The coachman, hearing shots, raises the alarm and Darcy and his cousin Colonel Fitzwilliam, Viscount Hartlep, hurry to the wood minutes later.

Later in court, Wickham says that Denny "thought that I had been wrong to resign my commission without having a sound profession and a settled home for my wife.

I believe that it was his increasing impatience with my conduct that made my company intolerable to him, and that it was this reason that led him to stop the chaise and run into the woodland."

The publican's wife at the inn from which the three travellers had set out said that she heard Denny say that "Mr Wickham was selfish and did not understand how women feel and that there had been deceit from start to finish."

Colonel Fitzwilliam, who owed Wickham a favour from the Irish campaign, agreed to lend or give him £30 so that Mrs Younge, once a companion to Darcy's younger sister, could bring up the boy.

She, however, is run over and killed outside the high court where Wickham has been tried, and it was expected that Louisa's married sister in Birmingham would adopt the child.

Louisa later marries Joseph Billings, butler at Highmarten, the home of Jane, née Bennet, and Charles Bingley, and intends that the boy will not in the future be found by Wickham, who will now emigrate to America with Lydia, financed once again by the benevolence of Darcy.

[3] A serial of three sixty-minute episodes, also titled Death Comes to Pemberley, written by Juliette Towhidi (Calendar Girls) was made by Origin Pictures for BBC One.

It was broadcast in the UK over three nights from 26 December 2013 as part of BBC's Christmas schedule, and stars Anna Maxwell Martin as Elizabeth, Matthew Rhys as Mr Darcy, Jenna Coleman as Lydia, Matthew Goode as Mr Wickham and Trevor Eve as Sir Selwyn Hardcastle.