2. The Last Man in the World
CHAPTER TWO
THE LAST MAN IN THE WORLD
You are the last man in the world I could ever be prevailed upon to marry.
Darcy had been riding for hours, which was not sufficient to outpace those words.
His proposal at Hunsford—a masterpiece in…
well, something… was certainly not in the art of winning a lady’s affections.
How could he have misjudged so thoroughly?
He had entered that parsonage with the confidence of a man who had been told since childhood that his very presence was a gift to those of lesser rank.
His father’s words rang in his ears. Remember, Fitzwilliam, even daughters of peers need love. Darcys aim high. Your mother was a daughter of an earl, but with your carriage and good looks, you should settle for nothing less than a daughter of a duke.
As for Elizabeth Bennet—she was barely a daughter of… anything. A lowly country gentleman hanging onto the rungs of gentry by the skin of his teeth. No dowry, no connections of note… in fact, her sole London acquaintances were tradesmen and other upstarts.
How could he explain to his esteemed ancestors that the only son of George Darcy, husband of Lady Anne, had strode into that modest parsonage intent on making this Elizabeth Bennet his bride, to elevate her with his magnanimous offer, and had been thoroughly and roundly rejected?
The woman had the temerity to consider his proposal a declaration of war, requiring the defense of her entire familial line, flea-bitten dog included.
Did she truly not understand the vast gulf? He was Fitzwilliam Darcy. He had offered her a life that most women would sell their souls to glimpse through a carriage window. And she had compared his proposal to fleas and rain puddles.
Even more mortifying was that long letter he’d pushed into her hands the next morning.
Had she even read it? The one where he’d poured his reputation, and his sister’s, onto the page—explaining how she’d misjudged him.
Instead of the expected contrition, this Elizabeth Bennet and her tiny canine were still bristling over his candid admission—that loving her was an affliction he was unable to remedy—even now, especially now.
It pained him to realize that she and her family lacked any comprehension or appreciation for the social graces so essential in the finest circles.
It was beyond galling. It was profoundly unfair.
That a Darcy from the first circles, esteemed by the ton, should be so denigrated by a country miss who deemed him the last man in the world.
Not the second-to-last, nor a man she might have been persuaded to consider under different circumstances, but the very last—after every other man on earth had been weighed and found less objectionable.
His father would be rolling in his grave at the notion of a Darcy holding such a distinction.
Why could he not banish thoughts of her? Hadn’t he vowed never to address her again with those sentiments she had found so repugnant? And now, adding insult to injury, he had been wounded not only by her sharp tongue but also by the sharp teeth of her mischievous rat terrier.
The footman at Number Thirty-Three Grosvenor Street, admitting him at half-past eight, took one look at the dust on his coat, the set of his jaw, and the ragged tear in his broadcloth, and elected to say nothing beyond, “Lady Sophia is in the study, sir. She did not expect you tonight.”
“No. She would not have.”
The study door stood open, a hearty fire crackling within.
Lady Sophia believed in keeping fires lit in every room she occupied from October to June, a practice she considered not extravagance or eccentricity, but good sense.
The lady herself was positioned at her desk, a book in one hand and her customary glass of Madeira in the other, appearing as though she had not moved since he departed at dawn.
“Fitzwilliam.” She glanced over her spectacles. “Good heavens. I anticipated a note, not the man himself. Do sit down before you collapse; you look as though you’ve been dragged through a hedgerow backward through four counties.”
“Only one, I assure you, and I managed to remain upright for the majority of the journey.”
Lady Sophia’s eye twinkled. “Shall I ring for tea, or will you require something substantially stronger?”
“Tea will do.”
“It shall hardly suffice, but we shall maintain the pretense.” She rang the bell.
Darcy sank into the familiar leather wingback chair to the left of the fire—a seat he had come to regard as his own over countless evenings spent reviewing canal shares and debating the respective merits of Madeira versus sherry.
Tonight, the usually comforting chair felt less like a refuge than a witness box.
“Now then.” Lady Sophia paused as the maid entered with the tea tray and waited until she had withdrawn.
