She nodded, and then turned and fled up the way and back to the house, filled with an intense feeling towards Mr. Darcy, whose meaning she did not wish to name to herself, because she knew it would bring her deep grief.
Chapter Six
The afternoon following the visit of Elizabeth and the rest of the Bennets, Mr. Bingley ducked his head into the nursery when Emily had fallen asleep for her now once-daily nap.
“There you are, old fellow, off for a ride. Need a gallop. You do too.”
Darcy went out with him.
They said a few words as they gathered their horses and set off over field and dell on a proper countryside run.
Darcy’s mind was on Elizabeth, on her face and way of being. How Emily had let Elizabeth pick her up.
He felt a deep tenderness for Elizabeth, and a sense of something… that there was something precious about the friendship they had developed. He had never spoken so much to anyone about Anne since she had died.
Darcy missed Anne.
A jump over a hedge, Darcy needed to grab his hat to keep it from flying off, and then down on the other side, one hand in the reins, and the exhilaration of galloping again, now down the roadside. His eyes seeking forward, to make sure there were no gopher holes or ditches along the line.
Bingley behind him whooping in glee.
Anne had become dear to him as a friend. As more than a friend… She had been his wife, after all. While he tended to silence, she drew him to talk, and he saw her every day. They lived together, and he’d learned to talk to Anne, to be comfortable in her presence, in the way that he was comfortable with Georgiana, or Richard, or best of all, when no one else was around at all.
Anne would have liked Elizabeth.
Elizabeth is the sort of woman she would have wanted you to marry after she died.
They turned down a new road with a wide field to each side, and then onto a clear road leading up to a grassy knoll with three benches circling the top. It was a shallow enough incline that they could ride the horses up to the top, at least from this side, at speed.
With a shout and a gesture Bingley showed that he meant to race Darcy to the top, and then he started out with a “Heehaw!”
There it was again, that bad horse that Elizabeth had referred to, in her slightly mangled reference to Plato. It told him to defile the pure and platonic friendship he had developed with Elizabeth with base passions and thoughts of her physical person.
She was a beautiful woman, with fine eyes, a wide mobile mouth, freckles and dimples, a light and pleasing figure, and that smile and laugh. His stomach leapt when she looked directly at him.
It would be easy, far too easy, to let himself fall in love with her. He was in danger, and he must be on his guard.
Darcy had fallen behind Bingley, more due to his preoccupation than any other cause, and he pulled up to a stop at the top of the hill. His horse, Aristotle, gasped.
Darcy lightly dismounted and petted Aristotle about the ears.
Bingley likewise came down, and he went to stand next to Darcy. They admired the late afternoon sun, the reddish light gleaming over the clouds and the brightly burning sun. The chittering of birds sounded. A soft wind tugged at them. There was an evening chill that seeped through them both, now that they had ceased to exercise.
“By George, a beautiful day!” Bingley exclaimed. “A perfect day! — to think, I was half bored with the world when that whole crowd arrived so early.”
“I fear that I’ve forgotten what it is to be bored with the world.” Darcy shook his head, wondering at himself.
Bingley laughed. “Fatherhood agrees with you. You approach it with great spirit. But then you always throw your full effort into that which you consider important. No dilettante like me.”
Darcy nodded.
Then Bingley made a huffing sound, and Darcy looked at him, as he showed him an amused grin. “Was I supposed to insist that you are not in sober truth a dilettante?”
“Upon my honour.” Bingley grinned. “I know better than to expect such a little lie fromyou. And we both know my defects — Lord, it’s a damned pity.”
“What?”
Bingley frowned and shrugged, then he said, “Miss Bennet was missing for a great while. The footmen didn’t find her when we sent them out so the Bennets could leave, and then she simply appeared.” Bingley looked at Darcy with raised eyebrows.
