Chapter 34
WHERE DARCY HOUSE RECEIVES AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR WHO, IN SUCH CIRCUMSTANCES, BELIEVES FRANKNESS IS BEST.
Darcy was sitting with Lady Carlisle in the drawing room of his Brook Street residence, staring out the window while she talked of idle nothings.
In just a handful of days he would be travelling to Pemberley with Elizabeth.
The journey would take them three full days if the weather cooperated, and they would be joined in holy matrimony the second morning after their arrival.
He could not repress his smile. In little more than a week she would be his wife.
“…exactly like your mother’s, Darcy,” said her ladyship, startling Darcy from his musings. “Lady Anne had such elegant taste. Her table linens were of the highest quality, and her china was exquisitely painted in one of the loveliest patterns I have ever seen.” She handed him a cup and saucer.
“Was it?” he asked staidly, ignoring the pang of guilt he felt for not attending.
He offered her a hasty smile as he accepted the proffered teacup, took a sip of tea, and grimaced.
Darcy had never cared for green tea, but the countess enjoyed singlo, so he put up with it.
For years he had put up with it. Shaking his head, he recalled his conversation with Mr Gardiner weeks before about the sacrifices he was in the habit of making to avoid disappointing those for whom he cared.
When was it to stop? This was his house, not his aunt’s.
He should have oolong if he wished it, or black tea, or coffee for that matter.
He laid his cup aside and rang for a servant.
A footman appeared promptly, bowed, and awaited Darcy’s instruction.
“I would like a pot of oolong tea, Smith, and some chocolate tarts. That will be all.”
“Oolong, Darcy?” his aunt enquired, frowning as Smith the footman quit the room. “When have you ever preferred oolong to singlo? Singlo is your favourite!”
“It is not my favourite. It is Arthur’s favourite, and yours. I like many kinds of tea but singlo is not one of them.”
She appeared confounded. “Really! You have never refused it before—quite the opposite in fact. You were always glad to accept a cup from me whenever you called at Carlisle House.”
Darcy shifted in his chair and crossed his legs. “I have never cared for singlo tea, nor any variety of green tea. I have tolerated it for your sake because I did not want to inconvenience you. If my drinking singlo pleased you, it was no great sacrifice on my part.”
“Why did you never say anything? I would have served you something you did like!”
“Would you have?” Darcy remarked dryly. “I recall mentioning my preference to you on several occasions, to little effect. Refusing a cup of tea from you, Lady Carlisle, was much like refusing an invitation to an evening party. You would thrust it at me and smile when I accepted and browbeat me whenever I did not. It was easier to simply suffer it in silence.”
“You allude to more than tea, Nephew,” said the countess, raising her teacup to her lips.
Darcy bowed his head. “Perhaps. It is done, however. I am to marry Miss Bennet in seven days.” Even as he said the words, he could not repress his smile.
Lady Carlisle laughed at him. “You are a hopeless case. Would that I had known of your Miss Bennet sooner! Perhaps I would have abandoned my efforts to find you a wife long ago, especially after seeing how you both admire one another.”
“I doubt it. There was a time when Miss Bennet did not admire me, and you are nothing if not tenacious, madam. My one consolation was that you appeared entirely disinclined to encourage me to marry Anne.”
The countess rolled her eyes. “Of course, I could not support such a scheme. You are far too exacting for our Anne. She needs someone with more liveliness, someone to draw her out of her shell, much like Miss Bennet has done for you. I daresay the idea of marrying you has likely terrified her! I have no doubt Anne will be relieved to hear you have chosen Miss Bennet instead and is now blessedly free of you.”
Darcy scoffed. “If ever Anne manages to extract herself from beneath her mother’s thumb long enough to meet a gentleman she wants to marry, I will support her and wish her every happiness. Until then, Lady Catherine will not relent.”
“Have you written to Catherine, Darcy?”
“I have not. I considered notifying her of my engagement several times, but as I cannot guarantee she will remain quietly at Rosings for the duration of it, I decided to forgo antagonising a sleeping tiger. It will be more prudent to present my marriage to Miss Bennet as a fait accompli rather than risk Lady Catherine paying me a visit to voice her disapprobation, or worse—paying Miss Bennet a visit and haranguing her in front of her family.”