“You left at dawn to deliver documents to a young woman in Hertfordshire. A journey of what, four, perhaps five hours at a reasonable pace? I would have thought, with the good news you were bearing, that you would have been received with tolerable civility, perhaps accept the family’s hospitality for dinner, and take a room at the inn for the night. ”
“I did not wish to tarry.” Darcy accepted the tea with regret that it wasn’t brandy. “Mr. Bennet has the documents, and your solicitor is expected in the morrow.”
“And you did not stay for dinner.”
“I was not invited.”
“Not invited?” His godmother’s eyebrow arched so high it nearly disappeared into her hairline. “A gentleman rides twenty-five miles to deliver a fortune of fifteen thousand a year, and the family does not press him to stay?”
“The household was occupied with the news. My continued presence would have been an imposition.”
She regarded him over her spectacles with the expression of a woman who had heard a great many convenient explanations in her long life and was not deceived.
“Yet here you are, looking like you’ve been chased by wild dogs. I can’t help but wonder, Fitzwilliam, if there’s more to this errand than a simple delivery of papers. Care to enlighten me on what transpired in the wilds of Hertfordshire?”
Her gaze dropped to his left trouser leg.
“What happened to your clothing?”
Darcy looked down. The tear in his broadcloth, ragged and enthusiastic, gaped at him with the mocking testimony of a small dog’s strongly held convictions.
“The family keeps a terrier. Small. Wire-haired. Apparently, their ankles require guarding, and it took exception to mine.”
“Fascinating,” she said, her voice devoid of sympathy and laced with a barely concealed delight. “You rode twenty-four miles, delivered a fortune, were bitten by the dog, and fled before dinner. Did I miss anything?”
“I didn’t flee.”
The denial was weak. He had collected what was left of his dignity and removed himself with Elizabeth’s parting observation— you are not a man who refuses obligations, even disagreeable ones —still rankling in his ears.
Even more maddening, he could not determine whether she was extending an olive branch or sliding a knife between his ribs.
“You are behaving,” Lady Sophia stated with the chilling calm she reserved for her most incisive remarks, “remarkably like a man who walked into a room and found something he wasn’t prepared for.
I’ve seen that exact look on your face only once before—when you came back from Kent, looking as though your skeleton had been poorly reassembled. ”
Darcy placed his teacup down. “I am perfectly well. The documents were delivered, despite the dog.”
“Then you are aware that I have given everything, including this house, to my newest goddaughter, Miss Elizabeth Bennet.” Lady Sophia waved a languid hand. “How did she receive the news?”
Darcy considered the question with more care than it, on its surface, deserved. Elizabeth had stood very still, which was the thing he could not stop seeing—her mother ascending to new operatic heights, her sisters in various states of astonishment, and Elizabeth utterly motionless.
Not a hint of gratitude nor elation. Just a jab about disagreeable duty, as if she understood just how humbling this errand had been for him.
“Well? You must have gathered an impression of her thoughts,” Lady Sophia pressed.
Darcy shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Miss Elizabeth received the news with… restraint.”
“Restraint?” His godmother set down her Madeira and laced her fingers, a gesture that signaled her intent to pry out every detail.
“How curious. Most young ladies, upon learning they’ve inherited a fortune and a London residence, react with unbridled joy or swoon dramatically.
Restraint implies contemplation, perhaps wariness.
Which leads me to believe…” She paused, her timing impeccable as always, “…that this Miss Elizabeth is every bit as sharp as I was led to believe.”
Darcy’s brow furrowed. “You were led to believe?”
“Oh, come now, Fitzwilliam. You don’t think I’d elevate any young lady in the kingdom, do you? I made inquiries. Discreet ones.”
“Naturally,” Darcy muttered, wondering just how much Lady Sophia knew about his history with Elizabeth Bennet. “I confess I was surprised you would dispose of your entire estate to a country nobody. What qualities did you base it on?”
“I have spent forty years watching fortunes settle on women who did nothing to deserve them,” Lady Sophia said, with the serenity of the entirely unrepentant.
“Do not concern yourself with my methods. What I wish to ascertain is your impression of this woman who will be my closest companion. Everything, mind you. I have given her my house and my fortune, yet I have not yet laid eyes on her. You have. I am owed a full accounting.”
Darcy stared at her. “You gave the woman your entire estate without meeting her?”
“That is what I said. Do keep up, Fitzwilliam. I have explained my reasoning. Now, you tell me what you know about her.”