We settled down to our fishing again. James had picked himself up and was much better behaved to Darcy. He had a bruise coming up on his cheek, but he said no more of being bored and tried to do as he was told, ending the morning by catching two very fine fish.
‘So Fitzwilliam is giving orders already, is he?’ asked Mama, when I told her of the incident. ‘He has the natural Darcy authority. Study him, George. That authority will be useful to you in the future.’
‘Mama, you know I have no authority!’ I said with a laugh. ‘I cannot give orders for the world! Anyway, why should I need to? As you are so fond of telling me, I have charm!’
‘Impudent boy!’ she said, ruffling my hair affectionately. But then she became more serious. ‘Charm is a great asset in life, but there are certain people who will not respond to it at all. Amongst them are tailors, bootmakers, and tradespeople, people you will need to converse with in the future. They will grant long credit to a man who behaves as though he owns the world, but they will not give anything to a charming rogue, for they know that charm never paid a bill. You must study people carefully, George, so that you can decide which manner will best suit the people you are dealing with. Sometimes charm and sometimes authority. Try it now. Stand up very straight and look down your nose at me. Just think of Fitzwilliam. He has the true Darcy spirit. There is not a tradesman in the land who would refuse him credit, though he is only sixteen years old.’
I tried to assume Darcy’s posture and expression, and Mama laughed and said that I did it very well, at which I collapsed into laughter beside her.
‘I wish I were Fitzwilliam,’ I said, when we had recovered. ‘Then other people would have to study how to please me, instead of me studying how to please them.’
‘My dear George, you would hate it if you were Fitzwilliam. He will grow up to inherit a lot of responsibility as well as his money, something you would not like at all. You are better as you are.’
I thought there was something in what she said. Even so, I would happily change places with Fitzwilliam. Then I could pay someone to take care of my responsibilities and I could spend my time enjoying myself.
8th June 1788
The morning was hot and Fitzwilliam and I escaped from the schoolroom and ran down to the river, where we dived in and swam to our heart’s content.
‘I love Pemberley,’ he said, as he swam lazily on his back, looking at the sky, which was a clear and cloudless blue. ‘I could not be happier, knowing that one day it will all be mine. Do you love it, too?’
‘Of course I do,’ I said, thinking, One day, when I marry an heiress, I shall have an estate just like it.
‘Do you think you will be the steward here, after your father?’ he asked.
His words shattered my daydream. He saw me, not as a landowner and an equal, but as a steward, someone who would spend the rest of my life serving him. I felt myself grow red with anger and mortification, but, remembering Mama’s advice, I thought of a way I could turn the situation to my advantage.
‘To do so I would need a good education,’ I said. ‘Papa went to university, you know, courtesy of a kind uncle, but I have no such relative to sponsor me.’
‘As to that, I believe Papa means to send you to Cambridge with me. He thinks a great deal of your papa, you know, and he wants to help you because of it.’
‘I had never imagined… that is very kind of him… I will try to be worthy of him,’ I said, expressing myself surprised and suitably grateful.
Fitzwilliam smiled and said, ‘I am glad we will be there together. It will be good to have someone there I know. All my cousins are the wrong age to be there with me, either just too old or just too young.’
I tried to think of Fitzwilliam at Cambridge and I wondered what he would do there, how he would comport himself. He would be unconsciously arrogant, no doubt, behaving as though he owned the place.
Such behaviour would not do for me. I would have to follow Mama’s advice. I would make friends, meet their sisters, and marry an heiress.
When I returned home, Mama was very pleased to hear that Mr Darcy meant to send me to Cambridge, and she laughed when I said I meant to take her advice.
‘A wise decision. You do not have the temperament to apply yourself to the books, Georgie, and you certainly do not have the temperament to be poor. You have winning manners and good looks and they will be a great help to you. But, whilst you should spend most of your time trying to hear of any suitable heiresses, you should not neglect any other opportunities that might come your way. You might have to wait a few years for the right heiress to come along. In the meantime, there are some valuable livings hereabouts. If you continue to win Mr Darcy’s approval, then he might give you one of them when you grow up.’
‘A living? What, as a churchman? Mama! You are joking? I have no desire to go into the church.’
‘Why not? It will give you a gentleman’s residence and a good income, for which you need do very little work. You need only look the gentleman, which you can do very easily, and hire a curate to write your sermons for you. You will have an entrée into all the best society and you will meet many sheltered young ladies who do not go out a great deal in the normal way. Moreover, they will already be disposed to like you, for you will appear to great advantage in the pulpit, and do not forget that you will not have any competition in church, as you would at a ball. A clergyman is the king in his own church. He reigns supreme.’
I thought about what she said, and I remembered that I had noticed the girls casting lingering looks at the Rev Mr Mathias last Sunday, despite his plain looks.
‘I think, perhaps, it might be a good idea,’ I said. ‘I could wear a black suit and have one simple pin—a diamond—in my cravat.’
I thought of myself standing in the pulpit, with everyone admiring me in my new black suit, and all the girls swooning over me, and I thought it would do very well, at least until I found my heiress.
