Chapter 36: Much Ado About Prejudice
Elizabeth reads Mr. Darcy's letter with much indignation. How dare he vilify her family! How dare he lie about his treatment of Mr. Wickham!
But she re-reads the letter a second time; and as she reads Darcy's account of Wickham, she starts to think, huh. You know, he didn't actually know me that long before he started bad-mouthing Darcy to me. And there was the time Wickham said he wasn't afraid of being around Darcy, but then flaked out on the ball. And he waited until Darcy had left town before he started spreading the gossip of what happened between them. AND he ghosted me real quick once that other girl came into some money oh my god Wickham might actually be a piece of shit.
And then she starts to think, well, if Mr. Bingley liked Jane like the letter says he did, then there's actually nothing wrong with him, and he's never found fault with Darcy. And because she was seeing Bingley, Jane spent a lot of time in Darcy's presence too, and she couldn't find fault with him either. So maybe... Darcy's actually a kind of okay guy? Maybe I'm the asshole here for hating on him all this time!
She then turns in for the night, now with quite a lot to think about.