Then he became engaged, and then Georgiana developed her infatuation with Mr. Peake, and then Elizabeth had ended their engagement when he did not follow her orders to allow Georgiana to marry Mr. Peake.
Darcy sought to keep resentment and reproach from his voice when he spoke of their argument which led to the final rift. His success was mixed.
After the story was done, Darcy leaned against the wall, with his glass in his hand. Richard was quiet for a while. The officer pulled back his cue stick to strike his ball. It hit the red ball that was placed in the center of the table. The red ball then shot into the right pocket with a crack. Richard’s cue ball bounced off the red ball and hit Darcy’s cue ball, knocking it into the left pocket, and then Richard’s ball rolled slowly towards the right pocket. It was on the line towards the pocket, but as the friction slowed its motion, Darcy thought the ball would not reach the edge.
Both men tensed watching. The ball stopped on the lip of the pocket. Darcy let out a sigh of relief while Richard sagged. Then prompted by some untimely gust of wind, the red ball tipped over into the pocket.
Richard pounded his hand. “Canon, losing hazard, and winning hazard! Ten points in one shot. Fifteen ahead.”
“Bravo!” Darcy clapped at the other gentleman’s performance. He felt rather mellow and better than he had since Elizabeth had jilted him. Talking made him feel as though a surgeon had lanced the boil that her treatment of him caused to grow and allowed the poison to drain out. Friendship and closeness restored with a fellow gentleman could create such pleasant and happy feelings.
He needed no woman to be happy.
Darcy swallowed half of the cognac remaining in his snifter. He placed the glass on the wooden edge of the billiards table, and stared at the felt table with purpose. He would likely lose the current game, but that was no excuse for not making an earnest effort.
Richard picked the red ball out of the pocket and handed Darcy his cue ball. Darcy placed, and then he picked up his cue stick. Despite the dark outside, the table was lit enough for Darcy to easily discern the marble balls. Six lamps with wide white shades were suspended from the ceiling, lighting the twelve-foot-long table.
“You made a deuced good shot.” Darcy shook his head.
“You’ll not match it.”
“Nor you, often. A good bit of luck for you I missed the last shot.” Darcy struck his ball on the center and it hit the red ball, knocking it against the green felt of the table’s border. Then Darcy’s cue ball spun backwards and fell into one of the middle pockets. Darcy made a face and shrugged. “Still three points.”
Richard shrugged and picked out his cue ball, marked with yellow as he was the second player in turn. He set it down in place and swallowed the rest of his cognac before setting up for the shot. He hit the ball with a hard, ringing strike, and swore as it bounced over the green surface, before missing the red ball and then hitting the back wall of the table and bouncing over it.
Darcy laughed good naturedly and grabbed the square bottle of alcohol from where it sat on a side shelf. He poured Richard more and then refilled his own snifter. “Foul. Two points to me.”
Richard laughed. “Overconfident — I am still well ahead of you.”
“If you continue to play likethatI’ll catch you, we have another hundred points left in the game.”
The two shot another round.
Richard said, “This, talking to you…seeing an old friend is a great source of happiness—”
“There is little that can match true companionship.”
“This is more than simply friendship. We were half brothers at one time.”
“Only in the past?” Darcy smiled.
“Ha! In the future as well. It was my fault in the main. The separation. I should not have been so… My treatment of you was not prompted primarily by Georgiana. The war. You had not been there. I needed to finish fighting our battles before I could come here and…apologize or be your family once more. I should have said something before.”
“I should have as well.”
“I would not have replied with any friendship before, oh, the middle of the year eighteen hundred and sixteen. I was a wreck by the end. The war ended, but it took a great time for me to stop fighting it in my mind.”
“I worried greatly when you were at Waterloo. Even though it had been years.”
Richard struck the cue ball, which bounced the red ball into a pocket before following it into a different pocket. “Ha! Further ahead.”
Darcy hummed. Richard had just been present for him. He wanted to be present for Richard.
“All soldiers have ghosts.” Richard looked him in the eye. “I mean those who fight real battles. Maybe not every soldier. But many. I had ghosts, but they left me after a while. I mean after several years. For years, not only you — everyone who had not fought. I was angry at everyone. Matters with my brother and father…” Richard laughed. “It is an excessive good fortune for me that I gained so much in spoils in Spain. After the things I said to them… Father would have cut me cold if he thought I would be hurt.”
“I am sorry.”
“A tradesman. Ha. My father would have hated that.”
