Chapter 9
The storm did not slacken with the morning.
If anything, it deepened, wrapping the house in white silence while within, the halls grew louder with every hour.
Footmen hurried through the galleries, lamps lit earlier than usual, and the front steps never stayed clear long enough to justify the labour of sweeping.
Elizabeth lingered near the fire with her aunt and uncle, doing her best to shield Mrs. Gardiner against the bustle, when the great door swung wide once more.
A family of four stumbled in, half-blinded by the snow, children shivering under cloaks.
Lady Montford herself hastened forward, transforming confusion into order: servants fetched blankets, the children were borne off to the nursery, and the parents relieved of boots and dripping wraps before they had gathered their breath.
In the press that followed, another lady—shaking with cold, her skirts damp from the drifts—hovered uncertainly near the hearth.
Elizabeth rose at once and yielded her place beside her aunt, settling Mrs. Gardiner more securely in the favoured chair before guiding the newcomer into her own.
Thus displaced, Elizabeth found herself carried into the centre of the room, exposed to the swirl of voices and strangers’ glances, while her aunt remained comfortably fixed by the fire.
Sir Edward, meanwhile, announced to anyone within hearing that Kelton would “keep Christmas for the whole county, if need be,” as though this were a challenge the storm had issued him to challenge his chivalry.
More travellers followed: a clergyman and his thin, sharp-eyed sister; two gentlemen forced to abandon their carriage in a drift; a farmer’s wife leading her pony by the bridle, snow clotted in its mane.
Each new arrival seemed to swell the hall, damp cloaks brushing Elizabeth’s sleeve, voices rising over one another until her head ached.
She shifted closer to her aunt’s chair, pretending it was to tuck in the shawl, though in truth she wanted the barrier.
Mr. Gardiner spoke gravely of their own fortune in being admitted earlier, his thanks resonating with several who muttered they had feared the same fate.
Conversation sprang up at once, all of it about the roads.
“The Northampton turnpike is impassable,” declared one gentleman, shaking snow from his hat. “We tried it at dawn. Two drifts higher than the carriage wheels. Impossible.”
“Impossible south as well,” said another. “A coach overturned near the turnpike. We passed the poor souls digging out with spades. Heaven help they reached shelter.”
“There are barns open to travellers,” added the clergyman, his tone more suited to pulpit than parlour. “Farmers bedding wayfarers down in hay. I saw twenty souls in one loft, and more expected.”
Sir Edward clapped his hands together as if the tales were nothing more than hearty entertainment. “There you are, my friends! The storm has made us all neighbours, willing or not. Kelton shall not be outdone in charity. Lady Montford will see you comfortable, and I shall see you fed.”
Lady Montford’s nod softened his boast, but Elizabeth noticed how many anxious glances passed among the ladies—glances that spoke of ruined journeys, family visits missed, children parted from their Christmas hearths.
Indeed, it was good of their host and hostess to see people settled and safe.
Yet her stomach knotted. The hall was too full—too many voices, too many curious ears.
Her name might be caught by chance and carried on a stranger’s lips, and she was no adept at slipping unnoticed through a room.
Laughter came too readily to her; her tongue too easily answered when spoken to.
Ordinarily, she would not have wished it otherwise.
But here, invisibility was her only refuge.
Each fresh account of overturned coaches, of strangers thrust into barns, seemed to hover on the verge of another story—the one she dreaded to hear.
Hertfordshire’s shame had wings enough without a storm to bear it further.
What if some careless tongue repeated it here, with Mr. Darcy himself no farther than across the hearth?
Her gaze fell—too late. She had already glimpsed him.
He stood apart, silent, his shoulders held too tightly, his eyes fixed too steadily on the mantel.
Indifference, for anyone else. For her, unmistakable tension.
She knew, with a certainty that stole her breath, that he, too, was listening for familiar names.
The hall grew hotter as more bodies pressed in, the air thick with damp wool and melting snow.
The crowd became her shield: laughter to cover her pulse, bustling figures between her and him.
She told herself they could hide from each other in the noise.
And yet, every time the throng shifted, she knew precisely where he was.
“Miss Bennet?”
Elizabeth looked up. Miss Kendrick’s classical features met her gaze—striking rather than soft, her dark eyes lively, her gown arranged with the stylish ease Elizabeth never achieved for herself.
