It was during one of the brief lulls—when the servants had withdrawn with a removed dish and the company, as if taking a breath, allowed their voices to fall into a softer register—that James found Darcy’s gaze upon him.
Mr. Darcy’s attention, when it was directed, had a way of making a man feel both examined and included. James did not fidget beneath it. He merely inclined his head, as one gentleman acknowledges another when there is no need to overstate the connection.
“I hope you find yourself not wholly oppressed by my aunt’s hospitality, Mr. Bennet,” Darcy said quietly, so as not to invite the room into the exchange.
James’s mouth quirked by the smallest degree—more honesty than amusement. “Your aunt leaves one in no danger of supposing oneself overlooked.”
Darcy’s expression did not soften into a smile, but something in it eased. “No. That is not among her faults.”
James, glancing briefly up the table—where Lady Catherine’s voice had paused, as if allowing its own authority to be fully registered—answered with composed candour. “Her ladyship is formidable, sir. Yet I find there is a certain advantage when authority declares itself plainly; one is spared the uncertainty of guessing where one stands.”
Darcy’s eyes held his for a moment longer, and James had the sense, not unpleasant, that he was being considered in earnest rather than by habit. “You manage it well,” Darcy said at last.“It is not always easy, when one’s place is assumed rather than offered.”
James’s tone remained even; there was no complaint in it, only fact. “At Longbourn, I must assume mine often enough. It is useful practice.”
Darcy gave the smallest inclination, as if accepting both the answer and the character it revealed, and his gaze moved—briefly, cautiously—toward Elias.
“I understand your brother has an interest in the law,” he added, in the same low register. “It is not an uncommon inclination in a second son.”
“It is not,” James agreed, “though in Elias it is not an inclination to fashion. He is serious in it.”
Darcy’s attention sharpened, not with warmth, but with the precise alertness of a man who measured seriousness. “Seriousness is rare in any son,” he said. “Particularly when it requires patience.”
James’s reply was honest, and it came without embellishment because there was no advantage in flattery. “Elias has always been patient. Our father supported us as he could. Longbourn bears the heir’s duties readily enough; it is the other four younger ones who must make their own way, and my father—whatever his restraint is supposed to be—has never refused us the means of study when it was asked with purpose.”
Darcy did not interrupt; he listened with the same quiet steadiness with which he watched a room. When James finished, he inclined his head again, and the gesture carried more acknowledgement than many men could fit into a compliment.
“It does your father credit,” he said simply, and left it there—an approval expressed without invitation to further familiarity, yet not withheld.
At almost the same time, and with none of the secrecy that belonged to Darcy and James’s exchange, Lady Catherine’s voice rose a fraction, as if she had decided the table required instruction rather than nourishment.
“We are fortunate, my dear guests and friends,” she announced rising, while setting down her fork with enough decision to make the nearest guests follow suit, “that Providence has seen fit to restore certain gentlemen to their families and their proper duties. The war is, I trust, nearly at an end.”
The room, trained to attention, quieted. The servants continued their motions at the edges, but even they seemed to move more carefully, as if sound itself might be taken for disrespect.
Lady Catherine turned her head—deliberately, so that everyone might observe she was turning it—and fixed her gaze upon Colonel Fitzwilliam, who sat near enough to be claimed.
“In particular,” she continued, “I have desired that this evening should be marked—distinctly marked—as a tribute to Colonel Fitzwilliam’s safe return from the late war, and to the honour he has brought upon his family.” She paused, allowing the words to settle into the room like an edict. “There are few men who conduct themselves the King’s service with propriety; fewer still who return with judgment unimpaired and principles strengthened. My nephew is among that number and I am delighted we have him among us this evening.”
Colonel Fitzwilliam, who had been cutting his meat with the composed efficiency of a man who had eaten under less comfortable circumstances, set down his knife and fork withouthurry. His colour did not rise; his expression did not seek applause. If anything altered in him, it was the quiet tightening at the corners of his mouth—an inward restraint, as though he would rather have had her praise in private, and knew perfectly it would never be granted.
Lady Catherine, however, had not concluded. Praise, in her hands, was seldom pure. It was advertisement, instruction, and warning, all polished into one.
“I have every reason to expect,” she went on, “that his advancement will not be long delayed. The country requires men of discretion as well as courage; and when a man possesses both, it is the duty of those in authority to recognise him.”
A murmur ran, respectful and carefully measured. Several heads inclined.
Having delivered her round of praise, Lady Catherine' s gaze now set on the expected man of the day, though something in her narrowed eyes betrayed a warring impulse—to elevate him as she must, yet simultaneously to remind him that even his considerable consequence remained subordinate to her own. “Colonel,” she said, with the air of a queen granting speech. “You will, of course, say a few words.”
For a moment, he did not comply. Colonel Fitzwilliam would not be hurried into sentiment like an actor following his script. Then he rose, pushing back his chair with quiet care, and the movement itself drew attention because it was so unforced. He stood straight, not theatrically, not stiffly; rather with that natural self-command that comes of having been required, in other rooms, to keep his steadiness for the sake of men who had less of their own.
“Madam,” Colonel Fitzwilliam began, and his voice—clear, manly, and perfectly controlled—carried along the table withouteffort, “you do me more honour than I deserve, and more praise than I can comfortably receive.”
Lady Catherine’s chin lifted, as if she would have preferred him to accept comfort as readily as she dispensed it; but the Colonel did not glance at her again. His eyes moved instead along the table, not seeking admiration, but acknowledging the company’s attention as something he must respect.
“If I have returned safe and sound,” he continued, “it is not because I hesitated, nor because I lacked courage. It is—if one must speak plainly—because Providence chose that some men should come home, and others should not.”
A deeper stillness fell—no embarrassment, no awkwardness, but the attentive hush of people compelled, in spite of themselves, to feel the weight of the words. Even Lady Catherine, who disliked any sentiment not placed by her hand, could not interrupt without appearing indecorous, and so she did what she did when restraint was demanded of her: she sat very upright and waited as if waiting were a kind of command.
