Part of me wished I could tell Elizabeth. But I couldn’t bring myself to.
I really can’t blame Edward for not wishing to speak of past battles to me. Though I suppose the cases are not exactly parallel.
But there has been one utterly happy result: This morning I went to my cousin Anne’s room, even before the hour when we usually meet for dancing practice.
Anne’s face was pale, and her eyelids looked puffy and reddened, as though she had been crying. But she smiled a little when I asked her how she was. “As well as can be expected, considering that I’m about to gain a step-father who is only five or six years older than I am myself.”
“Do you mind about your mother and M. de La Courcelle?” I asked. I had not fully realised it before—but of course the engagement would affect Anne more than anyone else.
She shook her head, though. “I don’t think I do. Not really.” The faint ghost of a smile touched her mouth again. Not a bitter smile, exactly, only sad. “At the very least, it will give my mother someone else in the house to bully and manage. I just wish—” she stopped and looked away.
“I’ve come to tell you something,” I said. And then I recounted the whole: Caroline’s confession, my interview with Aunt de Bourgh the day before.
Anne’s swollen eyes widened as I spoke. “You said what?” she said when I had finally done. And then: “And my mother actually … she actually agreed?”
“She did,” I said.
“I—” Anne shook her head. “I don’t know what to say.” She was sitting quite still. And yet her face looked … free. That’s the only word I can find to describe it. She looked like someone stepping out-of-doors on the first day of spring, or passing out through a prison gate and into the sun. She shook her head again. “It’s almost too much to take in.”
“You can tell Mr. Carter—” I began.
I could almost hear a thud as Anne seemed to come back to earth. She stared at me, her eyes still wide. “But I can’t—I mean, I couldn’t do that! How would it sound? And what on earth could I say? My mother has agreed to our marriage if you should like to propose to me? How can I tell him anything? It would sound so dreadfully bold.”
I had been trying my hardest to squash down any jealousy I might feel for Anne. I did—I do—want her to be happy, and it was not fair to envy her for actually having that happiness within her reach.
But all at once, looking at her, I felt every bit of misery and temper and heartache I had ever felt over Edward and George Wickham and Mr. Edgeware and my brother and Elizabeth and everything come churning up from inside me in a hot, furious wave.
“Oh for goodness’ sake, Anne, will you stop being such an incurable ninny!” My chest was so tight I felt as though it would split open. “You’re lucky enough to fall in love with someone who actually loves you in return—and you’re willing to lose all chance of happiness with him because you’re afraid of sounding forward? Very well! Go back to Rosings and live under your mother’s thumb for the rest of your life, and you can comfort yourself with the knowledge that you were always the essence of decorum and propriety!”
Anne’s jaw had dropped open. She closed her mouth, swallowed, then opened it again. “I’ll … I’ll speak to John,” she finally said.
“Good.”
The wildfire burn of anger was fading from my veins. I let out my breath and almost despite myself felt a small, reluctant smile forming at the corners of my lips at the realisation of how I must have looked. “I’m sorry, Anne,” I said. “I didn’t mean to barge into your room—before breakfast, even—and shout at you like a fishwife.”
Anne smiled—then started to laugh. “That’s all right. I suppose I was being stupid. And very irritating, besides. I—” and then she stopped, looking at me closely.
“What is it?” I asked.
“I was just wondering why you bothered,” Anne said. She was still watching me. “Why you bothered to speak to my mother for me, and take me out on carriage rides and teach me to dance and make me go to the ball and … and all the rest. We have never been friends. And you cannot say it was because you liked me or enjoyed my company.”
I tried to think of an answer. I was not sure whether Anne would be angry or no, but finally I said, “Maybe not at first. But I am glad now that I did—because I do like you now. And as for why I bothered in the first place I suppose it was because—” I stopped, then told her what I’d realised before. “Because I think we are alike, in many ways.”
As it turned out, Anne didn’t look angry—only thoughtful. Her blue eyes seemed to search me a long moment. And then she said, “Maybe we are. But what about you, Georgiana? You’ve”—she smiled a little again—“persuaded me into finding a chance of happiness. But what about you? Don’t you want anything for yourself?”
I was surprised. Truly, nearly as surprised as when Aunt de Bourgh announced her engagement. I think perhaps that is the most miraculous change of all: Anne caring enough to be concerned for someone besides herself.
