Page 2 of Moments of Truth
Even so, he could not have foreseen that among the crowd that night, the young lady he had ignored would be the one to challenge every assumption he had ever made about himself and the world. Her laughter, heard once across the floor, struck his ear with curious force, as though mocking not only the assemblybut his own severity. He dismissed it at the time, but memory is not always obedient to will.
The true cause lay with Bingley, who had fallen head over heels for Miss Jane Bennet, the elder sister of the very woman Mr. Darcy had dismissed at the assembly. As Bingley wished to know Jane better and spend as much time as possible in the company of the eldest Bennet sister, he began organising and attending more social events in Meryton, visiting her home at Longbourn and even hosting a ball at Netherfield. Out of loyalty to his friend, these forced Darcy to accompany him. Despite his initial reluctance, Darcy paid closer attention to Jane’s sister, Elizabeth Bennet, whose wit and intelligence stood out even in the most ordinary conversations. Her words carried a brightness that startled him, for she spoke without affectation, untroubled by the weight of his fortune or his silence.
Though fascinated by her, Darcy struggled to suppress his growing interest, deeming the Bennet family unsuitable due to their lack of refined manners and modest social standing. Meanwhile, the relationship between Bingley and Jane progressed in a manner that hinted at an imminent engagement. However, Darcy, joined by Bingley’s sisters, began to express concerns over the match. Bingley paid little heed. Darcy’s objections were cloaked in reason, yet they hid an unease he could not name, sharpened by the uneasy stirrings Elizabeth awakened in him.In memory he heard Colonel Fitzwilliam’s hearty laugh:“You weigh everything as though it were a campaign, cousin. But the heart does not consult a ledger before it chooses.”
As the weeks passed, Darcy found himself torn between his increasing attraction to Elizabeth and his disdain for what he saw as her family’s flaws. Ultimately, convinced that his friendwas heading toward an unwise marriage, Darcy persuaded Bingley to leave Netherfield and spend the winter in London without even saying farewell to Jane. To Darcy, it was an act of protection; to Jane, it was heartbreak; and to Elizabeth, it was betrayal.
In doing so, Darcy temporarily resolved his unease and ended the potential union between the two families. Yet this decision came with unintended consequences: Elizabeth, a witness to her sister’s heartbreak, began to view Darcy as the chief instigator of the separation, regarding him with mounting resentment. Her prejudice, once roused, grew quickly; and his pride, once wounded, only deepened the gulf between them.
Unaware of the disapproval he had attracted and oblivious to Elizabeth’s growing animosity, Darcy departed for Pemberley, where he remained undisturbed, deceiving himself that his actions had restored order. But order gained at such cost seldom endures; beneath the calm, the heart continues its quiet rebellion.
***
The winter season at Pemberley seemed to stretch wearily on, with heavier-than-usual snowfall and a shortage of firewood for some of Darcy’s tenants. He felt responsible for providing additional wood from his own forests, and, despite the hardship, found quiet satisfaction in ensuring no cottage stood without warmth in so bitter a season. Luckily, the issue was resolved before mid-January. Much to Darcy’s relief, Miss Darcy had also fully recovered from her summer ordeal. Her colour returned, her music resumed, and her smile no longer bore the shadow of past distress.
During the colder months, Mr. Darcy would often sit by the fire with Mrs. Reynolds, the housekeeper, or Mr. Pembrook, the steward, both delighted by Miss Darcy’s progress on the piano. In their steady, familiar company, the vastness of Pemberley seemed less austere, and the hearth’s glow softened his solitude.
As he relaxed in their company, Darcy’s mind often wandered. Sometimes he thought about how many months ago he had convinced Mr. Bingley to doubt Miss Jane Bennet’s true feelings and to consider the potential social implications of marrying into her lower-status family. Bingley followed his friend’s counsel as a good but easily influenced man. The recollection pricked his conscience more keenly in quiet hours, when no duty distracted him from the knowledge of his interference.“Guard your influence, Fitzwilliam,”his father had once said,“for good counsel can wound as easily as it heals.”
