Chapter 18 #2
Oddly, she was only a few paces away. Darcy was at a loss for why she had not simply walked back onto the main path. But she had said her ankle was injured, which must account for it.
Miss Bingley was a pitiable sight. Her hat had fallen askew, and she was bent over, gingerly touching her ankle. “I do not know what I stepped on, but I seem to have twisted my ankle. Will you be so good as to lend me the use of your arm?”
“Of course,” Darcy replied, concealing an ungentlemanly reluctance. He could not very well leave her there to struggle alone. Though feeling a strange unease, he held out his arm to her.
Miss Bingley took it eagerly. She must have been very frightened, Darcy thought, for she really almost snatched at it. “You are too kind, Mr Darcy,” she said sweetly.
“Not at all. Let us return to the main path, and then I will call for the physician.”
“Oh, no, I do not want to impose. If you will only help me walk, I am sure it will get better.” She walked slowly, her limp pronounced. But now that he was with her, she did not seem to be in pain. Miss Bingley smiled brightly up at him.
Darcy frowned. Her mood seemed oddly sunny for someone who had so lately been injured and frightened, but perhaps she was only putting on a brave face.
“Do not force yourself to speak if you do not wish it, Miss Bingley. I know how painful a sprain can be. I shall not take it amiss if you prefer to remain silent.”
“Not at all, Mr Darcy,” she reassured him. “No, I shall do better to distract myself and think of something pleasant. For example, I love Pemberley in the summer. It is so enchanting.”
“Indeed, I am very fond of it.” They took a few more steps in silence.
“Oh, dear!” Suddenly, Miss Bingley clung to him with all her weight. Darcy struggled to maintain his balance. He stopped them both from falling to the ground together in the nick of time.
“What has happened, Miss Bingley?” Darcy did his best to conceal his annoyance and recall proper compassion for her injury. But it was difficult, when she was making matters so very much worse.
“Oh, my ankle!” Miss Bingley gasped. “Suddenly, it hurts so dreadfully. I do not think I can take another step. Oh, what shall I do?” And she looked up at him with wide, pleading eyes.
Darcy looked away, torn between disgust and a deeply inappropriate desire to laugh.
Not since Georgiana was a very little girl had anyone begged him to carry them about.
Everything began to make sense now. He would bet five pounds that Miss Bingley’s ‘injury’ was purely imaginary, for it was all simply too convenient.
But that still left the question of what he was to do about it.
He could hardly confront her with accusations of making it up, but neither did Darcy feel much inclined to do as she had asked.
It was all too easy to imagine how such a position might become compromising — if, for example, Miss Bingley had succeeded in tumbling them both to the ground.
He would very much rather not be faced with the choice of marrying Caroline Bingley, or leaving her ruined and his friendship with Bingley in tatters.
“Ahem, well —” Darcy began, though he did not really know what he was going to say next.
“Yes, Mr Darcy?” Miss Bingley asked, her voice breathy and over-sweet.
To his profound relief, he was spared thinking of an answer. They began to hear the noise of someone crashing through the underbrush. Elizabeth appeared moments later.
“Mr Darcy? Ah, there you are. Miss Darcy asked me to —” Elizabeth stopped when she saw Miss Bingley hanging on his arm.
Darcy looked at her steadily, wondering what she might think of the scene. To his surprise, she met his eyes and gave him a private smile before turning to Miss Bingley with a very serious expression.
“Oh, dear. Have you injured yourself, Miss Bingley? Perhaps we should call for a footman to help you return to the house? Or two, perhaps, if you cannot walk. We might have a litter made,” she suggested.
Miss Bingley straightened, then, as if remembering, bent back down and winced. “Mr Darcy and I have things quite in hand, thank you. Return to the party,” Miss Bingley said coldly. She looked up at Darcy, her voice suddenly all sweetness. “I should hate to think I ruined the picnic for you.”
Darcy glanced at Elizabeth, then offered his arm to Miss Bingley.
“We will walk you back to the path nearest the picnic area, and call for one of the footmen to bring the phaeton around. You should not be on it for too long,” Darcy placed a hand on Miss Bingley’s elbow.
“Would you be so kind as to walk with us, Miss Bennet?”
“Of course,” Elizabeth said and quickly came to the other side of Miss Bingley.
She held out her arm so Miss Bingley could link with hers.
Though Miss Bingley looked at it with a certain reluctance, she took it.
They walked for several paces, first slowly as Miss Bingley struggled and limped.
Then, quickly, she seemed to get better and stood unassisted.
“I think I am well enough to make it back on my own. I suppose I only needed to stretch the muscles for a moment.”
Darcy held back a laugh. It would seem Miss Bingley did not want to walk with him unless she could do so with no one else present.
Perhaps the whole incident had been an elaborate ruse to get him to be alone with her.
Was he overcautious in fearing she might even have intended a compromise to force his hand? Thankfully, he would never know now.
They watched her walk away, limping slightly to keep up with her story of a twisted ankle. When she was gone, he turned to Elizabeth, letting out a sigh of relief.
“I cannot thank you enough for coming when you did, Miss Bennet. I confess I was quite uncomfortable with the whole situation.”
“Indeed,” Elizabeth said. “I had a feeling something was amiss when she strayed so far behind the rest of the group.”
It seemed Elizabeth was having just as difficult a time holding back a laugh as he had been.
Suddenly, they both laughed together. It was a musical sound, one that seemed to unlock something inside of him.
Darcy thought he would like nothing more than to laugh with her each day.
“Well, I thank you for coming to my rescue, Miss Bennet.”
“It is a rare switch, is it not? The damsel rescuing the knight in shining armour?”
Darcy stopped, turning toward her on the path. He cocked his head to the side, giving a sideways smile. “You see me as a knight in shining armour?”
