Chapter 23
TWENTY-THREE
The following week, while Mrs Bennet was meeting with Jane and Mrs Hill to discuss the household duties the future Mrs Bingley would undertake, Elizabeth was whiling away the afternoon, walking along the path by the stream which formed the natural border between Longbourn and Netherfield.
When she heard footsteps crunching the dry leaves behind her, she turned, expecting to see Lydia and Kitty, who had gone off collecting honeysuckle and witch hazel for the stillroom.
Instead, she found Mr Darcy staring at her solemnly.
He looked as he always did, tall and imposing, and finely turned out in an olive coat.
Under the brim of his hat, she could see that his hair was freshly cut; the dark curl that usually fell stubbornly across his brow was gone. Handsome as he was, he appeared tired.
After a moment’s hesitation, he gave her a slight, formal bow. “Miss Elizabeth, I apologise for startling you.”
She nodded, uncertain what to say. She had known of his impending arrival at Netherfield for the wedding, but she had not expected to see him so soon, seemingly fresh from his journey.
Realising that her silence was making him uneasy, she said, “Not at all. I feared it was my sister, fleeing from another of my mother’s talks about life as the mistress of a grand estate.
” She rolled her eyes, and saw that her insouciance had done as she hoped when his mouth curved into a small smile.
“There is much happy anticipation at Netherfield as well.”
Elizabeth, smirking, looked away. And angry dread.
The sound of Mr Darcy clearing his throat pulled her attention back to him. His cheeks were reddened, and he gazed at her earnestly. “I regret how we parted last. I offended you and wish to apologise.”
“For...?” Your declaration of love? The quizzing glass?
The tumult of her mind the past week, during which she had considered every aspect of their last two encounters in London, provided her no semblance of rationality.
Was he withdrawing his ardent sentiments and doing the duty of a gentleman, seeking her out only because his breeding demanded civility?
She could not contain a perverse sense of disappointment, but managed a slight nod.
“I thank you, but I believe the fault is shared equally between us.”
“No,” he said earnestly. “The fault is mine. I explained the quizzing glass, and my use of it, poorly.” Then, to her astonishment, he extended his hand, the glass lying in his palm. “You wonder why I carry it. Why I use it.”
“I wonder that you returned with it.” A new thought came to her, and she moved her gaze from the gleaming object to find Mr Darcy regarding her intently. “Does Mr Bingley know?”
He shook his head.
“No one beyond you has any idea of its true capabilities. My father used it sparingly—I believe, by the end of his life, he used it only to judge the cattle he meant to purchase from Tattersall’s.
” Shaking his head, he added gravely, “I do not think he would approve of how often I have come to rely upon it. I have convinced myself I need it, when examining business propositions or attending balls filled with eager young ladies and their fathers.”
“To protect yourself?”
“I have preferred others think me a dandy than wheedle their way into my homes or business. You were perfectly correct. I would not take the time to know others as I ought to have…as I could have, had I left the thing in its box.”
“Better a dandy than a disinterested judge of their character?”
Uncertain whether she had angered him or confused him with her arch behaviour, Elizabeth was relieved when he merely nodded.
“You had a glimpse through the glass, and must be curious about it,” Mr Darcy said carefully, “I thought perhaps you would like to judge for yourself whether it is worthy of such suspicion.”
Elizabeth was thrown off balance. Was this a challenge? She had seen how brusquely he had taken it from Miss Bingley’s grasp before she could look through it. As though he read her thoughts, Mr Darcy’s expression softened, and he held out his hand.
“There is nothing to fear. It is not sorcery nor a means of telling the fates or fortunes of those I see through it. Simply put, it is like any type of spectacle, enhancing what is seen—only more so.”
Curiosity overcoming trepidation, Elizabeth reached for the glass.
She lifted it slowly, her heart beating a little faster as she put it to her eye and peered through.
At once, everything around her sharpened.
The sunlight seemed to glow more richly, the leaves shimmered with delicate detail—and when her gaze fell on Mr Darcy himself, standing silently before her, something flickered around him.
Elizabeth caught her breath.
It was not magic in the sense of sorcery or spells—or what she imagined those to be.
Instead, the glass heightened her perception of what was already there.
His posture, proud but tense; the restrained kindness in his eyes; the faint crease of worry at his brow.
A profound sense of goodness, of warmth, of.
..of something she could not quite identify but could feel pulsated within and around him in a golden light.
She lowered the glass, shock thrumming through her and a thoughtful frown tugging at her lips.
“You are— It is...it is fantastical.”
He looked at her expectantly. “It is.”
“How...I do not understand how it works,” she murmured, her fingers tracing the edge of the frame. “Does the curve of the lens catch the light in some way my father’s spectacles and my uncle’s magnifier do not?”
“I imagine so, though I have no scientific explanation for the power of insight it—” Biting his lip, he looked at the ground, his brows furrowed in apparent frustration.
Did he seek assurance of what insight she had gained, of how he appeared to her?
How frightening it must have been to allow her to look at him!
Elizabeth swallowed, realising how difficult it was to explain what the glass had shown to her.
It certainly had revealed inherent qualities Mr Darcy concealed beneath his outwardly solemn, disinterested bearing.
