Chapter 15
THE SHEEP DISCOVERED the open gate before Elizabeth. By the time she reached the lower lane, six of them had pressed through the gap and spread themselves along the verge, cropping the new grass. A seventh stood halfway through the gate, then backed into the field.
Sarah stopped ten yards from the flock, head low, body still, and her eyes fixed on the nearest ewe.
“Stay,” Elizabeth said.
One ear turned toward her.
The gate had sagged during the wet weather, pulling one hinge loose from the post and leaving the lower rail to drag against the earth whenever it opened. The men had set it upright two days before, but no one had fitted the new latch. A loop of rope served in its place, but it was hanging loose.
Elizabeth caught the seventh sheep by the wool at its shoulder and pushed it back into the field. The ewe objected with a harsh complaint, planted all four feet, and then yielded at once when Sarah shifted half a pace to the left.
“You might pretend I am helping,” Elizabeth said, but Sarah continued to watch the flock.
The lane narrowed at the gate, with a bank on one side and a wet ditch on the other. The sheep had spread too far to bring back one at a time, and the brambles left Sarah little room to work.
Fetching help would mean admitting that six sheep had defeated both her and the best dog at Longbourn.
“Come by,” she said.
Sarah moved in a swift curve, keeping low along the lane. The nearest ewe raised its head, another followed, and for a moment the flock seemed as though it might gather.
Elizabeth straightened as hoofbeats sounded beyond the bend.
The sheep heard them a breath later, one crowding toward the ditch while two moved up the lane. The sixth stared at the approaching horse.
“Lie down.”
Sarah dropped at once.
The rider came into view before Elizabeth could decide how best to clear the lane.
She recognized Mr. Darcy, seated on his dark horse with the ease of someone who spent as much time in the saddle as out of it.
He checked the animal when he saw her, but the horse had already caught sight of the sheep.
Its head rose, and it pulled against the bit.
Elizabeth stepped toward the center of the lane and lifted one hand.
“Mr. Darcy, you had better wait.”
He had no need of the warning, for he had shortened the reins and brought the horse almost to a halt. One ewe broke from the others and darted across the lane, causing the horse to shy toward the ditch. Sarah held her place.
Darcy turned it away, but there was no room for the animal to recover its footing. Its hindquarters struck the bank, and one forehoof slid at the soft edge of the lane. The horse lunged, tossing its head.
“Sarah, away!”
The dog backed toward the open gate. The flock scattered from her, and the horse gave a second sharp bound.
Darcy was out of the saddle before Elizabeth understood his intention. He landed near the horse’s shoulder, kept hold of the reins, and moved with it rather than pulling against it, his voice low. Elizabeth could not distinguish the words, though the tone carried no alarm.
The horse trembled, its nostrils wide and foam marking the bit. Darcy laid one hand against its neck and turned its head from the sheep. “Take the dog into the field.”
The command might have offended her in another circumstance. Now it was sensible. “Sarah, in.”
Sarah slipped through the gate and lay down inside the field while Elizabeth followed far enough to draw her away from the opening. The sheep watched Darcy lead the horse forward two steps and stop while it tested the ground.
“Can you close the gate?” he asked.
“Not until the sheep are back.”
His eyes moved from the scattered flock to the broken latch. “Then we must put them back.”
We.
Elizabeth expected him to wait until the lane cleared, perhaps with impatience concealed beneath good manners; she did not expect him to involve himself.
“The horse may not agree.”
“He will stand if he cannot see them.”
Darcy led the animal around the bend and tied the reins to a low branch on the bank. The horse shifted but did not pull. Darcy returned, removed his gloves, and looked at Sarah.
“Will she take instruction from me?”
“No.”
His glance came to Elizabeth.
“She takes instruction only from those she knows.”
“I remember.” He moved to the upper side of the lane, cutting off the two sheep that had wandered toward the bend.
Elizabeth almost smiled, as he sounded as though he were awaiting orders in a matter of consequence. “Stand where you are. Do not move unless one tries to pass you.”
Darcy took his position, and Elizabeth sent Sarah wide around the sheep nearest the ditch.
The dog kept enough distance to avoid driving them into the water as the three drew together and moved toward the gate.
One veered when it noticed Darcy, but he stepped forward and blocked the lane without waving his arms or attempting to seize it.
The ewe turned back.
“You have done this before,” Elizabeth said.
“Not with sheep.”
