A flicker of surprise, then gratitude, crossed his countenance. “Yes. Precisely.”
She returned a small smile, hoping it conveyed gentleness and understanding, and…dare she consider it—love. “I think many feel that way, Mr. Darcy. Even those who speak readily. There is safety in poetry; it does not intrude.”
He gave a low laugh, touched with boyishness. “Indeed.” His hand stirred against his knee, as though some impulse urged it forward. A sudden desire that he might take hers rose within her, and she felt her heart beat all the faster for it.
She held still, willing her heart to calm. “I sometimes wonder if that is why some look to books of poetry—lest they crush what has scarcely begun to grow. Yet they need not. If a sentiment is genuine, it will flourish. Depth of feeling can be shown without words.”
The remark settled between them like snow—silent, but undeniable. She thought she discerned understanding in his eyes.I care for you,she longed to say, but the first avowal must be his.What if I mistake the matter? What if I am mistaken altogether, and it is not him?
“Yes. New feeling is fragile. One word spoken too soon—or too carelessly—and it may be lost.”
Elizabeth kept her eyes upon him, searching. “But silence may also destroy.”Please understand me!
He nodded, his features gentling. “A more cunning destroyer, perhaps.”
They lingered in that quiet communion until footsteps sounded from the hall—Mrs. Bennet’s shrill fussing announced her approach, and the company looked expectantly on as the matriarch bustled in.
Elizabeth glanced toward the door. “It seems supper is nearly ready.”
Darcy inclined his head. “I believe you are correct.”
She rose, slipping the book into a workbasket beneath her chair. “Just in case,” she murmured. Lydia could be unpredictable.
They moved together toward the door. There was no grand declaration, no dramatic transformation—yet something shifted. A thread spun between them—slender, silken—holding promise of what might bloom if nurtured.
And for once, neither sought words. The silence was enough.
Darcy
Darcy stood at the window of his bedchamber at Netherfield. The waning gibbous moon shed a pale, silvery light upon the landscape, where snow dusted the hedgerows and softened their outline. Within, however, his thoughts churned with anything but serenity.
Elizabeth knew.
She had not said so outright, but there had been a flicker in her eyes when they spoke of poetry that evening. The volume ofLyrical Balladswas one of the eight leather-bound books ofpoetry, he had chosen with care, each marked with his favorite verses. She had let her fingers trace the gilded title, smiling in a way he now recognized as genuine pleasure. Then she raised her eyes to his, and in that instant something passed between them—recognition, or understanding, perhaps.
She suspects at the very least. And she does not appear averse.
That thought alone unmoored him. In darker moments, he had feared her recoil—feared that she would laugh, or shrink from the affection revealed in his gifts. Instead, she had received each token, and now with what he dared to believe was curiosity; even gratitude.
He turned from the window and paced the room like a man beset. Four days remained—four carefully chosen offerings still to come. Four more chances to tell her what his heart longed to utter openly. Yet with so little time left, he found himself caught in a paradox.
Should he tell her now?
Part of him—impetuous, yearning—longed to do so, to lay all before her and hear his name spoken without reserve. Had he not already revealed enough? Had she not, in her manner, responded?
But the other part, the one schooled in caution and honor, held him back. From the outset he had meant to remain unnamed until the twelfth day. Not as some idle amusement, but as a true gift: a way to approach her not as Fitzwilliam Darcy of Pemberley, but as a man who admired her, who saw her, and sought to prove that she was valued beyond measure.
He had guarded every word in her presence. And now she suspected, yet did not turn away. That was progress; it was more than he had once dared believe possible.
Would he risk unsettling the balance?
Darcy pressed a hand through his hair. No, he would not hasten what had taken such care to cultivate. The final four days were not mere formality. They were a chance to deepen their understanding, to move from admiration to affection, from wonder to warmth.
But the last day…it must be different. A culmination not only of gifts, but of feeling. She deserved more than trinkets and riddles. She deserved the truth.
He would wait. He would see the twelve days through. But on the twelfth—yes, then—he would speak. And he would hope—pray—that what he had begun in secret might find its rightful answer in her heart.
Darcy glanced once more through the glass. Snow had begun to fall once more, a steady veil descending. Four days. He could endure four days.
