Elizabeth looked up in abject dismay. “Is that why we have kept meeting—because you were looking for my mother?”
“You were looking for your mother. I was looking for Bingley.”
“And they were together?”
“So it would seem.”
A sound escaped her, something between despair and hysteria. She felt sick. Her mother had not merely betrayed them once; she was still doing it.
“Will you please sit down. Truly, you look very ill.”
She shook her head and pulled away from him, repeating, “I must go,” as she hastened to the correct door, tugged it open, and ran out of his house.
Benjamin stood up in his seat, his weatherworn countenance crinkling with alarm when she burst through the front door. “Everything well, miss?”
“Yes, thank you. Please take me to Henrietta Street directly.” She climbed into the carriage, pulled the door shut behind her, and waited, fists clenched and breath held, for the horses to jerk into motion. Then she buried her face in her hands to muffle an anguished scream.
“How could you do this, Mama? How could you?”
Mrs Bennet was frivolous and silly, but Elizabeth had never considered that she might be disloyal. Yet, she was also uncommonly handsome, an incorrigible flirt, and—apparently—lonely.
“Oh, what a pernicious combination!”
To trample the happiness of one’s own daughter was unconscionable. Jane had been so obviously enamoured with Mr Bingley last November. Her mother had known it, had been trumpeting the match to anyone who would listen! As for Mr Bennet, he might not love his wife, but that could not eliminate the injury of adultery. She tore herself to shreds trying to fathom the knot of motives, lies, and complications attached to such a ruinous discovery, so that, when she arrived at Mrs Randall’s establishment, her distress had been completely overtaken by fury. She pounded on the door with no regard to propriety, her anger only abating—with horrible abruptness—when a complete stranger opened it.
“Who are you?” she asked in alarm.
The woman, whose apron marked her as a servant, crossed her arms. “More to the point, who are you, banging on my master’s door like that?”
“I am Mrs Bennet’s daughter. Is she in? I need to talk to her.”
“No one here by that name.”
Elizabeth’s heart began to thump unpleasantly hard. “Mrs Randall, then?”
A look of comprehension passed over the woman’s countenance. “If you mean Mr Bradshaw’s previous tenant, theyain’t seeing eye to eye these days. She upped and found herself a new protector, and new lodgings to boot.”
Elizabeth took a large breath, which did not even begin to alleviate her panic. “Where?”
“How should I know?”
“Who, then? Who is her new protector?”
“Said I don’t know!” The woman pulled away and slammed the door shut.
Elizabeth staggered backwards, her vision swimming. Benjamin called out to her with obvious concern, and she knew she needed to pretend that all was well, for he could not know.Nobodycould know. She could tell no one in her family for fear of shattering their happiness; she could tell no one outside of her family for fear of ruin. She must keep this entirely to herself, yet she had not the least idea what to do with the appalling information. Shame and anger and panic were crowding her mind, making her feel faint enough that she could not even raise a hand to wave at the coachman.
She thought at first that the thundering sound was in her head, until it stopped, and a horse whinnied, and she recognised it as the pounding of hooves. Blackness encroached from the corners of her vision, and she felt herself sway—then strong hands took hold of her, keeping her upright, bracing her with a solid yet unfathomably gentle grasp. Deep, resonant murmurs filtered through the fog in her head, growing clearer as her malaise receded, until Mr Darcy’s voice emerged, repeating words of comfort.
Elizabeth was too entrenched in misery to summon the mortification she ought to feel to be confronted with the only person in the world whodidknow of her mother’s disgrace. She was not sunk so deep that the futility of whatever it was she felt for him did not pierce her as sharply as a knife. She savoured the bittersweet comfort of his grip on her arms as she looked up intohis inscrutable countenance. “I do not know where she is. She has gone.”
“Never mind that now. Let us get you into your carriage.”
Elizabeth submitted to being guided thither, but she had seen his alarm before he hid it, no matter what he said, and his voice had reverted to the strange dispassionate tone she had noticed at his house. It was clear he resented the obligation of dealing with her, which only made it harder to bear when he climbed in behind her and draped something warm around her shoulders.
“This is my pelisse,” she said stupidly.
“Yes. You left it behind when you ran out.”
