Too late Elizabeth reached for the speaking-trumpet: Wollstonecraft had already banked deeply left, descending in a rushing wind that blew away Elizabeth’s shout of protest. Mr. Darcy was indeed not far from the hunting-lodge, riding alone. He and his alarmed horse looked up at the same time, and the poor beast bolted out from under him.
“Whyever did it run?” Wollstonecraft said, aggrieved, looking after the horse. “I did not mean to eat it; and if I had meant to eat it, I could certainly catch it, whether it ran away from me or no.”
“You ought to know by now a horse will run when you come down behind it; that is not a cavalry-
mount, with a hood and blinders. Mr. Darcy! Are you very hurt?” Elizabeth called down anxiously, unlatching her carabiners, and slid down Wollstonecraft’s side to find that gentleman dazed and with the breath knocked out of him, and a badly wrenched knee.
“I can do very well, Captain Bennet,” he said in a voice sufficiently thin of air to belie his words, and tried to stand.
“You cannot at all,” Elizabeth said, bracing him just in time to prevent a collapse: the leg did not wish to bear his weight. “Whatever were you thinking?” she said to Wollstonecraft. “We must get him inside the house.”
“I am sure that need be no great difficulty,” Wollstonecraft said, and with her talons pried open the large front door for them, leaving the iron locks hanging from the torn door-frame. “Now it is open. Here, I will put him inside.”
Mr. Darcy submitted with more courage than grace to being gathered up in a Longwing’s talons.
When Wollstonecraft had deposited him more or less intact upon the floor of his entrance hall and Elizabeth had joined him there, with her help he levered himself onto a sofa draped with holland covers in the parlor just off the hall, and then said, “Thank you, Captain Bennet; if you will send word to the house when you have gone back to the covert, I would be grateful.”
Elizabeth struggled with the natural instinct to accept this hint, and thereby put a period to a scene which could only be full of awkwardness; but guilt and practicality restrained her. “I cannot desert you in this state when we have been the cause of your injury,” she said, and returning to the doorway called to Wollstonecraft to fly back to the covert, and send for help. She turned back into the parlor reluctantly. Mr.
Darcy had stretched out his injured leg, bracing the knee, and he had fixed his gaze resolutely upon the fine prospect outside the window, with a degree of attention better merited if a troop of Bonaparte’s soldiers had been crossing the lawn.
They neither of them spoke, until the silence had been prolonged beyond any reasonable duration between two people who had neither of them any occupation, and Elizabeth’s sense of the ridiculous came slowly to her rescue. “Mr. Darcy!” she said at last. “I suppose we could not have found ourselves in a more awkward situation. We must consider it an opportunity to display our characters. I fear to expose my own as wretchedly forward, but I will venture to speak. I hope you will permit me to thank you for the letter you gave me.”
Darcy did not look at her all at once, but turned his head in such a way as to direct his gaze near her feet, and then lifted his eyes in one swift movement to her face, as though fearing what expression he should encounter. But Captain Bennet only smiled, or tried to, although conscious more than ever that her feelings were far from what they ought to have been. Darcy’s reserve was not equal to concealing his suffering, given this much leave to express it; his looks betrayed him, and she could not see his unhappiness without wishing almost to share it.
“The only thanks which ought pass between us,” he said, nearly inaudibly, “must be mine, if you should accept my apologies.”
“None are necessary. I beg you not to repine any further. My situation is so peculiar, so unworldly one might even say, that even the most refined sense of decorum might fail as a guide. I am very sensible of the consideration that you have shown for my honor, and sorry that my own caution should have failed me. It is so many years since I gave over all thoughts of marriage, and in comparison to the unsettled situation of my sisters, and the burden of our mother’s hopes, I little regretted it then.”
“Then? ” Mr. Darcy cried, with a meaningful emphasis upon the word.
Elizabeth colored and was silent. It was now her turn to feel she had betrayed herself. To give Mr.
Darcy encouragement, when she could give him no hope, was cruelty; to permit herself to desire what must be forever beyond her reach an indulgence she could not afford. But alas! these rational conclusions did as much good to stem the tide of passion as might be expected from the usual efficacy of such measures.
“Captain Bennet,” Darcy said, “—Elizabeth,” and struggled to his feet, only to nearly overbalance himself again. She went swiftly to him. His arm leaned across her shoulders; her hands were pressed to his side, bearing up his weight. They looked into one another’s faces.
Darcy’s restraint failed him. “Elizabeth, will you—”
“I cannot,” she said, cutting him short. A calm clarity, heretofore only experienced in the moments directly before battle, had settled upon her. Her own choice was made; now honor demanded she make plain the limits of what she might offer him. “I cannot marry you.”
Darcy flinched and would have drawn away. Elizabeth reached her hand for his cheek and turned him back, and deliberately raised her chin. He trembled against her in understanding. For one moment longer he lifted up his eyes, gazing blindly towards the window; then he closed them, and bent his head to meet her lips.