“You are from Meryton, right? You know, when we were introduced yesterday, your name stayed with me. I thought surely, I had heard it before. Perhaps I mistake it. My mother’s people lived some years in St. Albans, and I spent a summer there as a girl. It is not far from Hertfordshire, I believe?”
Elizabeth’s breath caught before she forced it into a laugh.
The sound felt brittle in her own ears, too quick, too practiced.
Noticed. Already noticed. Heat pricked at her temples, and against her will, her eyes darted—one swift, guilty glance across the room.
Darcy stood where she had last seen him, unmoving, unreadable.
She looked away at once, but not soon enough.
Miss Kendrick’s dark eyes had followed the glance, sharp with curiosity.
Elizabeth lifted her chin and managed, “Quite near. A strange coincidence, that my name should sound familiar in so many places. We Bennets are not remarkable enough to be spoken of often.”
“On the contrary,” Miss Kendrick smiled, “I think Bennet a very remarkable name. Just unusual enough to be noteworthy when it is mentioned, but not so odd that it strikes the ear as unfamiliar. It would suit a heroine in a novel.”
A heroine. The irony bit deep. Elizabeth bent her head, half amused and half unsettled. “Then I shall take it as a compliment that you have heard my name at all, Miss Kendrick, as we travel but rarely.”
“Names travel faster than people, Miss Bennet. I have heard them in the most unlikely places.”
Elizabeth’s pulse quickened. What name? Which Bennet? She forced a smile, praying no one would notice the strain.
Mrs. Barlow slipped near, spreading her fan with a flourish against the heat from the hearth.
“What is this you speak of? Surely, some gossip or other, I suppose. How tiresome!” she declared, but in a tone that suggested titillation rather than ennui.
“One cannot step into Bond Street without hearing some country tale repeated as if it were the latest fashion. London shops and London talk are much alike—you go for ribbons and come away with scandal.”
The words were playful, but Elizabeth felt them like a blow.
Lydia’s face—Lydia’s folly—paraded through drawing rooms she would never see.
Her hands tightened on the workbasket in her lap.
Still, her voice was even. “Then I am fortunate to prefer a quiet library. Books do not repeat what one tells them, and they behave better when kept at home.”
Miss Kendrick’s eyes danced. “A clever answer. Yet surely you have your favourite haunts in London—Hatchard’s, perhaps? I never escape that place without twice the books I intended.”
Elizabeth drew a shaky breath and willed her hands to cease their trembling. “We did not linger there. My aunt has lately had reason to avoid the bustle of crowds.”
“Of course.” Miss Kendrick’s gaze flicked toward Mrs. Gardiner, seated pale and still, before returning with a sympathetic smile that was not wholly kind.
“It is only natural, with delicate health, that quieter pursuits are preferable. And your uncle—he is in trade, is he not? How very fatiguing his obligations in town must be. One cannot wonder that his family chooses a more retiring circle.”
Elizabeth felt the words prickle like nettles.
She wanted to laugh them off, to contradict them, to do something—but to rise to the bait was to invite more eyes upon her.
She bit back every retort, forcing her expression smooth.
Her silence, she knew, was no disguise; she had never excelled at being forgettable.
Yet her temper slipped its leash. “If you must make remarks, pray make them at my expense, Miss Kendrick, not my aunt and uncle’s. Elizbeth Bennet is far more likely to be restless or sharp-tongued and therefore deserving of censure than either of them.”
Miss Kendrick raised her brows in polite surprise, but before she could reply, Mrs. Barlow, who was passing by leaned in. “Bennet, did you say? How very strange. I am certain I heard that name only last week in London.”
Elizabeth gave a light laugh, aiming for unconcern. “Oh, it must have been some other Bennet entirely. We are hardly rare in the world—there may be dozens of us abroad, each more remarkable than I.”
Miss Kendrick smiled, undeterred. “Perhaps so. Yet it is odd, is it not, how certain names seem to follow one about? You continue to disclaim remarkableness, Miss Bennet, but I begin to think you rather determined to be remembered.”
Elizabeth’s heart lurched. Her breath caught before she could master it. She dared not look at anyone. Lydia’s name hovered, unspoken, ready to fall. Not here. Please, not here.
Then a voice cut across the din—firm enough to still it.“Surely London has no want of distinguished names to discuss, without singling out Miss Bennet’s as an object of curiosity.”