Chapter 14
Elizabeth came to an abrupt halt when she reached her house and saw Colonel Fitzwilliam in the drawing room window, pointing up at the clouds.
Mr Tucker had assured her the family would be out if she came at three o’clock, and she had assiduously timed her walk across town to make very sure she would not be early.
As misfortune would have it, however, it had begun to rain about ten minutes ago; evidently, they had changed their plans.
She drew back lest she was seen while she decided what to do.
She had no way of knowing whether they had postponed their outing entirely or merely delayed it, but she had come on foot and would rather not walk all the way back to the Millhouses’ without having seen what Mr Tucker wished to show her.
Then again, neither was she keen to thrust herself into Mr Darcy’s notice again so soon.
It was not that she still disliked his company.
Indeed, he had been uncommonly attentive at the picnic, asking after her aunt Bennet and reassuring her about the house.
Even the unacknowledged spectre of his spurned proposal had begun to feel less awkward.
Nevertheless, his dip in the sea had left her flustered and embarrassed as, yet again, he had stood before her in a dripping wet shirt, every contour of his person accentuated, and rivulets of water streaming from his hair.
Providence was playing a very cruel joke on her, showing her again and again precisely what she had refused—and making her like it more each time.
She had felt dreadfully sorry for him, of course, for he had evidently been mortified, but of the two of them, she was certain her embarrassment had been greatest.
She started when the front door of Lady Preston’s house was abruptly wrenched open.
A servant stepped into the aperture. “Miss Bennet?”
“Yes.”
“Her ladyship wishes to know whether you intend to stand about out here all day? She advises against it, for she says no straw bonnet ever fared well in a storm, and the tea will go cold if you dally too long.” He belatedly bowed and added, “Ma’am.”
Elizabeth could not help but laugh and replied that she would welcome some tea while it was still hot.
She ascended the front steps, where the footman took her soggy bonnet and pelisse and showed her into a very pleasant saloon where Lady Preston was waiting.
Like those in Elizabeth’s own house, the windows here were tall and showed a fine view of Marine Parade and the beach; it was no surprise that her ladyship had seen her dithering about, and she could only pray that nobody next door had likewise seen her.
“I told you it rains more often than not here. You ought to have brought an umbrella. Or preferably a carriage.”
“Your ladyship is very kind to give me shelter,” Elizabeth said, curtseying.
“Yes, well, I thought perhaps you had forgotten which house was yours.”
“I was due to speak to my foreman, but the family are still at home, and I did not like to intrude. Would you like me to do that?” She had seen Lady Preston struggling with the teapot, her knotty fingers clearly giving her pain.
“If you insist,” her ladyship replied, though her surliness did not disguise how readily she surrendered the teapot and eased back into her chair. “Benedict tells me you had an eventful day yesterday.”
“At the picnic? Yes, we certainly did. Mr Darcy slipped trying to get his waistcoat on and fell in the sea.”
“Why on earth was his waistcoat off? Most people get dressed before they leave the house.”
“He took it off to rescue a drowning dog. Only then the dog turned out not to be drowning.”
Lady Preston frowned. “He cannot be a sensible man.”
“Actually, Mr Darcy is exceedingly clever.”
“Miss Bennet, anyone who cannot successfully insert two arms into a sleeveless garment without falling over must be deficient in some way. You observed my nephew managing perfectly well to stay upright, I take it?”
“I did, although he remained fully clothed for the entire excursion.”
“I should hope so! He is a proper gentleman.” She sipped her tea and returned the cup to the table. “You have spent a little more time with Benedict now. Tell me, how do you find him?”
“I like him very well. He is kind—and quick-witted, which I always appreciate.”
“And handsome, do not you agree?”
“Yes, he is very good-looking.” Which was not untrue, though in saying as much, Elizabeth comprehended that however well-favoured he might be, his looks had no effect on her sensibilities.
She continued speaking rather than dwell on whose did.
“I would have expected this room to be the mirror of my drawing room, since they share an adjoining wall, but it is larger and with more doors. Is the house entirely different throughout?”
“I cannot say, for I cannot recall how yours is laid out. When I stepped across your threshold the other week, it was for the first time in many years. I should think the last time was when your aunt was there.”
“I was not sure my aunt Bennet had ever lived in the house. She certainly never mentioned it.”
“It was only for a few summers, when she was younger. Before she married.”
“And you did not get along?”
“I never said that.”
“You said she was a perennial curmudgeon.”
“Well, you knew her. Was I wrong?”
Elizabeth had to concede that no, she was not wrong.
“And did you like her?” her ladyship pressed.
Elizabeth smiled, enjoying Lady Preston’s line of reasoning. “Yes, I did, as it happens.”
“There you are, then. But speaking of your house, how is the renovation coming along?”
“Slowly, I am afraid. I hope the noise is not disturbing you too much.”
“It is not disturbing me at all. I am too hard of hearing to be troubled by noises on the other side of walls.”
“That is a relief…” Elizabeth trailed off, for her eye had been caught by the sight of Lord Saye striding past the window. Colonel Fitzwilliam followed him with a lady on each arm. One was Miss Darcy; Elizabeth did not know the other.
“Is one of them Mr Darcy?” Lady Preston asked. She had extracted a lorgnette from somewhere and was using it to peer unabashedly at the party from next door.
