Chapter 12 #4
“Someone must. You certainly are not going to explain them yourself.” She raised a hand before he could respond. “I am not criticising. I am observing.”
He was a bit offended. “What is the difference?”
“Criticism implies I wish you to change. Observation means I am learning who you are.”
Darcy absorbed this. It was a rather precise distinction.
Georgiana loved, but did not really know him, for she was barely out of childhood.
His father had never looked at him closely, had preferred, always, the version of people that required the least effort to understand.
Even Fitz, who loved him like a brother, tended towards blunt correction.
Miss Bennet was offering something different—attention without judgement.
“I can be more forthcoming,” he said.
“And I can be less impatient. There. We have each made a concession. The negotiations are progressing admirably.” She folded her hands in her lap.
“Rule the third: no pretence in private. When we are in company, we perform as a couple ought. But when we are alone, we are ourselves. I will not play the devoted wife for an audience of one. We shall never make progress in that way.”
“Agreed. Pretence is exhausting.”
“It is. I am glad we are of one mind. Rule the fourth—”
He shook his head. “No.”
“No?” She tipped her head to one side.
“It is my turn, for I have not yet contributed a rule.”
She blinked. “I beg your pardon?”
He was amused by her befuddlement. “You have proposed three rules. I have agreed to all of them.”
Her eyes brightened. “It is an efficient way to negotiate.”
“You are dictating terms and allowing me to ratify them. That is not negotiation.”
She opened her mouth, closed it, and then, to his considerable satisfaction, she laughed. A real laugh, startled out of her, sharp and unguarded, and the sound of it did something to his heart that he elected not to examine.
“Very well, Mr. Darcy. I did suggest no pretence. The floor is yours.”
“Rule the fourth,” he said. “You will not mistake worry for your well-being as constraint. Caring is not the same as controlling.”
She was quiet for a beat. When she looked at him, there was something in her expression he could not entirely account for. Stubbornness and pride perhaps, but also acceptance. “That is a good rule.”
“Thank you.”
“It is also quite carefully worded. You have been composing it in your head while I was talking.”
“You were talking a great deal. I had ample time.”
The look she gave him was biting, but the corner of her mouth twitched. “Accepted with a caveat. Caring does not give you leave to make decisions on my behalf without consulting me, including arranging my days for my own good and expecting me to be grateful for it.”
“I cannot imagine anyone ever trying,” he replied drily.
“I have experience with men who manage things. My father manages by avoidance. My Uncle Gardiner manages by cheerful delegation. You, I suspect, manage by doing everything yourself and then feeling martyred when no one thanks you for it.”
The accuracy of this was startling. He had not expected her to see him this clearly after a so short an acquaintance. “I do not feel martyred.”
“Unappreciated, then.”
He felt a muscle in his jaw tick. “I will endeavour not to manage you.”
She paused and in a softer voice, said, “In fairness, I should warn you that I suffer from the identical complaint. I managed my sisters through a fever, our household through a crisis, and my father through his indifference to his own affairs. If I begin arranging your life without consulting you, you have my leave to tell me so.”
While the subject of this conversation was serious, the manner in which it was being held was absurd. “You are granting me permission to resist your management?”
Her eyes were alight with mischief. “I plan to resist yours. It is only fair.”
They eyed one another until they heard a maid in the hall.
“Rule the fifth,” Darcy said. “If we disagree, and I begin to believe that we will disagree frequently and with vigour—”
“I look forward to it, Mr. Darcy.”
He waited to be sure she was finished. When she leaned back and crossed her arms over her chest, he continued. “When we disagree, we resolve it between ourselves. Not through Georgiana, not through Mrs. Morgan, not through your sisters or mother or father.”
“My father would make a dreadful ally in any case. He would side with whichever of us was more amusing.”
“Then I am at a permanent disadvantage.”
She caught her breath. He saw it, the flash of surprise, the quick delight. He had made her laugh twice now. She coughed slightly, and he arched an eyebrow at her.
“Rule the sixth,” Elizabeth declared, recovering. “Georgiana is my sister now too. I do not require your permission to care for her, to advise her, or to take her side against you if I believe you are in the wrong.”
“You are already anticipating taking my sister’s side against me?”
“I am anticipating that you will be overbearing with her, because you love her and you are frightened for her, and overbearing protectiveness appears to be your natural response to such emotions.” She met his gaze and seemed to be challenging him to deny it.
Given the reason they were holding this conversation, he could not.
“When that happens, someone will need to tell you. I am volunteering.”
It was not difficult to comply. Having a woman to assist Georgiana as she navigated these trying years, one that his sister already adored and whose decisions had already demonstrated her strength of character? It was reassuring. “Accepted.”
She frowned. “Rule the seventh. I shall be allowed to keep a cock-a-too.”
Darcy looked at her. “I beg your pardon?”
“I wished to ensure you are paying attention. You have been agreeing to things very readily, Mr. Darcy. I must be certain you are not simply pretending to be agreeable.”
“I cannot pretend to anything, for rule two demands my honesty.”
She smiled knowingly. “Very well. The cock-a-too rule is withdrawn.”
Darcy could not help but smile. He had expected awkwardness, formality, the stiff courtesy of two strangers yoked together by disaster.
He had not expected to enjoy himself. It was a gift she had, he thought, of breaking through such moments.
“I am respectfully relieved. But as you have withdrawn, I do have a rule the seventh.”
“Please do not say you intend to keep a crocodile, Mr. Darcy, or I shall have to rethink our plan.”
“Reassessment,” he said. “We review the terms at monthly intervals.”
“Monthly is excessive. It suggests you expect this to go badly.”
He shook his head. “It suggests I expect it to change.” He held her gaze. “I hope it will change.”
They stared at one another, and then, to Darcy’s pleasure, she conceded.
“Very well,” she said. “I do have one final recommendation.”
“Not a rule?”
“Not a rule.” Her voice was quieter now.
“We did not choose each other. We were chosen for each other by circumstance and malice and extremely poor luck. But we are here now, and I should like to believe we are both the sort of people who would rather build something good than bemoan how we arrived here.”
He could measure the fluttering beats of her pulse in the hollow of her throat. She was not as calm as she sounded. “So let us build something, Mr. Darcy. Whatever it turns out to be.”
“I should like that very much, Miss Bennet,” he said. He smiled at her. “Recommendation accepted.”