Chapter Twelve
E lizabeth stirred, wincing as every movement reminded her of yesterday’s misadventure. Her body felt as though she had been trampled by a dozen horses, each muscle protesting at the slightest shift.
“Do not attempt to rise,” Charlotte’s voice came from nearby. “The surgeon was most insistent that you remain abed.”
She turned her head carefully, grateful that even that small motion did not send the room spinning. She so disliked laudanum. “How long have I slept?”
“Nearly fourteen hours. You required the rest.” Charlotte moved to sit beside the bed, her face etched with concern. “Though I confess, I am grateful you are awake. There have been . . . developments.”
Before Elizabeth could enquire further, Charlotte’s expression shifted, a warning in her eyes. “Lady Catherine has made her feelings regarding your presence here quite clear.”
Elizabeth was at a loss to comprehend what she might have done to warrant such antipathy. What had she done other than be injured by the collapse of Lady Catherine’s folly?
“I should not wish to impose upon her hospitality a moment longer than she is willing to extend it,” Elizabeth replied, attempting again to push herself upright, but realizing that one arm was bound and in a sling. The movement sent heat rushing through the bruised side of her face and warning pains through her ribs. Her involuntary gasp made Charlotte frown.
“You are one large bruise, Eliza,” Charlotte said firmly, pressing her back against the pillows. “You must rest at least a few days before attempting to move anywhere, even if it is only to the parsonage.”
Elizabeth opened her mouth to protest, but before she could say a word, Lady Catherine de Bourgh swept in, her bearing regal and her expression indignant.
“This is intolerable!” her ladyship declared.
Charlotte sighed, leaning forward to whisper, “The colonel would not allow her to enter last night, but I suppose the sun is up now. Barely.” She stood to greet Lady Catherine, but the woman was not finished speaking.
“I will not have my nephew’s reputation compromised. You must remove her to the parsonage immediately!”
For a moment, Elizabeth could scarcely credit that she had heard correctly. In what way had she compromised Mr. Darcy or his reputation? By being so unfortunate as to be buried beneath tons of stone? She thought of Mr. Darcy’s heroic efforts during their ordeal, his quiet strength and careful attention to her comfort even as he himself was suffering. That his aunt should now attempt to twist what they had endured into something sordid struck at a very deep part of her.
Drawing herself up as much as her injuries would allow, Elizabeth gathered both her dignity and her wit about her. She was not one to be cowed by grand titles and grander pronouncements. She would not allow such a falsehood to stand unchallenged.
“Your ladyship, Mr. Darcy warned you for years that the folly was unsafe. He told me that he repeatedly advised against both building it and allowing it to remain on the hill. That his counsel was ignored suggests that if blame for our ordeal must be assigned, it lies not with those who suffered the folly’s collapse, but those who did not heed the warning that this very event was inevitable. I do not believe our reputations are in danger, but if they were, the blame would not rest with me.”
Lady Catherine gaped, her mouth opening and closing without sound, rather like a fish suddenly finding itself upon dry land. Before she could recover her powers of speech, another figure appeared in the doorway.
“Mother.” Miss de Bourgh was calm, but her voice held an unmistakable note of authority. “You must cease harassing our guests.”
“Anne!” Lady Catherine turned to face her daughter. “This is not a matter for your interference. That girl—”
“That ‘girl’ was injured on our property, Mother. And Miss Bennet is quite right. Richard explained it last night, though you apparently did not listen. We all disregarded Darcy’s repeated warnings.” Miss de Bourgh moved into the chamber, her slight frame somehow commanding attention despite her mother’s imposing presence. Her brows pinched together, and Elizabeth’s hand moved unconsciously to hide her bruised cheek. Miss de Bourgh’s gaze met hers, and Elizabeth read an apology there.
“The rest of us did not wish to take on the vexation of opposing you, and this is the consequence of our inaction. It is a miracle that Darcy and Miss Bennet were not killed.” She took a steadying breath and straightened her thin shoulders. “We both know that I am the legal mistress here, and I will not allow you to remove Miss Bennet from the house. None of this is her fault.”
Lady Catherine’s visage twisted in dismay. “But surely you must see that her presence here, with Darcy—”
“She is not with Darcy, as you can see,” Miss de Bourgh said quietly, nodding at Elizabeth. “Though I believe he would not mind if she were.”
