Chapter Eleven #3
Elizabeth hissed at him and turned back to Mr. Worthing, her anger giving way to hope, and more confusion. “She is my sister.”
He blinked stupidly at her. “My ward? I told Bingley and Richard that I was certain you would approve of her, that you would be calling one another sister, as young ladies often do….”
Elizabeth stared up at him, not certain if he could truly be ignorant of their connection, or if he was again deceiving her. Kitty tugged at her hand. “Come away, Lizzy. They shall only spin more lies, no doubt. Men are such cowards!”
Kitty snatched her diary off the table with a look of pure loathing for Mr. Bingley.
Elizabeth retrieved her own small diary, shaking her head sadly at the man she loved, but apparently did not know at all.
Feeling herself the greatest fool in all the world, she clung to Kitty’s hand, and she managed not to let her tears spill until they were safely ensconced in the cozy parlor.
***
William watched the two ladies dearest in the world to him flee his presence, and rounded on Charles Bingley with irritation. “How you can sit there, calmly eating muffins while we are in this horrible trouble, I cannot make out. You are perfectly heartless!”
Bingley had the nerve to look affronted.
“Well, it was you who postponed dinner to a later hour, and I must eat something. I beg your pardon if I do not make a drama of it by eating the muffins in a more agitated manner – I have no wish to get butter on my cuffs. Rest assured, my old friend, I am eating these muffins because I am dreadfully unhappy.”
“And so you should be,” William grumbled, throwing himself down into the seat across from Bingley, who shrugged his shoulders with a wry smile.
“But it is some consolation, I suppose, that I am particularly fond of muffins.”
William bristled with impatience. This was all Bingley’s doing, and he wanted to throttle the man. Instead, he simply reached for the tray, moving the muffins out of Bingley’s reach. He took one for himself. “You need not eat them all in such a greedy way!”
Bingley bumped shoulders with him as he leaned across the table to grab another muffin, and then he pushed a different tray at William. “Take the tea-cake. I do not like tea cake.”
William let out a grumbling snarl. “You have trespassed into my home and vexed me in every possible way; I suppose I might at least be entitled to eat my own muffins in my own garden, Bingley, unless you are determined to drive me mad.”
“Drive you mad? I am entirely baffled, Mr. Worthing, how you can say it is perfectly heartless to eat muffins, and then steal them all away.”
“I said it was heartless for you to eat muffins; that is a different thing.”
“Well, the muffins are the same,” Bingley huffed. He sank back in his chair for a moment, sulking, and then flew at William, grappling to get the tray of muffins, until he finally catapulted the whole tray across the garden.
William exploded. “This is all your fault, Bingley!”
“My fault? If you had been willing to share, like a reasonable host….”
“Damn the muffins, you blockhead, I mean that the ladies will never forgive me!”
“For lying to them?” William gritted his teeth and nodded curtly; Bingley raised his brows, nonplussed. “And you mean to suggest I have somehow compelled you to engage in such deception?”
William let out a heavy sigh, and then a groan. “No, of course not. But I suppose I still clung to some hope that I could talk calmly and rationally to Elizabeth about it all.”
“My good fellow, that was never going to happen. It was always going to explode, you know. You got in far too deep with her. After three days, I might at least have stood a chance of bringing Kitty round. If Miss Elizabeth had arrived a half hour later, I am sure I would have managed it.”
“And now you think to blame Elizabeth? If you had gone away when I asked it of you, or not dithered about, cheating at billiards….”
“It is not cheating to play the game sober, Will.” Bingley blew out a long, defeated breath. “And yet, we are both properly confounded.”
William nodded his head, his anger cooling to dejection. “Elizabeth said Kitty is her sister. I wonder what she could mean by that.”
“Sisters are generally female persons with whom one shares a parent or two in common.”
William halfheartedly chucked a piece of teacake at Bingley, who did not even bother to dodge it as the pastry struck him in the face.
“We are a pair of miserable idiots, and I do not see how there is any getting out of this mess, now. I ought to have told her the truth sooner. I ought to have told everyone – you, Richard…. But I rather liked being Darcy. Being William Worthing is not especially agreeable, least of all at present.”
Bingley stroked his chin. “I had a taste of it myself, and I see what you mean. We must endeavor to embody the very spirit of Darcy – what would Darcy do about our present dilemma?”
“Beat you about the head?”
“No.”
“Write a beautifully worded letter of apology,” William mused. There was merit in the notion.
Bingley gave an exaggerated frown. “Lord, no!”
William threw up his hands. “Well… grovel?”
“I was going to say charm the ladies, but perhaps we might do a bit of both. We had better go and speak to them.”
William agreed, and as the sun finally began to sink below the distant tree line, William cherished some little hope that they might all sit down and have a civilized dinner together.
The ladies, however, refused to leave Kitty’s room.
After dining only with Bingley, William was not entirely convinced a sound thrashing of his friend would not be just the thing to cheer him.