Page 46 of A Quiet Affection

Elizabeth promised to certainly remain until after Christmas, though from the speed of Mr. Darcy’s decline over the past weeks, Elizabeth rather thought that would involve a delay relative to her plan of leaving shortly after the funeral.

That night Elizabeth started up in bed in the dead of night. Perhaps some sound had woken her, but she could not make it out. She suddenly felt that she should still tell Jane about Mr. Wickham’s long-ago dalliance with Submit Jones. She should wake up Jane right now to tell her.

And then, once again Elizabeth tried to convince herself, with tolerable success, that this was for the best. Jane could not possibly want to hear about the sins of her soon to be husband, and that in any case it was no fit reason to make a giant to-do. The conversation would be awkward.

Every gentleman, except probably Fitzwilliam and Mr. Darcy, did the same sort of thing that Wickham had.

From things Elizabeth could vaguely remember Papa having hinted at (and those had been vague hints, so this was not a point upon which Elizabeth was confident), she believed that he had engaged in such dalliances in the years before he married Mama. She refused to think worse of the memory of her Papa for such a reason, so it would be hypocritical to think worse of the reality of a Wickham.

It is unfortunate that Elizabeth did not connect her memory of Wickham’s behavior with Fitzwilliam’s desire to prevent the marriage. Had she done so, or had Fitzwilliam begged her to use her influence to dissuade Jane from marrying Mr. Wickham, she would have told Jane the tale.

Whether that would have made any difference is uncertain.

It was also unfortunate this night that Elizabeth had long since abandoned her old habits of walking the halls after all wereasleep. If she had done so, she would have heard—at the exact same location—the sounds of Mr. Wickham engaged in intimate relations once more with Submit Jones.

There was something in the habits and mind of that young man. A thing that required he risk all, and that he indulge his desires to prove that he was a man who did as he wished and let the rest of the world be damned.

Thus, despite her anger at him for marrying, he once more successfully seduced the young woman—only two years older than himself—on the night before he was to enter wedded bliss with Jane Bennet.

Chapter Thirteen

The wedding between Jane Bennet and George Wickham occurred on a blustery day at the start of November. It was attended by a delighted Mr. Darcy, who could not have been happier if he attended the wedding of his own children, and who perhaps was happier than he had been on the day of his own wedding. Mr. Wickham’s father attended, still drunk from the previous night of dissipation, during which he had sobbed at the memory of his own wedding and how much he missed a woman who had while alive thought very little about him. Additionally, Elizabeth, Georgiana, most of Pemberley’s servants, and divers friends of theirs from about the neighborhood sat in the cold pews to watch the vows made.

Submit Jones did not attend.

Even though Wickham had assured her of his affection the night before, and even though she looked forward to the position of housekeeper that she had been promised by Wickham, she was angry. She destroyed a vase that had the cost of more than two pounds and then hid the shards.

When the old familiar rector asked Miss Jane Bennet, “Wilt thou obey him, and serve him, love, honor, and keep him,” there was a shockingly long pause.

She did not love him.

She could not say that she loved him. That would be a lie. A lie. She could not say it. She did not want to live a life where she must love and serve George Wickham.

Jane looked about desperately, wishing to be anywhere else.

But Jane was a seventeen-year-old girl who had generally been raised to do what she ought, and who had a terrible fear of disappointing people. She blushed; she went pale. She saw Wickham looking at her with something in his eyes.

She had to say it.

Mr. Darcy was looking at her. Wickham was looking at her. The rector looked at her. Her eyes fell on Elizabeth, that black ribbon tied around her sister’s eyes. Even though she had never said so much, Jane was quietly confident thatElizabethwould approve if she did not marry George. But everyone else would be shocked and despise her. She would be a tale for the next thirty years of the young woman who refused to say her wedding vows after everyone had assembled to hear them.

She opened her mouth to say it.

A memory of a piece of paper, the quill dripping down into the inkpot. Saying something that was not true, and then terrible things happened.

She shouldn’t lie. Saying the marriage vows would be a lie.

The rector prompted her again. “Wilt thou obey him, and serve him, love, honor, and keep him?”

In a low voice that could barely be heard, Jane Bennet said, “I will,” and transformed herself into Jane Wickham.

Let us not judge Jane too harshly for this mistake. She was young, and her parents were dead, and all of the advice she had received had been poor. I doubt that many of us would have done better in her place.

Often though, the worst mistakes that we make are not like Jane’s mistake.

She was aware of her decision. She knew that she could have chosen differently, and she had not. No, the worst mistakes wemake are those of inattention, where we do not think about something absolutely important until it is too late, and we must forever more ask ourselves ‘what if’.

There was something in Jane’s barely audible voice as she’d finished her vows that sent a knife of ice through Elizabeth’s soul.