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> I am happy to add that I owed the knowledge of it to herself. I

> joined them unexpectedly a day or two before the intended elopement;

> and then Georgiana, unable to support the idea of grieving and

> offending a brother whom she almost looked up to as a father,

> acknowledged the whole to me. You may imagine what I felt and

> how I acted. Regard for my sister's credit and feelings prevented

> any public exposure; but I wrote to Mr. Wickham, who left the

> place immediately, and Mrs. Younge was of course removed from

> her charge. Mr. Wickham's chief object was unquestionably my

> sister's fortune, which is thirty thousand pounds; but I cannot help

> supposing that the hope of revenging himself on me was a strong

> inducement. His revenge would have been complete indeed. This,

> madam, is a faithful narrative of every event in which we have

> been concerned together; and if you do not absolutely reject it as

> false, you will, I hope, acquit me henceforth of cruelty towards Mr.

> Wickham. I know not in what manner, under what form of false-

> hood, he has imposed on you; but his success is not perhaps to be

> wondered at, ignorant as you previously were of everything con-

> cerning either. Detection could not be in your power, and suspicion

> certainly not in your inclination. You may possibly wonder why all

> this was not told you last night. But I was not then master enough

> of myself to know what could or ought to be revealed. For the

> truth of everything here related, I can appeal more particularly to

> the testimony of Colonel Fitzwilliam, who, from our near relation-

> ship and constant intimacy, and still more as one of the executors

> of my father's will, has been unavoidably acquainted with every

> particular of these transactions. If your abhorrence of _me_ should

> make _my_ assertions valueless, you cannot be prevented by the same

> cause from confiding in my cousin; and that there may be the pos-

> sibility of consulting him, I shall endeavour to find some opportunity

> of putting this letter in your hands in the course of the morning.

> I will only add, God bless you.'

>

> Fitzwilliam Darcy

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