CHAPTER 9
As they passed from the stifling confines of the house and descended toward the great park of Rosings, the afternoon light had softened into that gentle golden hue which flatters both old trees and complicated families.
With Miss de Bourgh and Mr. Darcy leading the way, Mr. Bennet and Elizabeth followed down the broad stone steps, their footsteps softened by the weathered granite that had stood as a silent witness to the de Bourgh legacy for generations.
Mr. Collins came after them in visible admiration, as though the landscape itself were another proof of Lady Catherine’s superiority.
Before them, the park unfolded in a display of deliberate and stately beauty.
The long lawns fell away in measured slopes so perfectly kept that they seemed to rebuff the very notion of untamed nature, while farther still, the darker woods gathered at the edge of the estate like a private sanctuary, offering a cool and silent refuge—a medicinal stillness after the disturbances of the afternoon.
For the first time that day, the air seemed entirely possible to breathe.
Anne de Bourgh walked with her hand resting lightly upon Mr. Darcy’s arm, with the ease of long habit and quiet trust. Mr. Collins followed close behind, his spirits still visibly agitated by the moral and clerical catastrophe of Mr. Wickham’s downfall, which he appeared to regard as nothing less than a personal affront to the natural order of the universe.
Mr. Bennet and Elizabeth kept a more leisurely pace, neither of them particularly inclined to hurry when the surrounding landscape offered such rich opportunities for quiet observation and private reflection.
Mr. Darcy, who moved through the grounds of Rosings with the familiarity of long acquaintance and frequent duty, eventually directed their course toward a broad avenue of ancient trees, whose solemn shade stretched cool across the gravel walk.
“These cedars,” he said, his voice carrying that composed gravity which seemed always to command attention without seeking it, “were planted by my uncle nearly twenty years ago, during one of his more ambitious periods of estate improvement. My aunt originally objected to their placement because they promised beauty too slowly to be immediately gratifying; but time, and their undeniable grandeur, have since persuaded Lady Catherine that the entire design was her own original idea.”
Anne allowed herself a faint, fleeting smile, perhaps the first truly untroubled expression Elizabeth had seen upon her face since their arrival in Kent.
“Mama’s affection for any improvement increases in exact and measurable proportion to the impossibility of reversing the decision,” she observed with a quiet dryness of wit that surprised no one so much as Mr. Collins.
He laughed at once with an enthusiasm so grateful that it echoed rather too loudly beneath the silent trees.
“A most elegant principle indeed, Miss de Bourgh; for nothing proves the wisdom of a lady’s improvement so much as its permanence and undeniable dignity. I thought precisely the same of the gravel before the parsonage at Hunsford, though naturally on a humbler and more ecclesiastical scale.”
Behind the leading couple, Mr. Bennet leaned slightly toward his daughter, his eyes bright with that familiar satirical mischief which Elizabeth loved too well.
“I had not previously considered gravel a significant moral achievement, but Mr. Collins continues to enlarge my understanding of virtue with every passing hour,” he murmured.
Elizabeth was obliged to lower her head at once, keenly aware that any audible response would betray a very unladylike degree of amusement.
In reply, Mr. Darcy, possessing a discipline which Elizabeth found equally admirable and provoking, gave every appearance of having heard absolutely nothing of their subversive exchange.
As the gravel paths divided and rejoined beneath the older beeches, the composition of the walking party shifted by natural inclination rather than formal arrangement.
Mr. Collins, still oppressed by a thousand practical anxieties regarding his future standing, drifted instinctively toward Mr. Darcy, whose formidable seriousness offered a safer harbour than Mr. Bennet’s dangerous wit.
He lowered his voice to a tone of profound clerical apprehension.
“My dear cousin, I confess myself under some slight apprehension. Her ladyship’s displeasure is never a light matter, and I cannot but wonder whether the unfortunate vacancy at Hunsford may place me in some awkward proximity to an expectation I am not prepared to meet.”
Darcy spared him a look of grave patience, his stride never faltering.