CAPTAIN BENNET returned to the covert late that afternoon in great disorder of spirit. She had known that the Corps might one day ask her to sacrifice her virtue, in hopes of producing an heir to her captaincy; and she had been bluntly and forthrightly educated on the practicalities by Captain St. Germain. “And I won’t tell you not to in the meantime,” that officer had added, “because that is of no use; this ain’t a nunnery we are living in. Only be cautious about it, and never take one of your own officers to bed.”
None of this excellent advice had prepared Elizabeth for the particular evils of her present situation.
She had accepted with calm resignation the loss of her reputation and the approval of the world; she had long known she would receive no respectable offers of marriage, and hoped only for an amiable, gentlemanlike arrangement with a fellow-officer, when the time came. But these sacrifices she had learned not to regret. That a gentleman had wished despite every barrier between them to bestow upon her hand and heart, and that she should suffer at refusing him, was a grief for which she had never looked.
“And to such an offer!” she cried to herself, alone in her small tent and looking once again through tears at the fatal letter, “—to such a gesture, I have offered in return only the lowest, most vulgar expression of feeling; in exchange for the honor he has done me, I have only stained his, with no hope of ever repairing the spot. What have either of us gained by it, but uneasiness and worse regrets? And yet, when this is all I may ever have of him—”
Reflection did not ease either Captain Bennet’s pain or her guilty conscience. She passed an uneasy night, wondering alternately when next she would have the power of being alone with Mr. Darcy, and hoping for the strength of will to avoid another such encounter; she slept only fitfully, towards the hours of the morning, and roused with difficulty at the sound of a throat cleared outside her tent. She gathered herself hurriedly, and coming outside found her first lieutenant, Cheadle, awaiting her urgently with a fresh dispatch.
She broke the wafer and read the message. Mingled relief and
regret: she felt at once that a hand had been stretched forth to save her, only a little too late. “Mr. Cheadle,” she said, “pray send to Captain Winslow and the other captains. Admiral Roland requires us at Folkestone without delay. It seems Bonaparte means to try another crossing, and we must be there to stop him.”
LIEUTENANT GARDINER'S London establishment was familiar, comfortable, and quiet; an ideal setting for a wounded soldier, and the careful and affectionate nursing of her aunt Gardiner shortly saw Elizabeth past the crisis of the feverish wound she had taken at the battle of Shoeburyness. But it left her with cause for regret at her surroundings: there was little remaining to distract her heart from its unfortunate occupation.
When Napoleon had been trampling the fields of Britain, and she and Wollstonecraft had nightly to scour the Channel for any sign of French ships trying to bring over more soldiers for his army of conquest, she might thrust Mr. Darcy from her mind with some success. Lying in a peaceful bedroom, with a view over the small garden tenanted by no-one more exciting than her youngest cousins, who furthermore had been abjured to keep quiet to avoid disturbing the convalescent, the matter proved considerably more difficult.
In vain did Elizabeth order herself to forget. The worst danger to her health past, consideration for Wollstonecraft’s anxiety had won her the liberty of leaving her bed and going to the covert for a visit, once each day, but this having been accomplished, Captain Bennet was ordered back to her bed with very little to do, and all of that sadly uninteresting and faded. She had always been used to find diversion in many places, but now books slipped out of her hands and slid to the coverlet with their pages unturned; trays were carried away with only a few mouthfuls taken; and she answered with so much distraction and restlessness, when her aunt sat with her, that Mrs. Gardiner began to be afraid for her health, and speak to Lieutenant Gardiner of calling in a physician.
But Admiral Roland came to her first, a fortnight after the battle, with a better medicine. “Bennet, you have a listless air,” she said, with her blunt kindness. “The hole those Frenchmen put through your side has healed nicely, so I dare say you had better get back to your duties: it will only be light work for a while now, for all of us. In any case,” she added, “you will need to be on your feet Thursday week. They are going to make you Knight of the Bath: it will be in tomorrow’s Gazette.”
Elizabeth had at first to overcome the most extreme astonishment at this news before she was able to express the sentiments of gratitude and delight natural to any young officer in like circumstances. We may well suppose these increased by her complete lack of anticipation of the honor to be bestowed upon her.
“No, you may thank General Wellesley,” Admiral Roland said, when Elizabeth attempted to thank her. “The Admiralty would be delighted to go on pretending we don’t exist, except when we are in the air, but he has no notion of brooking it, and you may well imagine the lot of them are ready to give him anything and everything, at present.”
Such an interesting piece of news could not fail to lift Captain Bennet’s spirits—and Admiral Roland’s prescription was eagerly seized upon; as soon as her visitor had gone, Elizabeth rose from her sick-bed and dressed in haste, meaning to go and share the news with Wollstonecraft. But she had no sooner finished tying her neckcloth when one of the servants came to her room, wide-eyed, to inform her that a lady had called upon her, and demanded to see her at once.
“A lady?” Elizabeth said, in some puzzlement.
