Chapter Three #3
Elizabeth did her best not to be bothered by this.
She could hardly do otherwise than speak with him, when everybody else was occupied.
And really, though the earl had said but little directly to her at supper, he stared at her from the card table in a far more distressing manner than her mother did, and Elizabeth could hardly lament the companion she found herself partnered with.
When Rose quit the instrument, Mr. Darcy expressed a wish to hear Elizabeth play. He could be no less gallant than his friend, and he remained at the instrument to turn the pages for her, though she selected a song she knew well.
“I shall warn you that I am not as fine a performer as my sister and cousins.” Elizabeth ran her fingers over the keys, plucking out something jaunty before she began to play properly.
Despite this, she acquitted herself well enough, making up for what was lacking in proficiency with what Mr. Darcy commended as exquisite feeling.
“I could listen to you all evening, Miss Elizabeth.”
“I shall certainly not punish our companions in such a dismal way,” Elizabeth quipped, surveying the room as she reverted to idly plucking at the instrument. “Jane is the musician of the family, she and our cousin Georgiana.”
“You have said you prefer painting,” Mr. Darcy said, and Elizabeth was gratified that he remembered.
“Yes, when I have the patience to sit still and apply myself. Mamma calls my paintings very modern, which is a generous way of saying that I make hasty swirls of color rather than dignified attempts at detail and accuracy.”
“Those merits you save for your powers of observation; it is a fine thing she has brought you amongst environs where you might apply such talents as often as you choose.”
“Oh, yes,” Elizabeth agreed with a smirk. “I shall begin directly.” She studied him with mock scrutiny.
He leveled an imperturbable gaze at her. “I am not afraid of you.”
She grinned. “I would not have you so, Mr. Darcy; I should much rather you remain in my thrall as you seem to be. I am glad you comprehend me so well. Shall we resume our study of these fine specimens of human folly? There is one in our midst we have not had the liberty of discussing at leisure – does the earl not make a fascinating case?”
Whatever they said of the earl was no better than he had deserved, and Elizabeth thought it a mark of how truly she felt a part of the family that she could make sport of her lecherous cousin; it was just the sort of banter she liked.
She was in absolute agreement with Rebecca that they were an assortment of characters in considerable possession of follies and foibles enough to delight her at leisure.
Happily, Mr. Darcy proved an ideal companion for being carried off by the levity her kin inspired, and yet treating their subjects with a satirical sort of gravity that led to a stimulating discussion of human nature in all its flawed and fantastic glory.
As impressed as she was with his turn of mind, Elizabeth was confident that she inspired the same impression in Mr. Darcy, for he gave every sign of being as desirous of furthering their intimacy as she had been since the moment she learned his name.
Content as Elizabeth might have been to pass every night in London so agreeably engaged, Lady Catherine could not be satisfied with their household set for long.
Over the next few days, she and her daughters paid morning calls all over Mayfair.
Lady Catherine’s circle of acquaintance was large, and varied in affability if not in quality, for she associated exclusively with the wealthy and titled of the ton.
She was singularly adept at maneuvering them all, and she procured enough praise of her wards and invitations to dinners and parties that she ended their first week in London exhausted but smug with the triumph of securing her girls so many grand introductions.
She had grand plans for her daughters, and they seemed to inflate with each passing day. She was sure that both her girls could find a titled husband with fortune, connection, and property, and she resolved that they must be spoiled for choice.
Elizabeth bore it all with far more amusement than she had anticipated, and she had already expected the ordeal of being paraded through the great drawing rooms of the first families to be excessively entertaining.
She was nearly as mortified as her sister at all the praise Lady Catherine demanded on their behalf, but she was compensated with ample sources of amusement as she met all manner of simpering swains, matchmaking matrons, and preening heiresses.
A few she wished to know better, and a great many strained her efforts of keeping a civil countenance, but she liked them all for their ability to hold her interest as she studied them.
Any discomfort was more than compensated by providing her ample fodder to discuss with Mr. Darcy in the afternoons, when the ladies returned from their calls and then walked in the park or explored galleries and museums with their companions from Matlock House.
And each night before bed, Elizabeth began to fill the pages of her diary with a fantastical recounting of all she had seen and heard – as well as the wondrous feelings that had begun to stir in her heart.