Page 74 of A Quiet Affection

He now thought of his childhood companion as ‘Mr. Darcy’, and Mr. Darcy and his wife were too far above him and too frightening for him to do anything against them.

It was solely because of Darcy that he had paid his first set of debts to tradesmen. Darcy would have him placed in debtor’s prison if he ever had a chance.

Mrs. Wickham was always held in the highest respect by all who knew her, for she acted as a Lady ought to. She was always demure, always proper, and she always kept a calm countenance no matter what she suffered. It must be admitted that there were some who were of a more romantic disposition who believed that her unwillingness to appear unhappy, no matter how her husband behaved, showed a lack of proper feeling.

Everyone agreed that she was angelically beautiful.

It was generally suspected that Mrs. Darcy had told her sister that they could arrange for her to safely live apart from her husband, but that Mrs. Wickham had refused.

Not being able to see the poverty of her sister’s dress, it was only several months after she’d returned to Pemberley as its mistress that Mrs. Darcy learned of the depth of the difficulties that her sister faced. After this Mrs. Darcy approached the merchants around town and told them all that shipments of food and coals should be charged to her account, that the cost for clothes that Jane purchased for herself should likewise be charged her accounts. Further Mrs. Darcy directly hired several respectable women to serve as Jane’s servants.

It was only after this that Wickham seriously harbored a wish to beat Mrs. Wickham. These women were spies. If he beat his wifenow, it would be immediately reported to Mr. and Mrs. Darcy, and Darcy would find some means to hurt him for hurting his wife’s sister.

Mr. Charles Bingley had been an intimate of Mr. Darcy since they both attended Eton.

This young gentleman of fortune had greatly admired Mrs. Wickham when he met her before accompanying Darcy for his shortened grand tour, when she was still ‘Miss Bennet.’

His infatuation likely would have faded following her marriage if it had been a happy marriage. However, anyone who saw Mrs. Wickham in a room with her worse half could see that he was sneering and contemptuous. Her behavior, while everything that was proper, lacked real affection.

When Bingley visited Darcy at Pemberley, which he did more frequently than he would have without his hopeless affection for Jane Bennet, they met at assemblies, at church, and at dinners.

Bingley was a person who Wickham particularly liked to play cards with for two reasons. The most important reason was that Wickham was delighted to watch gentleman helplessly admire his wife, looking at her from the corner of his eyes. It was not in Jane’s character to ever betray him. In that he had chosen his wife very well. And for Wickham the chief benefit of a wife was so that other men could wish to have what he possessed.

But Wickham also liked to have Bingley visit, because that gentleman was not unhappy when he lost money to Wickham.

Mr. Bingley was aware of the poor state of Mr. and Mrs. Wickham’s finances, and he incorrectly believed that losing some ten or twenty, or even a hundred guineas on one occasion to Wickham would in some small way benefit the woman who was the standard against which he measured all other women.

Bingley generally let Wickham succeed in his bluffs when the stakes were high, even though he had known since they were both at Eton about Wickham’s poorly hidden tells.

In the autumn of 1811, shortly after Mrs. Darcy reached her twentieth year, Mr. Bingley hosted the Darcys and their child for a long stay at the estate that he had just leased. Bingley’s estate of Netherfield was situated in the same neighborhood that Elizabeth had spent her early childhood in, and it was located only three miles from Longbourn.

Elizabeth found much delight in her return to the neighborhood of her childhood, even though she found the determination of Bingley’s younger sister to convince her and Georgiana to be the best of friends with her tiresome. This was especially the case as Miss Bingley insisted on constantly commenting upon how impressive anything Elizabeth did—even going to the chamberpot—was due to her blindness.

The weather was pleasant enough that Elizabeth spent a great deal of time walking around with Georgiana, her son, and her husband. She was particularly eager to do so much walking as she was with child once more. Elizabeth remembered from the first time that exercise had become both more necessary and more difficult in the final months.

A chief delight was in hearing Fitzwilliam describe old sights and seeing how well they matched up to her memories.

Upon seeing her again, now named as Mrs. Darcy, her less beloved aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Phillips were very obsequious to Elizabeth.

She felt deeply uncomfortable the first time that she sat in Mrs. Phillips little parlor and listened to her aunt and uncle paint her with praise and declare that they had always been sure that it would be a very good thing that God had spared her.

She had avoided coming back to Meryton when Mr. Gardiner went each Christmas to visit the house that he had been born in and that his surviving sister occupied. She’d excused herself by saying that the memories would be painful, but what Elizabeth now realized was that she had not wished to be resident again with Mr. and Mrs. Phillips.

“We had known that the scars would not be so bad, even though everyone said they would be,” Mrs. Phillips said. “And look at you! You are a lovely woman. I always thought that you would marry better than Jane. She did not have the same fire you do—and that spirit is what truly will attach a man of worth.”

They sounded so sincere about their delight in her, and all of it was because she had married much better than Jane.

“Lizzy, you look as though you must have some fresh air—you know that in her condition she cannot be kept toomuch indoors.” Fitzwilliam’s pleasant voice interrupted her increasingly frustrated thoughts.

“Of course,” Mrs. Phillips replied. “You take such good care of her. You must hope for another son.”

“I shall be happy in either case, so long as both my wife and the babe are healthy,” Fitzwilliam replied, drawing Elizabeth up and walking her to the door.

Before she left, Elizabeth adopted her now familiar role asMrs. Darcyto say some gracious parting words to her aunt and uncle. The way in which she spoke to them was the general manner she used with those who were inferior to her, and with whom she was in no way intimate.

From the cheerful sound of their replying voices, they were not at all offended by her manner or by her ending the call early.

As soon as they were out of the house and around the street corner, Fitzwilliam pulled her into a long embrace.