Chapter 9 #4
Darcy almost asked how two eight-year-old boys possessed such certainty regarding courtship intentions before remembering the twins approached most subjects with complete confidence regardless of actual understanding.
Still—
The idea lodged unpleasantly in his thoughts all the same.
“What sort of man is he?” Darcy asked, aiming for casualness and failing somewhat.
Thomas answered first this time.
“He talks too much.”
“And too loudly,” Toby added.
“He keeps staring at Lizzy.”
“And asking her questions.”
Darcy found himself irrationally irritated already.
“Perhaps he merely wishes acquaintance with his family.”
The twins exchanged matching looks of deep skepticism.
“That is not how men look at ladies when they merely wish acquaintance,” Thomas informed him.
Darcy stared.
Toby nodded gravely. “We know things.”
“I see.”
The twins moved closer.
“Did you apologize properly?” Toby demanded suddenly.
Darcy started. “I beg your pardon?”
“To Lizzy,” Thomas clarified impatiently. “Did you apologize?”
Darcy had the absurd sensation of being examined by particularly judgmental magistrates.
“Yes,” he answered.
The twins relaxed visibly.
“Good,” Toby declared.
“You did not waste the opportunity we gave you,” Thomas added with satisfaction.
Darcy narrowed his gaze.
“The opportunity you gave me.”
Neither boy appeared appropriately alarmed by his tone.
“The carriage,” Toby said.
Darcy stared at them.
The twins stared back.
Understanding dawned with astonishing speed.
“You,” Darcy said slowly, “were responsible for the broken carriage.”
Thomas had the decency to look ashamed.
Toby folded his arms across his chest.
“We did not know it would rain so hard.”
Darcy could scarcely decide whether to laugh or lecture them.
“You deliberately stranded your sisters at Netherfield?”
“So you could apologize,” Thomas explained, as though the reasoning ought to have been obvious.
“And because Jane likes Mr. Bingley,” Toby added.
Darcy tipped his head back and closed his eyes briefly.
“You understand,” he said carefully, “that interfering with carriage fittings could have caused serious injury.”
The twins exchanged alarmed looks.
“We only loosened them a little,” Toby admitted.
“And we thought the carriage would simply stop.”
Darcy exhaled slowly.
The sincerity of their remorse made anger difficult, though not impossible.
“You must never attempt such a thing again.”
“We are already punished,” Thomas offered.
“For the whole week,” Toby added mournfully.
Darcy suspected the punishment had not cured them nearly so thoroughly as Longbourn hoped.
The twins brightened again almost instantly.
“The Netherfield party comes to dine tomorrow.”
Darcy’s attention returned. “At Longbourn.”
“Yes.”
“We are not invited,” Thomas said tragically.
“Because we are confined.”
“But we shall still do what we can.”
Darcy narrowed his eyes further. “What precisely does that mean?”
The twins exchanged immediate looks.
Dangerous ones.
“What are you about?” Darcy asked sharply.
Toby straightened abruptly. “Did you know George Lucas fell in the pond yesterday?”
Darcy stared.
Thomas nodded with suspicious enthusiasm. “Quite covered in mud.”
“You are changing the subject.”
“Are we?” Toby asked innocently.
“Yes.”
The twins took one synchronized step backward.
“We must go.”
“Lessons.”
“Mama says tardiness builds bad character.”
Before Darcy could stop them, they turned and bolted across the field with astonishing speed.
“Toby!”
“Thomas!”
Neither slowed.
Darcy remained standing beside his horse watching the boys disappear over the rise, equal parts exasperated and entertained.
The twins were undoubtedly planning something.
The certainty fell heavily upon him, and whether Longbourn survived the experience intact remained very much open to question.
Darcy mounted once more and turned back toward Netherfield at a slower pace than before.
His thoughts remained thoroughly occupied during the ride home—not solely by the twins’ alarming schemes, but by the uncomfortable awareness that Mr. Alfred Barnett Wilson’s existence irritated him far more than reason justified.
The man was merely a distant cousin.
The man was merely a distant cousin, a guest, and a gentleman—more or less. Darcy disliked him already. The realization grew no more flattering upon reflection.
By the time he returned to Netherfield, the household had gathered in the drawing room, where Miss Bingley’s voice reached the hall before Darcy himself crossed the threshold.
“Another dinner at Longbourn,” she declared with dramatic despair. “I confess, Charles, Hertfordshire society demands fortitude beyond expectation.”
Bingley lounged near the fire looking untroubled.
“Then remain home if you prefer.”
Miss Bingley blinked in genuine surprise.
“Remain home?”
“You complain every time we visit our neighbors. Surely the simplest solution is returning to town.”
Mrs. Hurst lowered her gaze to her teacup, though the corners of her mouth betrayed what appeared suspiciously like a smile.
Miss Bingley recovered quickly. “I only mean the society lacks refinement.”
“Then improve it with your presence,” Bingley replied cheerfully.
Darcy moved farther into the room.
Miss Bingley turned toward him as though seeking alliance.
“Mr. Darcy must agree these constant country dinners grow tiresome.”
“I do not,” Darcy answered.
Her expression tightened slightly.
Bingley grinned outright.
“I thought not.”
Miss Bingley rallied again. “Well, at least this new relation of the Bennets promises novelty. Mr. Wilson, is it? Trade seems determined to assemble itself within Hertfordshire.”
Darcy’s jaw hardened before he could prevent it.
Bingley either failed to notice or wisely pretended not to.
“Wilson sounds interesting enough.”
“Interesting rarely improves dinner conversation,” Miss Bingley muttered.
Darcy excused himself soon afterward and retreated upstairs under the pretense of correspondence.
No letters awaited him.
Instead he found himself standing near the window of his chamber staring out toward the distant direction of Longbourn while thoughts of Alfred Barnett Wilson returned with increasing persistence.
What precisely was the man’s purpose in Hertfordshire?
Family connection alone seemed insufficient explanation for such sudden interest after years of silence.
And why—
Darcy frowned slightly.
Why had Elizabeth sounded so detached while speaking of him?
She had not encouraged the attention.
That realization brought disproportionate relief, though the twins’ suspicions still lingered unpleasantly in his thoughts. He wants to take Lizzy away.
Darcy turned from the window at last.
This will never do.
He was becoming absurdly invested in matters that did not properly concern him.
When he finally sat down beside the untouched correspondence upon his desk, it was not business, estate management, or London affairs occupying his mind.
It was Elizabeth Bennet.
And the increasingly unwelcome possibility that another man had begun to notice precisely what Darcy himself could no longer ignore.