Brutus rose and crossed the room, placing his head briefly against Darcy’s knee before settling again.
Darcy rested a hand between the dog’s ears without looking down. “Yes,” he said quietly. “I am aware.”
He did not seal the letter.
Instead, he stood, tucking both papers into his coat pocket, and crossed to the window. The night beyond offered nothing—only the dark outline of trees and the suggestion of movement where there should have been none.
Elizabeth stacked her father’sbooks with care and placed them at the top of her trunk, though she had already packed them once. She checked the ribbon Jane had insisted upon, then set it aside again. She straightened the shawl she had folded only moments earlier, then left it where it lay. Each task had a reason. None of them required haste.
Downstairs, voices drifted faintly upward—Jane’s, unmistakable, and Mr Bingley’s brighter tones beside it. The house was awake. The carriage would be announced any moment now. Elizabeth paused with her hands resting on the edge of the trunk, listening.
Nothing.
She glanced toward the door.
She did not expect to see the dog there. That would be ridiculous. And yet she found herself waiting for the sound of nails on the floor, for the quiet assurance of his presence in the passage beyond, as if he were some sort of custodian. When nothing came, irritation stirred where unease might otherwise have settled.
Very well, then.
Elizabeth took up her reticule and turned toward the door before she could reconsider. The passage lay empty. She stood there a moment longer than necessary, then moved on, setting her steps with care that was not caution so much as attention. She reached the stair.
For an instant—only an instant—she hesitated, expecting that subtle resistance she had felt before, that quiet refusal she could not have named if pressed. Nothing answered her pause. The stair remained as it always had been.
Elizabeth frowned faintly and placed her foot on the first step.
It held.
She took another.
Still nothing.
Her pulse quickened, not with alarm but with something closer to disbelief. She descended another step, then another, her hand brushing the banister more out of habit than need. The space behaved. The house offered no objection at all.
Halfway down, she became aware she was not alone.
Darcy stood at the foot of the stair, one hand resting on the newel post, a book open in his hand as though he had been interrupted mid-thought. He looked up as she descended, surprise flickering across his features before discipline smoothed it away.
“Miss Elizabeth.”
“Mr Darcy. I have not yet thanked you for finding me in the fields. Your kindness has not gone amiss, for I am well enough to go home today.”
“So I had heard.” His gaze shifted briefly—up the stair beyond her, then back to her face. “You appear quite recovered.”
She smiled, a little. “Appearances are having a very successful morning.”
The corner of his mouth moved, almost despite him. “I am glad to see it.”
Elizabeth took the remaining steps, watching him now with a curiosity she did not trouble to conceal. He had not offered his arm. He had not moved to bar her way or hasten her passage. He simply stood there, present, as though that were sufficient.
She reached the bottom of the stair without incident. The moment she stepped onto the hall carpet, the awareness she had carried with her—the quiet expectation of correction—slipped away entirely.
Elizabeth drew a breath and gave a small, incredulous laugh. “Well,” she said, “that is settled, then.”
Darcy’s brows drew together—not sharply, but with the faint crease of someone who had not reached the same conclusion. “Is it?”
She met his look squarely. “I appear to have alarmed myself unnecessarily. A habit I am determined to break.”
“One I should not have attributed to you,” he said, after a moment. His gaze flicked—briefly, unmistakably—toward the stair behind her. “You do not strike me as prone to it.”