“No,” Lady Carlisle agreed with an air of superiority and just a hint of satisfaction, “that would never do at all. I feel quite honoured, Darcy. So far, I am the only relation of yours to whom you have granted leave to harangue your future wife. I have no desire to share such an exalted distinction with the likes of Lady Catherine de Bourgh, I assure you.”
“Indeed,” Darcy quipped as a maid entered the room bearing a tray with a pot of tea and several chocolate tarts. “Thank you, Martha.”
Martha arranged everything on the table, curtseyed, and returned to the kitchen as Darcy reached for the teapot and poured himself a steaming cup of oolong.
The toasty, slightly chocolatey notes imbued his senses with a rich, full flavour, and he sighed contentedly as he raised his cup and took an appreciative sip.
His contentment, however, was not to last as Colonel Fitzwilliam was shown into the room twenty minutes later with none other than Anne de Bourgh attached to his arm. Dismayed, Darcy discarded his chocolate tart and stood to greet them.
“Anne!” his aunt cried with equal surprise. “We were just speaking of you not half an hour ago, my dear! I must say you look remarkably well. Whatever are you doing in London?”
Fitzwilliam saw Anne settled comfortably beside his mother on the sofa, then claimed a chair near Darcy’s. “Anne has some news,” he said, looking pointedly at Darcy with a flicker of amusement in his eyes.
“It is good to see you, your ladyship,” Anne replied with her usual gravity. Though she was still thinner than most other ladies of his acquaintance, Darcy observed a brightness in her eyes, and a hint of warmth in her sallow complexion.
Anne turned her full attention to him then, and her lips lifted with a gentle, deliberate smile as she offered him her hand. “Cousin,” she said softly, “I trust I find you well today.”
Darcy accepted her hand, bowing politely before relinquishing it.
He was shocked to see her. It was highly unusual for Lady Catherine to come to London, but even more so for Anne to make the journey, as her delicate constitution usually prevented her travelling beyond Kent.
In fact, he could not recall Anne ever being in London since her presentation at court eleven years prior, nor looking so well when she had.
Try as he may, he could not account for her presence, and the starry-eyed expression she wore as she looked at him did not make him want to enquire.
Realising he had been silent too long, he said, “I am very well, thank you, Anne. I hope your journey to town was a pleasant one and not too taxing.”
“I am extremely well, Cousin, I thank you. The carriage ride was rather long, but not the least bit unpleasant. As you can see my health is much improved since the spring and I am gratified to have been able to make such a journey. From what I recall of London, it is an exciting place. I am looking forward to seeing more of it in the coming weeks.”
It was the longest speech Darcy could ever remember hearing her make. “Yes,” he said succinctly, growing increasingly uncomfortable under her attentive gaze. “Would you care for some tea? We have oolong or singlo. You are welcome to either.”
“Darcy does not care for singlo, you know,” the countess remarked dryly.
Anne pursed her lips. “No, he does not. My mother has spoken of oolong being Darcy’s favourite for years. Though it suits him, I have always found it too severe for my liking, at least the way Darcy takes it. A nice, mild cup of green tea is far more to my tastes.”
Lady Carlisle’s lips quirked. She cast her nephew a self-satisfied look from over the top of her teacup and raised one pert brow.
Darcy made a valiant effort to ignore her and proceeded to pour a cup of singlo for Anne. “I believe Fitzwilliam mentioned you have some news.”
The colonel snorted. “Does she ever.”
Darcy glanced sharply at him, but the colonel merely shook his head and endeavoured to hide a smirk behind his hand.
Anne accepted her tea and promptly placed it upon the table. “I believe in such circumstances that frankness is best.” She smiled demurely at Darcy and said, “Cousin, I have recently learnt that I am to become a married woman.”
Darcy, who had just taken a sip of tea, began to choke.
“Good God,” he stammered, frantically wiping tea from his coat with a linen napkin.
He could not decide whether he was more horrified that news of his engagement had reached Rosings—and therefore his aunt—or that Anne seemed to suffer from the delusion that she was the lady he wished to take as his wife.
He tossed his napkin upon the table with the tea things and said incoherently, “Anne, I am not at liberty…I am entirely besotted with…that is to say that I cannot possibly—or rather, we cannot possibly—”
To his utter consternation, Colonel Fitzwilliam, who had been quietly snickering through Darcy’s attempt to correct Anne’s misapprehension, lost his composure completely and laughed outright.
“Richard!” Lady Carlisle admonished. “That is quite enough out of you!”