She really is different from the sickly invalid who never spoke or seemed to think of anything or anyone besides her own health. Or maybe she always was, and it is just that she never showed anyone this other side of her before.
For a moment, I wanted to confide in her—nearly as much as I wished I could tell Elizabeth. And that is yet another unexpected turn, because I should never have guessed that Anne would turn into someone I might truly want for a friend.
But I did not tell her, all the same.
Which I hope was more because I did not wish to spoil her happiness than because I envied her.
I shook my head and made myself smile and said, “What do I want? What I can’t have—I suppose like most of us in this world.”
Anne just looked at me another moment. And then she said, “You know, Georgiana, you’re not at all what I thought you were. I remember when you were small—I suppose I was fourteen or fifteen and you four or five—you were so shy I almost never heard you speak or saw you when you weren’t hiding behind someone’s skirts. Even from when we first arrived at Pemberley a few weeks ago—you’ve changed. Or at least, you’re very different from what I first thought.”
“Well, so are you,” I told her. And then—on impulse—I hugged her. “I am happy for you, Anne. Truly.”
Anne stiffened as though I had startled her. But then she hugged me in return and said, “Now, is there time for one last dancing practice before breakfast? I want to make sure I don’t disgrace myself—or your teaching—at the ball tomorrow night.” She smiled. “It was much easier at the masquerade—then I was wearing a mask and had the comfort of knowing that if I fell out of step, no one would know who I was.”
I just stared at her. But she is right—the ball here at Pemberley is to be held tomorrow night. I can scarcely believe it, but with everything else that has happened these last days, I had almost forgotten it was to be held at all.
Anne and I did go down to the music room to practice. Mr. Folliet joined us as usual. He was called away partway through our session by an urgent message that Mrs. Reynolds came to tell him had just arrived for him. He looked very serious as he left the room—as though he expected whatever the message was to contain bad news.
But he made both Anne and me promise to save him a dance.
Tuesday 31 May 1814
I suppose actually I should strike out that 31 May and write in 1 June instead, for it’s three o’clock in the morning. But I hate the look of ink blots and scratched-out words.
My feet ache from so many hours of dancing—and I should be tired enough to sleep for a week. But somehow every time I try to lie down, my mind starts flashing through the events of the ball again—like one of those pictures-in-motion flip books I used to have when I was small.
So I’m sitting up in bed to write this, with a candle lighted by my bedside.
I’m sure Aunt de Bough would scold me over the risk of fire, if I should knock the candle over onto the blankets
or sheets or bed hangings. But I’m too tired to move. So if this diary should be found burned to a cinder along with me and the bed, whoever finds it will know it was my own fault.
Well, they will if this final entry is still legible, I mean.
I wore the new ballgown tonight—the peach silk with its gauze overdress and embroidered rosebuds. The sleeves are pointed lace, trimmed with tiny seed pearls, and I had a ribbon trimmed with the same pearls woven through my hair. Anne came to my room when it was time to go downstairs. She had on a ball gown that I’m certain Aunt de Bourgh must have had made for her—the only ball gown she had in her trunk, I suppose: a pea green satin with a yellow lace overdress, trimmed with gold braid and spangles. She had a bandeau of the same pea green satin around her hair, trimmed with a spray of feathers.
But she looked so happy that even the gown couldn’t spoil her looks; I did not even need to ask to know she must already have spoken to Mr. Carter.
We went downstairs to the drawing room together. My brother and Elizabeth were already there, Elizabeth looking lovely in a gown of sea-blue silk, with a silver net overskirt, and silver embroidery around the neck and the hem. Her family arrived this afternoon--only her father and her sisters Mary and Kitty, since her mother was feeling unwell and unable to make the journey.
And Edward was there, as well. Dressed in his military uniform, of course: red coat and cream-coloured breeches, with the medal he won at Vimeiro pinned to his chest.
At least the carriages began to arrive almost as soon as Anne and I came down, and we were so busy with greeting the guests who were presented in turn that I was spared having to speak to him.
I had been dreading that part of the evening—having to greet everyone and shake hands and try to think of polite conversation to make with so many people that I do not know very well at all. Between my brother’s acquaintances and those of Aunt de Bourgh, there were more than a hundred families invited. Some of them I could not even remember having met with before.
