. Elizabeth breathed shallowly but carefully, willing her body to calm, and she listened carefully for sounds not made by her own laboured breathing.
There was a sharp whisper. It must be Lydia and Kitty, Elizabeth was sure. That was not terribly strange, even so late, but the answering whisper sounded desperate. “Please, Lyddie.Please!”
She grabbed her wrapper and tied it around herself as she opened the door, peering in the direction of the voices. The shock of seeing Lydia fully dressed, even in a pelisse and bonnet, in the middle of the night meant that she had to speak up, waken everyone, alert her parents, certainly, to whatever was going on here.
She said, “Lydia Bennet, where do you think you are going?”
Lydia gave a cry of disappointment, but she lifted her chin and said, “I am in love with Mr Wickham, and I am determined to marry him!”
“And yet he has no desire to marry you,” Elizabeth said flatly. Lydia, of course, was already opening her mouth—no doubt toclaim that he had proposed—so Elizabeth continued before her sister could protest, saying, “As you know, from what Papa has said about Mr Wickham, he promises marriage and proposes to young ladies, and then he ruins them and leaves them. He is not in the least honourable.”
