This is extract is from the beginning of Darcy's Diary. Darcy has surprised Georgiana by visiting her in Ramsgate, and Georgiana has revealed that she has been seeing George Wickham. In this extract, Darcy learns just how far things have gone.

'And what did Mrs Younge say to your seeing George Wickham?' I demanded.

'She said it was perfectly proper for me to entertain a family friend. I would not have done so otherwise,' said my sister.

'Entertain him?' I asked, feeling more and more alarmed.

'Yes. He has dined here on occasion, and joined us in the day if the weather was wet. He plays chess very well, but I am improving and I have beaten him twice.'

There was some animation in her face as she said this, but she faltered again on seeing my expression.

'I have displeased you.'

'Not at all,' I said, striving for my composure. 'You have done nothing wrong.'

'I did not mean to fall in love with him, really I did not,' she said imploringly. 'I know I am very young, but he told me so many pleasing stories about the future that I came to look on our marriage as a settled thing.'

'Marriage?' I exclaimed in horror.

'He . . . he said he loved me, and he reminded me of when I had said I loved him.'

'When did you say so?' I demanded.

'When I fell off the gate in the courtyard and he picked me up.'

'But you were seven years old!'

'Of course, it was just a childish thing to say at the time, but the more I saw of him here, the more I became convinced I was in love with him in earnest. Only I did not like to think of deceiving you. I wanted everything to be open. I told him he must ask you for my hand in the ordinary way, but he said you would not let us marry until I was eighteen, and that it would be a waste of three precious years of our life together. He said we should elope, and then send you a letter from the Lake District afterwards.'

'And did you agree to this?' I asked, stricken.

Her voice dropped.

'I thought it sounded like an adventure. But now that I see you, and know how much it grieves you, it does not seem like an adventure at all.'

'It is not. It is trickery of the basest kind. He has made love to you in order to gain your fortune, and in order to hurt me! To persuade you to forget friends and family and run away with him, to your utter ruin, is monstrous!'

'No!' she exclaimed. 'It was not so. He loves me.'

I saw the fear in her eyes and I did not want to go on. For her to learn that the rogue had never loved her must hurt her. But I could not let her continue under such a misapprehension.

'I do not want to tell you this, Georgiana,' I said softly, 'but I must. He does not love you. He has used you.'

At this she broke down. I was helpless in the face of her tears. I did not know what to do, how to comfort her, and in that moment I missed my mother more than I have ever done. She would have known what to do. She would have known what to say. She would have known how to comfort her daughter, whose affections had been played upon. I could only stand helplessly by and wait for Georgiana's grief to spend itself.

When her tears began to subside, I handed her my handkerchief. She took it and blew her nose.

'I must speak to Mrs Younge and make sure she knows what has been going on behind her back,' I said. 'It has been negligent of her not to notice.'

Something in Georgiana's expression stopped me.

'It was behind her back?' I asked.

Georgiana looked down into her lap.

'She helped me plan the elopement.'