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the same honor. He finds me quite silly, and I suppose I am at times.”

    “You are still very young, Lyddie.”
    “Am I?” The girl’s shoulders began to jerk with silent sobs. “I am old enough to know what my husband does on these trips when he sends me off to visit with Jane and now you.” Her tone turned sarcastic. “Can you imagine my dear Wickham not keeping company with some other woman when he is at Bath or London?”
    “You do not know that for certain, Lydia.” Elizabeth said the words to comfort her sister, not because she truly believed them.
    Lydia wiped at her face with her sleeve. “No…I do not know for certain what my husband does on his travels.” She wore bitterness on her face when she turned to her sister. “The colonel’s wife says that it is a man’s way—that a woman must accept her lot. But I will not spend my life with a man who does not love me. I fancy myself still capable of attracting a man of consequence—the same as you and Jane.”
    “Lydia, you cannot be thinking of leaving Mr.Wickham!” Elizabeth’s heart sank as she inwardly acknowledged the possible scandal. A divorce would be ten times more controversial than Lydia’s elopement, and it would not be something that even Darcy could cover up, even if it were possible for Wickham to execute. Divorce was usually granted only to those of a particular social class and those with deep pockets, neither of which described the Wickhams.
    “Why not?” Lydia went to the mirror to style her hair. “He has no qualms about leaving me—whether it be to Bath or London or even simply to his own bed. Well, I will have no more of it, Lizzy—I will not be tossed aside at seventeen.When Mr.Wickham left, I told him that I expected a renewal of his affections when he returned, or I would speak to the colonel about what happens behind our closed doors.”
    Elizabeth did not want to ask, but she did so anyway. “What happens, Lydia?”
    Her sister did not turn to speak directly to Elizabeth, but she spoke to her sister’s reflection in the beveled mirror.“Mr.Wickham drinks, Lizzy, and he is not a man who holds his liquor well.”

    “He hits you!” Elizabeth said, aghast. She had observed George Wickham being rude to Lydia, but it was always when Lydia had made a spectacle of herself, but Elizabeth had never thought it might be more than embarrassment mixed with irritation.
    “Not hit exactly—more like shove or fling or pinch or bend. But I will no longer tolerate my husband’s ire, and I told him so before I left Nottingham. I told Mr. Wickham to get whatever it was out of his system before he returned to Newcastle.”
    “Good for you.” Elizabeth moved to stand behind her sister. “I am proud of you, Lyddie.” She took up the brush to style Lydia’s hair.
    “Are you truly, Lizzy?”
    “Indeed, I am.”

CHAPTER 4

    “SO,WORTH,WOULD YOU LIKE to explain to me how you ended up in a carriage with the wife of a man you previously prosecuted for gambling debts?”
    Worth leaned back in his chair. “Would you believe it was purely coincidence?”
    “Not in the least.” Darcy sat forward to press his point.“I prefer the truth. Mrs.Wickham is Mrs. Darcy’s youngest sister. If the lady’s husband has brought additional shame on this family, I have a right to know.”
    Worth played with his pocket watch, opening and closing the case.After several moments, he responded,“Mr.Wickham has made some unsavory connections.”
    Darcy paused and then asked, “What should I know?”
    “Nearly a month ago, Mr. Niall O’Malley , a former associate from Cheshire—sent me a letter. He is practicing in Newcastle and had received several complaints by merchants and officers regarding George Wickham. It took him some time before he made the connection to the case we had brought in my home shire against your wife’s brother.” Remembering Darcy’s contempt for Wickham, Worth was careful not to refer to the man as also being