Four
The door opened before she knocked.
The butler was tall, silver-haired, and had a face that suggested he had been born disapproving and had only refined the skill since.
His eyes travelled from her bonnet to her hem in one efficient sweep—a full inventory conducted in under two seconds.
Elizabeth had been assessed by shopkeepers, creditors, and one particularly ruthless pawnbroker in the last seven years, but none of them had managed it with such economy.
“Miss Bennet, I presume.” His tone implied that presuming was the most he was prepared to do until further evidence was presented.
“You presume correctly.”
He stepped aside, allowing her to enter.
The entrance hall was marble, polished to a shine that made her shoes look like an insult. There were cut flowers on a side table—hothouse roses.
Mr Darcy stood at the foot of the staircase.
He was in a dark blue coat, impeccably fitted, his hands clasped behind his back. His cravat was precise, and he was entirely composed, save for the shadows beneath his eyes, faint but unmistakable. She wondered briefly about it, but there were more pressing matters than Mr Darcy’s sleeping habits.
“Miss Bennet.” He inclined his head. “Welcome to Darcy House. I trust the journey was comfortable?”
“Perfectly, thank you.” Elizabeth noticed the use of her surname at once. Proper, of course. She had not come as a guest.
He introduced the butler—Barton—who acknowledged her with a nod so minimal it barely qualified as movement.
Then he introduced Mrs Hatfield, the housekeeper, who appeared quietly from a side corridor.
Her curtsy was perfectly polite, her smile genuine, and her eyes missed nothing.
Elizabeth recognised a sharp mind behind the pleasant manner and resolved to stay on the right side of it.
“Shall I show you to your room, Miss Bennet?” Mrs Hatfield offered. “You will want to settle in before—”
“That is very kind, but the room will not go anywhere, Mrs Hatfield.” Elizabeth turned to Mr Darcy. “I am anxious to meet this little menace you described, Mr Darcy.”
His mouth did something she was not prepared for. It curved—not the stiff, controlled expression she remembered from Hertfordshire, but a full, crooked, entirely disarming smile.
“Brace yourself, Miss Bennet. You are forewarned.”
Dimples.
Mr Darcy had dimples. Two of them, bracketing that impossible smile, and creasing his cheeks in a way that made him appear ten years younger.
Also, entirely unlike the man who had stood across a ballroom and declared her merely tolerable.
She had known him for years. Not once—not a single time—had she seen dimples.
Had he developed them in maturity, the way one develops wisdom teeth?
Was that a common occurrence among gentlemen of five-and-thirty?
And why, in the name of all that was sensible, was she devoting mental energy to Mr Darcy’s facial architecture?
Especially when she was climbing an unfamiliar grand staircase and the banister was her only ally against a humiliating descent?
She gripped the polished wood and tried to concentrate on her footing. She ascended with dignity, not tripping, and absolutely not thinking about dimples.
Mr Darcy opened the nursery door and stood aside to let her pass.
The room was bright, south-facing, with a rug that was worn in all the right places—the places where a child had played, crawled, and dragged things across the floor without anyone telling her to stop.
A rocking horse stood in one corner. Bookshelves lined the far wall, low enough for small hands to reach.
It was a room that had been designed for a child rather than imposed upon one.
Elizabeth registered this the way she registered everything—quietly, precisely, and with a small ache she did not have time to examine.
A young woman rose from the table and curtsied. She was freckled and bright-eyed. Elizabeth was introduced to Alice, and realised that the girl had been managing beyond her capacity and doing her valiant best. She liked her immediately.
The child did not rise.
Miss Anne Darcy sat at the table with a piece of chalk in her fist and a drawing before her.
She studied Elizabeth the way a cat studied a new piece of furniture—with absolute stillness, unblinking assessment, and no inclination whatsoever to be impressed until sufficient evidence had been provided.
She was small, blonde, and blue-eyed, with a stubborn chin and curls that had escaped their ribbon.
She bore not the slightest resemblance to her father.
Nor, Elizabeth noted with a flicker of surprise, to her mother.
Elizabeth had met Anne de Bourgh at Rosings.
She had been red-haired, green-eyed, and frail as a pressed flower.
This child was none of those things. She was pink-cheeked, sturdy, energetic, and had opinions she fully intended to share.