But as it turned out, it was not nearly so bad as I had feared.
Maybe Anne was right, and I really have changed.
Mr. and Mrs. Herron arrived first, and that helped—they were both of them so unaffected and truly kind. Maria has gone back home to her family, and they miss her terribly. Though Mrs. Herron said she would be back for a visit in the summer, because it appears she didn’t manage to get engaged after all.
Which made me smile—but I do sincerely wish her well.
After the guests had all arrived, we went into the ballroom—which looked magical, all decked with garlands of flowers and with potted palms arranged in the corners and candles glowing in the chandeliers and sconces on the walls.
I opened the ball dancing with my brother—and of course a set of dancers formed from the neighbourhood families we know best, and Mr. Carter and Anne, who lined up below Fitzwilliam and me as we stood at the top of the room. And I was concentrating so hard on not tripping or forgetting a step—or looking at all the people watching—that it was all over almost before I realised.
After that I was partnered by Mr. Folliet—who came to remind me that I had promised him a dance. And then—
But I can scarcely remember them all, I danced so many sets. That part of the evening was lovely. It was. Of course, I knew quite well that a solid half of my partners would not have danced with me at all, save for the size of my fortune. But somehow being well aware of the fact meant that it did not trouble me nearly as much as it might once have done.
And some of the quieter, more serious ones looked at me with real admiration in their eyes. At least, I think it must have been real, because they didn’t try to be charming or pay me compliments out loud or beg a place beside me at supper. Which was nice, to realise that the world is not entirely composed of fortune hunters.
And yet—
I’d told myself I was not going to stare at Edward all evening like some lovesick schoolgirl. He had not even spoken to me at any time during the day to ask me to save him a dance.
But you know how it is when you have told yourself you absolutely must not take any notice of someone—and that only makes you want to look in their direction even more?
I felt as though every nerve in my body were strung tight with awareness of exactly where he was. His red coat of course made him easy to spot among the crowd of guests; there weren’t many other army officers there. But I did not even need that. My skin prickled every time he came within twenty paces of where I stood, and my neck muscles ached with the wish to turn in his direction.
At last, I finally did turn.
Elizabeth was feeling a little tired, and I had sat down beside her on one of the couches around the dancing floor to keep her company while she rested. I could feel Edward’s presence behind me, and when I looked to the left, I could just see him out of the corner of my eye as he stood talking to some of the other guests.
I couldn’t help it—one of the older ladies stopped to say something to Elizabeth, and while they were speaking I turned in Edward’s direction. And found him staring at me, with the strangest look on his face and an expression I could not read at all in his dark eyes.
He said something—an apology, maybe—to the stout matron in pearl-grey with whom he had been speaking. And then he started towards me, his eyes still holding mine.
I felt my heart give a strange little lurch and my pulse quicken. But before Edward reached Elizabeth’s and my sofa, Mr. Carter had come up on my other side. “Miss Darcy, may I—m-m-may I speak to you?”
He seemed so much agitated that I was frightened something had happened or gone wrong between him and Anne. I stood up and went with him into a quieter alcove of the ballroom, at the far end of the room away from the musicians hired for the evening.
“Mr. Carter, what is it? Is something amiss?”
Nothing was, of course. He had spoken to Anne—or rather Anne had spoken to him, earlier in the day. And he had simply wanted to come and thank me in person for all I had done.
I told him it was nothing and that I was happy to have been of help. And offered him every felicitation on his engagement to Anne. For they are engaged—he gave me the news himself—and are to be married as soon as he can find a new vicarage.
I am very happy for them.
But when I came out from the alcove, Edward was nowhere to be seen.
It was not until it was time to go in to supper that I saw him again. This time, I actually had not been at all aware of where he was. I was being pushed on the tide of guests moving from the ballroom to the supper room, and I almost walked straight into him. I drew back so sharply to keep from colliding with him that I nearly lost my balance. He had to steady me with a hand on my elbow.
The other attendants to the ball were streaming past us on either side; Edward moved us back towards the wall, out of the worst of the traffic—and he still had to raise his voice to be heard over the noise.
“Georgiana, I—” he began.
But then a stout, elderly gentleman in a green velvet jacket and old-fashioned wig actually did carom straight into Edward, separating us. I did recognise the older gentleman—though I don’t know him well. His name is Colonel George Wylton. He lives on an estate near Klimpton, and he earned his army title commanding a regiment in the American colonies during the war for independence.