Admirable qualities he had no need to keep hidden, but neither would he be eager to make himself vulnerable by exposing his depths.
“It is as you say, sharpening details of what I looked at—the trees and light—while revealing depths and complexities of character,” she said, feeling tongue-tied.
“Yes.” Her clumsy answer had clearly disappointed him; his eyes drifted away from her to the tops of the trees before he spoke again.
“Much as it sounds like sorcery, the glass provides perception into true character, which you have reminded me, can be done in a more manual fashion. Also, as you say, no person is wholly good, and few, it is to be supposed, are wholly bad. I have depended on it to make immediate judgments, but one could guess that the view through the glass would change, even in the same person, perhaps from day to day.”
Their eyes met and she offered him a small smile. “I said many things,” she offered.
“I am not unwilling to practise,” he said wryly.
Seeing sincerity in his countenance, Elizabeth spoke in an encouraging tone. “You said the glass serves as safeguard.”
“Without it, I might have afflicted my sister with a black-hearted villainess as her companion rather than the kind lady who now guides her. I might have wasted valuable time separating truth from fiction in the grievances my tenants sometimes make against one another. I might have invested with a man trying to sell land that was not his—as a friend had the misfortune to do.”
He recited the instances blandly, as though the impact of the glass had become unremarkable for him. She, however, was shocked. “Of course, you should employ it to protect your sister,” she said, adding, “and to warn Mr Bingley about Mr Tremblay.”
“It is difficult to know just how much is ‘too much’—but I shall do anything necessary to protect my sister. In the case of my estate, I must do what appears wisest for many beyond myself, and the glass has proved valuable since I became Pemberley’s master.
But I had other sources of knowledge of Mr Tremblay—and nonetheless reached immediately for the glass. ”
“It was instinctive of you to protect your friend.”
“A pretty way to put it. You found amusement in my plight as a single man of wealth pursued for my attention or my fortune or my interest in their daughter or sister.” He gave her a wry look, and Elizabeth’s cheeks warmed.
“But with the glass, I have managed to see whether those of the ton care more for my friendship or my fortune.”
“Your friendship and attention are much coveted,” she assured him.
“Trust, however, is as valuable as gold. I came into my fortune, and the responsibilities that accompany it, before I felt myself able. It has helped me to protect my sister, who was only ten years of age when I became her guardian.”
His sister is the same age as Lydia, and fully dependent on a brother with duties and responsibilities far greater than anyone she had met.
How could she question, let alone fault him for relying on the mysterious power of the quizzing glass?
Lord knew her own father set aside his obligations in favour of books, and other gentlemen she knew made imprudent decisions from pride.
Sir William, so pleased with his knighthood, had given up his business, causing the family to retrench only five years later.
“I understand it is difficult to converse easily with those who have not earned your trust.” She pressed the quizzing glass into his hand. “You would not have allowed me to gaze through the glass, and explained it to me, unless you trusted me.”
“I do.”
At her touch, her hand on his, the relief and gratitude that flooded through him turned to something more. After a long moment, he pocketed the glass. “Do I have your trust, despite my continued reliance on it, even when I had a surer grasp of my duties?”
“Duties to your sister and your estate never cease,” Elizabeth said, nodding. “And you chose not to rely on it here, not because we were beneath you, but because you were already trying to ease your reliance on it outside of those areas?”
“Yes. I admit, I arrived here with relatively few expectations, coming to aid Bingley in a small town where little was anticipated of its society and from which I expected little beyond good shooting and fishing. I was content to bide my time, assist him, and even learn to enjoy the reprieve from relying on the glass. I almost despise my reputation for infallibility—it was not earned solely by me.”
“You expected neither challenge nor intellect in Meryton,” she said soberly, “and while I cannot like your presumption, having lived here all of my life, I can understand it.”
“No! Yes,” he said quickly, disliking the gravity in her voice. “But none of that mattered, for you alone subverted my most ridiculous assumptions, all concocted from what I had grown to expect from a beautiful woman looking for a wealthy husband.”
“Oh,” she said. “I am neither of those—”
You are beautiful, and I would be happy to be your wealthy husband, he thought before managing a less impulsive reply.
“You appeared to me in a singular manner, and I was induced to leave Meryton when I did to fetch the quizzing glass.” Darcy rubbed his neck, unused to confessing emotions or fault, and overwhelmed at the way Elizabeth Bennet compelled him to do so.
“I admit, in the beginning, I thought to return and look at you through it and determine whether I was in fact losing my mind or whether you... To see how you looked through the glass.”
“And yet, you did not return, and you did not use it to look at me in town, you said.”
He blew out a breath and swallowed. “When we met in town, and you were as you had been, I could not bear to treat you as I had others. It was unjust. You were not like any other. You are not like any other, not only in how you appear to me but in every way.”
She blushed in a most becoming manner before replying in a soft voice, “I-I cannot understand this light you see around me even without the glass, but now, having seen you through it, I understand how very wrong I was in my own first impressions.”
Much as Darcy wished to know the particulars of how he appeared to her, or better yet, to kiss her, the cacophonous arrival of her sisters drew them apart.