#darcy should just contradict it if it's not true. maybe he won't hear about it but he should still contradict it.

[anghraine]

Wickham's lies and half-lies to Elizabeth are aggravating on one level, but ngl, the initial conversation between them is pretty funny in other ways.

At first, Wickham doesn't say much that Elizabeth doesn't already know, then just asks, "Are you much acquainted with Mr Darcy?" It's Elizabeth who jumps feet-first into venting about Darcy to this perfect stranger.

Then, after Wickham's tale of his woes at Darcy's hands, she is 100% onboard:

“This is quite shocking! He deserves to be publicly disgraced.” “Some time or other he will be—but it shall not be by me. Till I can forget his father, I can never defy or expose him.” Elizabeth honoured him for such feelings, and thought him handsomer than ever as he expressed them.

&

Elizabeth was again deep in thought, and after a time exclaimed, “To treat in such a manner the godson, the friend, the favourite of his father!” She could have added, “A young man, too, like you, whose very countenance may vouch for your being amiable.”

With Jane afterwards:

“I can much more easily believe Mr Bingley’s being imposed on than that Mr Wickham should invent such a history of himself as he gave me last night; names, facts, everything mentioned without ceremony. If it be not so, let Mr Darcy contradict it. Besides, there was truth in his looks.” “It is difficult, indeed—it is distressing. One does not know what to think.” “I beg your pardon;—one knows exactly what to think.”

It's funnier, ngl, because she's someone who will tell a slight acquaintance, "I understand you perfectly" with an absolutely incredible degree of assurance about her ability to judge character and then she turns around and has this conversation with Wickham that's just ... lol what.

It's also, obviously, awful and frustrating that he's going around misleading young women, lying about his own victims, etc etc. And Elizabeth is so eager to accommodate Wickham's dubious tale-telling that she becomes ethically compromised in her own way, as I've talked about before. And that can be frustrating as well!

But. The scene is funny, too.