Chapter 8
Mr. Darcy
The pig had taken up residence, and Darcy had made himself a rule: he would be civil to Miss Elizabeth during her stay, he would enquire after Miss Bennet's health with appropriate concern, and he would not, under any circumstances, form an attachment to the pig.
He broke the rule on the first morning. He came downstairs to the breakfast room at half seven, which was early by Netherfield standards and which he preferred because it meant he could eat in peace before Caroline appeared.
He opened the door and found Truffles on the rug in front of the sideboard, asleep on her side, her small body rising and falling with the deep, contented breathing of an animal who had found exactly where she wanted to be.
She opened one eye when he entered. Her curly tail gave a small, satisfied twitch. She did not get up. She simply watched him cross the room, take his seat, and begin buttering toast, and then she closed her eye and went back to sleep.
He ate his breakfast. The pig slept. The rain hammered against the windows. It was, he realised, the most peaceful morning he had spent at Netherfield.
Something about the pig's trust unsettled him.
The absolute defencelessness of a creature that small, sleeping in the open with no concern for who might walk through the door.
It reminded him of Georgiana. His sister had that same quality, the willingness to believe that the world was kind, and it had nearly destroyed her last summer at Ramsgate.
He had arrived in time. He had not been too late.
But the memory of how close it had been still woke him at three in the morning, and looking at the pig on the rug, small and trusting and entirely at the mercy of whoever chose to walk into this room, he felt the same cold flicker in his chest.
The peace did not last. Caroline appeared at nine, dressed for the drawing room though there was no one to receive. She stopped in the doorway and looked at the pig on the rug.
"That creature is in the breakfast room."
"Yes."
"It should be in the kitchen. Or the stable. It should not be in the breakfast room."
"She is quiet. She has done no harm."
"She is a pig, Mr. Darcy."
Darcy looked at Truffles. Truffles looked at Darcy. Her snout lifted and her ears pricked forward, the whole small body tensing with hope.
"I am aware," he said, and returned to his toast.
Caroline sat down. She poured tea. She did not look at the pig again, but her jaw was set in a way that suggested she was merely regrouping.
Over the course of the morning, Caroline raised the question of the pig four more times.
She raised it with Louisa, who agreed that a pig in a drawing room was irregular.
She raised it with Bingley, who said the pig was harmless and rather charming and had he mentioned that Miss Bennet's complexion was remarkable even when she was ill?
She raised it with Mr. Hurst, who said "mm" and continued eating.
She did not raise it with Darcy again. But she looked at the pig with the careful assessment of a woman formulating a strategy.
Darcy retreated to the library after breakfast. He opened Mr. Bennet's book of Cowper, though he had brought a volume of his own.
He read the poem Miss Elizabeth had marked, the one about the quiet comfort of familiar places.
He read her margin note again. This is the best line in the whole collection and no one ever talks about it.
He turned the page and found another note, beside a poem about solitude: If this were true, I would live in a field.
He smiled. He caught himself smiling and stopped.
A scratching at the library door. A small, insistent sound, like a fingernail on wood. Then a squeal. Short, polite, questioning. A pig knocking.
He should not open the door. Opening the door would establish a precedent. The pig would expect the library to be available, and he would have a pig in the library for the duration of Elizabeth's stay, and there was absolutely no reason to find that anything other than an inconvenience.
He opened the door.
Truffles trotted in, circled the rug twice, and lay down beside his chair. She rested her chin on his boot and sighed.
He looked at the pig. The pig looked at him. He sat back down and continued reading, and if he leaned over after a few pages to rest his hand on the pig's warm back, it was merely to confirm that the animal was settled and would not cause further disruption.
Elizabeth was upstairs with Jane. He could hear her footsteps occasionally, moving between the guest room and the corridor.
Once, he heard her voice, low and soothing, and once, he heard her laugh at something Jane said.
The laugh was muffled by a floor and a closed door, and it still reached him with the clarity of a bell.
He turned pages without reading them.
At midday, a maid brought a tray to the library.