“Eh, what?” Colonel Wylton squinted at Edward from port-bleared eyes. “Ah, Fitzwilliam! But what luck—I was just looking for you. I never got to finish telling you about what happened during the battle at Norfolk. Got some stories that would curl your hair, I can tell you. Townspeople wouldn’t surrender their provisions to us—had to eat rats and whatever else we could catch for days. I—”
I lost the rest of what he said as he carried Edward off with him into the supper room. Edward did look back at me—once—but by then there were ten or more people in between us, and no chance of exchanging another word.
Mr. Folliet sat beside me at supper;
he had held a chair for me, and asked whether I would sit with him the moment I came into the room. He was very quiet, though, his handsome face thoughtful and grave and not like his usual manner at all.
When we had finished our plates of mayonnaise of chicken and pineapple cream, he turned to me and said, “Miss Darcy, I realise this may not be the most opportune time, but may I … may I speak to you? Privately, I mean? There’s something of a … there is something I need to ask you.”
I did feel some apprehension, because for a moment I wondered whether he was going to propose—and that would spoil our friendship. But I said, “Of course. Come outside into the garden. It will be quiet there.”
Strictly speaking, it might not have been entirely proper for me to go outside alone with Mr. Folliet. But if I were going to be forced to refuse him, I could not stand for it to be under the eyes of some hundred or more guests at the ball.
And the garden was quiet. Quiet and cool after the heat and noise inside. For a moment, I just stood quite still, feeling the soft night breeze on my skin, breathing in the scent of the flowers and freshly clipped grass. Then I turned to Mr. Folliet, bracing myself a little for fear of whatever he was about to say. But his first words were, “The message that arrived for me yesterday. It was from my grandfather. The Earl of Blaisdon.”
“Oh.” I felt a quick rush of relief. Because if it were to be a proposal, this was surely the oddest beginning for one I had ever heard.
“Or rather, I should say that it was from my grandfather’s estate agent. My grandfather can’t write anymore, his hands are so crippled by his rheumatism. He’s been in poor health for years. But he is failing seriously, now. The message I received yesterday said that his physician doubts he can last more than a month. Perhaps not even so long.”
“I am so sorry,” I said.
I could see lines of worry and grief about the corners of Mr. Folliet’s mouth. But he forced a smile. “Thank you. I’m fond of the old boy. He practically raised me, after my parents died. He’s been good to me always. Even when I was fifteen with spots and enough vanity of my own opinions and intelligence to make two of the Emperor Napoleon.”
Mr. Folliet fell silent a moment, staring at the shadows cast by a lilac bush. Then he suddenly said, “Do you remember, the night of the masquerade ball, I asked whether I might I ask you a question? But then I never got the chance to finish. Do you think I might ask it now?”
I nodded. “Of course.”
Mr. Folliet didn’t speak at once, though. He rubbed a hand across the back of his neck and then finally said, half under his breath, “I actually have no idea how to put this. But all right.” He swung round to face me. “My question is this: are you in love with me?”
I was so utterly taken aback—and then sick with apprehension, because it seemed he was going to press his suit after all—that I couldn’t find a word to say. I just stood there, feeling as though the words to every polite denial I tried to frame … I’m deeply sensible of the honour … I do like you very much … were like water droplets, sliding through my grasp.
But Mr. Folliet, studying my face, let out a long breath of relief and said, “Ah, thank God. You’re not.”
If I had been surprised before, it was nothing to what I felt now. Mr. Folliet laughed at my expression. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think you were. But I had to be sure. I—” He stopped and then turned and offered me his arm. “But shall we walk a little. I will explain, I swear it. And ask your help, if you are of a mind to give it. It’s just I feel as though this might be easier to speak of while I’m in motion.”
I was still thoroughly puzzled. But I did take his arm, and we started to walk along one of the garden paths. “It’s like this,” Mr. Folliet finally said. “My grandfather’s dearest wish is—and has been for some time—to see me married. It’s been a continued grief to him that I haven’t yet found a wife. The trouble is”—Mr. Folliet stopped, and rubbed the back of his neck again. “The trouble is that I’m not … not of the marrying inclination. If you see what I mean.”