“With tenants?”
“No, my sister.”
She looked at him.
His expression did not change, but something in the answer suggested he knew what he had said.
At Elizabeth’s direction, Sarah brought the first three through the gate.
The others followed with less argument, though the last made a determined attempt to double behind Darcy.
He caught it at the shoulder, held it long enough for Sarah to take position, and released it without losing his balance.
The ewe bounded into the field.
Sarah stopped on Elizabeth’s signal and looked back, tongue showing at one side of her mouth. “Well done.”
The dog came to her and pressed against her skirt. Elizabeth bent to run a hand over her neck.
Darcy stood by the gate, his coat marked with dust where the sheep had struck him. One cuff bore a dark smear that he appeared not to notice.
“Thank you,” Elizabeth said. “You prevented a longer chase.”
“I did little.”
“You stood where you were told. Few people manage it so well.”
A brief change touched his face. It was not the open amusement she had seen once before, but it came near.
“Your dog did not appear to require much direction.”
“She would have managed without us, though she might have taken the flock halfway to Meryton before deciding where they belonged.”
Sarah looked up.
Darcy regarded her with the same attention he had given the broken hedge during their last conversation. “She watches you before each command.”
“Nothing escapes her.”
“She knew the horse took fright.”
“Before I did.”
Darcy glanced toward the bend. The horse had ceased pulling at the branch, though its ears remained turned toward the gate.
“I should see to him.”
Elizabeth nodded and took hold of the gate. The lower rail caught against the earth. She lifted, pushed, and felt the weight drag through her arms.
Darcy returned before she had moved it halfway.
“Allow me.”
“I can manage.”
“I believe you.”
That answer left her no good reason to refuse, so she stepped aside.
He lifted the gate near the hinge, taking the strain from the loose post, and swung it into place. Elizabeth drew the rope around the upright and pulled it tight. The arrangement would hold until someone came with the latch.
Darcy kept one hand beneath the rail until she finished.
“This requires more than rope,” he said.
“Papa will have a latch put on it.”
“When?”
“When the man who has it remembers where he put it.”
Darcy looked at the post, then at the field. “Until then, the flock may find the road again.”
“Then Sarah and I shall bring them back again.”
His gaze settled on her. “This is not work you should have to undertake.”
There it was.
Though he spoke without contempt, his words were no less certain. He had helped because the situation demanded it, and with the sheep contained and his horse safe beyond the bend, Elizabeth heard rank in his words.
She rested a hand on the gate. “Sarah knows this work, Mr. Darcy, and loves it. I would not keep her from what she understands best because it is inconvenient.”
Darcy looked at Sarah, stretched out in the grass with her head between her paws, though her eyes were on the sheep.
“And,” Elizabeth continued, “this is part of Longbourn. My finding it agreeable or not has little to do with seeing it done.”
His brow drew together. “I did not mean that the work was beneath you.”
“No?”
“I meant that the estate should provide enough men to spare you the necessity.”
The explanation did not improve matters as much as he appeared to expect.
“Longbourn provides what it can.”
“I intended no criticism of your father.”
“Then your criticism has wandered into unfortunate ground.”
Darcy’s hand fell from the gate.
Elizabeth regretted the sharpness as soon as she heard it. He had not mocked her or stood aside while she struggled. The dirt on his coat and gloves proved that, yet he looked at a task she had performed since childhood and saw only Longbourn’s failure to spare her from it.
He glanced across the field. “At Pemberley, the steward would answer for a gate left in this condition.”
“At Longbourn, the steward answers for a dozen things before breakfast and another dozen before dinner. He will mend the gate.”
“That does not make the delay wise.”
“No. It makes it a delay.”
Silence settled between them.
Sarah rose, circled once, and lay down against Elizabeth’s skirt.
Darcy looked at her again. “You think I speak only of rank.”
“Do you not?”
His answer did not come at once.
“I think responsibility increases with possession.”
Elizabeth had expected a defense of privilege. The reply was harder to dismiss.
“And decreases without it?” she asked.
“No.”
“Then we agree that work does not become shameful because it falls to someone who owns less.”
“I did not call it shameful.”
“You called it work I should not be required to undertake.”
“Required,” he repeated. “Not permitted.”
She studied him. The distinction was real and convenient. He had chosen the word and now expected her to accept its better meaning because that was what he intended.
“Your concern sounds more like disapproval, Mr. Darcy.”