Chapter 35
“Mr Darcy?” Elizabeth said, and the name was repeated by her father.
Mr Collins looked at his cousins, his brow furrowed. “I thought you knew, Mr Darcy is Lady Catherine’s nephew.”
“And he is to visit tomorrow?” Elizabeth questioned again.
“Yes,” Mr Collins confirmed.
“Well, well, that will make a most interesting tableau, hey Lizzy? What sport seeing how Mr Darcy behaves with his aunt?” her father said, his eyebrows raising and dropping again in quick succession.
Elizabeth and Jane were sitting in the sunny parlour at the front of the parsonage the next morning, writing to their mother, while Mr Collins and her father were gone into the village.
The ladies were startled by a ring at the door, the certain signal of a visitor.
As they had heard no carriage, Elizabeth wondered who could have come by foot?
Perhaps a parishioner in need of her cousin, but when the door opened, and to her very great surprise, Mr Darcy, and Mr Darcy only, entered the room.
He apologised for his intrusion by letting her know that he had understood that Mr Collins and Mr Bennet were also at home.
They then sat down, and Elizabeth observed that none of them had been aware yesterday evening that Lady Catherine was his aunt.
“Did you not?” he asked. “She is my mother’s older sister, and we are not so large a family that I would neglect such a close relative.”
“Family is very important to you, then?” Elizabeth asked.
“Yes,” he replied, and gave no further answer, but instead remarked that he was surprised to see them visiting so soon with their cousin.
Elizabeth replied that it had not been overlong since they had last seen Mr Collins, but they were very pleased to see him.
“But the relationship cannot be so far progressed,” he said, his voice urgent, bending towards her with a look of such intensity that Elizabeth was quite taken aback.
Noting her reaction, he sat back in his chair and, in a more controlled tone, noted that they seemed to be very fond of their cousin and that he thought he had understood that the relationship was very new.
Elizabeth owned that they had not known their cousin long, but that long acquaintance was not always necessary.
“You would not, I think, be rushed to form attachments on a merely frivolous connection, I think,” he said.
Elizabeth was unsure as to what he was referring, and, trying to ascertain his meaning, she said, “I think it depends on the personalities involved; some people are very open and easy to get to know better, but some others are complex and require a lengthy acquaintance to really know them.”
“I have travelled into Kent with my cousin,” Mr Darcy replied, and Elizabeth was unsure if they were speaking of the same topic.
“Oh,” she said, one eyebrow raised.
“We have been close since childhood, and since we reached our majority, we always visit with our aunt together at this time of year.”
“That is admirable,” Elizabeth said, thinking that this statement required some form of response.
“How long does your family intend to stay in Kent?” he enquired.
Elizabeth confirmed that they were to remain with their cousin for three weeks.
“That being so, I am sure that you will meet my cousin during our stay with our aunt,” and with those words, he rose to his feet and bowed to both Elizabeth and Jane.
It was only as he left that Elizabeth realised that apart from the initial acknowledgement of Jane’s presence, Mr Darcy had spoken entirely to her. She looked at Jane. Her face held a look Elizabeth had never seen on her before; she might have called it arch.
“Well, I do not know what to make of that,” she said.
“Do you not?” Jane asked, to which Elizabeth assumed she did not expect a reply.