“No,” Elizabeth replied, praying her scrutiny would be unnoticed. “They are his cousins, Lord Saye and Colonel Fitzwilliam.”
Mr Darcy soon came into view, however, and he also had a young lady on his arm.
An extraordinarily handsome, very finely dressed lady.
They were smiling and laughing gaily with each other, which struck Elizabeth, for Mr Darcy did not often laugh.
The whole scene brought an odd, flustery feeling to her gut.
Hastily she rose, wishing for escape from Lady Preston and her keen eye.
“But now they have gone out, I had better see what Mr Tucker wants. Thank you so much for the tea.”
Darcy was in a foul humour. It had begun the instant he emerged, dripping wet, from the sea and had not yet shown any sign of abating.
As if he had not been humbled enough already!
Elizabeth had called out every conceivable fault in his character, pride being chief among them, but did it follow that even the pride he took in his personal appearance must be dismantled?
Was it necessary that he be robbed of all dignity?
The care with which he presented himself to the world as a respectable gentleman, master of a great estate, and descendant of a noble family—done away with completely as he was bared, literally as well as figuratively, in front of the woman he loved.
If only his forays to Benjamin and Gerald’s had not rendered what she saw beneath his clinging shirt as unappealing as what she had seen in his character.
He had continued exercising: swimming, farther up the beach where fewer people ventured, and occasionally running up the hills on the outskirts of town.
He could not yet see any improvement—but then, he had not thought his figure much altered to begin with.
Only Saye’s incessant teasing had made him aware of the danger of growing stout.
“Be not offended by Darcy’s silence, ladies,” Fitzwilliam said. “He has had a bad few days.”
“I was not offended in the least,” replied Miss Hawkridge. “Indeed, I had not noticed that he was any graver than usual.”
Fitzwilliam and Saye’s maternal cousin, Miss Georgette Hawkridge, was spending the summer at the Brighton home of her friend Miss Jane Larkin, with whom she had come to call.
It was unfortunate that this happened to be the first day of inclement weather all week, and they were all stuck in the dreadful excuse for a drawing room, waiting for the rain to cease.
“Have you done much since you got here?” Miss Hawkridge continued. “There was a ball at Lady Rosse’s which I understand was a great success. Did you go?”
“No, we arrived too late for that one,” Fitzwilliam answered. “We have dined with some of the officers and been riding up on the Downs.”
“We had a picnic on the beach yesterday,” Georgiana added.
Perhaps noticing the manner in which this made Darcy glower even more darkly at the carpet, Fitzwilliam cleared his throat and moved the conversation quickly along. “Saye is organising a card party. Should be fun.”
“He said he is going to invite Mr Hartham,” Georgiana said. “Apparently he has a reputation for always winning.”
Darcy glowered harder still.
“Where is Saye?” asked Miss Hawkridge.
Fitzwilliam sighed. “Getting changed. His outfit did not suit the weather, apparently.”
“It has taken a rather chilly turn,” Miss Larkin said, affecting an exaggerated shiver.
“The house is a little cold today on account of our walls having been breached,” Fitzwilliam said with a grin. Evidently, he found the situation far more diverting than Darcy did.
Tucker had that morning sent men to remove the splintered window frame on which Georgiana’s maid had supposedly skewered herself.
Regrettably, they had seen fit to discard the glass along with the frame.
A replacement pane had been ordered, but for now, there was an enormous hole in the wall through which most of the day’s rain had fallen, and at one point, a seagull had flown in and defecated profusely all about the place, doing nothing to improve Darcy’s mood.
“It is not because of the ghost, then?” Miss Hawkridge asked with a satirical smile. “Saye said the house was haunted. Is it?”
Fitzwilliam shook his head. “I have not seen any indication of it, though it does creak and sigh a fair bit.”
“Apparently someone died here,” Miss Larkin said in a voice soft with awe.
“They did find bones,” Georgiana agreed.
Darcy suppressed a groan that his sister should continue so credulous. Had she learnt nothing from her misadventure with Wickham about the lies men told for their own amusement?
“How did they die?” Miss Larkin asked.
“Probably murdered,” Miss Hawkridge supplied with mock gravity. “Spirits only linger when they are unhappy.”
“The house is not haunted,” Darcy said flatly.
It would have been a much more effective pronouncement if, at that precise moment, there had not come a blood-curdling shriek, an explosion of plaster from above their heads, and the protrusion of a ghostly shrouded figure through the ceiling.
Miss Larkin screamed; Georgiana gasped. Miss Hawkridge looked positively thrilled. The cocoon-like object began to wriggle and writhe, then a muffled voice shouted, “Damn and blast it! Do not just stand there gaping, Denvers! Pull me out!”
Darcy ceased glowering and began to grin. His grin broadened into a smile, and he started chuckling. His chuckle soon progressed into deep-throated laughter. “That is not a ghost. That is Saye.”
It appeared his cousin had discovered a rotten floorboard in his bedchamber and had been saved from falling all the way through into the drawing room only by dint of the rug that had wedged him into the hole.
This wonderful piece of just deserts cheered Darcy as very little else could have.
By the time Saye was rescued, the rain had stopped, and as they set out on their walk, Darcy was still laughing heartily over it.