9. Chapter Nine #3
The first occurred when Georgiana sat beside Miss Lydia near the pianoforte, both girls bent over a sheet of music with their heads close together.
Lydia’s curls had just survived the efforts of Miss Darcy’s maid after the fishing disaster, and one stubborn lock continued to fall over her cheek no matter how often she pushed it away.
Georgiana was laughing under her breath at something written in the margin.
Then Miss Bingley crossed the room.
“My dear Georgiana,” she said, resting one hand lightly upon the back of the chair, “surely you do not mean to puzzle over Scotch airs all evening. Mr. Darcy prefers Italian music, do you not, sir?”
Darcy raised his head from his conversation with Mr. Gardiner. He had not the least desire to be drawn in, but Miss Bingley had already directed every face in his direction.
Before he could answer, Lydia rose so abruptly the music slid from her lap onto the carpet.
“Oh! Then he shall be disappointed in me forever,” she declared, stooping to gather the pages. “I cannot sing unless someone desires to hear a cat with a sore throat.”
Mr. Hurst choked on his wine.
Bingley was vastly amused. Georgiana’s hand, which had been inching back from the music, stilled.
Darcy observed Lydia thrust the pages into Georgiana’s hands again. “You must teach me the Scotch one,” Lydia insisted. “It sounds the least likely to expose my ignorance.”
Miss Bingley’s smile remained, but her fingers gripped the chair back.
Darcy returned his attention to Mr. Gardiner without answering her question.
The second attempt came during cards.
Miss Bingley arranged the table neatly, with all the appearance of chance and none of its reality.
Georgiana was directed toward Miss Bingley’s side.
Elizabeth, by some miracle of strategy, was placed as far from Darcy as the room permitted.
Lydia stood behind her aunt’s chair eating sugared almonds one at a time, plainly aware of every movement.
“You will sit here, dearest,” Miss Bingley told Georgiana, indicating the chair beside her. “I shall guide you through the play if you are uncertain.”
Georgiana considered the chair. Then Lydia.
Lydia popped an almond into her mouth. “Miss Darcy promised to teach me piquet tomorrow. She cannot forget all she knows tonight, or I shall be ruined.”
Miss Bingley’s eyes narrowed. “Miss Lydia, piquet requires concentration.”
“How fortunate. I have always wished to try concentration.”
Mrs. Gardiner lowered her cards and directed her attention downward, ostensibly to arrange them.
Georgiana moved to the chair beside Lydia instead. “Perhaps Miss Lydia may observe my hand.”
“She cannot possibly learn that way,” Miss Bingley replied.
Lydia dragged a chair closer with a scrape that made Mrs. Hurst flinch. “I learn best through interference.”
Darcy covered his mouth with two fingers and pretended to study the fireplace.
The third attempt was more delicate and therefore worse.
Georgiana had gone to fetch a shawl from the smaller drawing room, and Miss Bingley followed her after a short delay.
Darcy had already risen, intending to intercept whatever private instruction Miss Bingley meant to deliver, when Lydia slipped from the room ahead of him with the speed of a girl accustomed to escape.
He paused in the doorway.
Voices drifted back from the passage.
“My dear,” Miss Bingley was saying, “I fear you are allowing yourself to be led into excessive familiarity. Miss Lydia is entertaining, certainly, but you must remember what is due to your position.”
Darcy’s jaw stiffened.
Before Georgiana could answer, Lydia’s voice rang out with cheerful horror. “Oh! Miss Bingley, there you are. I have been searching everywhere.”
“I beg your pardon?” Miss Bingley sounded much less polished now.
“I require advice on whether one may wear pink ribbons with green silk if one means to appear daring rather than deranged.”
A pause.
Darcy leaned one shoulder against the doorway and shut his eyes.
Miss Bingley answered at last. “That depends greatly upon the shade.”
“I knew it must be complicated. Come, Georgiana, you must hear this. Fashion is more difficult than mathematics.”
A rustle of skirts followed. Georgiana reappeared first, shawl in hand, her cheeks colored but her mouth fighting a smile. Lydia walked beside her, talking so rapidly of ribbons, turbans, and the moral dangers of puce that Miss Bingley could not regain the prior subject without appearing absurd.
Darcy was back in the drawing room before they saw him.
By the time the party separated for the night, his temper had outlived his manners by a narrow margin.
Miss Bingley had been gracious, elegant, and relentless.
Nothing she said, taken alone, warranted public rebuke.
That was the art of it. She needled without wounding visibly, claimed authority without naming it, and corrected Georgiana beneath the cover of affection.
Lydia had no such art.
That had become her advantage.