Chapter 7 #4
“No.” The answer came more quickly than she had intended. Elizabeth pressed her lips together. “I do not disagree,” she repeated, more carefully. “It is only… unexpected.”
“From Mr. Darcy?”
“Yes.”
Where, she wondered, had the proud and haughty gentleman gone?
Jane considered this. “Perhaps we have yet to see him fully.”
Jane’s voice remained gentle, but there was unusual certainty in it. She had watched Mr. Darcy closely during the past several days and appeared quite persuaded that his present conduct revealed his true character far more accurately than his earlier reserve.
Elizabeth turned away. “Perhaps.”
Silence settled between them.
Jane shifted slightly against the pillows. “Did he speak of you?”
Elizabeth grew still. The question, though quietly asked, struck with remarkable precision. Jane had given voice to the very suspicion Elizabeth had scarcely admitted to herself.
“I cannot say with certainty.”
She had her suspicions, though she might easily be mistaken.
Jane’s attention remained steady. “You believe he may have.”
Elizabeth smothered a sigh. Jane knew her exceedingly well.
“He described a woman,” she said, her voice lower now but perfectly clear. “A woman who reads, who thinks, who speaks without vanity, and who is kind without seeking notice for it.”
Jane's features warmed. “That sounds like a very admirable woman.”
“Yes.”
“And what did you feel?”
Elizabeth found no immediate answer. She moved restlessly, though nowhere in the room offered escape from the question. At length, she returned to the chair and resumed her seat, folding her hands in her lap.
“I felt,” she said slowly, “that he was speaking of someone he knew rather than some abstract ideal.”
Jane’s smile carried a touch of warmth that might, in better health, have become amusement. “And you believed that person to be yourself.”
Elizabeth met her sister's gaze, a brief flash of resistance rising before she could suppress it. “I made no such claim.”
Jane’s expression remained unchanged. “You did not need to.”
Elizabeth directed her attention to the window.
“He was speaking to me,” she said after a moment. “While he spoke.”
Jane’s fingers tightened once more around hers. “And you found that disagreeable?”
Elizabeth opened her mouth to answer, then closed it again.
The truth resisted the expectations she had so carefully formed.
“I was unprepared for it,” she said at last.
Jane studied her. “That is hardly the same thing.”
“No.”
Another silence followed, carrying greater weight than the first.
Elizabeth’s thoughts returned to the sitting room.
To the subtle change in his voice—neither louder nor subdued, but more assured.
To the ease with which he contradicted Miss Bingley, apparently indifferent to any consequences.
To the absurd declaration that he might marry a milkmaid if he chose, delivered without the slightest hint of jest.
And then to his description.
At the memory, warmth rose once more to her face.
“You are flushed,” Jane said gently.
“I have been sitting near the fire.”
Jane’s smile suggested she was not deceived. “Of course.”
Elizabeth rose once more and crossed to the window.
The rain continued, lighter than before but steady enough to blur the view beyond the glass. Darkness had deepened, and the outlines of the gardens were scarcely discernible.
She pressed her hand briefly against the cool pane.
This was folly.
She knew it perfectly well.
A gentleman who had once pronounced her merely tolerable had no rightful claim upon her thoughts. Whatever he had said since, and whatever he might say, could not erase that first impression.
He had attempted to speak with her on more than one occasion.
Those attempts had come to nothing, though circumstances bore part of the responsibility.
Elizabeth shut her eyes briefly. That was the true difficulty.
Everything would have been far simpler had he remained indifferent, had his manner continued unchanged, and had he offered no indication of reconsidering his original judgment.
Instead, he had altered.
He had sought her out.
He had spoken plainly and earnestly, in a manner wholly inconsistent with the opinion she had formed of him.
It unsettled her. Worse—it interested her.
Elizabeth turned back to the room.
Jane watched her with quiet patience.
“You are thinking of him again,” Jane said.
Elizabeth faltered, then inclined her head. “I am.”
“And you are determined not to like him.”
“Yes.”
Jane’s lips curved slightly. “You sound very certain.”
“I must be.”
“Must you?”
Elizabeth drew a breath.
“He is proud,” she said. “He is reserved to the point of rudeness. He formed an opinion of me without knowing me and spoke it without consideration.”
“All true.”
“Even so—” Elizabeth stopped.
Jane waited.
“Even so,” Elizabeth continued, more quietly, “he seems determined to pursue the matter.”
Jane’s gaze showed her agreement. “Yes.”
Elizabeth returned to her seat.
“I do not trust it.”
“His change?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Elizabeth considered that. “Because I do not understand it.”
Jane smiled. “Understanding is not always necessary.”
Elizabeth shook her head. “For me, it is.”
Jane’s hand tightened gently around hers once more. “Then you must learn more.”
Elizabeth met her gaze.
“That would require speaking with him.”
Jane’s expression conveyed quiet encouragement. “It would.”
Elizabeth turned away.
“I am uncertain whether I wish to.”
Jane’s smile deepened. “And still, you wish to know.”
Elizabeth offered no reply.
The silence lengthened, though it remained entirely comfortable.
At last, Jane slept once more, her breathing gradually evening as she settled back into rest.
Elizabeth remained at her side.
The fire shifted behind her. Rain continued its steady fall beyond the window, and the house, despite the number of its occupants, seemed wrapped in a stillness that left little refuge from one’s own thoughts.
Only the night before, she had resolved to give no further thought to Mr. Darcy.
That resolution now lay in unmistakable ruin.
Elizabeth leaned back in her chair, her gaze resting on nothing in particular.
She would not like him.
That much remained unchanged.
A few well-spoken observations would not overturn her judgment.
Her lips curved, almost against her will.
He had spoken exceedingly well—far too well. Elizabeth pressed her hand lightly to her cheek, as though the gesture might dispel the warmth gathering there.
This would never do. She must be sensible. She must remember his cruel words at the assembly.
Elizabeth pressed her hand lightly to her cheek, as though the gesture might dispel the warmth gathering there.
This would never do.
Her thoughts faltered, for despite every effort to direct them elsewhere, they returned again and again to the same point: the way he had regarded her, and the unsettling possibility that, for once, she had been correct in believing that look meant something more.
And to the unsettling possibility that, for once, she had been correct in believing that look meant something more.