“If you fear my aunt intends to propose your immediate return to the living of Hunsford, Mr. Collins, you may set your mind at rest. Apparently, Lady Catherine has no intention of restoring what has once required such painful explanation, and the parsonage will be settled in a manner that requires no further obligation from you. But my offer for Kympton, within my patronage still stands.”
The relief with which Mr. Collins received this assurance was so visible that gratitude itself seemed to reduce his height.
“You relieve me beyond expression, sir; for as my parents had often observed since I was a boy my health and constitution prosper best at a respectful distance from moral emergencies.”
Ahead of them, Elizabeth and her father found themselves keeping pace with Anne, who seemed to breathe more freely the farther they moved from the immediate shadow of the great house.
“Rosings will feel quite altered after the events of this day, I should imagine,” Elizabeth suggested gently, watching Miss de Bourgh’s face with quiet care.
Anne looked back toward the mansion, pale through the leaves and still magnificent despite the human absurdity recently enacted within its walls.
“Perhaps alteration is not always to be counted as a misfortune,” she replied after a pause. “Habit is often mistaken for peace by those who have never known anything else—particularly by those who benefit most from being constantly obeyed.”
The path narrowed significantly as they entered a more secluded part of the woods, and necessity forced the company to break into pairs.
Mr. Collins, having recovered enough of his natural pomposity to begin a lengthy discourse upon the medicinal superiority of the waters at Bath, attached himself to Anne and Mr. Bennet, both of whom submitted with varying degrees of resignation.
Thus Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy found themselves walking a little apart from the others, the silence between them carrying the weight of everything that remained unsaid.
It was not an awkward silence, but one made intimate by mutual understanding—born of truths too recently discovered to permit trivial conversation.
At length, Mr. Darcy, as though unwilling to let the silence extend too far, said, “You have now seen something of Kent, Miss Bennet; may I ask how it has answered your expectations?”
“I believe, Mr. Darcy,” Elizabeth began, though her voice lacked its usual saucy confidence, “that I have been obliged to reconsider a great many of my opinions within a very short time, and I find the effort of adjusting them not a little fatiguing.”
He turned his gaze upon her, his expression unreadable yet intent.
“So considerable a revision, Miss Bennet? I must hope, then, that I have not been entirely overlooked,” he returned, his tone lowered, though without any appearance of design.
She could not immediately determine whether she ought to be amused or reproved by such a speech; but as neither sentiment appeared entirely sufficient to the occasion, Elizabeth chose, with some prudence, to be both.
“I should be very sorry to disappoint you, sir,” she replied, with a composure which owed something to effort, “but I must beg leave to form a considered opinion of you, and that may require some time.”
Darcy regarded her steadily, as though weighing both her words and the manner in which they were delivered. “Time, Miss Bennet?” he said at last. “I had imagined that my character must, by now, be tolerably well understood.”
Elizabeth felt the colour rise, though whether from the challenge or its implication she could not immediately have said.
“That may depend, sir,” she returned, with a steadiness which, though maintained, was not entirely without caution, “upon how much one has been inclined to trust first impressions.”
There was a brief pause; and though nothing in his countenance betrayed offence, neither did it invite further ease.
“First impressions,” he repeated, “are sometimes the most difficult to correct, Miss Bennet.”
“Indeed,” Elizabeth replied, more quietly, “and not always the least deserving of correction.”
Their eyes met for a moment longer than was strictly necessary; and though neither chose to pursue the subject further, neither turned away unchanged.
Elizabeth resumed her attention to the path as it narrowed beneath the trees; yet the conversation was not so easily dismissed.
Darcy, on his side, resumed his former composure, though with a slight relaxation which suggested he was not displeased.
“I would not wish you to surrender any opinion without sufficient cause,” he said. “Even when those opinions have been unfavourable to myself.”
“You are very generous, sir,” Elizabeth returned, with a glance that held a trace of her former arch spirit. “Most gentlemen, I believe, would prefer to be well thought of without the inconvenience of deserving it.”
“Then I must be content to differ from most gentlemen,” he replied quietly; “for I have found that undeserved approval is of very little use, except in encouraging errors which must eventually be corrected.”