Chapter 27 #2
“Um, yes.” Leaving her behind, he strode rapidly towards the back of the house and the door to the courtyard. Moments later, he thrust the door wide, then nearly collapsed with the relief of seeing her, calm and maternal, watching over their boy.
“Pop!” Bennet cried, racing over to show him a rock.
“Oh! Is not that a fine rock!” he said, one eye on his wife. She sat in a bit of dappled shade, a gentle smile on her lips. There was a slight chill in the air, and she wore a shawl about her shoulders that he had given her back when they were engaged. He hoped that was a good sign.
“May I join you?”
“Certainly.” She moved aside on the bench to make room for him. Nurse Harriet came outdoors before anything else could be said. It was Bennet’s nap time, and she intended to take him inside. Elizabeth rose as well, but Darcy forestalled her.
“Stay with me?”
“Very well,” Elizabeth agreed.
When the door closed behind the pair, Darcy’s stomach knotted painfully. He could not look at her as he remarked, “I understand Miss Bingley interrupted your visit to your sister this morning and said…and told an absurd lie to you about…”
He knew not what to expect, but what he decidedly did not anticipate was Elizabeth’s chuckle. “I begin to think she is mad. What a tale! She should consider writing novels.”
“I…I could not stand the thought that she had upset you. I am sure it must have been humiliating…”
Elizabeth rose, smiling down at him on the bench. “No, if anything, I am concerned for Jane. She must see her settled somehow before things get worse.”
“Miss Bingley did come here once to see me… I still cannot remember what made me admit her entry. Foolishness I suppose, for clearly she just wished to bestir more trouble.”
Elizabeth shrugged as he rose. “Miss Bingley is no friend of mine. I should not be surprised that she sought to take advantage of my absence in whatever way she could. But I can hardly imagine that you would take up with the likes of her. You can hardly stand to be in the same room with her much less take her into your bed.”
“While I cannot deny that, it is not Miss Bingley’s lack of appeal that should persuade you. The whole of my being was focused on finding you, my beloved wife. The very notion that I should take up with another—”
“I could hardly blame you if you had. Most gentlemen would have.” She said it almost carelessly, her attention ostensibly on a small topiary bush beside them.
He reached out, taking her hand, which she gave him without looking at him. “Will you please look at me?”
From all appearance, she was calm and unconcerned.
“I care not what most gentlemen might have done. I love you, and the very idea of another woman disgusts me.”
Her eyes slid from his, and she did not reply.
He dropped her hand. “You do not believe me,” he accused.
“I said nothing of the sort.”
“Do you believe me?”
“Do I believe Miss Bingley was not your mistress? Of course, I do.”
“Do you believe I did not, have not, nor would I ever, ever have a mistress?”
She laughed in a tight, uncomfortable way. “If you say so.”
He gasped. “I cannot believe you. You think I had a mistress.”
“I do understand that a gentleman has…needs.”
Angrily, he retorted, “What I need is you, not the meaningless embrace of some paid vessel.”
A flash of anger went into her eyes. “I have never barred you from my bed. In fact, I invited you into it.”
“For sleep only!”
“Well, if you want more, take it! Do you expect an invitation?”
“Yes!” He exclaimed. “Yes, I do!”
“Very well,” she said, still so damnably placid. “You, Fitzwilliam Darcy, are cordially invited to exert your marital rights—”
“Stop it!” he roared. Why could she not become angry? Where were her tears? Was he really so unimportant to her?
The volume of his voice made her grow stern. “Is all this shouting really necessary?”
“I think it is,” he said, still angry but in a low tone. “There is much wrong I have done you, but I cannot sit idly by and allow you to believe—”
The flash of anger was back, and more than a flash, it was a burn.
“To believe of you as you believed of me?” she retorted.
“Yes, you are an expert at upholding your wedding vows with the exception of the ‘to have and to hold from this day forward’ portion. That bit only lasted a few months for you. Is it so absurd that I should imagine the rest to be done with so easily as well?”
She advanced on him, and he realised this was it, the true measure of her feelings was about to come forth.
Her eyes fairly shot sparks, and her voice, still low, was nothing short of menacing.
“Do not dare stand there like some great lumbering hypocrite, indignant that I should think of you just as you thought of me. Yes, I did think you had a mistress, and in my darker hours, I wondered whether it was for her sake that you sent me away.”
“I have never wanted any woman, ever, the way I wanted, and still want, you. A mistress? The idea is laughable.”
“Except when the laughter stops, and the banishment to Yorkshire begins,” she spat back at him.
“I love you. I have from the very first moment I saw you, and you love me too, and we have to—”
“Love is not the problem!” she cried. “Your love did me no good when I was alone and sad, and you would not reply to my letters. You never even read them, did you?”
“Had I the opportunity, it would be done very differently. But to my discredit, no, I did not read many of them. The first one, yes, but many others were sent directly to the fire.”
This made her sag, her eyes immediately turned downward. “You did not wish to hear me then, and you cannot blame me for wishing to remain silent now. If you will excuse me, I think I must go lie down.”