Page 67 of Undone

Wickham swallowed where he stood, and every eye in the room turned briefly toward him.

"And what consolation was your presence to your own mother?"

Mrs. Vane recoiled as though he had struck her.

The silence that followed was broken only by the crackling of the fire. Wickham had ceased his restless shifting, and even Hale kept his eyes fixed upon the floor.

Darcy had expected to feel triumph when at last he confronted the person responsible for the dangers that had threatened his family. He felt none. There was only anger, mingled with a reluctant understanding of how grief, nourished for too many years, could become something monstrous.

"You married Mr. Vane," he said. "A wealthy man with no connection to Derbyshire."

"My parents lost everything, including my dowry," she replied. "With neither fortune nor consequence to recommend me, I accepted the security that was offered."

"And after his death, his fortune gave you the means to pursue this design."

"If you mean to obtain justice, then yes."

"This was never justice."

"It should have begun with your father," she said. "He died just as I was laying my plans and left everything to you. He left Pemberley untouched, his name unsullied, and his childrenprovided for. Mine was buried while half the county whispered that his death had spared the hangman his duty."

"My father was not responsible for your father's taking his own life."

"He knew what would happen."

"He could not have known."

"He did not care."

Darcy met her gaze steadily. He would not defend every decision his father had made without knowing every circumstance, but neither would he permit grief to transform guilt into innocence.

"Even were that true, Georgiana bore no responsibility for it. Nor did the servants whose lives you endangered, the tenants whose affairs you pried into, or the many others you injured merely because they were connected with my family."

She looked back at him, and for the first time he saw not anger alone, but profound weariness beneath it.

"You speak as a man who has never known what it is to lose everything," she said quietly. "You were free to marry where you pleased. You inherited your father's estate, his consequence, and his place in society. I possessed neither fortune nor dowry. Affection mattered very little when survival demanded something else."

Darcy regarded her for a long moment.

"You have spent so many years allowing your father's actions to destroy what remained of your own conscience."

Her face hardened. "You shall not pity me."

"I do not."

The quiet reply appeared to wound her more deeply than pity ever could.

Darcy stepped backwards as Colonel Forster stepped forward.

"Mrs. Vane, you will accompany us. Hale will be questioned separately, and the statements already obtained from Mrs. Younge and Mr. Wickham will be laid before the magistrate."

Mrs. Vane drew herself upright.

"On whose evidence do you expect to convict me? Hale will never speak, and I doubt any magistrate will place much reliance upon the word of a disgraced companion or George Wickham."

"Your presence here will require some explanation," Colonel Fitzwilliam replied. "So too will the forged references procured for Mrs. Younge. You have paid in gold until now, and I imagine the money found in your reticule will correspond closely with the sum Wickham described in his statement. You may be surprised what further evidence the militia and the Bow Street Runners can uncover when given sufficient cause."

A slight movement near the wall drew Darcy's attention. Hale wrenched himself free of the sergeant's grasp and lunged towards the pistol lying upon the floor.