Page 9 of Time Stands Still

He could not conceal his astonishment. He had not been prepared for a negotiation. To his credit, he inclined his head, his brow furrowed in surprise and cautious curiosity. “Ask what you will.”

“I find I have done you a great disservice,” she began, her voice even and analytical. “My judgement of you has been based on partial information and a degree of prejudice I am only now beginning to comprehend. Before this conversation can proceed, I must beg you to answer my questions with candour, not as a suitor, but as a gentleman of honour.”

He seemed taken aback by her preamble, but after a moment’s consideration, he gave a single, sharp nod. “Speak plainly, madam. I shall do the same.”

“I know of your part in separating my sister Jane from Mr. Bingley,” she began. “On what grounds did you make such a judgement? Did you think her a mercenary, seeking only his fortune?”

A flicker of genuine astonishment, quickly followed by irritation, crossed Darcy’s features. He was silent for a long moment before murmuring, more to himself than to her, “I see my cousin is as discreet as ever.” He then met her gaze, his eyes now guarded. “To answer your question, no. I have the highest respect for Miss Bennet. I have always found her to be a woman of gentle heart and unassuming grace.”

“Then why?” Elizabeth pressed. “Why did you feel it your place to interfere?”

He hesitated, and for a moment, an emotion she could not quite name, something akin to regret, or perhaps embarrassment, flickered in his eyes before they became guarded once more. “I did not see in her the affection that a woman should feel for a man she intends to marry. Her composure, her serenity… in my observation, it evinced a decided lack of genuine attachment, a fact which Bingley, in his ardent admiration, seemed entirely to overlook.”

A flash of ironic amusement went through Elizabeth; how rich, for him to chastise another for misreading a woman’s feelings, when he had so completely misinterpreted her own civil silence as encouragement. The thought was gone as quickly as it came, replaced by a prickle of shame. She had resolved to be fair, and such a thought was anything but.

“I had… other reasons,” Darcy continued, his voice low. “At the ball, I could not help but overhear your mother speaking of the match to anyone who would listen, boasting of the fine establishment it would be for her daughter. It seemed to me a matter of public triumph rather than private affection. I feared she would press the match, regardless of your sister’s true feelings. It was for his sake, to protect him from what I perceived to be a most unhappy prospect, that I acted as I did.”

He paused, and Elizabeth’s mind flew unwillingly to the Netherfield ball, to the sound of her own mother’s voice, loud and triumphant, carrying across the room. "Oh, my dear, when she is married to Mr. Bingley, we shall all be well-provided for! Such a fine young man! So handsome! So charming!" A wave of hot mortification washed over her. She could not deny the truth of his observation, however much she disliked the man who had made it.

His explanation did not excuse his actions, yet it changed them. His motive, she conceded, had been to protect his friend. It was a misguided and arrogant act, perhaps, yet it had carried some semblance of nobility, a quality quite apart from malice or a desire to wound. He had erred in his assessment of Jane, badly, but he had not judged her unworthy.

“You misjudged her,” Elizabeth said quietly. “Her heart is not so easily read. She feels deeply, but she does not show it readily.”

Darcy turned away from her, a muscle working in his jaw. For a long moment, he was silent. "You are quite certain of this," he stated at last, his voice strained.

"I am," she replied simply. "I know my sister."

His gaze was steady, and a note of genuine regret entered his voice. “Then I concede I was in error. It was a severe misjudgment, and for any pain it may have caused your sister, I am truly sorry.”

Elizabeth was silenced. He had admitted his error. He had apologized. The man before her was one capable of reflection and regret, quite unlike the cold, prideful figure she had constructed in her mind.

She took a breath. There was one charge remaining. Though it was, she admitted to herself, none of her affair, she felt compelled to see the matter through, to understand the final piece of the puzzle. “Then there is the matter of Mr. Wickham,” she said, forcing herself to meet his gaze. “I must ask what you have to say of the great injury you have done him?”

The name, just as it had before, brought a change in him. His jaw tightened, but he held her gaze, his own expression unreadable. “You defend him with a passion I find… surprising. May I ask what tale of woe he has spun for you?”

“He told me of your father’s great affection for him,” she began, feeling suddenly less certain. “He told me of the living your father intended for him, a living you denied him out of jealousy and spite, leaving him to a life of poverty.”

“And you believed him.” It was a statement of weary fact, more than a question. “You, a woman of perception, believed the tale of a man who would so malign his benefactor’s son to a perfect stranger?”

Elizabeth felt a flush of colour rise in her cheeks. Put so plainly, her credulity seemed a terrible folly.

“There is more to the story of my acquaintance with Mr. Wickham than I would ever wish to make public,” Darcy said, his voice tight with resentment.“ But since he has made me the villain in his pretty tragedy, you have a right to the truth. The living he speaks of was his to have, on one condition: that he take holy orders. He told me himself that he had no intention of ever entering the church. It was a profession for which he felt himself, in his own words, entirely unsuited. On that point, at least, I found myself in complete agreement. He asked for a pecuniary equivalent instead. I gave him three thousand pounds. He declared himself satisfied and renounced all claim to the living forever.”

He paused, letting the weight of his words settle in the silent room. “The money was gone in less than three years, and he had the audacity to write to me again, declaring his intention to take orders and asking for the very living he had so formally resigned. I refused him. I believe now you will not blame me for it.”

But there was more. His voice dropped, taking on a new and dangerous edge of cold fury. "That is not the extent of his villainy. A year ago, he abused my father's generosity in the worst possible way. He insinuated himself into the affections of my sister, who was then but fifteen years of age, and persuaded her to elope with him."

Elizabeth gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. Georgiana Darcy. That accomplished girl Miss Bingley had spoken of so much when she staying at Netherfield Park.

“His object was not my sister,” Darcy continued, his voice tight with controlled rage, “but her fortune of thirty thousand pounds. He cared not that he would be ruining her, casting her out from society forever. He saw a lonely, motherless girl, and preyed upon her innocence. They were on the point of eloping from Ramsgate when, by chance, I arrived. I spoke to my sister, and she, in her distress, confessed the whole. It was my sister's fortune he pursued, not her heart. The affair broke her spirit. The man you have so readily defended is a gamester, a seducer, and a liar of the first order.”

He spoke with a conviction so absolute, so devoid of artifice, that Elizabeth felt the last of her certainty crumble. She had been so wrong. So terribly, blindly wrong. She had judged him on the word of a man she did not know, a man whose charm had been his only currency. She had built her castle of righteous indignation on a foundation of lies. The full weight of Wickham's deceit, and her own foolishness in believing it, crashed down upon her.

The story of his sister was the final, devastating blow. She could not doubt its truth; no man, however proud or vengeful, would invent a story so ruinous to his own sister’s reputation. The pain and cold fury in his voice had been undeniably real. The man she had so eagerly defended was a monster, a seducer who had preyed upon a fifteen-year-old girl for money. A cold sickness washed over her as she thought of Georgiana Darcy, so ill-used, and of Mr. Darcy himself, forced to carry the weight of this secret.

The silence in the room stretched on, thick with unspoken revelations. Her mind was a whirl of confusion, of regret, of a dawning and deeply unsettling understanding. It was not regret for her refusal, but a profound and shameful regret for her own blindness. Her pride, her prejudice, had made her a fool.

She looked up at him. “I… I must think,” she whispered.