Cold meat, bread, an apple. Darcy ate at his desk.
He gave the pig a crust of bread, which she accepted with a delicacy that surprised him.
She took it gently from his fingers, chewed with her eyes half-closed, and then looked at him with an expression that plainly communicated: more.
"One crust," he said. "That is the limit."
He gave her a second crust. And then a small piece of cheese. And then the core of his apple, which she devoured with a crunching enthusiasm that was nearly musical.
"This is the end of it," he told her. "I am not feeding you. This is not an arrangement."
The pig pressed her snout against his knee. Her eyes were large and dark and trusting.
He gave her a third crust. He was being managed by a pig. He was being managed by a pig, and the pig was winning.
The afternoon passed quietly. Darcy read. The pig slept. Occasionally, Truffles would shift and her hoof would tap against his boot, and the sound was oddly companionable, like a clock ticking in a familiar room.
At some point, he began talking to her. He told her the Latin was better than the translation.
He told her that her mistress would disagree, at length, and would probably be right.
He caught himself, stopped, and returned to his book.
The pig returned to sleep. Neither of them acknowledged that he had just spoken aloud about a woman he was not interested in to a pig who was not listening.
In the middle of the afternoon, Elizabeth passed the library on her way to the kitchen to request broth for Jane.
She paused in the doorway. Darcy did not notice at first. He was reading, one hand on the book, the other resting on the pig's back, his thumb moving in slow circles over the warm pink skin.
"Mr. Darcy."
He looked up. His hand froze on the pig's back. He withdrew it with a speed that was, he realised, far too sudden to be casual.
"Miss Elizabeth. How is your sister?"
"Improving. The fever has eased." She was looking at his hand, the one that had been resting on the pig. "You appear to have made a friend."
"The pig followed me into the library. I did not invite her."
"You opened the door."
"She was scratching at it. The noise was distracting."
Elizabeth's mouth did that thing again. The slight curve that was more dangerous than a full smile because it suggested she was restraining herself, and the restraint was the joke.
"Of course," she said. "Very practical."
"Entirely practical."
"And the bread crumbs on the floor beside your chair?"
He looked down. There were, in fact, crumbs. A small constellation of evidence that he had been feeding the pig. He looked up at Elizabeth. She was not laughing. She was holding herself very still, as though laughing would break something she needed to keep intact.
"The bread is stale," he said. "I was merely preventing waste."
"Naturally."
"It has nothing to do with the pig."
"Of course not."
They looked at each other. The library was quiet.
The rain tapped against the windows. The pig sighed in her sleep and rolled onto her side, exposing her belly, and Darcy became aware that he was alone in a room with Miss Elizabeth Bennet and a sleeping pig and that the room felt smaller than it had a moment ago, in a way he could not define.
She broke the look first. "I should see to Jane's broth."
"Of course."
She turned to go. Stopped. Turned back.
"Mr. Darcy. The pig. She... she does not do this with everyone. She does not follow people. She does not sit on their boots. She does not knock on library doors." Elizabeth's voice was different now. Quieter. Almost uncertain. "She has only ever done this with me. And now, with you."
He did not know what to say. He did not know what she was telling him, or what she wanted him to understand, or whether there was a correct response to being told that a pig considered you worth following.
"I am honoured," he said. He meant it as a light remark. It came out sincere.
She searched his face for a moment, as if looking for something. Then she turned and went to the kitchen.
Elizabeth came down for dinner that evening. Jane was improving but still feverish, and Elizabeth's face showed the strain of a day spent nursing. There were shadows under her eyes and her hair was pinned loosely. She had changed into a gown that was clean but plain, dark blue, without ornament.
She looked, he thought, more beautiful than any woman at any assembly he had ever attended. He did not want to think this. He thought it anyway.
Miss Bennet's fever had eased. Another day, perhaps two, and the sisters would leave. The pig would leave. The library would be his again, and the rug would be empty, and the bread crusts would not be needed. The thought should have been a relief. It was not a relief.