Chapter 9
By the time his mother’s guests had all departed, Darcy was certain that he had behaved exactly as a gentleman should. There was no reason at all for him to remain awake considering the matter.
By half past four, he was not certain at all.
What unsettled him was not the things he had done, for he had done very little. It was the things he had not.
When the Gardiners and the Bennet sisters were announced, he bowed to them from where he stood, with all the formality expected of a gentleman acquaintance and not one degree more.
He had then retreated to the card tables at the far end of the drawing room, where he had remained for almost the rest of the evening.
He had not, beyond that first bow and the barest of civilities, said anything to Miss Elizabeth, except for those few moments at the punch bowl, when he had crossed the room with his eyes fixed firmly on his feet, and had looked up only when it was too late to avoid finding her there.
That had been his promise to his mother. To remain at the opposite end of whatever room contained the Bennet sisters. Not to pursue Miss Elizabeth for conversation, clarification, or redemption. If she addressed him, to keep his answers brief and gentlemanly.
He had welcomed the arrangement. It was the only way he could endure a London winter in which Bingley’s interest in Miss Bennet would so often bring him into Miss Elizabeth’s presence.
He had instead attended to other things.
He stood with Richard, who had decided to take on the challenge of charming the elderly, cantankerous Lady Trevelyan.
He had listened as Mr. Hollingsworth asked him repeatedly for changes at the parish living at Curbar, which was not in Darcy’s gift.
He had also nodded along to Sir Henry’s outrage over the alarming direction of Mr. Nash’s plans for Marylebone Park.
He had very studiously not attended to Miss Elizabeth Bennet.
He had, however, watched Miss Bingley address her when Miss Elizabeth entered the room.
They had exchanged a brief conversation, and Miss Bingley had lost her smug composure for some seconds before recovering.
He had also noticed his mother smile at Miss Elizabeth in the way she smiled at people she liked.
Then he had become aware that Mr. Cresswell of Maplehurst was standing by the fire, apparently waiting for something. Darcy had viewed the introduction and pretended not to be bothered by it.
Mr. Cresswell was a respectable clergyman who had recently come into a valuable family living.
He had been a guest rather frequently over the past two years when in London, for he was a distant relation of his mother’s.
The man had never, however, appeared at one of his mother’s matchmaking parties.
That he was invited tonight was, Darcy supposed, the sort of arrangement with which his mother did not generally trouble him.
He knew, of course, why it bothered him, but it could not matter. If his mother chose to introduce Mr. Cresswell to a young woman she believed her son had used ill, he ought simply to be pleased for them both.
He was pleased. In principle.
Darcy rolled onto his side and pulled the covers over his head. His mother understood women far better than he. If she believed this was the correct course, then it was.
At half past ten that morning, Hewitt appeared in the doorway of Darcy’s study. “Mr. Bingley to see you, sir.”
“Send him in.”
Bingley was barely two paces behind Hewitt.
His cravat had been tied in haste, and his fair hair had not been brought entirely under management.
There were also slightly darkened circles beneath his eyes—he had not slept any better than Darcy, evidently, only Bingley was less discreet about who knew it.
“Your valet must be beside himself to send you out of doors like this,” he noted drily.
Bingley snorted. “He asked for the day off.”
“Before or after you insisted on leaving the house in such a state?”
“Never mind that,” Bingley replied, waving Darcy’s comments aside. “I would not have come before noon ordinarily, but I had to see you, and I thought you of all people would understand. Your mother was a marvel last evening, Darcy. A marvel.”
“She is generally a marvel. Sit down, Bingley.”
“I will stand if you do not mind.”
Darcy, quite willing to be distracted, allowed himself to be amused.
“Bingley, you have been admitted to my study at half past ten in the morning after you were here until midnight last night. You will sit, you will tell me what you have come to tell me, and then you may go on about your business as you choose.”
Bingley laughed at himself once, ran a hand through his already disarranged hair, and said, “Yes. Yes, of course. I am being ridiculous.” He sat.
“Not at all,” Darcy assured his friend, though he was, in fact, being ridiculous. “You are being a man who had a good evening.”
“I had an excellent evening.”
Hewitt supervised the arrival of fresh coffee and withdrew.
