“That is a simple matter, yet also a substantial one.” A warm sensation spread through Darcy’s chest. “Then I shall always strive to be your friend.”
“Thank you.”
They looked at each other for a long minute. “Friend,” Elizabeth said.
“Yes, friend,” Darcy agreed.
When they began to walk forward again, Elizabeth said, “Such a strange thing. It is merely clothes! Yet everyone treats me differently.”
“No, no. It is not merely the clothes,” Darcy replied. “You carry yourself differently. With additional confidence. As though you believe yourself to beworthyof attention. I think that is what draws it. I was surprised by how confidently you faced my aunt last night.”
She told him with her arch smile, and in a low, conspiratorial voice, “I thought about you. Howyouwould behave, and what would make you approve of my behavior.”
That spark went through Darcy again. It was like he was falling, but did not mind. He knew that he needed to see Elizabeth safe and well, and that he did not wish it to be nearly six months before they would be in company again.
“I have thought,” she said, “about asking Mary if I might stay. Sheishappy to have me here. But...she does not makeuseof me. I am so used to being required to do this, or that, as repayment for my place. It is too odd to be comfortable. Mary acts quite like I am her sister—she even refers to me as her sister...I wish it were true.”
“Is it not true in some essential way?”
“Yes, but it is also false in an equally essential way.” Elizabeth sighed. “It is that philosophical thing you said. Our language does not catch the delicacy, the multiplicity of human experience, where a thing can be both one thing and yet another at the same time. It feels fragile.”
“Whether you return to Longbourn, or stay with Mrs. Collins,” Darcy asked, having formed the scheme in his head in the last minute, “I can offer you a reprieve from all of your habitual company this summer: Mr. Bingley and his family will visit Pemberley after the season ends. I would like it if you were a part of the party. I especially very much like the idea of you having a chance to see my estate.”
“You would?” She smiled at him. “I would be delighted. I shall eagerly await it. Oh, I do thank you!” She looked almost as if she wished to embrace him or kiss him. The air was filled with a magnetic vibrancy again, like a rainbow had burst from her face to strike his eyes.
Or something else equally ridiculous.
As they continued to walk, Darcy said, “I do wonder at Mr. Bennet not telling you what plans he has for you.”
Elizabeth grimaced. “He has always been secretive on the matter.” A long pause. “I know part of why, but not the whole of it. I had feared last night that your aunt had guessed the worst of the secret. Or you.”
“That sounds very serious,” Darcy said. Something about the grim manner that Elizabeth said this with made him smileat her. He could not care, but he was happy that she trusted him enough to hint towards it. “Do you wish to tell me the ‘secret’?”
“No.” She wrapped her arms around herself. “I wish I did not know. Trying to hide it from me was a kindness of Mr. Bennet’s. But it is shameful.”
“I do not believeyoucan feel any shame on the point.” Darcy took her arm again. “You are being most mysterious, begging me to guess but not saying. Why? Either tell me or entreat me to not think on the matter at all.”
“I worry.” Elizabeth flushed. “It is best that no one knows. So, I must entreat you to not think about it at all. That is why Mr. Bennet never says anything.”
“And you think my aunt might know?”
“I think your aunt might have known my mother. The insistence on knowing her name, and that question about the hairstyle. I copied it from the miniature I have of my mother. The only image of her I’ve ever had.” Elizabeth touched the locket that she wore. “I had thought to myself that I looked very much like her when I studied the mirror that afternoon.”
“I see.”
“Do you?” Elizabeth asked. She pulled her arm away to wrap it around herself again. Then Elizabeth pressed a hand on the locket, as though that gave her comfort. “I hardly can.”
“I only mean to say,” Darcy smiled, “that she must have been an exceptional beauty.”
Elizabeth looked up at him sharply. “No flirting!” She wagged her finger in his face. “We already agreed: Only friendship, no flirting.”
“Of course, Miss Bennet.”
“Do not call methat.” She frowned. “It makes me feel as though I am pretending to be a daughter of the house. Even though Kitty and Lydia are not here, it isKittywho has now taken the mantle of Miss Bennet from her sisters.”
“Not you?”
“Just call me Miss Elizabeth.”
