“An accident,” I said. “They were out riding horses and a sudden storm came in. We don’t entirely know what happened, but they were found off the horses at the bottom of a rockyoutcropping. We posit perhaps the horses were frightened by the lightning, or… I don’t know.”
“They were thrown, you think?”
“In the end, wild beasts, no matter how it is we have domesticated them, are wild at their core. They serve us, yes, but one cannot override all of their own instinct to protect themselves.”
“Indeed,” said Elizabeth, shuddering. “I am not one for horses myself.”
“Really?” I said.
“It amazes me, truly,” she said, “how many people die on the backs of horses. Either from being thrown or trampled or any number of other things and then everyone just gets right back on them!”
I chuckled gently.
“Yes,” she said, nodding at me, “that is right. Everyone laughs at me when I say it, but I do think I am quite correct in this, and no one wishes to acknowledge that I am. They don’t want to admit that they are being entirely foolhardy by riding those beasts.”
I graduated to full-on laughter.
She glared at me. “You are just like everyone else, I see.”
I found this aspect of her, this fear of horseback riding, drew me to her more. I couldn’t say why. Possibly, it was just because I liked her already. When you liked someone, all their foibles seemed sort of endearing, I supposed. But it was also that she was so self-possessed and so capable and here was one little chink. I liked it. She would be afraid of horses, and I would not, and there would be something that I could provide for her, some level of use I would have to her when we were—
Oh, Lord.
I furrowed my brow, eyeing her, feeling a rising panic growing in my chest.
“What?” she said, noticing the change that had come over me.
“Nothing,” I said, and I pushed to my feet. “Miss Bennet, you are right, of course, it is foolhardy to ride a horse, but sometimes we must take risks if we wish to have advantages. If you do not ride a horse, you must take materially longer to get anywhere at all. So, yes, it’s dangerous, but it’s not dangerous often enough to mean it makes sense to avoid the activity entirely.” I went out of the room and over to hold onto the railing and look down at the bottom level, the one we could not get to at all.
“I did not mean to offend you,” came her voice, small and unsure.
I looked over at her. “You did not.”
“I did something,” she said.
“I can’t marry you, Miss Bennet,” I said.
She was so shocked that she scrambled to her feet as well. “No one thought you were going to marry me, sir.”
It was quiet.
“Except Caroline, I suppose, but you said that was a jest.”
I looked outward, gripping the railing.
“As we have already said, you are betrothed to your cousin.”
“Not formally, though,” I said.
“But it is understood,” she said.
“Yes,” I said. “And I always do what is expected of me. Always.”
“That is a good trait,” she said.
“Except that I haven’t been lately,” I said.
“Oh?”
