Just like that, the two were allies again.
Lydia giggled. “The look on Miss Bingley’s face when we opened the door and saw Lizzy in Mr. Darcy’s embrace!” She turned from Kitty to Elizabeth. “I heard her call you a hoyden.”
Kitty patted Elizabeth’s arm consolingly. “Better a hoyden than a harridan.”
Her sisters fell into a fit of giggles, skipping away to join their partners.
They had no idea what they had done.
Had it all been one, dreadful accident? Was this to be how all Elizabeth’s efforts on behalf of her family were to be rewarded?
She shook her head. No, she would not dwell on despair. This was an opportunity to encourage Mr. Bingley’s attachment to Jane. There was no doubt that a union with one so lofty as Mr. Darcy would provide many advantages which Elizabeth could use to help others. She could pay for tutors for her sisters with her pin money.
The final couples scurried to take their places for the minuet. Mr. Darcy appeared, standing in front of her with a glass of punch. She took the drink. “Thank you, Mr. Darcy.”
He bowed. “May I have the honor of this dance?”
He had a deep, soothing voice, and the intensity in his dark eyes made it difficult for Elizabeth to swallow her punch.
Leaning a touch closer to her, she saw a spark in his eye when he said, “I trust that a minuet is calm enough for your coiffure.”
Elizabeth grinned at the jest, reaching up to pat her hair gently with one hand and pressing against the strange fluttering in her stomach with the other. “You think of everything, Mr. Darcy.” Setting her empty glass on a tray, she took his arm, and they joined the other couples. Sighs and whispers of “fine eyes” and “So romantic!” swirled around Elizabeth with the stir of ladies’ fans.
Mr. Darcy danced gracefully, albeit silently. Several times he opened his mouth, then seemed to reconsider and close it.
After witnessing yet another failed attempt, Elizabeth took pity on him. “Do you enjoy the minuet, Mr. Darcy?”
He answered when the dance required him to step closer. “Pray call me Fitzwilliam.”
Fitzwilliam, she tried in her mind, but she could not yet bring herself to say it aloud. Not yet. Once they were better acquainted, perhaps.
Mr. Darcy stepped back. “This dance is a favorite of my aunt Catherine. She appreciates its rigid formality.” The ice now broken, he continued, “You are an elegant dancer. Did you learn from a master?”
She laughed. “Observation and imitation have been my best teachers. If I perform well enough, nobody is the wiser.” He did not seem to know how to reply to that, so Elizabeth asked a question of her own. It concerned her how easily he was able to cover over their compromise. Was he much practiced in getting himself out of troublesome situations? “What is your opinion of disguise?”
“I abhor disguise of every sort,” he snapped.
His abrupt change of manner took Elizabeth aback. Did he refer to her comment about pretending to be a more knowledgeable dancer than she was?
Softer, he added, “By disguise, I refer not to a person’s sincere efforts to master a skill by their own initiative but to a person’s purposeful deceit with the aim of misleading others to their harm.” A deep breath. “It was a value my father upheld and by which I have attempted to live.” He winced, and Elizabeth imagined she knew the painful direction his thoughts had taken.
He confirmed it on the next step forward. “I fear I am failing my father miserably this evening.”
His understanding of her thoughts and revelation of personal history inspired Elizabeth to lighten his burden. “That depends. Was not your offer made sincerely, out of a desire to protect many from harm? That does not sound like the ‘disguise’ you described to me.”
“Then what is it?”
She thought. “Mm, I would call it initiative, or… dare I say, heroic.”
He barked a laugh, causing several heads turn in their direction. After a few minutes of bows and curtsies in the choreography, he said, “It is not my custom to wallow in misery or live with regrets. What is done is done. I hope you will join me in making the best of our situation.”
Hardly the words Elizabeth had expected Mr. Darcy to utter, but they soothed her. Making the best of her situation was what she did best. “I would like that very much.”
The rest of the minuet passed in such pleasant, easy conversation, Elizabeth began to believe she just might be capable of liking this Mr. Darcy.
CHAPTER17
Darcy enjoyed dancing and conversing with Elizabeth, but the remainder of the ball was insufferable. He smiled and danced, all the while planning how to inform his family of his engagement.
