“Aye.” Her flat tone spoke volumes as to her bitter disillusionment.
“What the devil possessed her?”
“I told her I am with child. And she is not, and she despises me for it.”
Darcy felt a vein in his neck throb. “She did thisknowingyou are with child?” Elizabeth nodded. He could not immediately respond, so livid was his rage. Not until he felt able to speak without cursing did he unclench his teeth and say, “We will be leaving at first light, we will not be returning, and you will not be seeing your sister again before we depart.”
Elizabeth wrapped her arms about herself and turned to the dying fire, its dwindling light just enough to set aflame the tear that ran down her cheek. “You will hear no argument from me.”
PREJUDICE, THY POWER IS SINKING
Monday 5 October 1812, Kent
Colonel Fitzwilliam caughtsight of the arriving carriage and watched as his cousin stepped down and looked up at the house with unconcealed contempt. He did not blame Darcy for his rancour and frankly admired his decision to come at all. He set his drink down and made his way to the entrance hall.
“Fitzwilliam!” Darcy exclaimed. “We did not expect to see you here.”
“It was a recent decision. Grandmother was determined to attend, but I had the devil of a time wriggling out of my engagements.”
“Your grandmother ishere?”
He grinned. “Ineludibly so.”
“And Lady Catherine consented to this?”
“In no way, shape, or form! But she has exhausted her energy complaining and has none left with which to drive her out.”
“Is she very ill then?” Darcy enquired gravely.
“Montgomery informs me she has good days and bad.”
“And where is Montgomery?”
“He has taken Anne and my grandmother to Hunsford village. You may as well take the opportunity to settle into your room and change before dinner.” Observing that the housekeeper had engaged Elizabethin conversation, Fitzwilliam took the opportunity to discreetly enquire how well Darcy had weathered his stay in Hertfordshire.
“Another time,” he replied darkly.
Never had there lived such a proficient at conveying abject loathing in the mere curl of a lip; Darcy’s scowl told a thousand words, and it did not take a genius to deduce something dire had occurred. And now he must suffer Lady Catherine’s censure also!
“De Charybde en Scylla, eh?”
“Précisément,” Darcy replied flatly and turned away to escort his wife upstairs.
Since their falling out in the summer, Darcy and Lady Catherine had been in company but once, at Ashby’s ball, and Fitzwilliam did not believe they had exchanged more than a few venomous glares on that occasion. What with Lady Catherine’s continued campaign of calumny and decidedly underhanded tactic of being incurably ill, he knew not whether this encounter would go much better. Watching them reunite that evening, therefore, made for an anxious few moments.
Darcy stood guard over Elizabeth with a storm seething in his eyes and a snarl prowling about his lips. Lady Catherine came in on Montgomery’s arm, her new infirmity almost the first thing one noticed about her after the raging umbrage emanating from her in waves. As heavily as she dropped into her chair did her gaze fall disdainfully upon Elizabeth, on whose shoulder Darcy immediately placed his hand, as though to prevent her from even contemplating rising.
“You came then?” Lady Catherine said curtly.
Darcy had adopted the ominous stillness that marked him as one of the few people of Fitzwilliam’s acquaintance capable of unnerving him.
“Lady Catherine, you will greet my wife and me properly, or we shall leave.”
Her countenance coloured crimson. “I hardly know how,” she croaked. “Yourwifeis my incumbent’s cousin, a tradesman’s niece! What am I to call her?”
“Mrs Darcy,” he replied in an eerily low voice.
“I certainly shall not! My daughter was to be Mrs Darcy. My sisterwas Lady Anne Darcy. This…girlfrom nowhere at all is not worthy of the name!”
