CHAPTER 40 #2
The first chamber was large, pale, and cold with the particular coldness of rooms which are kept clean but not loved.
The curtains were good and old. The paper had once been handsome, but now appeared to be making a virtue of retirement.
The bed was excellent, the grate sound, the carpet defensible only to a person determined to defend it from principle.
Elizabeth stood just inside the room and found, to her irritation, that the word bedchamber had become less neutral than it had been yesterday.
This, too, was Mr. Darcy's fault.
"The curtains must go," she said.
Mrs. Albright looked at them.
"Yes, miss."
"And the paper. It is too thin. Mr. Darcy is not a gentleman to be set against apologetic paper."
"No, miss."
"The carpet may remain until we are sure it cannot be improved by better company."
"Yes, miss."
Elizabeth moved through the bedchamber, then into the dressing room, then into the little back room beyond.
The dressing room was practical, which recommended it.
It required more than a surface cleaning.
The presses must be emptied, scrubbed, lined, and made ready for Mr. Darcy's clothes.
Nothing must remain that suggested old storage, spare linen, or temporary permission.
There must be space enough for his man to work without confusion, hooks enough for coats, shelves enough for linen, and no remnant of vacancy pretending to be economy.
The bedchamber required still more.
The bed must be made new from the mattress outward, or as near to new as Mrs. Albright's judgment required.
Fresh ticking, if necessary. Fresh pillows.
Fresh blankets. Fresh sheets. A counterpane that had never belonged to absence.
The bed-hangings must be considered with the curtains, and the whole room made warm enough to receive a man who had lived too long in narrowed rooms and yet dignified enough not to look like pity.
The dressing room must also be prepared for ordinary bodily life, which was never ordinary when one began to think seriously about it.
Washing, shaving, towels, hot water, a proper glass, a basin and ewer that did not look borrowed from guest arrangements, a stand where it should be, fires where fires would be needed, bell-pulls checked, keys found, locks tested, and every servant instructed where water was to be carried without waiting to be told.
Elizabeth discovered that preparing for a husband required a surprising intimacy with pitchers.
This reflection did not assist her composure.
She therefore proceeded to the little back room.
That room decided her.
It had the best light.
That was enough.
Mr. Darcy should not be put to work in a corner merely because he had once learned to endure one.
Elizabeth stood near the window and imagined a writing table there, plain and strong; shelves on the inner wall; space enough for papers that were not to be pushed aside whenever a servant entered; a chair fit for long occupation; a fire that could be useful without apology.
Mr. Darcy's work was not merely employment.
It had been discipline, shelter, proof, and survival.
His papers should not be treated as temporary visitors.
"This room for his work," she said.
Mrs. Albright's eyes passed over the light, the walls, the fireplace, and the door.
"Yes, miss."
"Not fussy."
"No, miss."
"Not gloomy either."
"No, miss."
"And no little gilt tables which appear to have been raised with too high an opinion of themselves."
"I shall see what is in storage, miss."
Elizabeth nodded.
It was not enough that the rooms should be handsome. Handsome rooms could still reject a man. Guest rooms were often handsome in that manner: all surface, no expectation, prepared to receive a person and forget him as soon as he departed. These rooms must not do that.
Mr. Darcy was not to be accommodated.
He was to belong.
That distinction, Elizabeth discovered, required a surprising number of decisions about curtains, blankets, water cans, writing tables, and where a gentleman might put his boots.
By the time they had finished their first survey, two rooms had been condemned, one carpet reprieved, three curtains sentenced to removal, the bed assigned to serious inquiry, a grate ordered for inspection, the dressing room stripped in intention, several pieces of stored furniture summoned for trial, and the little back room promoted from vacancy to consequence.
Mrs. Albright had made notes. Elizabeth had made more.
The house, which had already survived the breakfast room, the drawing room, and the dining room, would not be astonished by workmen on Monday.
The upholsterer who had endured the breakfast room, the paper-hanger who had learned not to recommend timid patterns, and the carpenter who had made the dining-room sideboard behave itself could all be summoned again.
But not yet.
First, Elizabeth required certain intelligence.
She had no intention of showing Mr. Darcy the rooms. A man should not be made to supervise his own welcome. Nor should he be consulted into gratitude. But if Mr. Darcy possessed some violent hatred of blue, walnut, or a writing table near good light, it was better to discover it before Monday.
She would ask what must be asked.
No more.
The rooms themselves would remain her secret.
Mrs. Albright went below at last, carrying a list which would have frightened a smaller household.
Elizabeth remained for a moment in the little back room.
The fire was not lit there, and the glass had turned dark enough to give back only a dim shape of herself: a young woman in evening dress, newly engaged, standing in a room which had been empty for nearly as long as she had lived in the house.
She had written against Mr. Wickham.
She had begun to make room for Mr. Darcy.
It was not, perhaps, the usual occupation of a newly engaged lady.
But then happiness, if it meant to be real, must be given drawers, curtains, and a place to put its papers.
---
Mr. Darcy came on Sunday morning with all the outward propriety that London, church, servants, Mrs. Doddridge, and an engaged gentleman's conscience could require.
He was shown into the drawing room, where Elizabeth waited in a sober pelisse and bonnet, with gloves buttoned and Mrs. Doddridge seated nearby in a condition of such perfect chaperonage that no accusation could have attached itself to the room without first apologising to her.
Mr. Darcy bowed.
Elizabeth curtseyed.
For a moment, they looked at one another with the grave composure of two people who had not, less than twenty-four hours before, discovered that composure had limits.
"Miss Bennet."
"Mr. Darcy."
His eyes moved once over her face. That was all. It was enough to make her remember that he had said her name yesterday with no such formality.
Mrs. Doddridge put away her sewing.
"The carriage is ready, miss."
"Thank you."
In the hall, Mr. Darcy offered his arm with perfect correctness.
Elizabeth took it with equal correctness.
This did not make the arrangement harmless.
The walk from the hall to the carriage was not long enough to contain all that an arm may convey when the lady holding it has lately been kissed by the gentleman offering it. Mr. Darcy's sleeve was dark, his hand gloved, his posture exact. There was nothing in his manner for any servant to fault.
Elizabeth, who had begun to understand that innocence and faultlessness were not always the same condition, looked straight ahead and entered the carriage with admirable self-command.
They conducted themselves through church, street, and return with such propriety that even Mrs. Doddridge could have found little to improve, had she been a woman given to improvement.
Mr. Darcy escorted Elizabeth to the pew.
He stood, sat, and bowed at all the proper intervals.
He did not look at her mouth. Elizabeth was aware of this chiefly because she was aware of the effort with which he did not look at it.
This gave Sunday service an interest it did not always possess.
On the way back, and later over tea, Elizabeth contrived, without alarming him more than was necessary, to learn that Mr. Darcy had no quarrel with dark blue, preferred good light for writing when the world permitted such luxuries, and did not appear to harbour any violent hostility toward walnut.
It was enough.
A woman did not require an exhaustive confession of taste in order to prepare rooms. Only warning against disaster.