It took me a moment to understand, but then I did. “I—oh.” I frowned. “And your … your grandfather the earl doesn’t know?” I asked.
Mr. Folliet was watching me, with something between amusement and surprised relief in his eyes. “That’s all? Just ‘oh’? No screams of horror? Not even a gasp of alarm?”
“Not for the present, at any rate. I promise I’ll give you fair warning if I do feel any screams coming on.”
Mr. Folliet laughed again, some of the lines of tension on his face loosening their grip. “Fair enough.” He sobered almost at once, though, and said, “As for my grandfather, no, he doesn’t know. I’ve never told him. I—” he stopped. “He’s all the family I have… and I’m all he has. I didn’t want to be a disappointment to him. Even when he’s asked me when I’m going to bring my bride home to meet him, I’ve always been too much of a coward to tell him the truth.”
Mr. Folliet’s words from the first conversation we’d ever had came back to me. I said, “I think just as you said, it’s not always easy to be honest with family. Especially the ones we love best.”
Mr. Folliet shook his head. “I always meant to, one day. I would have. At least I hope I would have. But then his health began to fail, and—and now I can’t tell him the truth. The shock might be enough to kill him outright. And he’d never have time to grow accustomed to the news—to accept it, if he could. Telling him now would only mean that he’d die angry and bitterly disappointed in the boy he’d raised almost as a son.”
I touched Mr. Folliet’s hand. “I do understand. Truly. But you spoke of asking my help. What is it I can do for you?”
Mr. Folliet looked away, back towards the lighted rectangles that were the house windows. “Now my grandfather is … dying”—he flinched a little over saying the word—“and wandering in his wits. His estate manager writes that he is greatly troubled by my not having yet found a wife. He grieves to think of me, alone in the world and without a family of my own, once he’s gone. I’m planning to travel to him at once—I’ll have to leave Pemberley first thing tomorrow morning. And the favour I have to ask of you is this: would you permit me to tell my grandfather that you and I are engaged? The falsehood would be for his ears only,” he hastened to add. “His health doesn’t permit him to leave his bedroom anymore, so he would be quite unable to speak of it to anyone else. And it’s not a question of securing my inheritance or anything of that—the estate is entailed on me, regardless of my grandfather’s will. But it would”—his lips tightened—“it would bring him great happiness, and enable him to die in peace, if he could spend his last days believing me engaged to Miss Georgiana Darcy of Pemberley.”
“Of course,” I said. I did not even need to think about my answer. “Of course you may tell him that, if you wish. You have my free and full consent.”
I heard Mr. Folliet’s breath go out in a rush, and then he took my hand. “Thank you,” he said. He raised my hand to his lips. And then he lifted his head and looked down at me. “Is it Colonel Fitzwilliam? The man you’re actually in love with?”
I felt my own breath go out as though a giant hand had struck me in the ribs. I was so utterly caught off guard that I could not even summon words to deny it. Almost before I realised the words had left my mouth, I heard myself say, “How did you know?”
One side of Mr. Folliet’s mouth lifted in a wry smile. “I know a thing or two about watching someone you love but can never have. Or at least, think you can’t.”
“I … I suppose you would,” I said. I turned my head to look down at the pebbled edging on one of the flower beds. “But in this case, I don’t just think, I know. Edward doesn’t … he doesn’t feel that way about me—not the way I feel for him.”
“How do you know?”
“He told me. Or as good as.”
Somewhere in one of the lilac bushes, a night bird had set up a trilling song. All around us, the breeze was full
of the soft whispers of leaves, the music drifting out to us from the house. “Well, then,” Mr. Folliet said at last, “he’s an utter fool.” He squeezed my hand. “And you can tell him I said so.”
That made me smile. “Thank you,” I said. “That’s—”
And then I broke off, my whole body freezing and my heart skittering to a stop at the voice that spoke behind us. “Georgiana!”
It was Edward. Of course. Score another for Fate’s unpleasant sense of humour.
Except that in this case, it was not only Fate. Edward must have come outside after us because he was following me. Again.
And how much of what Mr. Folliet and I had been saying had Edward overheard? My heart had started again and was pounding in my chest, and I was grateful for the darkness that hid the burning blush I knew was spreading over my face.
For all I knew, Edward could have been standing there behind us long enough to hear the whole of that last exchange.
