Page 62 of Such Low Connections

Rising to his feet, Darcy went to the bedroom door and rapped against it.

“Be ready to leave in five minutes, Miss Lydia. I am taking you to your uncle’s house to make arrangements for the wedding.”

“But my uncle and aunt are in Derbyshire with Lizzy,” said Lydia as she opened the door. “I don’t see how I can go to them.”

“They have all returned, due to your escapade. My agents tell me that your uncle has been back in Gracechurch Street since last night. I am sure Mr Gardiner will be immensely relieved to see you. Come along.”

Briefly, Lydia seemed ready to object to this abrupt removal, but Darcy’s expression was adamant and possessed of a steady authority she had rarely encountered in her short life. Lydia seemed to instinctively grasp that she and Wickham were now in Darcy’s hands and that there was no advantage to be gained from resisting.

“We can go now,” Lydia told him. “I have only my coat, hat, and a wash-bag. Darling Wickham promised me we would buy all my outfits once we were married.”

“Indeed,” Darcy remarked tightly on hearing this further example of Wickham’s perfidy, and then led the way to the front door.

Outside, the sight of several gaudily dressed young women soliciting for custom on the street corner near Wickham’s lodgings made Darcy’s blood run cold. Their faces were only the age of Lydia or Georgiana, but their eyes were horribly old. How many of them had been deserted by treacherous lovers who promised them the world and then betrayed them?

“How funny they look! It’s like they’ve dressed for a ball before breakfast,” giggled Lydia, with little idea of how close she might have come to joining their number. “Look, that one has feathers in her hair!”

“We must get to Gracechurch Street,” Darcy muttered, and opened the door to his hired coach.

∞∞∞

“My aunt Gardiner does dress well, far better than Mother, I suppose,” Lydia prattled as she looked out of the carriage window. “It will be better to have her help with my wedding dress.”

Darcy acknowledged this remark only with a flicker of his eye, it being only the latest in a stream of naive and excited jabbering that had not ceased since the moment they left Drury Lane.

“I shall want all my sisters there as my bridesmaids, of course. Imagine, me, the youngest, being the first to marry! How jealous they will all be!”

She bounced on the seat with excitement at this absurd idea. There would be no bridesmaids at her wedding, certainly not her sisters, Darcy knew. When he thought of how Elizabeth would feel about this wedding, it was not jealousy he expected, but worry, anger, and dismay.

“Wickham must buy me a ring too. He said he would, but we had to wait…”

It was too much to be borne, and Darcy’s patience ran out.

“Can you stop talking of weddings for five minutes?” he said severely. “You might think instead of what you have done and the anxiety and trouble it has caused your family.”

“You are such a cross-patch, Mr Darcy, with no sense of fun whatsoever,” Lydia retorted, putting her nose in the air. “I can’t say I’m surprised that you are still unmarried with such a sour temper. I don’t know why you should be so angry with me, anyway.”

“I’m not angry with you,” he told her, finding that this was true. “I am angry with George Wickham. One day you will understand why.”

Lydia pretended to ignore him for a minute, but could not hold onto either silence or resentment for long. Her childishness only made him more appalled at Wickham.

“Why have you never married, Mr Darcy?” she asked curiously. “Have you never been in love at all? I’ve been in love dozens of times.”

Darcy came close to groaning aloud at this intrusive question from such a foolish and unthinking young person, but turned it into a sigh instead.

“There is only one woman I have ever truly wished to marry,” he said truthfully, “and she will not have me.”

The second part of his sentence was spoken so softly that Lydia paid no attention to it.

“Only once, at your age? How very funny you are.”

Chapter 19

“How is Mother?” Elizabeth asked Jane when she came downstairs with the tea tray from Mrs Bennet’s bedroom.

“The same as yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that,” Jane sighed. “Weeping, cursing the Forsters and complaining of heart palpitations.”

“It can do no good,” said Elizabeth, shaking her head unhappily. “But at least our uncle is in London now and may have more success than Father in seeking out Lydia’s whereabouts. That ought to give Mother some comfort.”