Chapter Thirteen #2
When everyone else had filed out the room, Mrs. Rushworth gently caught Elizabeth’s elbow in the doorway. “What are you going to do?”
“I am going to try not to end up like the general, or the captain, or the others down in the cellar,” Elizabeth said in a gruff whisper. “I suggest you do the same.”
Mrs. Rushworth bobbed her head. “I have more cause now than when last I offered my assistance. If there is anything….”
“I believe there may be. I will let you know when we have a plan.”
At this, Elizabeth hastened after her friends, and they all returned to their suite. “What did Mrs. Rushworth have to say, Lizzy?”
“Something that may be very useful,” she told her uncle.
“I see. Well, I suppose you have a great deal to tell me, after such an eventful day.”
Perhaps he had not meant to accuse her, but her own guilty conscience was mortified. Her first thought was not of the murder, but of her kiss with Mr. Darcy, and she felt her face flush with heat as they entered the parlor.
“Oh! What a shocking ordeal, to be locked away for hours!” Lady Allen fanned herself as she sat on the chaise, tutting sympathetically at them.
“Four hours,” Cathy cried. “However did you pass the time?”
“Mr. Willoughby and I had a very interesting conversation,” Emma said, sinking onto the sofa between Cathy and Harriet.
“I played the pianoforte for a little while, which I believe Lizzy rather enjoyed! And then when they came in, we all played parlor games. I have brought one back for us, the alphabet letters.”
Cathy furrowed her brow. “When they came in? What do you mean? They were locked in with you.”
“No, they were locked in the billiard room next door. After an hour or two, Elizabeth discovered that the fireplace rotates, and she and Mr. Darcy remained in the music room with Mr. Willoughby after that.”
Elizabeth was brooding by the window, pondering the raft Sir Edward had spoken of as she gazed out at the moat.
She had usurped Mr. Darcy’s usual place, but he lingered near her, as had been his custom since the first night they arrived.
She smiled to herself as she looked up and caught his reflection in the window.
He met her eye in the glass, and for a moment they silently stared at one another, until Lady Allen cried out, “Oh! So you and Mr. Willoughby were alone together?”
“Yes,” Emma said with shameless defiance. “As I said, we had an interesting conversation. We discussed the practical advantages of a marriage of convenience.”
Elizabeth watched Harriet’s shoulders sag, but Emma hastily reassured her beloved friend of all the advantages she had described to Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy, and Harriet was clearly accustomed to trusting in Emma’s indefatigable confidence.
Sir Edward listened with a skeptical expression but refrained from speaking until Emma had concluded. Elizabeth looked on with sense of strange foreboding in her stomach as Mr. Darcy drew near her. Just as when they had first heard Emma’s news, Mr. Darcy was silently seething.
Lady Allen merrily congratulated Emma and Mr. Willoughby, but Sir Edward could not refrain from expressing his concern. “Do you not want to come to London with your mother and I, Harriet?”
“Oh, I do! But I should not like to be in London always, any more than I should like to be always in the country. And I think Emma is right, it will be exciting to live someplace new. I am grateful to have been welcomed at Hartfield, when first I came, but I have been uncomfortable ever since… since Mr. Woodhouse died.”
“Of course you want to be near your special friend,” Lady Allen said.
“And since you were locked in alone together all that time, you had better marry, anyhow, or there could be a scandal! But do not forget that she is nearly your cousin, John. You must treat her and Miss Woodhouse with every respect; spoil them.”
“Combe Magna has been dreary long enough; some lively ladies are just the thing. My bride and her companion, my cousin, will make the place merry,” Mr. Willoughby said, kissing his aunt’s hand with a bright smile.
Mr. Darcy let out another heavy sigh at this, earning a sharp look from Sir Edward.
“Well,” Sir Edward mused. “I have no right to advise you, Miss Woodhouse, though I should like to see my daughter as often as I can. I do have the right to speak to Lizzy, however.” He left his position behind Lady Allen and crossed to the window.
“I believe you and Mr. Darcy were also locked in, alone together,” he said sternly.
“It is hardly the most shocking thing that has happened today,” Elizabeth bristled. She felt a wave of resentment at his sudden fatherly behavior and was resolved to resist him at all costs.
Sir Edward was just as stubborn, and just as determined to carry his point. “I asked you if anything happened….”
