Darcy fully comprehended that his previous complacency where Elizabeth was concerned had been egregiously misplaced. Yet, he simply could not believe she disliked him. No man who had been looked at the way Elizabeth gazed up at him in the snow yesterday could ever willingly give up hope of there being a warmer sentiment at play. It had felt as though, had he kissed her there in the street before all her relations, she would not have objected. How was it that Anne’s admission had angered her so?
“What precisely did you say to her?”
“I cannot remember the exact words. I think…that your attentions were deliberate, not mere civilities, and that you were not being duplicitous in giving her such notice because you were not bound tomeby honour.”
“Did you say it exactly like that?”
“No, of course not. I am not completely devoid of self-respect, Darcy. I had no objection to enlightening Miss Elizabeth as to my mistake, but neither had I any intention of allowing Mrs Bennet to gloat about being right when she told me I was ill-suited to be your wife.”
Georgiana let out a shaky breath that might have been an ill-concealed giggle. “She said that to you?”
“Oh, do be quiet,” Anne retorted rudely.
Georgiana straightened her back, her expression as close to resentment as Darcy had ever seen it. “Iremember what you said at Longbourn, Anne. You told them that Brother had no intention of being civil when he visited Mr and Mrs Philips, that he spent this morning ignoring you and me and that is what drove us to call at Longbourn, that Mrs Bennet was wondrous silly, and that you found Miss Elizabeth’s disposition tiresome. I could not understand why you said any of it and hoped you had a kinder intention than was immediately apparent, but I am beginning to wonder whether that was the case, for you seem to take great pleasure in beingunkind!”
“All done!” came a jubilant pronouncement from Bingley as he bounded into the room. “Ah, you have had tea already, I see. What else have I missed?”
Nobody answered. Darcy knew not what prevented the others, but for his part, he found panting with anger precluded much in the way of good-humoured conversation.
“Upon my word,” Bingley said as he surveyed everyone’s faces. “Who died?”
No one had, though Darcy knew who he would nominate if there were a ballot on who should. He ought never to have agreed to bring Anne back to Hertfordshire.
“My patience,” he said darkly and then, though conscious that he had done it several times of late and risked beginning to look like a histrionic adolescent, he excused himself and stalked from the room, unable to trust himself to remain civil if he stayed.
16
Elizabeth’s love of snow diminished considerably over the next day. The drifts that had accumulated on Thursday crystalised overnight into an icy blockade that kept them imprisoned at Longbourn and deprived of callers throughout the whole of Friday. It was a situation with which Jane appeared quite comfortable, but then, she had received word explaining her gentleman caller’s absence, thereby allaying any doubts in his affection. For Elizabeth, it meant only that she was prevented from taking any exercise, leaving her at the mercy of her mother and younger sisters’ inanity and denying her any reprieve from her own distressing reflections.
Matters had been much simpler a few months earlier when she had despised Darcy. Doing so had not caused her a moment’s worry. She had reviled many less irksome men. When he left Hertfordshire, she had believed herself perfectly content never to think of him again, her enmity readily consigned to an unpleasant memory. Even after she had absolved him of any wrongdoing towards Wickham, recognised the prodigious care he took of all those he esteemed, better understood his self-averred resentfulness, learnt to admire his taciturnity, grown covetous of his rare smile and even rarer laughter, and become altogether too enraptured with his person—still, Elizabeth had been untroubled by doubts. For then, he had been engaged to somebody else, and her regard for him had been immaterial, an injury from which her heart would have eventually recovered.
It was all different now. Mr Darcy had broken with his cousin, and her feelings had assumed a portent of unbearable moment. Hope assuaged her at every turn, whispering that he might mean to propose to her, obliging her to constantly repress it, for it would be the worst form of evil to tempt him away from Miss de Bourgh. She could never live with herself for such a despicable act against another woman. Yet, therein lay her struggle, for Elizabeth grew increasingly unsure that she could easily live with a decision to refuse him if hedidcare for her. In such circumstances, she doubted her heartwouldever recover.
Thus it was, despite all the reasons she ought not even to be contemplating it, Elizabeth could not prevent herself from endlessly speculating what it was that Darcy felt for her. By Friday morning, she had settled it that he could not possibly love her, for she knew he thought her too plain, her family too vulgar, and her situation too far beneath him. It was halfway through breakfast that she remembered his resolute disavowal of all he had ever said in censure of her beauty. Her resulting blush caused her mother to check her brow for a fever and instruct her to don an extra shawl.
By midday on Friday, she had recalled Darcy’s request for a front row seat to watch the Gardiner children’s Christmas play and decided that his disdain for her connexions was perhaps not quite so severe as she had assumed. By suppertime, she had decided that hemustadmire her, for nothing else justified his cousin’s violent jealousy. By bedtime, she had recognised herself for the fool she was to presume such a man would ever notice her and despised herself for wishing that he would. By midnight, her reflections had turned to the way he listened, rapt, every time she spoke, and she despaired of ever finding another man who made her feel so precious.
Elizabeth woke early on Saturday, after too little repose. She tossed and turned in her bed long enough to make it certain sleep would not return, then pushed off her covers and crossed the room to open the curtains. Snow still blanketed everything. It was a little churned up at the gate and along the drive where the servants and farmers had traipsed through it, but the world was otherwise unchanged. She rested her head against the pane and sighed. There would be no visitors again today. There absolutelymustbe walking, though. If the servants had managed to get through the drifts, then so could she, and without some fresh air to clear her mind, she would go distracted long before anything thawed.
Something fluttered foolishly in Elizabeth’s stomach at the thought of an accidental meeting out of doors with Darcy, but she quashed the silly notion and pushed herself away from the window to pull the cord for the maid. Hot water was presently provided, and in short order, Elizabeth was dressed in her warmest woollen stockings and thickest walking dress, ready to stomp out her agitation on the snow. She snatched up her bonnet and crept along the hall, navigating every loose floorboard and creaking stair, retrieving her coat, and digging out a pair of gloves without drawing any unwanted attention. Satisfied she had not roused anyone who would object to her going out, she pulled open the front door—only to stagger backwards two steps, shocked by a blast of icy air and a vastly unexpected sight.
“Mr Darcy!”
He lowered his hand from where it had evidently been poised to knock. “Miss Elizab?—”
She gestured for him to be quiet. “You will wake everyone!” she hissed, her heart hammering so violently that manners quite escaped her. “What are you doing here?”
He looked at her intently for a moment. Then he smiled very slightly but most effectively. “I came to see you.”
His whispered voice was even more resonant than his usual one, an observation that vexed Elizabeth no end, for she had not previously been aware of its having any effect on her, never mind the absurd blushing breathlessness afflicting her at present.
“Well, I wish you had not!” she replied in an angry whisper.
The effect her words had upon his countenance tugged at her heart, though in too many directions to make it easy to know what else to say.
“I am excessively sorry to hear that,” he said too loudly.
She pressed a finger expressively to her lips to silence him again. He obliged her, and they were both silent until a sharp gust of wind blew a flurry of snow into the house, and without thinking, Elizabeth gestured for him to come in so she could shut the door.
