Chapter 18 #3
He turned another page. “You said one essay was foolish.”
“Very.”
“And yet you recommend it?”
“Foolish arguments may be useful if they make one think more clearly in opposition.”
“That is a dangerous defense. It would make nearly any bad book valuable.”
“Not nearly any. Only those bad in an interesting direction. Dull foolishness is beyond redemption.”
“I shall remember the distinction.”
“I hope you do. It is essential to any proper education.”
He looked down again, but the smile remained. “And who directed yours, Miss Elizabeth? Your father?”
“In part. Papa has a great many books and very few rules regarding who may read them, provided one does not ask too loudly or disturb his own enjoyment of solitude.”
“That sounds generous.”
“It can be. It can also be a little like being given a key to a cupboard and told nothing about which jars contain preserves and which contain medicine.”
“Then you learned by tasting?”
“In books, yes. In actual cupboards, Cook would have boxed my ears.”
The laugh that escaped him was quiet but genuine, and Elizabeth looked into her teacup before he could see how much it pleased her.
She had been wary of him only days ago. Wary and hurt.
And now here they were, speaking in the early stillness of Netherfield’s library as though the assembly had never happened, as though his insult, her wounded pride, and the whole impossible secret of Gracechurch Street lay safely folded away.
Yet it did not feel false.
That was what unsettled her.
“You read more widely than most young ladies of my acquaintance,” he said.
Elizabeth gave him a mock-suspicious look. “Is that praise or accusation?”
“Observation.”
“That is the safest answer and therefore the least interesting.”
“Then praise,” he said.
The warmth that rose in her cheeks was entirely unnecessary. “In that case, I accept it.”
His gaze held hers a moment longer than ordinary civility required, and Elizabeth suddenly became very interested in setting her cup precisely upon its saucer.
“Though,” she added, to recover herself, “I should not have you imagine me a prodigy of scholarship. I read what I can, when I can. Often I begin with one purpose and end somewhere entirely different.”
“As in finding William Bridge among your father’s papers?”
Her surprise must have shown, for his expression softened into something almost shy. “I remembered the name.”
“So you did.”
“It was an unusual quotation.”
“It was an unusual dinner conversation.”
“A pleasant one.”
The words were simple, but Elizabeth felt them with embarrassing force. She looked toward the shelves, pretending to consider whether the histories required rearranging. “Yes. It was.”
Mr. Darcy closed the book upon one finger to mark his place. “May I ask whether you have found any more obscure divines in this library, or must I depend upon your father’s papers for my education?”
“This library is stronger in county history, agricultural improvement, sermons no one has opened in thirty years, and novels tucked discreetly behind heavier volumes.”
“Novels hidden behind sermons?”
“Where else should one hide them? It lends an air of moral struggle to the shelf.”
“Do you approve of novels, then?”
“I approve of anything that is honest about what it intends. A novel that wishes to entertain is less tiresome than a sermon that wishes to be admired for scolding.”
“Some would say entertainment is a poor object for reading.”
“Some people enjoy saying poor things.” She leaned back slightly, more comfortable now than she had meant to be. “Besides, entertainment may have more truth in it than solemnity. A person may reveal himself by what he laughs at.”
“And what does my amusement reveal?”
“That you are not so severe as you appear.”
Darcy’s eyes moved to hers.
For half a second, Elizabeth wished the words unsaid. They were too direct. Too near to confession. But his expression did not close. If anything, he looked almost startled, as though the idea mattered more than she intended.
“Do I appear severe?”
“Sometimes.”
“And now?”
She ought to have teased. It would have been safer. Instead, she found herself answering with a honesty that surprised her. “No. Not now.”
The fire shifted in the grate, and a small fall of ash broke the silence. Somewhere in the hall a maid passed, her footsteps softened by distance. Netherfield seemed to hold its breath around them.
Mr. Darcy looked down first. “I am glad of it.”
Elizabeth’s fingers tightened around the arm of her chair.
This was dangerous ground. Not improper—nothing in their words had crossed any visible line—but dangerous all the same.
He had a way of making ordinary conversation feel as though something greater moved beneath it.
She had felt the same in the cellar two years before, though then she had been too overwhelmed by gold, grief, and mud to understand it.
She searched for firmer footing and found it in the book upon his knee. “Have you reached the foolish essay yet?”
“Not yet.”
“Then you must persevere. I assure you it rewards endurance with irritation.”
“A strange recommendation.”
“I have always thought irritation a useful stimulant.”
“So I have noticed.”
She laughed. “That sounded almost like an accusation.”
“Observation,” he said again.
“Coward.”
His brows rose. “I beg your pardon?”
“You hide behind observation whenever you are too prudent to admit an opinion.”
“I had not realized I was so transparent.”
“You are not. I am unusually penetrating.”
“That must be very inconvenient for those around you.”