Her mother gasped. “Anne, you must think of your future!”
Miss de Bourgh’s voice softened. “I have, Mother. And my future is here. Even if Darcy wished to marry me, I do not wish to marry him.”
“Whyever not?” Lady Catherine cried.
Elizabeth had the same question.
“Rosings is my home and my estate. Why would I give that up to move to his? Besides, I would miss you.”
Something tender passed briefly across Lady Catherine’s features before being masked by her habitual hauteur. She opened her mouth to speak again, but Miss de Bourgh was not finished.
“The only reason I would move so far away was if I loved my husband, and I do not love Darcy. Not in that way.”
Lady Catherine’s eyes flashed with indignation as she gathered herself, her tone regaining its imperious edge. “I am not to be placated by modern sensibilities.”
Miss de Bourgh interposed gently but firmly, “Mother, I am not attempting to placate you. It is past time for that. You know that wishing for a thing does not make it so, and this wish will not be fulfilled. Like the folly, I did not wish to argue with you, but after this, I am done with being quiet.” She paused, then smiled, amused. “Furthermore, just a few days ago you told me how refreshing you found Miss Bennet’s conversation. You like her, Mother. Do not try to deny it now.”
“Well.” Lady Catherine drew herself up, though with notably less rigidity than before. “I suppose one must agree that she shows an uncommon understanding for a young woman of her station. But had I known she was doing so for Darcy’s benefit—”
“Oh, I can promise you, Lady Catherine,” Charlotte interjected, “it is not for Mr. Darcy’s benefit. She has been her same impertinent self since she was a child.”
Lady Catherine’s eyes narrowed as she evaluated Elizabeth. “Hmph. Then I suppose she may stay.”
Miss de Bourgh smiled, a little brighter this time, and made no attempt to remind her mother that it was not her decision to make. “You are very kind, Mother.”
“Yes,” Lady Catherine agreed.
With that grudging concession, her ladyship retreated from the room.
“Do let the servants know if the two of you require anything,” Miss de Bourgh said to Charlotte. “Rest well, Miss Bennet.”
Once they were alone again, Elizabeth turned to her friend. “I am not sure what just happened.”
Charlotte’s eyes danced with suppressed mirth. “I believe, my dear Eliza, that we have just witnessed the true mistress of Rosings Park assuming her authority. And,” she added with a knowing look, “I believe you have also discovered who holds a tendre for you, as your dear friend might have intimated once or twice before. Did you know he visited the parsonage and tarried for more than half an hour yesterday? I believe he had some hopes of seeing you there.”
Elizabeth sank back against the pillows, her lips curving into a bemused smile, and ignored Charlotte’s jibe about Mr. Darcy. “I confess, I had not thought Miss de Bourgh capable of such decisive action.”
“Perhaps she was inspired to protect Mr. Darcy’s heart,” Charlotte said meaningfully.
At the mention of Mr. Darcy, Elizabeth’s heart quickened. “Is there any news of him?”
“He rests,” Charlotte said carefully, studying Elizabeth’s face. “Colonel Fitzwilliam has been directing his care. Though I understand he was lucid enough in the night to express concern for your well-being. He asked the colonel to bar his aunt access to you last night.”
Elizabeth could not quite suppress the flutter of pleasure that rose in her breast at this evidence of Mr. Darcy’s regard. She felt a pleasant warmth spread across her cheeks, and she turned her face toward the window, hoping Charlotte would attribute the flush to the morning sun. “Perhaps she ought to have come then. For I would not have been able to wake.”
What a strange turn of events, she mused, that she should find herself not only grateful for Mr. Darcy’s protection but concerned for his well-being, yearning for his company.
“Are you hungry?” Charlotte asked. “You slept through dinner last night.”
Elizabeth nodded, and her friend rang for a maid.
How peculiar that the man she had so recently considered the proudest, most disagreeable gentleman of her acquaintance should now occupy her thoughts with such persistence. But then, perhaps it was not so strange at all. She had been reconsidering his character nearly since his appearance in Kent. In fact, she felt as though she had been given a great gift, if she could call it that. She had been able to see Mr. Darcy with all formality and pretence stripped away. She had been given a long look at his true nature.
He was still the man who had separated Mr. Bingley from Jane. But he had said he would confess to his friend. Would he?
She believed that he would.
