“Our family. Can you not see how our position corrupts? Mary believes herself a gifted performer because none dare correct her. Lydia grows more outrageous because everyone tolerates her behaviour. And Mama…” Elizabeth gestured towards where Lady Hartford was now offering Mrs Phillips unwelcome advice about her son’s choice of profession. “She mistakes rank for the right to wound others with impunity. If we were not titled, we would most certainly not be tolerated by polite society. I must hope the family will behave better in London.”
“Of our reputation has not preceded us. Still, we are fortunate for Father’s wealth and position. You are right. Otherwise, we might not be in such high regard,” Jane conceded.
Across the room, Darcy continued his quiet work, unnoticed by most yet essential to the evening’s success. The contrast between his unassuming competence and her family’s casual assumption of superiority struck her with uncomfortable force.
She watched him pause to assist an elderly gentleman who had dropped his walking stick, his manner respectful yet natural, unmarked by either servility or presumption. When had she begun to notice such things about him? When had the steward she had once dismissed as presumptuous become someone whose character commanded her reluctant respect?
“Lizzy?” Jane’s voice seemed to come from a great distance. “You appear quite lost in thought.”
“I was merely observing,” Elizabeth replied, though her pulse had quickened in a way that suggested her observations had become rather more personal than she cared to admit. “I am a little warm. I think I will go to the terrace for a little while, if you will excuse me.”
She made her way through the crowd, eager to get away even if just for a few minutes so she would not have to think about Darcy, Wickham, and the general unfairness of her station.
***
Darcy checked the wine supplies for the third time that evening, though his attention remained divided between his duties and the uncomfortable awareness of being watched. Theballroom whirred with conversation and music, punctuated by Lady Lydia’s increasingly shrill laughter and the scrape of dancing slippers against polished floors.
“Another bottle of the Bordeaux,” he instructed the footman, ensuring his voice carried no trace of the tension coiling in his shoulders. The evening progressed smoothly enough, yet something in the atmosphere felt charged, as though storm clouds gathered just beyond the candlelight’s reach.
He retreated towards the servants’ corridor to review the supper arrangements when voices from the card room caught his attention. The door stood slightly ajar, revealing Sir William Lucas deep in conversation with Mr Lawrence, the mayor, and another gentleman Darcy recognised as a local magistrate.
“—must admit, Lawrence, the transformation remains quite remarkable,” Sir William was saying, his tone carrying that particular mixture of admiration and condescension reserved for discussing the newly elevated. “To think that not twenty-five years past, old Bennet was nothing more than a country squire scratching out a living from his modest acres.”
“Indeed,” Lawrence replied. “One can still detect the old habits, can one not? The way Hartford conducts himself—pleasant enough, certainly, but lacking that natural authority born of generations.”
Darcy’s jaw tightened. He should move away, return to his duties, yet something kept his feet planted on the worn carpet.
“The daughters are handsome enough,” the magistrate observed with the casual dismissal of a man accustomed to judging livestock. “Though one cannot help but noticecertain… irregularities in their deportment. That youngest girl’s behaviour tonight would scandalise proper company.”
“And the mother!” Lawrence’s laugh held malicious satisfaction. “Lady Hartford carries herself as though she were born to the purple, yet every word reveals her origins. Did you hear her instructing Mrs Long on proper precedence? As though a woman raised in trade herself possessed any understanding of such matters.”
“Still,” Sir William interjected with diplomatic caution, “one must acknowledge their current position. Hartford’s service to the Crown earned him considerable favour.”
“Service, yes. But blood will tell, will it not?” The magistrate’s voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. “Mark my words, within a generation the family will have dissipated their fortune through poor judgement and worse connections. These upstart titles rarely endure. Besides, there are no sons. The heir is that obscure vicar over yonder.”
Darcy’s hands clenched at his sides. The casual cruelty of their observations, the assumption that worth derived solely from ancestry rather than character, stirred an anger that surprised him with its intensity. Yet what disturbed him most was not their dismissal of Lord Hartford—a man who had proven his courage in battle and his competence in peace—but their contemptuous assessment of his daughters.
Lady Elizabeth’s face rose in his memory—her quick intelligence, her genuine concern for others, the way she had spoken of love as too precious to sacrifice for social convenience. These men reduced her to nothing more than breeding stock marked by inferior bloodlines.
“The estate management has certainly improved under Hartford’s stewardship,” Lawence conceded grudgingly. “Though I suspect that has more to do with his new man than his own efforts. That steward of his—Darcy, I believe—seems competent enough.”
“Trained at Matlock, I heard,” the magistrate replied. “No doubt learned proper methods there. Still, one wonders what Hartford pays him. These upstart peers often lack judgement in such matters.”
The conversation drifted towards other topics, but Darcy had heard enough. He retreated down the corridor, his thoughts churning with unexpected turbulence. Their words had revealed the precarious nature of the Bennet family’s position—elevated by royal favour yet still viewed as interlopers by established society.
The irony was not lost on him. Here he stood, a man whose own origins placed him far beneath even the ‘humble Bennets’ these gentlemen dismissed, yet he felt compelled to defend a family whose very existence highlighted the arbitrary nature of social distinction. Birth, it seemed, mattered less than men pretended, yet far more than justice would demand.
Chapter Ten
Elizabeth
“Charlotte!” Elizabeth exclaimed, relief flooding her voice as she spotted her friend near the stone balustrade. “What brings you out here? Are you not enjoying the dancing?”
Charlotte Lucas turned from where she had been gazing across the moonlit gardens. “As much as a knight’s daughter can when her prospects remain limited,” she replied with characteristic honesty. “Though I confess I welcomed the respite. The air grows rather close inside.”
Elizabeth moved to join her friend, grateful for the cool breeze that carried the scent of late roses and wood smoke. Behind them, the sounds of revelry continued.
“I begin to think Papa should have limited the guest list,” Elizabeth said, adjusting her gloves. “Half of Hertfordshire appears to be crammed into our ballroom.”
