Pride and Premeditation (Jane Austen Murder Mystery #1)(75)

But Mrs. Bennet would not be pushed aside so easily. “You’re always cutting me out of important decisions and situations. Always! First, Collins shows interest in Lizzie after months of disinterest, and then he proposes marriage—a truly unexpected miracle—and you decide that she doesn’t need to be married? A husband and wife ought to be in complete confidence in all things!”

“That defense only works in a court of law,” her father replied wearily. “And I for one am very glad that Lizzie shall not spend the rest of her days having to keep Collins’s banal confidences.”

If Mrs. Bennet had a response to that, Lizzie didn’t hear the particulars. A roaring filled her ears, and she felt very, very faint. Could it be? No, she was insane. She was desperate. Was it inspiration when you were struck by an idea at the eleventh hour or madness?

But underneath her light-headedness, her heart raced with certainty.

“Are you all right, Lizzie?” Charlotte asked.

“Elizabeth?” Mr. Darcy was at her side, intent with concern.

He called me Elizabeth again, she thought with delight. “I . . . don’t know, I . . .”

Mr. Darcy guided her to the nearest seat, but she barely noticed the movement or the way his thumb caressed her knuckles briefly before releasing her hand.

“Her nerves! She’s overcome! Lizzie, don’t fret—it’s not too late to salvage this situation. I shall ring for the maid, and we will get you into bed, and Jane can—”

“My nerves are fine,” Lizzie told Mrs. Bennet. “I’m simply thinking.”

At first, the thought seemed too preposterous to entertain, but the more credence Lizzie gave it, the more value it held.

Mr. Collins’s proposal had been unexpected. Just days earlier he’d been pursuing Charlotte—what had induced him to then propose marriage to Lizzie after months of ill will between them? She had never flattered him; he was well aware that she despised him. His reasoning, which she had accepted at the time, now did not make any sense. Why would he propose to Lizzie when she had four other sisters he could have aligned himself with? Jane, Kitty, and Lydia would have all refused him, of course, but Mary might have accepted him.

Was she mad to think that he was motivated by some darker purpose?

She thought of how she’d seen him from a distance at the public assembly. Collins had disparaged such social events in the past. And yet, there he was—at the same public assembly that Lady Catherine and Wickham attended. He could have been receiving instructions or reporting to her. With unease, she thought of the day she’d been followed. Had Collins passed along information about her movements? Or had that been Wickham? Had they been working for the same woman?

Perhaps Lizzie would never know how great a hand Wickham had in misleading her, but the more she thought on Collins, the faster the evidence stacked up.

“Mama, where did you say Sir Lewis was from?”

“Kent, dear,” Mrs. Bennet replied.

Kent, where Collins was from. Where his benefactress resided!

And, oh, heavens—the day Lizzie caught him flirting with Charlotte, hadn’t she been sharpening his quill for him? Why would he ask such a thing of her, unless he was no longer in possession of his penknife, the penknife that Mr. Bennet had in fact given Collins upon his appointment as heir? Lizzie closed her eyes briefly. She had helped Mr. Bennet pick out that penknife, and it was silver, with mother-of-pearl inlay. She’d have to look at the one in custody to say whether it was the same one, but why hadn’t she seen it before?

There had also been Collins’s fury when she declined his proposal. His threats.

“May I see the insurance policy?” she asked Darcy, and he handed it to her without question. “Charlotte, would you look at this?”

Charlotte sat next to her. “What am I looking for?”

But Lizzie didn’t want to plant thoughts in Charlotte’s mind, not when they’d fallen out over Collins. She simply handed the document over and watched her read it. Hereto, therefore, whither, henceforth, and insomuch as. The document was riddled with ridiculous, gilded language. Distracting language. Lizzie had read many such documents before in her work behind the scenes of Longbourn & Sons and had crossed many such words out of said documents. All written by Collins.

Lizzie forced herself to sit with these suspicions, for the simple reason that quick judgments had gone horribly awry for her lately. She despised Collins. She was affronted by his spurious interest in Charlotte, and she wanted to believe him manipulative and untrue. She wished that her father had never hired him in the first place, never named him successor to the business, never put so much stock and faith in his ability to run the firm when it became obvious that he was judgmental, hypocritical, and unfaithful. But, that didn’t make him a murderer.

Charlotte examined the document wordlessly, but Lizzie knew the moment when Charlotte understood. She set down the document, and Lizzie was frightened that Charlotte disagreed with her and that Lizzie had angered her best friend. But instead, Charlotte reached for the satchel and riffled through it, extracting a stray sheet of paper and a magnifying glass. She took her time examining the documents with her magnifier, taking in the cramped swoop of the letters and the jagged angle of the clauses. When Mrs. Bennet whispered, “What on earth is going on?” Mr. Bennet hushed her.

Finally, Charlotte looked up. Lizzie was relieved to find that her friend didn’t look heartbroken—she looked furious. Charlotte nodded once.