“I did not think so, then. How could he have known his regiment would be thus assigned? Perhaps it was simply an awful fate. Did Miss Lydia follow him to Brighton, do you believe?”
“I did not think so. None of us thought any particular attachment was manifested in Meryton.” I made myself look at him. “You have guessed, I see, that she put herself into his power.”
He finally left off his study of the ceiling. “Yes,” he replied soberly.
“I had been looking forward to a tour of the Lakes with my aunt and uncle, but business delayed it, so I was at home when the express came from Colonel Forster saying she was gone. Kitty, it turned out, knew of their affair in Brighton from hints Lydia put in her letters, but she thought Wickham meant to marry her. I do not see how either of them could have believed it, since she had neither money nor connexions to tempt him. We did hope, of course, but in vain. The colonel followed them, checking every inn, but he lost them in Clapham and could never pick up the trail again. She was only sixteen when Wickham took her.”
“Too young,” he murmured.
The rest was difficult to say aloud, and so I returned to addressing the putti. And if I spoke in a whisper, it was because whispers were all that could emerge from behind the lump in my throat. “My father decided to go to London to see if he could discover them. My mother insisted upon accompanying him. I thought he would refuse her, but he seemed to have lost all conviction of his authority in the shock of it. And I…”
He reached over and took my cold hand in his warm one. I hardly felt the action. “I rang a peal over him, accusing him of foolishness at best, and negligence at worst. I lost my temper utterly. My last words to my papa were ones of blame and denunciation.”
That was the worst of it. The rest was only epilogue. “For some days we heard nothing, and then my uncle came to us. There had been an accident, when they were nearly to Gracechurch Street—the carriage overturned. Mama was killed instantly. My father lived for a few days in excruciating pain. I think he tried…I will always believe he tried his best to cling to life, for us. For Longbourn. And at least they never had to know for certain of Lydia’s fate.”
The tears, the futile, useless tears wanted release. I tried pressing my fists against my eyes, shuddering in an effort to restrain their force.
And then a pair of strong arms came around me, pulling me into a broad chest; his coat smelled of horse and wind and rain. I lost the battle for control then. With a sob, I let them free.
* * *
I soaked my husband’s chest until the tears spent themselves. I felt, afterwards, the numbness that comes when all emotion has been exhausted. He had gathered me onto his lap; I vaguely noticed he rocked me, back and forth like a small child. I ought to have been embarrassed, but I could not summon the strength. When I spoke again, my voice croaked.
“He—Wickham—taunted me with it. About Lydia.” I felt his arms tighten in response. “I knew it already—that she had tried to come home, and Mr Collins sent her away, putting her on the post to London without a penny to her name. Both Mary and Kitty wrote to me of it. Mary was inclined to think him justified, while Kitty was horribly upset but without the–the wherewithal to defy him. I would have. I would not have allowed Mr Collins to put her on that carriage! Or perhaps I could not have stopped him. But at the very least, I would have gone with her, taken her to my uncle’s home in London. My uncle tried to find her, again and again. He never could, and finally we accepted that she was probably dead. I wish she had come to us there, but Kitty told me Collins expelled her from the family, ordering her to never see any of us again. I hate him more, I think, than Wickham. Wickham, at least, boldly declares his own iniquity. Collins pretends to righteousness, without an ounce of charity within his cold soul.”
I felt his slight nod against my head, and looked up at him. “You knew of my parents’ deaths though—you told Bingley.”
“My aunt informed me of it at my wedding. Well, she told me of losing her vicar, and the reason for it. I made enquiries.”
“Why?” I asked, my voice only a whisper.
For long moments he was silent. Then he said, “I knew you all thought well of him. I ought to have said something, let at least your father know that he was not to be trusted. Instead, I said nothing, perhaps for fear Wickham would start whispers about Georgiana, or perhaps because I thought him too far beneath my notice. Perhaps because I had not taken the time to consider how he might take his revenge. He saw my interest in you, I know he did. I cannot help but believe that he chose Miss Lydia, at least in part, as a sort of backhanded stab at me.”
“How could he have seen it? I certainly did not, and he must have known that whatever interest you once had…well, you learnt of his wickedness on your wedding day, after you wed a different woman—he cannot have believed you were still interested in me?”
“He saw it, and that was all it required,” was his stubborn answer.
I shook my head against his coat. It seemed preposterous.
“I have not even written to Mary or Kitty, much less Charlotte, to tell them of my marriage. I asked Jane to say nothing yet. I remember, you see, how my cousin importuned you at Netherfield. I can only imagine what he would do if he knew the connexion. He will never be ashamed of his brash, self-advancing ways. He always believes himself to be right.”
He lifted my chin. “I can deal with him. He shall not bother you, no matter what he knows or does not know. You need not put off writing any longer.” He paused, seeming to struggle with his words.
“You may, if you wish, write to your youngest sister as well. Lydia…she is not dead,” he said at last.