If Darcy had not planted the seeds of doubt in Bingley’s mind or persuaded him to stay away, perhaps Bingley would have returned to Netherfield Park and rekindled his relationship with Jane Bennet. He was genuinely in love with her and had no desire to end things, but Darcy seriously doubted Jane’s intentions. It was this very doubt that now unsettled him, for he could no longer be certain whether he had preserved his friend’s happiness or destroyed it.“You see too much with your head, and not enough with your heart,”Colonel Fitzwilliam had teased him once, when Darcy had spoken critically of another acquaintance’s courtship.
Nevertheless, the ban on Bingley was now affecting Darcy as well. He could no longer see Miss Elizabeth Bennet. It was obvious he had no reason to visit Netherfield Park since Bingley was no longer there, and it would be considered impolite for him to visit the neighbours at Longbourn without a properinvitation. Thus, he bore the strange punishment of his own making: in protecting one friend, he had banished himself from the presence of another who had begun to mean far more than friendship.
Despite their initial social differences and Darcy’s own reluctance, he often thought of Miss Elizabeth Bennet. She was undeniably intelligent and sharp-witted, qualities that he admired. During their conversations, Elizabeth stood her ground. She held her own against the intimidating Darcy, which intrigued and challenged him, as he was used to women in his social circle being submissive and accepting of his authority. It was her courage, not merely her cleverness, that unsettled him—for she treated him neither as a prize nor as a terror, but as a man to be met on equal terms.“I am not afraid of you, sir,”she had once said with a playful smile,“though you do seem determined that I ought to be.”
However, Elizabeth’s wit and subtle sense of humour had slowly won him over. She was not afraid to tease and challenge him, unlike other women who were docile and subservient. This contrast made Darcy secretly admire her, even though he did not want to admit it initially. He enjoyed listening to her ideas and her pleasant voice and could have been content to listen to her forever if she so wished. Her laughter seemed to brighten even the dullest remark, and her quick turns of phrase lingered in his memory long after their parting. Why did other women feel the need to talk so much? As a child, he recalled how his mother rarely spoke, only when there was something significant to say, a quality he always admired. Elizabeth, too, spoke with purpose—yet her words carried both weight and playfulness, a harmony he had never before encountered.
On the other hand, while society may not have considered Elizabeth conventionally beautiful, Darcy found her captivating due to the expressiveness of her eyes and the natural charm that came from her unique features and lively personality. In her presence, beauty was no longer a matter of symmetry or fashion, but of spirit, quickened by intelligence and warmth.
In addition, Elizabeth’s indifference towards Darcy’s wealth and status came as a shock to him. Her independence and unwillingness to seek favours from the wealthy only increased his admiration for her. Despite being of lower social standing, she maintained her dignity and refused to flatter Darcy like other women in his circle. Ultimately, Elizabeth’s steadfast adherence to her principles and refusal to compromise them, even when faced with financial temptations, demonstrated her integrity and earned Darcy’s respect for her honourable character. It was this integrity—so rare, so unyielding—that convinced him she was unlike any woman he had ever known, and the only one capable of teaching him humility.
Mr. Darcy reflected on all of this with bittersweet longing, praying that destiny would once again bring him into the presence of Miss Elizabeth Bennet. The snow might melt, the days might lengthen, but his heart remained captive to the memory of her eyes, and to the hope—so faint, yet so persistent—that spring might grant him a second chance.
***
As spring arrived, Mr. Darcy longed for a change of scenery. Despite the joy he felt at hearing his sister Georgiana’s merry laughs filling the halls of their family home, the cold season had weighed upon him. The snow had gone, the buds were showingon the hedgerows, yet within him lingered the heaviness of winter, as though no sun could quite thaw the frost from his spirit. With its familiar comforts, including his favourite readings in the well-appointed library, Pemberley was a refuge and a place of emotional turmoil. The library, carefully curated over the years to enhance the collection his father had started, was a sanctuary for Mr. Darcy. Every leather-bound volume, every annotated margin, bore testimony not only to a lineage of learning but to a father’s silent command: be equal to this inheritance. Yet, it also served as a constant reminder of his responsibilities and the weight of his late father’s expectations.