‘Then set your sights on the church, George, and on the rich living of Pemberley. The parsonage is a fine house, far better than this one, and it is capable of further improvement. It is well situated, and it would not shame a far wealthier man than you. And why not set your sights on Georgiana Darcy, too?’
‘Georgie? She is little more than a baby!’ I said, laughing at the thought of it.
‘But she will not always be so. Little children have a habit of growing up, you know, and there is not such a great difference in age between you. When she is ready for marriage you will not yet be thirty. And she has a handsome dowry, thirty thousand pounds.’
‘That is so,’ I said thoughtfully.
‘A man can go far with thirty thousand pounds. He can take a house in town for the Season, and better yet, as the husband of Georgiana Darcy, he will be admitted into the highest society, for do not forget that her uncle is an earl. And the beauty of it is that no one will blame you for mixing so much in the world, as they might do if you did not have such an exalted wife, for you can say that you are doing it for her sake and not your own.’
‘And we can go to Brighton in the summer, and Bath in the autumn,’ I said, seeing a happy future stretching out in front of me.
‘You can indeed. You can travel as much as you desire.’
‘Though it is a long time to wait,’ I said, feeling suddenly dissatisfied. ‘I do not think it will suit me to live on a narrow income until I am thirty. I would rather have my heiress sooner.’
She smiled at me.
‘You have your mother’s impatience, alas! Very well, what about Anne de Bourgh? She is coming here next week. She is another wealthy heiress; indeed, she will be richer than Georgiana, for she will inherit Rosings Park. Should you like to live there, George?’
I was much struck by the idea.
‘I have never been, but it sounds very grand,’ I said, adding, ‘far better than a parsonage.’
‘You are right, it is a great house, a very great house, with an extensive park and delightful garde
ns. It is in a delightful part of the country, too, being in Kent, and so very convenient for London. I went there once when I was a girl. Oh, not to stay, but just to look around when the family was away. I was touring the area with Mama and Papa, and Mama had a wish to see it. If an opportunity arises for you to visit it, you should not neglect it. I think you would like Rosings very well.’
‘And no doubt you would like it very well, too!’
‘I cannot deny that I would welcome a suite of rooms there,’ she said with a dimple. ‘You must not forget your mama when you are well settled.’
‘I will never forget you. I will give you an allowance and you may shop to your heart’s content.’ My mood sobered. ‘But it is out of the question,’ I said, abandoning the rosy picture reluctantly. ‘Anne is intended for Fitzwilliam. I heard Lady Anne and Lady Catherine talking about it the last time the de Bourghs were here. They want their children to marry, indeed they have been planning it since Fitzwilliam and Anne were in their cradles.’
‘They might intend Anne for Fitzwilliam, and they might have no difficulty in getting her to agree to the match, but I think they will find it hard to get Fitzwilliam to fall in with their plans. He has no inclination for Anne. I have watched them together, and although he is always polite to her, he never chooses to spend any time in her company and he says barely two words to her beyond what is necessary. There are some boys who could be encouraged into such a match but I do not believe that Fitzwilliam is one of them. There is a strength about his character, something that will not be encouraged or bullied or coerced. He knows his own mind and he can be firm to the point of stubbornness when he believes himself to be right. He will marry to please himself, you will see, like his mother and his aunt. They both made love matches and I believe that Fitzwilliam will do the same.’
‘I did not know they made love matches,’ I said, startled, for both ladies married very well.
‘Oh, yes, it was something of a scandal at the time. Lady Anne was destined for much higher things. She was the daughter of an earl, you know, and her father wanted her to marry a title, but she met Mr Darcy at a ball and from then on she would countenance no one else. Her father tried to persuade her by appealing to her vanity, telling her she could marry an earl, but she said she already had her own title and did not need another one. Mr Darcy was very handsome, of course, and he had an air about him—Fitzwilliam has it, too—something challenging, something that is very appealing to women. Her father railed at her, telling her that she was descended from William the Conqueror; for, you know, Fitzwilliam means the son of William and it implies royal blood.’
‘How so?’ I asked.
‘Kings have a habit of adding Fitz to their own name when they christen any children they might have with their mistresses, instead of with their wives. But Lady Anne only retorted that the name of Darcy would not shame anyone, and she called her son Fitzwilliam Darcy to prove it.
‘Lady Catherine was just as headstrong.
‘They were the rage of the Season, those two girls, Lady Anne and Lady Catherine. Lady Anne was the pretty one but Lady Catherine had something in her air and manner which set her apart. Sir Lewis de Bourgh fell under her spell as soon as he saw her, though it is less certain what she saw in him. An easygoing temperament, perhaps, a man who would allow her to mould him. But whatever the case, there was a great deal of love on both sides.’
‘I cannot imagine Lady Catherine being in love,’ I said thoughtfully.
‘She has grown colder since Sir Lewis died. And Anne has grown colder, too. She used to be much happier, poor child. I think she would make you a very good wife. She would be easy to mould, like her father, and she would be grateful for your attentions. She is a plain little thing, and a handsome boy like you who is respectful and friendly and who can make her laugh is sure to have a chance of winning her affections. Play with her, George, dance with her—little girls always like someone to dance with them, and she is too old to be climbing trees with you now—talk to her, draw her out, be a friend to her, flatter her, look at her as though she is the most important person alive. You are so young that Lady Catherine will not be on her guard, as she will be when Anne is of a marriageable age, and such kindnesses now might well pay dividends in the future, for Anne is sure to remember them.’
