“Oh, no,” Elizabeth replied tipping her head to one side and smiling. “I believe we can do better.”
“Happy Christmas, my friends,” Mr. Bennet said, “Happy Christmas.”
The End
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Excerpt fromAn Accidental Scandal, the second book in the Accidental Love series
The play was over.
Elizabeth realized, with a shock, that she and Aunt Gardiner had spoken over nearly the entire final act. It was unlike her to converse during a performance; she visited the theatre so rarely that the entertainment was always her first object.
She had only one night in London before she continued her journey into Kent, and she had wasted it. Had it been necessary to canvas Mr. Darcy’s cruelty to Mr. Wickham and the latter man’s subsequent engagement to the wealthy Miss King?Surely they might have spoken of it some other time. She was thoroughly disappointed in herself.
Aunt Gardiner had warned her not to become bitter, and truly, she was not. Mr. Darcy was free to disapprove of whomever he chose, and Mr. Wickham likewise free to find his fortune where he might.
Of the two, however, she must give Mr. Darcy his due. Begrudgingly, perhaps, but her aunt’s gentle remonstrance reminded Elizabeth that she was not being fair. Very well, she would judge both men by their actions.
As unpleasant as he often was, Mr. Darcy had always been consistent. He might feel himself above them all, but there had at least been no dishonesty there. It pained Elizabeth to think it, but she could not say as much for Mr. Wickham, for he had neatly dropped the acquaintance of nearly every other lady the instant Miss King’s inheritance became known.
Fortunately, it was but the work of a moment to remind herself that Mr. Wickham’s circumstances were Mr. Darcy’s fault.
There. Her world was set aright.
Perhaps it ought to make her feel better, having someone upon whom to place the blame, but it did not. Despite defending Mr. Wickham’s engagement to her aunt, Elizabeth could not be satisfied with him. She was not in love with the man—he was too free with his flirtations for her to take him seriously in that way—but she did count him a friend, and for him to act in the same way Charlotte had . . . Well, Elizabeth thought ruefully, perhaps she herself was the one who was out of step.
After Charlotte had accepted an offer of marriage from the Bennets’ ridiculous cousin Mr. Collins, Elizabeth’s sister Jane had pointed out that not all people were the same. And it was true. All around her, people were making matches for security, for consequence. Perhaps she was the greater fool in waiting for a man she could admire and respect. Security was necessary, ofcourse, but she would not accept an offer for safety alone. She feared and most emphatically did not want a marriage like that of her parents.
She wished for a marriage like the one the Gardiners shared. She wished for it very much.
Perhaps some would condemn her for rejecting Mr. Collins’s offer of marriage last autumn. He was the heir to Longbourn, after all. Trading the security of Mr. Collins’s situation for her sanity would have been a very poor bargain.
Everyone stood to gather their things as the throngs below began to make their way out to the lobby. Elizabeth’s head ached, and she stepped out of the stuffy box before her companions, turning to her right and walking down the hall to peer down the grand marble staircase.
It was suitably wide, but she wondered whether a mistake had been made in the construction, for the treads were a little shallow and the whole quite steep. She felt a sickly flutter in her stomach as she always did when she was too close to the edge of something very high, and she stepped back. Thank goodness they were only in one of the lower boxes and not in the upper, where the very wealthy preferred to sit.
Then, because she detested feeling intimidated, she walked half a dozen steps to cross the hall and peered over the railing to the ground floor. She swallowed and forced herself to look, just as she had forced herself to climb trees as a girl.
The floor seemed very far down.
Her uncle had secured a larger box than normal this evening in deference to their party’s size, but he need not have troubled himself; Sir William and Maria Lucas had politely declined the invitation. Elizabeth had never believed Sir William a man of much delicacy, but there too, she must have been mistaken. From something he had said quietly to Maria, Elizabeth learned he was offering her the gift of time with her family.
Though Jane’s spirits were not what they had been before Mr. Bingley came into their lives, they had improved since Christmas. Her sister had not grown gaunt, nor was she eschewing company. That Jane harboured regrets was clear, but she would recover.
Elizabeth could not have travelled to Kent on the morrow had it been otherwise.
She sighed. At least she had correctly judged Miss Bingley to be a false friend to Jane. She had not been wrong aboutthat. Elizabeth was vastly relieved.
That is, until a familiar voice broke into her contemplations.
“Miss Bennet!”
A terrible foreboding seized her as she turned to face the man who had spoken her name. And there he was, as though Elizabeth’s own uncharitable thoughts had summoned him—Mr. Darcy.
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