Chapter 3
THREE
Darcy paced the length of his chamber. His hand kept reaching upwards to rake his hair.
He dismissed his valet when he came to assist him for the night with a curt shake of his head; nobody else dared to enter - not even to tend to the fire.
His mind was in turmoil - he could not bear Elizabeth thinking he had acted against the interests of her sister.
He could see now that it might have been perceived that way by her family - her mother certainly.
But he had tried to explain Bingley’s fickle nature to Elizabeth, hoping to warn her sister from forming an attachment.
He knew Elizabeth did not love him, but did she resent him?
Did she think him cruel? And was this misunderstanding the foundation of that resentment?
He sat back down, his clenched fist colliding with his desk.
If only he could go back fifteen years and ask Elizabeth why she had rejected him.
Maybe if he had cleared her misconceptions about himself then, there would have been hope for them.
Perhaps he should explain to her; he owed himself that much.
And yet he could not be trusted to do so in person.
He could reason with her, not with that fiery stance she adopted every time she was not prepared to listen, and he seemed to be the last person she would listen to.
One look at her and he would be undone, reduced to a tongue-tied mooncalf.
If he went to see her again, she might presume he’d returned for another dose of her passion, and would not be incorrect, because (damn him!), he would hope for it.
A letter then. Impersonal - but that was what was needed.
A calm way to lay out his actions and reasons.
It would be up to Elizabeth to weigh them and determine whether she believed him or not.
It posed a risk. She might toss it aside unread, or worse, mock his efforts; the alternative was leaving her with a false understanding of him. That he could not abide.
A servant delivering such a letter would undoubtedly spark interest, particularly from Mr Brook, who already seemed to hover too close.
No, better to send it via post. Let it arrive among her ordinary correspondence, a simple missive she could ignore or heed at her own leisure.
He did not seek a reply. He sought nothing, only for Elizabeth to know.
And yet, as he pulled out a fresh sheet of paper, he hesitated. Would she care at all? Would she even believe him? He gritted his teeth and dipped his pen in ink. It did not matter. He would write it anyway.
* * *
Elizabeth sat at her vanity with a pile of her neglected correspondence.
Letters arrived from each of her sisters, a note from Aunt Gardiner and a letter she did not recognise the hand of the sender.
The letters of business she put aside to deal with later that day.
For now, she wanted to drink tea and find out all her family’s goings-on.
She started with the letter from Mary. Her letters were always uplifting, even though she often spoke of poverty.
This time she wrote of a college being opened, the first of its kind in West Africa.
Elizabeth smiled at her sister’s tone, proud of her adoptive home.
It had been upward of ten years since Mary made the leap into the unknown and met it with valour.
She worried for her sister, for her safety, for her very life but Mary’s determination and resilience put Elizabeth herself to shame.
It was through correspondence they grew closer as sisters even if the service was unreliable and long winded.
“I have heard some say that such a college is a waste; that the people here do not need such lofty pursuits. But I, dear Elizabeth, am convinced they do. There is an intelligence and a potential in these men and women that I have come to respect deeply, and I believe it is only through education that they will rise beyond the circumstances that have long kept them in chains, both literal and metaphorical.” Mary wrote.
Elizabeth smiled at the sermonising tone that had characterised her sister since a very young age, yet the shift in her understanding was impossible to miss.
There was a depth now, a wisdom that had grown with her years in Sierra Leone.
Elizabeth finished the letter truly warmed by the proof of some good happening in the world. She allowed herself to lean into her curiosity and picked up the letter by the “mysterious” sender. She broke the seal and scanned right to the bottom of the page
“With sincere regard,
Fitzwilliam Darcy”
She ran her thumb across the name, whispering it aloud. It struck her, she never knew his christian name. He was Mr Darcy when she mocked him and Darcy when she could not sleep at night.
She decided, immediately, the name suited him.
Haughty, cumbersome but dignified - she smiled at that thought, thinking of ‘Fitzwilliam’ disheveled but upstanding in her surgery still catching breath.
That image was etched in her mind - only he could look dignified in that state, having bedded a woman who was not his wife in the middle of the afternoon.
She bit her lip and stood up, still wearing her night clothes.
