Very Fortunate Indeed
For a moment Elizabeth thought Mr Darcy meant to ride past with no more than the smallest acknowledgement. Then Mr Bingley drew rein.
“Miss Bennet,” he said, with a warmth that made Jane’s colour rise despite the cold air. “Miss Elizabeth, how fortunate we are. We were just on our way to Longbourn.”
Mr Darcy’s presence among them seemed less easily explained.
Mr Collins, who had not yet determined whether these gentlemen were persons of consequence or merely well-mounted strangers, released Kitty’s arm and withdrew half a step.
Elizabeth saw Colonel Fitzwilliam notice the movement. Mr Darcy, unfortunately, noticed Elizabeth noticing it. He dismounted.
It was not, Elizabeth thought, a decision he had intended to make. But he dismounted, looped Wicked’s reins over his arm, and came to stand on the road with the rest of them, and the morning continued.
Mr Collins fell silent in the presence of three gentlemen of obvious consequence, which was the most useful thing he had done since arriving at Longbourn.
Mr Bingley had already drawn Jane a little apart, deep in conversation about something that required no assistance from anyone else.
Lydia and Kitty had discovered that a colonel was nearly as interesting as an officer in a red coat, and were whispering accordingly.
Colonel Fitzwilliam stood comfortably near Elizabeth, apparently quite content to remain there. Which left Mr Darcy.
“Miss Elizabeth,” he said.
“Mr Darcy. You look tired.”
“I am well.”
“I did not say you were not.”
“No,” he said. “You did not.”
“My sister arrived at Netherfield yesterday,” Mr Darcy said. “With her husband and children.”
Elizabeth’s eyes sharpened. “Yesterday,” she said.
He did not answer.
“That was what Colonel Fitzwilliam came to tell you.”
“It was part of it.”
“Part of it,” she repeated.
“Miss Elizabeth…”
“No, I understand. That is all I am to have.”
Colonel Fitzwilliam, who had been apparently occupied with Lydia’s questions about the regiment, looked briefly towards them.
“I am sorry,” Mr Darcy said quietly. “I wish I could tell you more.”
“I know. I am not angry with you. I simply find…” She stopped.
“What?”
“I find it difficult,” she said carefully, “to have half a picture.”
Wicked shifted beside him and Mr Darcy steadied the horse. “I know,” he said. “I am sorry for it.”
It was not enough. She knew it was not enough and she suspected he knew it too. But it was what he had, standing on a public road with his sister and her husband two miles away and Colonel Fitzwilliam watching from the corner of his eye.
“You are well?” he said. “Truly.”
“Truly. And you?”
“I am better for seeing you.”
It was said simply, without the least appearance of a compliment, which made it considerably worse.
Colonel Fitzwilliam came to Mr Darcy’s shoulder. “We should ride on,” he said pleasantly. “Before Miss Lydia enlists me in the regiment.”
Mr Darcy mounted, and they rode on, and Elizabeth stood in the road and watched them go. Colonel Fitzwilliam glanced back once. Elizabeth had the distinct impression that he had just confirmed something he had suspected.
“Well,” Lydia said, with great satisfaction, “I think colonels are very handsome.”
“He is not in regimentals,” Kitty said.
“That does not signify. One can tell.”
Elizabeth looked once more down the road. The riders had disappeared. How very like Mr Darcy, she thought, to leave her with more information and less understanding.
The walk resumed, Mr Collins returning to Kitty and Lydia hastening towards Meryton in search of officers. Elizabeth followed more slowly.
Mr Darcy had told her something. Not enough, never enough, but something. His sister had come. Her husband had come. The children had come. And that, somehow, had been the danger expected on the morrow.
Lydia laughed up at Lieutenant Denny outside the milliner’s, and Mr Collins slowed. Elizabeth noticed it at once. He looked from Lydia to the officer, then back to Kitty. Kitty’s alarm returned. Elizabeth almost felt sorry for her.
The next morning, Mr Collins was occupied with Kitty and the moral improvement of blue ribbons, which Elizabeth considered a providence too rare to waste.
She took her bonnet, declined Lydia’s invitation to Meryton, and went out alone. She did not mean to walk towards the old lane. Or rather, she did not mean to admit that she meant it.
The lane was quiet when she reached it. The hedges were damp from the night’s rain, the air sharp and clean, and beneath the oak stood Wicked, black as spilled ink against the pale morning.
Mr Darcy was beside him. Of course he was. For a moment neither of them spoke. Wicked lifted his head, ears pricked, and Mr Darcy put a hand to his neck as though the horse required soothing. Elizabeth did not think the horse required it.
“You are fond of this lane,” she said.
“So it would appear.”
“And of saying very little in it.”
His hand stilled against Wicked’s mane. “I deserve that.”
“Yes,” she said. “You do.”