“Darcy,” Bingley said, “I am going to Gracechurch Street. I had thought of calling at noon, but noon felt—that is, given how much my feelings have—”
“Bingley,” Darcy interrupted.
“Yes?”
“Drink your coffee.”
Bingley drank his coffee. The forced pause in his flurried movements helped him to gather his wits.
“Your mother received Mrs. Gardiner like they had known one another for years. Miss Bennet too. I cannot tell you how that made me—well, it was unmistakable, you know. That she entirely accepted them, and everyone in the room had best do the same. Caroline attempted to convince me otherwise, but I know what I saw.”
Bingley set his cup in his saucer and then lifted it to take another sip before he resumed.
“Last night,” he said at last, “I sat next to Miss Bennet at supper and could not have moved had the house been on fire. I shall not bore you with the conversation. You would tell me it was dull. It was about her aunt’s house in Cheapside, and a pelisse her sister Mary had finished mending for her before she left Hertfordshire, and her little cousin Maggie, who—never mind.
None of it would interest you. All of it interested me.
I do not believe I have been so happy since I was a boy. ”
Darcy looked at his coffee but did not drink it. “I am glad for you, Bingley.” And he was, even if he could not be glad for himself.
Bingley looked up suddenly, only just remembering there existed a world beyond his own thoughts.
“Come with me.”
“To Gracechurch Street?”
“Yes. Why not? Mrs. Gardiner was kindness itself yesterday, and Miss Bennet—well.” He smiled helplessly, no doubt finding language inadequate to express his sentiments. “It would not be strange. You know them already.”
Darcy considered Bingley’s invitation. It would be strange. It would, in fact, be a very great mistake.
Gracechurch Street was not a ballroom or crowded drawing room in which distance and civility could be maintained. It would be a family parlour. A fire. Conversation. Miss Elizabeth within speaking distance for longer than a moment at a punch bowl.
“I think,” Darcy said evenly, “that your visit will prosper better without an additional gentleman imposed upon it.”
“Nonsense. Mrs. Gardiner likes you.”
That, unfortunately, was true. Worse yet—he liked Mrs. Gardiner. And her husband.
“Even so.”
Bingley studied him for a moment. “You are well?”
“Perfectly.”
His friend appeared only half convinced, though happiness quickly reclaimed him. “Very well. But I mean to stay longer than propriety allows.”
Despite himself, Darcy laughed. “Go to Gracechurch Street, Bingley, and do as you will.”
Bingley smiled, seized his gloves from the chair beside him, and was gone almost before the servant could properly open the door.
The room felt markedly quieter after his departure. Darcy stood for a moment beside the fire with his untouched coffee cooling once again in his hand.
Then, because he apparently possessed neither judgement nor self-preservation, he found himself wondering whether Miss Elizabeth Bennet was at that moment sitting in the Gardiners’ drawing room. What was she doing? Was she reading, sewing, making lively conversation?
The clock struck three-quarters of the hour.
Darcy moved to the window of his study, which overlooked the paved courtyard behind the house, and watched a wren that was perched upon an empty stone planter.
Mr. Darcy of Pemberley accompanying his friend to Gracechurch Street once would occasion no remark of consequence.
His family, and particularly his mother, had long possessed the habit of treating people according to their merits rather than their rank, and a single visit to the Gardiners’ house in Cheapside would be understood merely as civility.
Repetition, however, was another matter. A gentleman might go anywhere once, but a settled habit invited interpretation.
If he accompanied Bingley to Gracechurch Street today, Bingley would wish for his presence every time he visited—at least, until he was sure Miss Bennet would marry him.
By then, however, the visits would be regular events.
And once the visits became regular, society would not long remain satisfied with the obvious explanation, that he was supporting his friend.
No, Bingley’s attentions to Miss Bennet were already sufficiently clear.
A second unmarried gentleman regularly accompanying his friend on calls would inevitably produce speculation about the unattached sister, and speculation, once formed, could turn ugly.
It would not be Darcy who suffered from it.
Men rarely did. But Miss Elizabeth might.
Her name would begin to appear in conversations where it ought not.
People would decide she had attracted him, encouraged him, perhaps held expectations of him.
And when nothing came of it, the embarrassment would settle not upon him, but upon her.