My voice was quite steady, though, as I turned to Mr. Folliet. “Would you excuse us for a moment, please?”
“Of course. Good night, Miss Darcy. And”—Mr. Folliet’s eyes met mine—“Thank you. With all my heart.”
He divided a bow between me and Edward and was gone almost at once, walking back towards the house.
Edward watched him, frowning. “He beats a hasty retreat.”
“You can hardly blame him for that,” I said. “The last time you found him with me, you punched him in the mouth.” I took a breath, trying to steady my voice. Even though renewed anger had kindled inside me that Edward should have taken it on himself to follow me again. “And what do you mean by this, Edward? I thought we’d established that I do not require to be guarded like a child of six.”
Edward ignored that. There was just light enough for me to see the muscle ticking in his cheek. “Are you and Folliet engaged?” he asked.
“And why is that any concern of yours?”
“Because your father left me as your guardian. And unless you’re engaged to a man, it is not decent for you to be walking alone in a garden with him at night.”
If Edward had said anything—practically anything—else, I mightn’t have been so furious. But the words, combined with the knowledge that he might well have stood listening to me speaking of what I felt for him, seemed to strike my already smouldering temper like a bolt of lightning, igniting it into a blaze.
“Decent? You’re going to stand there and lecture me about decency and propriety and respectable behaviour when you’ve spent the last year on army campaign? Slogging through mud and snow and sleeping on the ground and fighting battles and killing—”
I broke off—and wished I could have bitten my tongue out, because I had taken a step forward and seen Edward’s face more clearly in the rays of moonlight slanting down.
I had been focusing so much all night long on not letting myself look at him … not following him with my eyes … or throwing myself in his path … or giving him another opportunity to give me a polite speech about how much he cares about me … that it hadn’t occurred to me to think about what this evening must have been like for him.
He’d told me how hard he finds it to be in large crowds of company, now. How the noise and the heat and the candle smoke contrive to bring back the roar of battle.
Now his face looked so drained of colour it was like bleached bone, and his expression was the grim, tight-jawed stare of a man suffering almost unendurable pain.
“Edward, I’m sorry,” I said. I took another step forward and put my hand on his arm. “I should not have said that.”
“Why not?” Edward’s look didn’t alter, and the muscles of his arm felt like those of a stone statue under my hand. “It’s true. I don’t fit in with this world any more. I’m not a part of balls or dancing or talking a great deal without actually saying anything.” The muscles of his jaw were still jumping, and he almost spat the words out. “I’m much better at fighting and shooting and killing than I am at being in polite society now.”
“Edward, I—” I stopped. What could I possibly say? I had to try, though—that look on his face was my doing, my fault. “I don’t feel myself much a part of balls and supper parties and all the rest, either. But that doesn’t mean you don’t belong here. You could never change so much that there wouldn’t be a place for you here at Pemberley.”
Edward didn’t speak. My hand was still on his arm and we were standing so close together that I could see the pulse beating in his throat, but I couldn’t read his expression at all.
“And I … I apologise for accusing you of following me,” I finally said. I forced myself to speak slowly, calmly, forced the anger and resentment back down. “I know you only wish to protect me. As my brother does. I know I should be grateful to you for being willing to track down George Wickham. I am very sure that there are more pleasant ways you could have spent that week of your—”
“Devil take it!” Edward almost shouted the words. I would have taken a step backward, but he’d seized my shoulders and his hard grip held me in place. “I don’t want your damned gratitude! I didn’t do it so you’d be grateful!”
His fingers dug painfully into my skin, and the remote, austere mask had cracked. I had never seen Edward look so utterly furious before.
“Then why did you, Edward?” I’d meant to make the words calm, still, and steady, but they came out as barely a whisper.
Edward’s eyes were locked on mine, and I saw something flicker in their depths. “I—” I saw the muscles of his throat contract as he swallowed. Then he let out a ragged breath. “You’d better go.” I could see a glitter of perspiration on his brow. I felt his hands loosen their hard grip on my arms—slowly, as though he were forcing his fingers to relax one by one.
“Edward, I—” I began.
But he cut me off, his voice flat, now, but so savage it made me take a stumbling step back. “Go, Georgiana. Go back to your ball.”