It should have sounded sharper than it did. Instead it sounded tired, and that seemed to trouble him more.
“I did not come here to find you,” he said.
“No,” Elizabeth said. “Nor I you.”
Neither of them pretended to believe it.
“You understood what I meant yesterday.”
“I understood that your sister arrived at Netherfield with her husband and children,” Elizabeth said. “I understood that Colonel Fitzwilliam came because of it. I understood that this was the tomorrow you would not explain.”
“Yes,” he said.
“And that is still all?”
“No.”
The answer was so unexpected that for a moment she could only look at him. Mr Darcy drew a breath. Wicked shifted beside him, and this time Elizabeth thought the horse was not the only creature in need of steadying.
“It is not all,” he said. “But it is still not enough.”
His hand moved once along Wicked’s mane.
“Mr Wickham is not what he appears.”
“That much I had wondered.”
“Then suspect more.”
“You warn me against him, but you will not tell me why.”
“I cannot.”
“Cannot, or will not?”
“Both.”
She looked away first. The lane was quiet, the hedges still wet from the night’s rain. Somewhere beyond the trees a cart moved along the Meryton road, its wheels muffled by distance.
“Then we are where we were,” she said.
“No,” he said quietly.
She turned back. For a moment he looked younger than he had any right to look, and far less certain than he wished to appear.
“Bingley is to give a ball at Netherfield on Tuesday,” he said.
“I had not heard.”
“The invitation will come today or tomorrow, I believe. If you are not already engaged…”
“For a ball to which I have not yet been invited?”
He almost smiled. “Then I must take advantage of my intelligence while I have it. May I have the honour of the second set?”
Elizabeth should have refused him on principle. She did not.
“Yes,” she said. “You may.”
“The second set,” he said, as though the words required confirmation.
“The second set,” she agreed.
For a moment the agreement stood between them like something almost ordinary. Then Elizabeth remembered the locked door, the cut bell pull, and Mr Darcy’s face when Colonel Fitzwilliam had arrived.
“The second set,” she repeated more quietly. “And between now and Tuesday?”
“Between now and Tuesday, you must be cautious.”
“Of Mr Wickham.”
“Yes.”
“And of Mrs Wickham?”
“No.” The answer came too quickly. “No. Never of Georgiana.”
Elizabeth heard the name as much as the defence.
“Then she is in danger too.”
The silence that followed was answer enough.
For the first time the matter shifted in Elizabeth’s mind.
It was not only Mr Darcy who stood in danger, nor even Mr Darcy who stood at the centre of it.
There was a sister, a husband, children, and a fear so old that Mr Darcy seemed to have built his manners around it.
“I am sorry,” she said.
His eyes returned to her. “For what?”
“For whatever made you look like that when I said her name.”
He drew breath, but before he could answer, Wicked lifted his head sharply.
Wheels sounded on the Meryton road. Then voices.
Whatever caution he had meant to exercise had come too late.
“Miss Elizabeth,” he said quietly, “if they stop, you must not appear alarmed.”
“That is becoming a familiar instruction.”
“I know.”
The carriage came into view between the hedges. It was not travelling quickly. A groom rode behind it, and beside the window sat Mrs Wickham, pale beneath the brim of her bonnet.
Opposite her, smiling as though the morning had arranged itself for his pleasure, was Mr Wickham. He saw them at once.
Elizabeth felt the change in Mr Darcy before she saw it. The man beside her withdrew without moving. His face became composed, his shoulders easy, his hand light upon Wicked’s rein. Mr Wickham leaned slightly forward, his smile easy and warm.
“Darcy,” he said, “will you not introduce me to this lovely young lady?”
For one brief moment Mr Darcy’s hand tightened on Wicked’s rein.
“Miss Elizabeth Bennet,” he said, “may I present my brother-in-law, Mr Wickham. Mrs Wickham.”
“Miss Bennet.” Mr Wickham bowed from the carriage with every appearance of pleasure. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance at last.”
“At last?” Elizabeth said.
His smile did not alter. “We have heard of you, naturally. Darcy’s account of the fire was characteristically brief, but even he could not entirely conceal that you behaved with uncommon courage.”
“Mr Darcy has overstated the matter,” Elizabeth said.
“I doubt that,” Mr Wickham said pleasantly. “He is not much given to overstating anyone’s merits.”
Mrs Wickham looked from her husband to Elizabeth.
“Fitzwilliam is very fortunate in his friends,” she said quietly.
Mr Wickham’s smile deepened.
“Very fortunate indeed.”
The words were perfectly civil. The smile was perfectly amiable.
The morning remained damp and still, Wicked’s breath white in the cold air and the carriage wheels sunk slightly in the softened road.
Yet Elizabeth felt Mr Darcy go still beside her.
And understood, with sudden certainty, that something had just been lost.