‘Very well, I will dance with her, I promise you, and be kind to her and amuse her.’
The more I thought of the idea, the more I liked it.
George Wickham, rector of Pemberley, would be somebody, certainly. But not nearly as great a somebody as George Wickham, master of Rosings Park.
15th June 1788
The de Bourghs have arrived. The day being wet, Fitzwilliam and I were playing at billiards and so I was at the house when the carriage rolled up the drive. The de Bourghs went to their rooms to rest after their journey, but they soon joined the Darcys in the drawing-room and one of the servants came to request the presence of Fitzwilliam. I followed him quietly, effacing myself so that no one should notice me, and I watched him as he greeted his father’s guests. He was polite to Anne, but nothing more. He asked after her journey and said that he hoped it had not tired her, but then he retreated into his customary hauteur and said no more, unless Lady Catherine directed a question at him.
I went quietly over to Anne, without drawing attention to myself. I asked her about her journey and made a few remarks on the weather, then I pulled the screen forward to protect her from draughts—and to hide myself from other eyes: if they had noticed me they might have expected me to leave. I made myself agreeable to her, and she soon began to smile and then to laugh. She is really not so plain when she laughs. I found her easy company, expecting nothing, but taking a shy pleasure in my company and in my compliments. Poor girl! I think she has little enough attention from anyone else, unless it is to fuss over her health. I think I could do her good if I were her husband. I would amuse her and entertain her and make her happy, and in return I would have the position I deserve. I think I should like being married to Anne.
18th June 1788
Mama was right; Lady Catherine does not consider me a threat and she smiles on my attentions to her daughter, seeing them as Miss Anne de Bourgh’s due. I overheard her remarking to Mr Darcy that I had excellent manners and saying that I would make a good courtier.
I wonder… George Wickham, courtier. George Wickham, knight.
If I was a knight I would be Sir George Wickham… Sir George Wickham of Rosings.
Yes, I like that very well.
24th June 1788
Another wet day. After we had finished our lessons, Fitzwilliam and I were called into the drawing-room to entertain Anne. Fitzwilliam made a few cursory remarks and then fell silent, being in a restless mood. I could tell that he was longing to be out of doors, for he does not like to be confined, and wet days are a hardship for him. His restlessness made him more brusque than usual and, when Anne ventured to say that it looked as though it would rain all day, he was curt with her. She was downcast, but I soon lifted her spirits by saying that we must have some exercise and that, even though it was raining, we could dance. Her mother overheard me and said that it was a good idea, for Anne was an accomplished dancer. She then instructed Anne’s companion to play the piano. I made Anne a courtly bow and asked her for the honour. She blushed, but she took my hand readily enough and I led her out into the middle of the room. I took care not to dance too well, for I know that Lady Catherine likes rank to be preserved and I did not want to outshine her daughter. But I danced well enough to show Anne to advantage, covering for her small mistakes. Anne herself enjoyed dancing with me. Her face was flushed, and she looked sorry when the dance was over.
Lady Catherine then said that Fitzwilliam should dance with Anne. Poor Anne! Her face fell, and she watched him walking towards her with trepidation.
Fitzwilliam was scarcely any more pleased, for he is not used to falling in with the wishes of others, but he could not refuse. He took her hand reluct
antly and danced well, but I believe that Anne enjoyed dancing with me more.
Lady Catherine was so well pleased with the afternoon that she suggested the Darcys hold a party ‘for the young people’ and that after a light meal there should be dancing.
‘It is time for Anne and Fitzwilliam to learn how to go on in public,’ she said. Then, addressing Fitzwilliam, she said, ‘You bear a great name, Fitzwilliam, and you must not disgrace it.’
The party was agreed upon, and when I returned home I told Mama all about it.
She clapped her hands in glee and said, ‘Excellent, George! This is just the kind of opportunity you need. You will have a chance to meet all the neighbouring heiresses and to impress them with your charm and good manners. Any friendships started now may well be continued, if circumstances are favourable, when you are of marriageable age. You will be able to bring yourself to their notice if you should meet them out in the world, for you will be acquainted. You can give them news of the Darcys and, the conversation being thus begun, you will know how to continue it. This party could be the start of great things for you. Now, we must look through your clothes and decide what you are going to wear.’
30th June 1788
I arrived at Pemberley in good time for the party and I had the good fortune to pick up a handkerchief that a girl had dropped, later to discover that she was a Miss Layson and that she would have ten thousand pounds when she came of age.
I spoke to her again when I met her in the drawing-room, and she was friendly towards me. I bowed and moved on, and I was just congratulating myself on making such a useful acquaintance when I heard her friend sniggering behind my back. I could not hear what she said, but the words, ‘only invited because they were a boy short’ reached my ears. Mama had warned me that I would hear this kind of thing and that I must not mind it and so I took no notice, but set out to please each and every one of the girls present.