Elizabeth liked the man she had met. Might even love him. Was that possible? She closed her eyes and shivered as she recalled the ground collapsing all about them. Being rescued and hurried down the hill without knowing whether Mr. Darcy was behind her. Waiting, her hands over her mouth as he and his cousin fled toward the road and the ground disappeared behind them.
If anything had happened to him . . . Her heart thumped painfully in her chest, and she purposefully moved her thoughts to what he had said to her in the cart. Had he meant it? Would he even remember having said it?
Because even if Elizabeth lived to be ninety, she would never, ever forget.
Darcy awoke to warm light flooding in through the windows. He stirred and groaned. Everything hurt.
As he squeezed his eyes shut again to take stock, he decided it felt as though he had been trampled by a horse. He opened his eyes, but for a long moment he lay in silence, struggling to summon the strength to rise.
Two hands rested lightly on his shoulders. “Stay where you are, Darcy.”
Darcy did not want to remain where he was. It was uncomfortable to be positioned on his stomach. He wanted to sit up. “I need to—”
“You need to remain still. You have more stitches in you than one of your fancy embroidered handkerchiefs.”
“Fitz,” he grunted. “I need to use the—”
His cousin cleared his throat. “Ah. Wait until I can find someone to help me. We will balance you between us.”
After that humiliating exercise had been completed, Darcy had been helped back to bed and allowed to recline against a mountain of pillows while Fitz rang for a meal. Darcy was still disoriented and, in the absence of his watch, had to glance out the window and judge the time of day from the position of the sunlight. Just as he had when . . . He shook the thought away and returned his gaze to the sunlight. It was past midday, he thought.
Fitz was staring at him.
“What is it?” he inquired.
His cousin shook his head. “I am simply grateful that you are alive and whole. That wound in your back was but an inch from your spine. The surgeon examined you this morning while you were asleep, and there does not seem to be any sign of infection.”
“You clearly made a good job of cleaning it out.”
Fitz shrugged. “Soldiering is good for something, I suppose.”
Darcy managed a wry smile despite the pain behind his eyes, though his thoughts swiftly turned to matters he did not wish to revisit. The memory of the collapse, of the path beneath Elizabeth’s feet giving way—it was a dreadful spectre that he had little desire to contemplate further.
“How fares Miss Bennet?” he inquired, hoping Fitz would not hear the apprehension in his voice.
“She is well,” his cousin reassured him. “Lady Catherine threatened to send her back to the parsonage, but her heart was not really in it. She gave way to Anne readily enough.”
“Anne?” Darcy asked with some surprise.
“Anne,” Fitz confirmed with a small smile. “She has claimed her position as mistress of Rosings. She told her mother that as she did not wish to marry you, it did not bother her at all if you wished to marry Miss Bennet instead.”
“It would not be ‘instead,’” Darcy complained. “Anne and I never—”
“Yes, I know,” Fitz said with a chuckle. “In any case, Miss Bennet is resting as comfortably as possible just down the hall.”
“Has a letter been sent—”
“To her family? Yes. Mrs. Collins expects her aunt and sister to come.”
His food arrived and had to be sent back to the kitchen, for he would not eat gruel like a child or an invalid. His injuries had not affected his appetite.
While they waited, Fitz asked how everything had happened. Darcy actually found it of aid to tell the story, as though sending the words out into the room kept them from festering inside him. By the time he had finished, the food had arrived, and he ate hungrily.
It was not until the trays had been cleared that Fitz spoke again.
“I must apologise, Darcy, for my part in this.”
“Your part?” Darcy inquired.
“I dismissed your concerns about the folly. Made a joke of them.”
Fitz waited, but Darcy said nothing. Truthfully, he did not know what to say.
“I did not heed your warning. I told myself that it did not matter, that should the folly actually collapse, no one would be inside it.” Fitz’s voice faltered as he said, “I heard it, you know. I was on my annual tour of the park when there was a sound like a hundred shots being taken and a puff of dust rising from the hill—I learned later that was the roof sliding into the trees and shearing them into bits. I came back to the house directly to tell you I was wrong, but you were nowhere to be found. Then I thought you might have walked up the hill yourself to have a look.