She could not bear to face what he had to say, she could not bear his regrets and reproofs.
She did not want to read the letter just to stay ‘the delicious enchantress’ a little longer.
She rang for Molly to help her dress. She turned her eyes back to the pile of letters and closed them in the drawer, picking out the note from Aunt Gardiner - inviting her for a luncheon today.
Molly came to the room just as Elizabeth folded a note to accept her aunt’s invitation.
She decided to dress for a walk - she felt a strong need to see some trees, so she headed to St.Paul’s to make a brisk lap around the building, in the greenery, before turning round towards Gracechurch Street.
She never quite got used to the lack of opportunities for walking in the city - she missed the country.
While London was more than adequate in amusements, the lack of fresh air she could never grow accustomed to.
* * *
The smell of oiled leather and musk of sweaty bodies lingered in the fencing hall.
The rhythmic clash of steel on steel echoed through the chamber, but for Darcy, there was only the opponent before him, the silver glint of a blade, the precise footwork required to outmaneuver his adversary.
He struck forward, forcing the other man back, parrying a counter thrust with practiced ease.
His body was working, but his mind strayed.
This was settled; it was done - there was no more left to say between him and Eliza…
Mrs Morley. Fitzwilliam was right, fifteen years from now he would still fail to understand why he did what he did that afternoon.
The ghost of her laughter, the feel of her against him, the sheer audacity of her!
Her boldness, her infuriating ability to unman him with a word, that would linger, relentless, for the reminder of his days.
As if his cousin was privy to his thoughts, Darcy heard him enter.
“You are fencing like a man with something to prove, Darcy,” said Fitzwilliam, watching him with an easy smirk, shedding his coat and rolling up his sleeves - a sure sign he intended to join.
“I was not aware my technique required commentary,” Darcy replied coolly, wiping off his brow. He took a slow breath, tamping down the frustration curling in his chest.
Fitzwilliam only grinned. “No, your technique is as fine as ever. But the way you are lunging… it is as if you are trying to impale a ghost.”
Darcy did not reply. He merely handed his foil to a waiting attendant and reached for a fresh towel.
“Ah,” Fitzwilliam continued, stepping onto the floor opposite him, “so I am right. A ghost indeed. Tell me, is it the spectre of some old offence, or a more recent, shall we say, encounter?”
“Let me hazard a guess,” Fitzwilliam went on, dodging a thrust. “You went to see her.” He leaned forward, locking their blades for a brief moment. “And, judging by the set of your jaw, I would wager she did not welcome you with open arms.”
Darcy forced him back with a sharp riposte, irritation flaring. “You presume too much.”
“Do I?” Fitzwilliam sidestepped neatly. “You saw her, then.”
Darcy hesitated just long enough.
Fitzwilliam laughed. “Ah, so I am right! What did the esteemed lady say? Did she reprimand you for your past insults? Express regret for refusing you all those years ago? No, wait,” he grinned wickedly, “did you perhaps renew your suit?”
Darcy’s grip tightened on his foil, the muscle in his jaw flexing. “She is not the woman I once thought her to be.”
“She has made something of herself,” Darcy admitted stiffly. He saw the flash of curiosity in his cousin’s eyes and regretted the words immediately.
Fitzwilliam feinted, forcing Darcy into a quick retreat. “Yes, yes, impressive independence and all that. But you did not answer my question. How did it go?”
Darcy exhaled sharply. “I spoke to Mrs Morley, I am satisfied with her wellbeing. There is no more to say.”
Fitzwilliam’s grin widened. “Satisfied? You look anything but ‘satisfied’ with that conversation.”
Luckily, Darcy managed to get his cousin’s focus back to fencing and finished their match in silence.
The feeling of gratification from winning eluded Darcy and now he had to accept an invitation for drinks just to keep up the pretense of all being as it ever was.
He mustered smiles, he even mustered a laugh when Richard was lying on the ground beneath him.
All he wanted to do was to return to his library and read something tragic.
As they sat in the carriage, Fitzwilliam watched him speculatively and while picking non-existent specks off the sleeve of his coat he asked with a smirk “You did not, by chance, propose?”