Darcy looked quickly from the Colonel, to Georgiana, to Elizabeth, and back again. In a few moments, he shook his head and laughed, clasping the Colonel’s hands and kissing Georgiana. “How is it that I am so stupid here? Elizabeth, do I have your usual prescience in these matters to thank for exposing my imperceptivity so dreadfully?”

Elizabeth replied, “Dearest husband, I did not know, but I have believed this man here,” pointing to the Colonel, “to be both the cause and the cure for Georgiana’s malaise, since so long ago as this morning.” Rising to kiss Georgiana, and allowing the Colonel to kiss her, she sat back down and said, “May we now discuss the one remaining mystery, and that is, of course, little Betsey. It is certainly best that we all appear in agreement when she comes down from her bath. It would be very unkind to the child were we to seem in disagreement, and she to believe herself the cause.”

Again, Georgiana spoke, but in a louder and more determined voice than any present had heard her employ before. Hearing the story of how Betsey was found and the circumstances of her former home, it was impossible to think otherwise than to agree that Georgiana had chosen the only path consistent with both reason and Christian charity.

At last, Darcy spoke again, “But, even if you return to Derbyshire as man and wife, it will look very awkward to be bringing a child with you. Or,” he said, turning to Colonel Fitzwilliam, “does your perfect understanding of the world entitle you to an answer for that, as well?”

Colonel Fitzwilliam turned to Georgiana, who replied, “You are right, Brother, to be concerned, but I do not think that the censure of the world could persuade me to any other course. I would be very unhappy were I to find that our feelings on the matter were at variance, but I would be miserable, indeed, with taking any other.”

Again, the Colonel stepped into the breach, saying, “Now then, there is no cause for either misery or disapprobation. I will write to-day about taking steps to adopt the child; I am sure Lizzy’s Uncle Phillips will be happy to accept such a commission. My family is under such a cloud of humiliation presently, that an extra child here or there will hardly signify, and besides, Darcy,” he said, becoming more serious, “it may be the last act of my poor brother’s charity that the world at-large impute Betsey’s existence to his general profligacy, and decide that the Fitzwilliam family are doing the right thing by the child.”

“But,” rejoined Elizabeth, “surely there will be the stain of illegitimacy if such a thing is generally believed.”