During this period of introspection, Mr. Darcy received a letter from his cousin, Colonel Fitzwilliam, inviting him to join him in London in late March. The Colonel expected to return then from the Spanish front for a brief refit. The colonel’s regiment had been engaged in the Peninsular War, and Darcy was eager to hear firsthand about his cousin’s experiences and to offer him some much-needed respite. The tales of battle, hardship, and endurance fascinated Darcy less for their romance than for their testament to courage—qualities he both admired and, in another sphere, demanded of himself. The two cousins shared a close bond, and their time together in London would undoubtedly be filled with camaraderie and mutual support. Colonel Fitzwilliam was the only one who truly understood Darcy and with whom he could speak as if he were speaking with an older brother. In Fitzwilliam’s presence, Darcy could shed the armour of reserve, trading it for candour without fear of being misjudged.
Thus, Darcy’s decision to leave Pemberley for a while was a means to escape the memories that haunted him and an opportunity to renew society with friends and family in a setting that promised familiarity and a touch of newness. Derbyshire,for all its grandeur, echoed too loudly with the voices of his own thoughts; London, by contrast, offered motion, society, and the blessed relief of distraction. The trip to London, with its mix of social engagements and personal encounters, would serve as a much-needed diversion from the contemplative solitude of his Derbyshire estate. And though he did not yet confess it aloud, Darcy also nurtured a faint, restless hope—that among the crowds and conversations of town, some unforeseen chance might alter the course of his solitude forever.
***
After the long winter in Pemberley, Mr. Darcy found himself once more in the comfortable and familiar setting of his London house. The bustle of the city, so different from the quiet seclusion of Derbyshire, offered him a sense of movement he had half-forgotten during the snowbound months. It was here, during one such spring afternoon, that his cousin Colonel Fitzwilliam visited him.
With his warm demeanour and easy conversation, the Colonel was one of the few relatives Darcy genuinely enjoyed spending time with, for despite their different temperaments, Darcy’s cousin possessed a rare ability to put people at ease—a quality Darcy sometimes envied. Darcy, for all his discipline and reserve, could not help but admire the manner in which Fitzwilliam turned even a stiff drawing-room into a place of ease.
As they sat in the study, exchanging the usual pleasantries about family, estate matters, and the affairs of the ton, Fitzwilliam broached a subject that Darcy had been expecting yet dreading: their impending visit to their Aunt Catherine de Bourgh at Rosings Park.
“Darcy, we haven’t seen our dear Aunt in some time,” Fitzwilliam said with a faint, knowing smile. “And she has written in her customary fashion again, insisting we make our way to Rosings before Easter. What say you? We might as well go together and save ourselves the lecture on familial duty.”
Darcy sighed, knowing there was little escape from the inevitability of the visit. Lady Catherine was nothing if not persistent, and while he respected his aunt’s position, the thought of enduring her sharp tongue and unrelenting insistence on his marriage to her daughter Anne was hardly appealing. Her letters were always filled with underlined words and emphatic pronouncements, as though a bold hand could strengthen a weak argument.
Visiting Rosings often came with a set of Aunt Catherine’s expectations and demands. Gradually, Darcy had grown accustomed to her overbearing nature. Experience had taught him that reason availed little in her presence; patience, silence, and Fitzwilliam’s good humour were far safer weapons. He knew that with Colonel Fitzwilliam by his side, they would manage to endure her pointed remarks and inquiries with the tact and patience they had developed over the years. Therefore, Fitzwilliam’s suggestion made the prospect somewhat more bearable. With his easy-going nature, the Colonel had a way of diffusing Lady Catherine’s severity, and the idea of companionship during the trip made Darcy nod in agreement.
“Very well,” Darcy replied, “we shall visit before Easter, as her ladyship desires. Your presence will render the visit less formidable, though I suspect you know it. But I must confess, Fitzwilliam, my mind has been otherwise occupied.”
He hesitated, unwilling to delve deeper into the thoughts of Elizabeth Bennet that had plagued him since their lastencounter at Netherfield. Her image, unbidden, had returned to him too often: a voice that could quicken his mind as swiftly as it unsettled his composure; eyes that seemed to read him more truly than he wished. Darcy pushed the memory aside, focusing instead on the duty at hand.