“You informed me that I must have a lot to say. You did not ask me any question,” she said archly. The thought of kissing Mr. Darcy had scarcely left her mind for a moment since it happened, but she would not be forced to confess it to Sir Edward.
“And you did not intend to tell me that you were compromised? Lizzy, you have sisters to think of, and now that your origins are known….”
“Now they will wonder if I am just like my father?” Elizabeth sucked in a sharp breath, instantly regretting her barb.
She was only a little ashamed of her boldness; she was more afraid of the gossip she would face for her birth, and she bitterly resented that she had little control over the circumstances that may come to define her.
Mr. Darcy stepped forward, his expression severe. “Sir Edward, while I cannot fault Miss Bennet’s logic, for surely the killing of Mrs. Clay must overshadow any other unfortunate mishaps, you must allow me to ease your anxiety. I have no disagreement with you.”
Sir Edward gave a begrudging nod. “So, you are prepared to satisfy what honor demands?”
Elizabeth looked between the two men with horror and shame, and was nearly tempted to hurl herself out the nearest window.
Mr. Darcy returned Sir Edward’s intense glare. “Of course I will marry your daughter, I love her.”
Elizabeth had perished. She had shuffled off her mortal coil and was condemned to an eternity of silently observing the most mortifying possible scenarios as they played out before her.
She could only gape at Mr. Darcy as he shook hands with Sir Edward.
Only when he looked over at her with the same warm gaze he had lavished upon her in the billiard room did Elizabeth find her voice. “You love me?”
Sir Edward began to wax poetical about the suspicions he had harbored but Elizabeth did not hear a word. She stared at Mr. Darcy, who began to look a bit abashed at his admission. He offered her a rueful smile. “Yes.”
Across the room, Emma was shamelessly attempting to listen to them, and Mr. Darcy frowned at her.
“Sir Edward, I believe Miss Bennet is entitled to a modicum of privacy at such a moment, do you not agree? We have another hour of daylight, and I wish to walk with her on the battlements, if she will permit it.”
“This, you ask me,” she muttered with disbelief. She did not wait for Sir Edward’s consent before retrieving her bonnet and pelisse, and hastening from the room with Mr. Darcy behind her.
As soon as they were in the corridor, Elizabeth rounded on Mr. Darcy. “You love me?”
“Most ardently,” he said, his voice husky with emotion. He took her hands in his and gazed at her with anxiety.
Elizabeth stammered, a thousand questions on her tongue. “How… how is that possible?”
Mr. Darcy stroked her hands with his fingers. “I was very moved by the care you showed your sister at Netherfield.”
“Netherfield!” Elizabeth gasped. “That was a year ago.”
“Yes. I often observed your bright wit and charm in company, as well as your intelligence and lively turn of mind, and admired deeply you for all these qualities, and countless others. I have already told you how well I enjoyed our lively debates, and what it meant to me to dance with you at the ball.”
Elizabeth stared up at him in a state of wonderment, as if waking up from a dream.
Everything shifted into place at once, in an instant of overpowering comprehension.
Since the moment he had seen her in the parlor four days ago, Mr. Darcy had never been more than a dozen paces away from her, it seemed.
He was determined to attach himself to her at every opportunity.
He had confided in her with tremendous feeling, and had given her sage and tender counsel when she sought it – when she sought it from the man she had come to esteem.
Yet when he flirted with her, she dismissed it as a gallant attempt to ease her distress. She had refused to think more of it, and yet she had savored every moment.
There could be no denying what passed between them in the billiard room. She had known, at last, that he felt something for her, and she had reciprocated every sentiment with astonishing elation. “But… why did you never tell me?”
His face twisted with agony. “Will you walk with me? There is much to say, if you will hear me.”
She linked her arm through his. “I will.”
For a few minutes he was silent, and she could perceive that he was considering where to begin, choosing his words carefully, as he was ever inclined to do.
She smiled to herself as she considered how well she had come to understand the man she once despised; she now thought his manners and mannerisms just what they ought to be.
They climbed the stairs in the turret and when they went out onto the battlements, the vibrant sky was a shock after so many days of stormy gray. A sense of peace washed over Elizabeth as Mr. Darcy laid his hand atop hers, which held fast to his arm.
“I left Netherfield abruptly; you already know why,” Mr. Darcy said as they slowly strolled along the battlements.
“Your poor sister,” Elizabeth sighed. “You have been entirely devoted to her since her ordeal.”