Chapter One — An Invitation Too Well Arranged #5
The discussion continued, drawing the shape of Silvermere before any of them had seen it: pale stone, long windows, a lake bright in spring light, gardens disciplined into beauty, a hostess whose control had become indistinguishable from taste, and a company selected with too much care to be innocent of design.
Elizabeth felt, as she listened, the first stirring of that peculiar anticipation which had become almost familiar to her: not dread, not excitement, but the sensation of approaching a room in which the furniture had already been arranged to conceal something beneath the carpet.
Darcy remained for half an hour. The conversation moved eventually to safer subjects, though none of them seemed entirely safe after Silvermere had entered the room.
He spoke with Mrs Gardiner of mutual acquaintances, with Jane of music, and with Elizabeth of nothing that could not have been repeated publicly, though everything between them seemed to carry more than the words allowed.
When he rose to leave, Mrs Gardiner invited him to call again once their answer to Lady Ashbourne had been settled. He bowed and said he should be honoured. At the door, Elizabeth found herself accompanying him a few paces under the pretence of returning the invitation to the table.
“You intend to accept?” he asked quietly.
“I believe so.”
His gaze searched her face. “Because you trust the invitation?”
“No.” She folded the letter once along its crease. “Because I mistrust it too intelligently to refuse.”
For one brief moment, the gravity of his expression yielded to something warmer. “That is very like you.”
“I shall choose to hear that as praise.”
“It was meant as such.”
There was a pause. It should not have been difficult.
They stood in her aunt’s drawing room, within sight of propriety, speaking of an invitation.
Yet Elizabeth felt the stillness of the moment as though it had removed them from the ordinary sequence of conversation.
Praise from Mr Darcy had once provoked her because she suspected its condescension.
Now it unsettled her because she believed its sincerity.
He seemed to wish to say more. Instead, he bowed.
“Miss Bennet.”
“Mr Darcy.”
He left, and Elizabeth stood for a moment with the letter in her hand, listening to the sound of the door closing below.
Jane, of course, had seen enough. She did not speak immediately, which was worse. Jane’s silence, when affectionate, had become far too perceptive.
Elizabeth returned to her seat. “If you intend to look wise, Jane, I must ask you to do it less noticeably.”
Jane smiled. “I said nothing.”
“You said a great deal by not saying it.”
“I was only thinking that Mr Darcy seems very much altered.”
“Does he?”
“Or perhaps,” Jane said softly, “we know him better.”
Elizabeth busied herself with smoothing the edge of Lady Ashbourne’s letter. “That is possible.”
Jane’s smile deepened. “Lizzy.”
“My dear Jane, do not use that tone. It suggests you are about to be gentle in a way I shall find intolerable.”
“I would not be intolerable.”
“You are often intolerable by being right too kindly.”
Mrs Gardiner, who had wisely pretended not to attend, now rose and declared that she must write a reply before the afternoon post. “But I shall not send it until we are all agreed.”
“I am agreed,” Jane said, surprising Elizabeth a little.
“You are certain?”
Jane looked down, then up again with quiet resolution. “I am not certain of what Silvermere may be. But I am certain I do not wish to be governed by fear of observation. If people choose to watch me, that is their choice. It need not decide mine.”
Elizabeth felt a rush of tenderness. “Then we shall go.”
Mrs Gardiner looked to her. “And you, Lizzy?”
Elizabeth lifted the invitation. “How could I refuse? Lady Ashbourne has arranged the matter so elegantly that refusal would be almost rude.”
“That is not an answer.”
“It is the beginning of one. The rest is that I am curious.”
“Curiosity,” Mrs Gardiner said, “has led you into difficulty before.”
“Yes, but never dull difficulty.”
Jane laughed despite herself, and Mrs Gardiner shook her head, smiling.
Yet Elizabeth knew that her aunt understood.
There were invitations one accepted out of pleasure, duty, affection or convenience.
This one belonged to another category. It asked for attendance while concealing its need; it gathered names already touched by recent truths; it placed a hesitant widow, a polished nephew, a discreet hostess and a watchful society beneath one roof and called the arrangement leisure.
No. It was not an invitation to be trusted.
That did not mean it ought to be declined.
Later that day, after the reply had been written but not yet sealed, Elizabeth walked alone for a short while.
Bath in the afternoon had resumed its habitual performance of elegance.
The streets shone faintly after a brief shower.
The shop windows offered ribbons, gloves, books and confections as though human happiness might be purchased by the yard, the pair, the volume or the sugared ounce.
Ladies moved in twos and threes, gentlemen bowed, carriages rolled, and every face seemed arranged for the benefit of every other.
She passed near the Pump Room and heard, from two ladies walking ahead, a mention of Ravenscroft.
“Of course, I never believed it a ghost,” one said.
“No, indeed,” said the other. “It was always quite clear there must be some human explanation.”
“Quite clear.”
“And yet so sad.”
“Very sad.”
They moved on, comforted by the generosity of their revised memories.
Elizabeth paused before a milliner’s window and appeared to examine a bonnet trimmed with pale ribbon.
In truth, she saw nothing of it. Her thoughts had moved from Ravenscroft to Silvermere, from the woman made into a ghost to the widow whose name had acquired a shadow without shape.
Society seldom invented darkness where there was no object at all; more often, it took some small fact, some hesitation, some old sorrow or mistake, and enlarged it until it could obscure whatever stood behind.
A young widow. A ruined friend. A charming nephew. A discreet aunt. A house by a silver lake.
Elizabeth smiled faintly at her own reflection in the glass.
“You are becoming fanciful,” she told herself.
Her reflection did not look convinced.
When she returned to Mrs Gardiner’s lodgings, she found Jane alone in the drawing room. The reply to Lady Ashbourne lay sealed upon the table. Jane stood by the window, looking out at the street with an expression so soft that Elizabeth approached quietly.
“Are you repenting?” Elizabeth asked.
Jane turned. “No.”
“Then you are thinking of Mr Bingley.”
Jane’s colour rose, but she did not deny it. “Yes.”
Elizabeth came to stand beside her. For a moment they looked out together at the orderly movement below.
“I am happy,” Jane said.
“I know.”
“And yet happiness is not always simple when others can see it.”
“No,” Elizabeth said. “Being happy in society is almost as dangerous as being unhappy. Everyone believes they have a right to explain it.”
Jane smiled faintly. “I do not mind people knowing, when there is something to know. But I should like the knowing to come after the truth, not before it.”
Elizabeth reached for her hand. “It shall, if I have to stand guard with a fire iron.”
“Lizzy.”