Chapter 4 #2
"First impressions are often unreliable. Depth of character reveals itself gradually to those patient enough to observe."
"And you have been most observant of late." Mr. Bennet swirled his port. "Speaking of Kent — the neighbourhood must feel the loss of Mr. Collins acutely. I understand your cousin has been most attentive to the widow. Grief draws people together in curious ways."
Dangerous. The question connected Elizabeth's engagement to Fitzwilliam's claim on Charlotte, which connected both to the events at Hunsford. Mr. Bennet was building a chain of implication, link by link, and Darcy could see exactly where it led.
"My cousin possesses a strong sense of duty. Mrs. Collins's situation naturally evokes sympathy from gentlemen of principle."
"Sympathy. Yes, I suppose one can only admire such constancy of purpose."
Bingley, God bless him, chose this moment to interject with enthusiasm about the local hunting.
The tension broke. Darcy drank his port.
His own strategy sat in his mouth like a stone.
Mr. Bennet had looked at him across the table and connected the two courtships without naming his suspicion, and the accuracy of it, the surgical, effortless precision, had produced a sensation Darcy rarely experienced: the feeling of being outmanoeuvred by someone with no power at all.
He revised his assessment of Mr. Bennet considerably upward.
The man was not merely perceptive. He was dangerous.
He would require watching, not management, because Mr. Bennet was not a man who could be managed, but the kind of sustained attention Darcy usually reserved for opponents rather than fathers-in-law.
When they rejoined the ladies, Darcy found Elizabeth talking to Mrs. Hurst. She looked tired. The effort was wearing on her, he could see it in the tightness around her mouth, the tension in her hands. She was running out of smiles.
Caroline approached him. "What a charming domestic scene. Though I confess myself still astonished by your choice."
"You mistake the matter entirely."
"Discretion, indeed. Or perhaps... expediency? One can't help but wonder what transpired in Kent to precipitate such a dramatic reversal of fortune."
Anger cooled his voice until the conversation itself seemed to frost.
"You presume too much, Miss Bingley. I suggest you direct your speculations elsewhere, lest they lead you into territory you might find uncomfortable."
Caroline paled. Retreated. He watched her go and thought: Settled.
From across the parlour, he heard her parting shot at Elizabeth, "I do hope the country air continues to agree with you, Mrs. Darcy. One hears that transplanted flowers sometimes struggle to bloom in unfamiliar soil", and watched Elizabeth handle it with a calm that stopped him in his tracks.
"How reassuring, then, that Mr. Darcy prefers flowers with deep roots to hothouse blooms. It speaks to his taste, does it not?"
Caroline flushed. Elizabeth held steady.
The exchange was swift, and Darcy learned something about Elizabeth Bennet that he had not previously understood: she needed none of his protection.
She was fully capable of dismantling Caroline Bingley without assistance, without heat, without breaking character.
He disliked the lesson. He adjusted his cuffs and refused to ask why.
He found her at Mrs. Hurst's side and extracted her with a fiction about wedding arrangements. They stood in the manufactured privacy of a crowded room, and he asked about Caroline's earlier approach.
"Nothing beyond what one might expect from a disappointed aspirant to your hand. Her barbs were subtle enough to maintain deniability."
"I have spoken to her. She will trouble you no further this evening. Should she approach you again with unpleasantness, you will inform me immediately."
Elizabeth's eyes narrowed. A fraction. He caught it.
"As you wish. Though I'm capable of managing Caroline Bingley without a gentleman's assistance."
"Your capabilities are not in question. But as my wife, you will learn that certain battles need not be fought alone."
Her resistance faltered into puzzlement. He had said something she could not judge.
"You would defend me, then? Even against your longtime acquaintance?"
The question had layers. He could not see to the bottom of it.
"I protect what is mine."
She said nothing. Surprise crossed her face, unguarded and real, followed by the briefest possibility of trust.
It vanished immediately. She was too intelligent to trust him, but the glimpse settled in his chest like a coal.
Mary played the pianoforte. Kitty followed.
During the music, Darcy surveyed the gathering: Bingley and Jane exchanging glances like notes passed in church, Caroline rigid with humiliation, Mr. Bennet in his corner watching his daughter with the face of a man who had run out of useful things to say.
Elizabeth slipped out through the French doors after Caroline's final attack. She asked no one's permission. She simply went. Her small, unilateral decision produced in Darcy both irritation and reluctant admiration.
He gave her three minutes. Then he followed. The terrace was visible through the French doors, anyone glancing out would see them, which provided the thinnest veneer of propriety.
She stood at the balustrade in the moonlight, and the sight of her, silver-lit, unguarded, her face turned toward the garden with an expression she would never have shown him willingly, made him stop. His breathing stilled. He noted this. He resented noting it.
"You should not have followed me," she said without turning.
"You are visibly distressed. As your betrothed, it would be more remarkable if I did not attend to your well-being."
She laughed. Short. Bitter. "My well-being. How curious that you should express concern for that which you systematically undermine."
Direct hit. He absorbed it.
"You mistake my purpose entirely. Did I not just demonstrate as much with Miss Bingley?"
She turned. Her eyes were bright. Wet. She had been crying, or nearly. The sight tightened his throat and roused an impulse toward gentleness that ran against every habit of command he possessed.
"Protection? Is that what you call this?
This slow dismantling of my will, this public charade, this —" She stopped.
Drew breath. "Miss Bingley's words wounded not because they were spiteful, but because they contained truth.
You do not love me. You desire to keep me.
There is a world of difference between the two. "
Darcy looked at her. Moonlight. Tears. The honest, devastating clarity of a woman who could read him better than he read himself.
Did he love her?