“I found your hat not far from the wreckage,” Fitz continued, and Darcy watched his cousin’s countenance drain of colour at the memory. “And not long after, Mrs. Collins rushed up to the site—I had to back her down the hill, for I feared the ground was unstable. She was frantic, because she knew Miss Bennet was fond of the bluebells. I told her I had sent her friend in the direction of the orchard earlier, and that seemed to calm her. But when Miss Bennet did not return, we assumed the worst.”
“Which was, in fact, correct.”
Fitz swallowed and nodded. “By then, we were already examining the hill for any conceivable way in to find you. But the ground was so unstable it was several hours before we could find somewhere we could safely dig.”
It had not been safe, but Darcy did not say so. It had likely been the only way in, and as the rescue had been a success, there was no need to elucidate the details.
A dull pain pulsed behind his eyes. “I was not so insistent about the folly because I wished to vex you or Lady Catherine or to suggest I knew better. But you must understand, Fitz, I had feared, truly feared this calamity from the moment I first learned of my aunt’s plans. It has frustrated me beyond measure to be so blithely dismissed when I spoke of the risks. Even if I did not—” He closed his eyes briefly and then opened them again. “Even if I did not admire Miss Bennet as I do, I could have done nothing other than risk myself to save her, for it was my own family who had imperilled her.”
Fitz caught Darcy’s gaze and held it. “I am very sorry.”
Darcy sighed. There was no point in holding a grudge now that Fitz had tendered a genuine apology. “You are forgiven.”
His cousin released a heavy breath of relief. A brief silence settled between them before Fitz ventured another inquiry, his tone tentative. “So, you were not meeting Miss Bennet there?”
“At the folly? Are you mad?” Darcy replied, his words edged with incredulity.
Fitz frowned. “You were meeting her elsewhere?”
“Not intentionally,” Darcy answered. “I walked up the hill to examine the position of the folly, as I often do when we are here. I saw that Miss Bennet was in the grove gathering bluebells.” He recalled the image of Elizabeth with a bouquet of the purplish flowers held against her ivory dress. She was bending down to pick another—it had been a sight that stirred him in ways most ungentlemanly.
“We spoke and then quarrelled regarding my interference with her sister and Mr. Bingley.”
“You quarrelled,” Fitz said, though he sounded sceptical.
Darcy raised a hand to pinch the bridge of his nose. Even that hurt. “Yes. I did not know what to say, so I left her standing there in the flowers. When I had descended the hill and glanced back, I saw she had taken a seat in the folly to read a letter. Then I looked more carefully at the hill and saw that the trees were leaning in towards the folly and that one of the columns was leaning out towards the trees.” He paused, recalling the fear that had struck him like a bolt of lightning. “I ran back up the hill and called to Miss Bennet to remove herself.”
“And she refused?”
“No, she complied at once, no doubt so that she might continue our argument.”
Fitz inclined his head in a conspiratorial manner and said, “My dear Darcy, I wish you the best of luck, for as clever as you are, I think your lady shall dance circles around you.”
Darcy, though wincing slightly as he shifted, allowed a wry smile to play upon his lips. “I will take whatever luck you can spare, for I seem to have used up all of my own.”
Fitz regarded his cousin with a sort of chagrined amusement. “Indeed. Though I daresay your heroic rescue might have softened her disposition towards you.”
Darcy sighed and gazed out of the window. “It is not her gratitude I am after.”
“Well,” Fitz said, settling himself more comfortably in his chair, “let us think on Miss Bennet’s behaviour, shall we? She enquired after your welfare both last night and this morning, as well as scolding me when I said you owed me for the rescue.” Here Fitz’s eyes sparkled with barely suppressed mirth. “And there is also the matter of her addressing Lady Catherine on your behalf.”
“What?”
“Oh, yes. According to the servants, my aunt burst into Miss Bennet’s chambers this morning determined to preserve your good name, but Miss Bennet explained that if your reputation had been blemished, it was Lady Catherine’s fault.”
Darcy looked away, uncomfortable with the direction of his thoughts. He must put them aside until he was well enough to act upon them.
“Do you intend to speak with her?” Fitz asked quietly.
“I do,” Darcy replied, resolution steadying his voice. “When I am able to stand without assistance, I shall call upon her properly.”
Fitz nodded, satisfaction evident in his expression. “Excellent. Though I recommend you practise your proposal beforehand. I suspect you shall need to be rather more eloquent than is your custom.”
Darcy could only lean back into the pillows and expel a wheezy laugh.