“This is absurd,” he said under his breath, and tried again. “Brutus. Away.”
The dog’s head lowered a fraction—not in submission, but in acknowledgment. He did not retreat.
Darcy glanced up the stair. The passage above lay empty, perfectly ordinary. No sound. No movement. Nothing to justify—
Brutus’s gaze followedhim.
Not Miss Bennet. Not the stair itself. Darcy. The dog’s attention did not waver as Darcy shifted his weight or turned his head; it tracked him with a steady, unblinking focus that raised the fine hairs along his arms.
Darcy let out a slow breath. “Wait here,” he said to Miss Bennet. “One moment.”
He stepped aside, breaking the line between the dog and the stair. Brutus did not follow him. He held his position—still aligned with the steps, still watching Darcy, as though the space mattered less than the man approaching it.
A brief, unwelcome calculation followed. Calling the dog again would look foolish. Lifting a hand to collar him would require explanation. And Miss Bennet—already weary, already strained—stood waiting for him to decide what to do about a very large, very stubborn animal.
Darcy stepped back instead.
He paused, then added, as if only just considering it, “Brutus is not attending to you, Miss Bennet. He has taken some private objection tomethis evening. I shall answer forit. Like enough, he has it in mind to oblige me to procure him another bone from Mrs Nicholls.”
She looked doubtful. “He is that clever?”
“Absolutely. See how his eyes never leave me? Take a step toward the stair, Miss Bennet.”
She nodded and did so. Brutus never even glanced at her.
“Ah, you see. I have him fairly, the old criminal.” The corner of his mouth lifted—barely. “You need not concern yourself.”
Miss Bennet hesitated, then inclined her head. “Good night, Mr Darcy.”
“Good night.” He waited until she had turned away before looking back at the dog.
Brutus remained where he was.
And Darcy turned back for the servant’s staircase.
Chapter Twelve
Sleep came to himunevenly, as it often did when his mind refused to relinquish its hold upon the day. He lay aware of the bed, of the hangings stirred faintly by a draught he had not noticed before retiring, of Brutus shifting once at the foot of the mattress before settling again. It should have been enough. He had known harder nights than this.
Yet when the dream took him, it did so without even a hint of warning.
He was walking—no, inspecting—a stretch of land that ought to have been familiar. By the view of a low hill in the distance, the river cutting across the valley below, it was the same land he had stalked with Bingley only yesterday.
The lie of the hedge, the thinning grass where water gathered, the shallow descent toward lower ground—all of it answered to expectation. His attention moved as it always did, measuring, noting, arranging what he saw into habit and record.
One moment, he was filling his lungs, marking breaks in the grass where a hare had flushed, trees in the stand still green and full, listening to Brutus ranging on ahead.
Then his stride shortened.
Not by intention. Not by misstep. His foot lifted and set down again, but the distance it carried him had diminished, as though the ground itself had subtly altered its measure. The next step required attention. The next, effort.
He stopped and drew breath.
The breath came, but without force behind it. His chest rose; the air reached him thinly, as though some deeper correspondence had failed. A faint tremor passed through his legs—not pain, not alarm, but enough to set his nerves on edge.
He waited, but the sensation did not pass. Fatigue, he told himself. A residue of poor sleep. Of long days. Such things left impressions even in dreams.
Perhaps there was a slight incline here, gradual enough that he had not marked it. He adjusted his stance and went on.
