“Now, Mr. Bennet!” Mrs. Bennet, hurrying up behind him, fixed him with an indignant look. “You were not so sanguine about it when your best decanter went missing!”
Mr. Bennet’s mouth twitched. “True, my dear, but I have since recovered my equilibrium—if not the decanter.”
Elizabeth could not help but laugh, though the catalogue of oddities stirred a ripple of unease deep inside her. She glanced instinctively towards Mr. Darcy, who was speaking with Mr. Bingley a short distance away, and wondered—without quite meaning to—what hewould make of such tales.
The parties began to disperse from the churchyard, bonnets bobbing as farewells were exchanged. Mr. Bingley’s carriage was brought round, the glossy horses stamping in the cold air, and soon the Netherfield party—together with Jane and Elizabeth—were settled inside.
Kitty and Lydia, still brimming with energy, had protested being sent home with their parents in the Bennet carriage. Elizabeth felt an odd mixture of relief and lingering curiosity; their chatter had been chaotic, yet the details gnawed at her.
Miss Bingley, seated opposite Elizabeth, broke the comfortable quiet. “Are the Bennet ladies always so…lively?” she asked, with an arch lift of her brow. “And imaginative?”
Elizabeth met her gaze evenly. “They can be lively, certainly. But in this case, I fear they are not playing pretend. The incidents they described—missing belongings, locked doors, strange noises—are quite real, though the causes remain unknown.”
Miss Bingley’s eyes widened in delicate horror. She turned at once to her brother. “Charles, are you quitecertain it is safe for you to remain in Hertfordshire with such danger lurking about?”
Mr. Bingley laughed outright. “Nonsense, Caroline. I have never heard of anything more harmless. Mischief and imagination—that is all.”
“Harmless?” Miss Bingley echoed, pressing a gloved hand to her breast. “A locked larder, stolen garments, lights in the garden—”
“Harmless,” Mr. Bingley repeated cheerfully. “And if there were any real danger, I am sure the Bennets’ household would soon have it well in hand.”
Jane’s eyes met his, warm with a quiet understanding, and she smiled—a soft, private smile that seemed to brighten her whole countenance. Elizabeth, catching the look, felt her own lips curve in response. Her sister’s happiness was so apparent that it softened even the dullest moments of these social calls.
Still, Elizabeth’s thoughts drifted, drawn inexorably back to Kitty and Lydia’s catalogue of strange events. The image of floating lights in the garden returned to her mind—two pale orbs moving soundlessly in the night. She told herself it could be lanterns, foxfire, or even a trick of the eyes… yet unease threaded through her all the same.
Opposite her, Mr. Darcy was silent, his gaze turned to the window. The low winter sunlight caught at the edgeof his profile, and Elizabeth wondered—half in jest, half in hope—whether he, too, was thinking of what the Bennet girls had said.
When the carriage rolled up the gravel sweep of Netherfield Park, the household was already astir with preparations for supper. A groom came forward to take the horses, and the party moved inside, shaking off the cold. Miss Bingley swept ahead with Mrs. Hurst, their voices floating back in soft, assessing tones about the quality of the sermon. Jane followed with Mr. Bingley, the two of them in quiet, contented conversation.
Elizabeth lingered in the entry hall, untying her bonnet ribbons more slowly than necessary. Mr. Darcy, handing his gloves to a footman, glanced towards her. The faintest question rested in his eyes—one that needed no words.
She stepped towards him, her voice pitched low. “I have been thinking of what Kitty and Lydia said. I cannot help but feel there may be more to their stories than mere mischief.”
Mr. Darcy inclined his head slightly. “I have been considering the same. Is it not curious that some of the oddities at Longbourn bear a faint echo of what we read in the Moore journals? The missing belongings, the disturbances at night—small things, perhaps, but theytrouble me.”
Elizabeth’s gaze flicked upward, checking the position of the others, before replying. “If there is a connection, it might be in the history of the place. I wonder if my father knows more than he lets on. If we ask directly about a fire in the area—”
“—we may learn more about the Longbourn fire,” Darcy finished, his tone thoughtful. “If it occurred as Moore described, others in the district would have remembered it.”
Elizabeth nodded. “My father has a habit of keeping old papers and ledgers in his study. If such records exist, he may have them.”
Darcy’s mouth quirked faintly. “Then it seems we must become historians as well as investigators.”
She allowed herself a small smile at his phrasing. “Better that than idle guests. At the very least, we shall know whether this is merely local lore…or something that casts a longer shadow.”
A stir from the drawing room signaled the return of Miss Bingley’s voice, bright and insistent. “We shall have cards before supper!” she was declaring.
Elizabeth’s shoulders sank almost imperceptibly. “It appears we are to be social this evening,” she murmured.
Darcy’s eyes warmed with understanding. “Patience, Miss Bennet. Thelibrary will still be there tomorrow.”
But as they stepped into the drawing room and took their places at the card table, Elizabeth could not quite banish the thought of dust-coated shelves, faded ink, and the half-told tale waiting in the black-bound journals. She caught Darcy’s gaze across the table more than once during the game, and each time, the same message seemed to pass between them: soon.
The card tables had been cleared away, and the company lingered in the drawing room, each person occupying themselves as they pleased. Jane and Mr. Bingley sat together near the fire, speaking in low, contented tones. Mrs. Hurst and Miss Bingley were bent over an embroidery frame, the former stitching while the latter offered intermittent “advice.” Elizabeth had taken a seat near one of the long windows, her attention half on the gentle rain pattering against the glass and half on the conversation flowing through the room.
Mr. Darcy, standing with a cup of coffee in hand, turned to Mrs. Nicholls, who had just come in to inquire if more refreshment was wanted. “Mrs. Nicholls,” he began in his courteous, deliberate manner, “I wonder if you are familiarwith the history of this district—whether the manor houses hereabouts are all their original structures, or if any have been rebuilt.”
The housekeeper blinked, clearly taken by surprise at the question. “Oh, I couldn’t rightly say, sir,” she replied. “I am not from Hertfordshire myself—born and raised in Surrey, I was. I’ve been at Netherfield for but twelve years, and even then, the estate was already as you see it now.” She paused, her expression brightening. “But perhaps a lifetime resident might know..”