I did look back over my shoulder at him just once as I walked back to the house. Edward hadn’t moved. He was standing absolutely motionless, with his back straight and his shoulders rigid, looking out into the night.
He did not want me with him—he made that clear. So why have I felt ever since—and more strongly, still, writing this now—that I should have stayed? I can’t stop seeing him the way he looked standing there at the last—fierce and proud and so utterly alone that it’s making my throat ache and my heart contract just to remember it. I—
It’s no use. I’m not going to be able to sleep in any case.
I’m going to set this book down and go to Edward’s room. If those words look illegible, it’s because my hand is gripping the pen so hard it is likely to snap in my fingers. I have no idea what I’ll find when I get there. Maybe Edward will only send me away again. But I know I will not be able to live with myself if I do not at least try.
Not when I am the one who brought that look to his face, that savage note to his voice, by losing my temper and saying to him what I did.
If Edward does refuse to see me, I suppose my next diary entry will be dated half an hour from now.
Wednesday 1 June 1814
It’s just a few short hours since I set this book down. It’s dawn, now—or nearly so. The sky is turning from midnight blue to pearly grey, and the birds are singing.
I haven’t slept yet. But I couldn’t possibly even try. My slippers are stained with grass and dirt and the hem of my dressing gown is wet with the morning dew and I feel—
But I’m going to set this down properly. Maybe that will help me decide whether I have been awake or only dreamed this all.
I did go to Edward’s room. My pulse was racing and I had to force myself to take every step down the long hall to the stairs. Edward’s room—the new room Mrs. Reynolds found him—is one floor up from mine and over in the east wing of the house, and at each step I felt the fingers grasping my candle holder turning colder and colder with nerves.
But I would
not let myself turn back. Regardless of what Edward felt for me, I knew as surely as I have ever known anything that he needed someone to be with him last night. And I knew equally well that he would never ask himself.
But he had sat every night with me, after my mother died. I surely owed it to him to do the same for him. Even if he was engaged to another girl—even if he never saw me as anything but his ward and friend.
My heart felt as though it were trying to hammer a way out of my chest when I finally reached Edward’s door. I tapped on the door panel—just softly, but there was a response from inside at once. A sound of movement, and then Edward’s voice saying, “Hello? Who’s there?”
His voice sounded raspy, and I realised that he might well have been asleep. It was past three o’clock in the morning, after all. He had probably been peacefully asleep in his bed, and I had come along and awakened him.
I might have turned around and gone straight back to my own room then and there. But before I could move, the door had swung open and Edward was standing there.
“Georgiana!” His eyes were bleared, and he shook his head as though trying to clear it. “What is it? Is Elizabeth ill—or your brother—”
I shook my head before he could imagine any worse. “No, nothing like that. I just—” I stopped.
Edward must have lain down in his clothes. He wore trousers and shirt, still, but the trousers were rumpled and the shirt opened nearly to the waist. The hard planes of his muscles gleamed in the light of my candle, and I could see the knotted red line of another scar running down his ribcage.
I was feeling more than foolish by that time—and I realised as well that in deciding to go to Edward, I had given no thought whatever to what I was going to say when I actually saw him.
“I’ve woken you,” I finally said. “I’m sorry.”
Edward pushed a hand through his dishevelled hair. “Don’t be.” His lips curved in a quick flicker of his usual smile—though there was a grim edge to it tonight. “My dreams aren’t the best of company these days.”
“Is that why—” my gesture encompassed his room and the empty, darkened hall of the east wing. As Mrs. Reynolds said, none of the other rooms nearby are in use—they never are, unless we’ve a large party of guests to stay.
I thought first Edward was not going to answer, but then his lips flattened into a line and his fingers tightened on the door frame. “I thought it better manners not to inflict my nightmares on the other residents here. You’d soon get tired of being woken up by my shouts.” He shook his head. “But you haven’t told me what you’re doing here. You didn’t come up here in the middle of the night to ask about my dreams.”
“Actually”—I swallowed—“I did.” Edward’s eyebrows shot up, and I hurried on, “I thought you might … tonight you looked …” I stopped and drew in my breath, looking up into Edward’s face. “I thought you looked as though you needed a friend to be with tonight. And I couldn’t sleep. So here I am.”
Something flickered—just for an instant—across Edward’s lean face. But then he shook his head. “You wouldn’t understand—” he began.