Her cheeks immediately flushed. “Did I say that?”
“It was implied, I suppose,” he replied. Strangely, the suggestion did not seem absurd, as when Miss Bingley had tried to force a rescue out of her unwilling knight, but like the highest compliment he could be given.
Elizabeth had looked away. If he was not mistaken, she was even blushing slightly. Darcy smiled to himself. On her, the absence of complacence was charming.
Elizabeth cleared her throat. “Shall we rejoin the others before we are missed?”
“Yes, of course,” he replied, then led the way through the wood, moving branches so she could pass through unharmed.
Soon, they had rejoined the others. Georgiana noticed their return straightaway. “Is everything well?” she asked. “Where is Miss Bingley?”
Darcy cleared his throat as the rest of the party turned and looked at them. “Miss Bingley has returned to the house after a slight twist of her ankle. She has said she does not require assistance.”
“Ah, that is too bad. Shall we go back to the picnic area?” Georgiana asked.
“We should finish our walk and then return. I believe the footmen are setting out the sweets as we speak,” Darcy said, making the children squeal with delight.
To Darcy’s satisfaction, the others resumed their pace, allowing him to fall a few paces back — an ideal opportunity to continue his conversation with Elizabeth.
“I thank you for coming to my aid,” Darcy said softly. Perhaps it was ungentlemanly to mention her comment again, but the temptation was overwhelming. Darcy indulged himself. “So, a knight, am I?”
She looked into his eyes for the first time since they had rejoined the party.
After only a moment, she looked away, her cheeks once again slightly pink.
“I suppose I do feel that way. You saved my family and I from a very arduous few months. I had already grown very, very tired of that lodging house.”
His need to protect her rose all the more at her words. “It was only what anyone would have done,” Darcy replied. He would have done anything to keep her safe, to ensure that she was happy and well provided for.
“No,” she said softly. Their eyes met, and his heart raced as they looked deeply into each other’s eyes. “It was much more.”
∞∞∞
Having finally left the disgusting muddy outdoors behind and reached the privacy of her guest room, Caroline Bingley dismissed her maid, stalked over to the bed, snatched up a pillow, and screamed into it.
Her feelings a little relieved by the indulgence, she tossed it away and called back the maid.
By the time she had exchanged her torn and muddied dress for a fresh one and had her hair rearranged, her anger had not cooled.
She had worked too hard for too long to win Mr Darcy over, and Elizabeth Bennet had ruined the last chance she had.
Moving with icy, deliberate grace, she walked up the steps toward the drawing room door.
She was not sure how, but Miss Bennet would pay for interrupting her moment with Mr Darcy.
Caroline hesitated. Perhaps this was her opportunity, after all. Everyone would still be out, finishing their revoltingly uncivilised picnic. Rather than going to the drawing room, she would seize this chance.
Returning to the guest rooms on the second floor, Caroline walked past her own door and on to the one she knew to be Elizabeth’s.
She knocked, then cracked open the door and called for Miss Bennet, in case a servant was inside.
When no one answered, she slipped through the door and closed it softly.
Caroline snuck over to the writing desk.
Surely Elizabeth Bennet did more writing than simply penning letters to her family.
Her fingers were too smudged with ink stains to be explained solely by correspondence.
No one was that clumsy. Perhaps she kept a diary.
And if she found it, surely it must contain something to damage her in Mr Darcy’s eyes.
Even a written record of too-great ambitions might be enough to sink her forever.
She went to the writing desk and started rummaging around. There were two full inkwells, along with a dozen quills. Caroline raised a brow at this. The young woman was certainly taking liberties with Mr Darcy’s generosity. It was a terrible extravagance, although Mr Darcy could well afford it.
Caroline opened one drawer after another, looking for anything that might serve as a weapon against her rival. Surely there must be a diary hidden somewhere. Even the purported letters might prove useful.
Yet there was nothing. Whatever letters Miss Bennet had written had already been sent, and if there was a diary, Caroline saw no sign of it.
She gave a huff of frustration, but just as she was on the point of giving up, her eyes alighted on a stack of papers that she had taken for blank sheets of paper.
Upon further inspection, words were written on a sheet several pages down.
She took the entire stack up, discarding the blank pages until she reached the first with writing.
There were only a few words scribbled across the middle of the page. “Kentworth Abbey, a novel,” Caroline read aloud, barely above a whisper. “By Mrs Laurence…”
Glee suddenly warmed her heart. Her mind raced as she started to put the puzzle together.
“Elizabeth Bennet is the infamous Mrs Laurence?” She laughed aloud and began thumbing through the partial manuscript.
“Oh, Eliza, you are a sly one.” She took what looked like several pages of notes from the top of the manuscript, folded them, and slipped them into her reticule.
Perhaps if she required leverage or proof, they would come in handy.
Quickly, she put the rest of the manuscript back where she had found it, with the blank sheets of paper on top.
Caroline snuck out of the room, opened the door a crack to see if anyone was in the hall, then hurried out and closed the door.
She went to her room to change into a formal ensemble for supper.
And although her immediate plans for a picnic compromise had failed, she could not have been happier.
She had found the leverage she needed — even better than she had hoped for!
When she told Mr Darcy of Elizabeth Bennet’s true identity, he would never look at her the same way again. Surely, she would be disgraced in his eyes. And Caroline would be waiting in the wings, ready to comfort him over the shocking betrayal and mend his broken heart.
Then again, such a plan might have disadvantages. The bringer of bad news is often punished for it. There might be another way…a way to convince Elizabeth to remove herself from the field, without the inconvenience and risk of a public scene. In fact, it might be simplicity itself.
At the thought of what she would do, Caroline laughed silently in delight.