Not because Elizabeth appeared—but because the space she occupied elsewhere in the house pressed against his awareness with an insistence he could not dismiss. He knew where she was. The knowledge arrived without effort and remained without permission. He set his papers in order twice and abandoned the task both times, his attention slipping away before it could be completed.
Bingley paced.
He crossed from window to door and back again, stopped, turned, opened his mouth—and closed it once more. The restraint cost him visibly.
“You cannot simply avoid her,” Bingley said at last.
Darcy did not look up. “I am doing nothing of the sort.”
“You have altered your entire morning,” Bingley replied. “You have taken your coffee here instead of the breakfast room, declined to accompany us, and given explicit instructions that messages be routed through the steward.”
Darcy adjusted the stack of broadsheets on his desk. “I have work to do.”
“You are attempting to outmanoeuvre your own house.”
Darcy’s hand paused. The faint pressure beneath his breastbone reminded him, sharply, why this was necessary.
“She is better,” he said. “That is sufficient.”
Bingley stopped pacing. “And you are not.”
“Do not start that again.”
“I am not starting anything,” Bingley said, frustration breaking through his usual good humour at last. “I am standing in the middle of it. Caroline is upstairs composing a speech on impropriety and insult, and I am attempting to keep her from delivering it to anyone who will listen.”
Darcy’s jaw tightened. “You have my thanks.”
“I should like more than thanks. I should like—” He broke off, scrubbed a hand through his hair, and turned toward the window instead. “Never mind.”
The knock came then—sharp, peremptory, poorly timed.
Before Darcy could answer, the door opened.
The footman barely had time to announce the name before the man himself surged forward, coat askew, hat tucked beneath his arm, eyes alight with something that looked uncomfortably like triumph edged with alarm.
“Harrowe,” Darcy greeted.About time.
“Darcy,” Harrowe replied, already moving toward the desk. “You felt it. Of course you did. The whole city—no, farther—” He halted only long enough to drag the satchel from his shoulder and set it down with a thud. “I came as soon as I could get these from the Archives.”
Bingley stared. “Ah… Darcy?”
Harrowe did not notice him. He had already begun to open the satchel, fingers impatient with leather and buckles, muttering to himself as he went. “I shouldn’t’ve waited. I knew the delay was—ah. There it is.”
Darcy rose. The movement sent a warning pulse through his chest, but he ignored it. “Harrowe,” he said again, more firmly. “Youforget yourself.”
Harrowe looked up at last, taking in the room properly for the first time. His gaze flicked to Bingley, assessed, dismissed.
“Beg pardon,” he said, with no trace of apology at all. “I didn’t figure you had company.”
“This is Mr Bingley,” Darcy said. “My friend who has just arrived from Hertfordshire.”
Harrowe inclined his head by a fraction. “Sir.”
Bingley recovered himself enough to bow in return. “I am sorry. You appear—” He searched for the word. “Urgent.”
“I am,” Harrowe said simply. He reached into the satchel again.
Darcy held up a hand. “Not yet.”