It was indeed a lady: the card upon the salver read Lady Catherine de Bourgh, whose name was only dimly familiar—some struggle was required before Elizabeth recalled that Mr. Darcy had an aunt, of that name. “But whatever can have brought her to see me?” Elizabeth said, wondering also at the lack of propriety in Lady Catherine’s coming to call upon a stranger in so insistent a manner, without any introduction to establish the acquaintance. But she could not refuse a relation of Mr. Darcy’s, and though wishing nothing more than to be gone, she shifted her clothing once more to put on a morning dress, and descended to greet Lady Catherine.
She found that noblewoman, dressed with far more grandeur than was appropriate to the occasion and the hour, standing stiffly by the mantelpiece in the sitting-room and inspecting with a disapproving expression the handful of small watercolors displayed upon the walls therein, which were not fashionable but merely the handiwork of Mrs. Gardiner’s children. “Ma’am,” Elizabeth said, and only just remembered to curtsey, instead of bow.
“You are Miss Elizabeth Bennet?” Lady Catherine demanded. Elizabeth admitted it. “I am Lady Catherine de Bourgh—I am, indeed, the aunt of Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy, and his nearest living relation.
Having said so much, I fancy I can have left you in no doubt of the cause which has compelled me to approach you.”
“Your ladyship is quite mistaken,” Elizabeth said, with increasing reserve; she could not wish but to like any of Mr. Darcy’s relations, but it was impossible to excuse the brusqueness of Lady Catherine’s manner. “I cannot in the least account for the honor of your visit.” But no sooner had Elizabeth spoken than she forcibly recalled the terrible extent of French depredations in the final weeks of the war, and alarm made her forget decorum—she took a step into the room and cried out, “Mr. Darcy is not—your nephew is well?”
But Lady Catherine only colored with anger. “Let it be understood at once, Miss Bennet, that I will brook neither impertinence nor insincerity,” she said. “You will not claim the right to make such an inquiry of me, while denying me my rights to demand an accounting from you.”
Reassured that she could not have received this answer, as peculiar as it was, if Mr. Darcy had been seriously injured, Elizabeth had now only to be baffled. “Your ladyship must excuse me from willfully provoking any such charge. I can only assure you once again of my very sincere confusion, and urge you to speak plainly.”
“Very well, Miss Bennet,” Lady Catherine said. “My character has always been of a forthright nature, and if you will insist upon evasions, I will meet them with frankness. My daughter and I were forced by the invasion to leave our home in Rosings Park, and seek a refuge with my nephew at his home in Derbyshire. We found him very altered. He would not at first confess the cause, but when I had questioned the servants, I learned that Pemberley had lately been compelled to house a host of dragons and aviators, and that you yourself, Miss Bennet, had formed one of their number, and were, indeed, serving as an aviator yourself. —Well? Do you deny this shocking report?”
“I do not,” Elizabeth said, her temper rising at the tones in which Lady Catherine uttered the name of aviator.
“And you avow it so brazenly! That you have sunk so entirely beneath reproach!”
“If I could consider myself to have done so, in serving my King, I might indeed feel shame,”
Elizabeth said. “But I cannot, and if your ladyship means to speak insultingly of the Corps, I must beg to be excused from any further conversation.”
“Not so fast, if you please!” Lady Catherine said. “You shall not escape me so easily. I have not come to reproach you for staining your own character and reputation, which must be the business of your own family, but that of a gentleman of irreproachable honor and ancient family—I am speaking of my own nephew.”
Halted by this accusation, too close to those she had leveled against herself, Elizabeth did not immediately quit the room, and Lady Catherine seized upon the opening thus afforded her to press home her attack. “My inquiries further uncovered the most appalling intelligence, surely a scand
alous falsehood, that through the association thus unavoidably thrust upon him, you had practiced upon him—
you had enticed him—to such lengths that he was on the point of making you— you—an offer of marriage.
“I could not insult my nephew so far as to broach the subject with him. I knew it must not be the truth
—I knew he would never commit so great an offense against the propriety and reputation of his family.
But I have been resolved to confront you, as soon as the unsettled state of the countryside should allow it, and to make plain to you that your wiles shall never achieve this disgraceful alliance. Now what have you to say for yourself?”
“Nothing whatsoever, to one so wholly unconnected to me, and who has not scrupled to offer me every form of insult,” Elizabeth said, and only the very strongest feeling for Mr. Darcy prevented her from giving a harsher answer. “Your ladyship must excuse me; I can endure no more.” She left the room without waiting for another word, shutting the door firmly behind her, and ran directly upstairs to her room, where she paced the narrow confines of her chamber in great disorder of spirit, as conscious of guilt as Lady Catherine might have wished, if from a very contrary motive.
That Lady Catherine thought only of her nephew’s reputation in the eyes of the world, and cared nothing either for his virtue or his happiness, was manifest, and her ill-bred insults invited no answer but scorn. But Elizabeth could not ignore that she, too, had safeguarded only the first, and wounded the latter.