“Anne,” Mr Darcy said, “this is Miss Bennet. She is your new governess.”
Her gaze did not waver. She was taking her time. She would not be rushed, and Elizabeth respected this enormously.
Elizabeth stood at the edge of the table and inclined her head with the same formality she would have offered a duchess.
“I am pleased to make your acquaintance, Miss Darcy.”
The effect was immediate. Anne’s chin lifted a fraction, barely perceptible.
She had been addressed as a person. Not a pet, not a project, not a darling-sweetheart-little-one.
A person, with a surname and a title, and the dignity of it registered on her face with the solemnity of a six-year-old who had just been taken seriously for the first time by a stranger.
“How do you do, Miss Bennet.” It was not a question but a pronouncement. Anne had decided to engage, and she was doing so on her own terms.
She turned two drawings towards Elizabeth. “This is Muffin.” She pointed to the brown oval with four legs, two dots, and a fork-like protrusion from its back. “And this is a potato.” She pointed to the second drawing—a simple brown oval. “Alice said they are the same. They are NOT the same.”
Elizabeth studied both portraits with the gravity they deserved. She glanced between them, tilting her head one way, then the other.
“I see clear differences, Miss Darcy. The potato has no eyes, for one. And Muffin has a tail, which potatoes do not. The likeness is superficial at best.” She straightened. “Alice was mistaken.”
Anne turned to Alice, triumphant. Alice rolled her eyes. Mr Darcy’s mouth pressed into a line that was fighting very hard not to be a smile.
Anne beamed at Elizabeth. The assessment was over.
Elizabeth had been weighed, measured, and found acceptable.
“This is Muffin.” She seized the wooden horse from the table and held it out.
The paint was worn, the legs slightly uneven, one ear chipped.
It had been loved hard and long, and it showed.
“My Papa made him for me. He carved him when I was a baby, because he was waiting for me to grow up so he could give him to me.”
Elizabeth’s chest tightened. She turned the wooden horse in her hands—the rough grain of the wood, the uneven legs, the careful attention in every imperfect detail.
This had been carved by a man who did not know how to carve, for a child who could not yet hold it.
She glanced at him. Mr Darcy was still there, his arms folded across his chest, and the tips of his ears were crimson.
Yes, Mr Darcy. Your secret is out. You are not good at crafts. Who would have thought it.
She returned Muffin to Anne with appropriate ceremony.
Anne clutched the horse to her chest. Then she fixed Elizabeth with her direct, unguarded gaze. She was about to ask the only question that mattered.
“Will you marry and leave me?”
Mr Darcy unfolded his arms and took half a step forward.
Elizabeth held the child’s gaze. “I have no such plans, Miss Darcy. You may rest assured that I shall be right here beside you, until the day you are out in society and the diamond of the first water.”
Anne’s nose wrinkled. “What is a diamond of the first water?”
“It means every young man in England will want to dance with you.”
Anne considered this. “Will they have horses?”
“Almost certainly.”
“Very well. You may stay until then.”
Mr Darcy made a sound—a cough, or possibly a laugh strangled at birth. Elizabeth did not turn to confirm which.
Mr Darcy excused himself, saying that he would send Mrs Hatfield to help her settle. True enough, the good lady appeared shortly after.
“If you will follow me, Miss Bennet. Your chamber is just along here.”
She led her two doors down from the nursery.
She opened the door and stepped aside. Elizabeth entered, and smiled.
The room itself was not large, nor grand.
It was a governess’s room, not a guest suite, and it made no pretence of being otherwise.
But it was clean, warm and private. Each of those three words carried a weight that Mrs Hatfield could not have understood and Elizabeth would not have explained.
In the middle of it there was a bed, with a proper frame and a mattress that did not sag in the middle, dressed in white linen so crisp it could have been pressed that morning.
There was a washstand with a basin and pitcher, both unchipped.
A writing desk was positioned beneath the window, where the light would fall on the page in the afternoon.
A small bookshelf and a wardrobe of dark oak.
The curtains matched each other, lined and whole, without a single patch.
Elizabeth stood in the centre and did not move.
In Somers Town, she shared a bed with Jane. The mattress was stuffed with horsehair that had long since given up any structural ambition. The washbasin had a crack that left a small puddle on the floor every morning. The window faced a wall, and the curtains were thick, serviceable, and patched.