Thelightwasgoingoff the mere when they came down to the path along the bank. Her hand had been on his arm since leaving the house, and she had not yet put it back at her side.
“You will be cold by the bridge, Elizabeth. The water at this hour.”
“I am not cold, sir, and do not propose to be. If I become cold, I will tell you, and you may give me your coat for the second time in your acquaintance with me.”
“Forgive me if I doubt that you will say anything. You did not once mention that you were cold on the day we met, by which hour you had been in the snow for the better part of one.”
“On the day we met, Mr Darcy, I had a broken leg, and you must grant that the matter was a distraction. I will own the precedent is not in my favour.”
The willow on the bank had been the first thing to colour this spring. They came up to it on the path. “I have been watching this one every morning for a fortnight,” she said. “From the parlour window. I had a wager with myself it would come into leaf before the first of April.”
“You have won your wager. The first of April is still a week off. There is nothing like the view from your window in the morning at half past six. The first light comes off the water at that hour, and the willow stands against it.”
She stopped and smiled up at him. “You know my hours, sir?”
“I have been walking out to the bank of the mere every morning since the second week of January. I have stood at the water and turned back to look at the house. For the first seven weeks your window was empty; Dr Aldridge had not yet permitted you the walk from the bed to the glass. I went down anyway. I stood at the water at half past six, and I looked at the empty window. Three weeks ago you came to it for the first time. I have not, since then, missed a morning.”
“That is a particular liberty, sir.”
“It was the only liberty open to a man whose wedding day had not yet come.”
“And the man whose wedding day has come?”
“He proposes to be in the parlour looking out with her at twenty past six in the morning instead of standing at the water.”
Elizabeth laughed. “He has not the courage.”
“He had not the courage three weeks ago, when she would have laughed at him for it. He has it now.”
She threaded her arm more tightly through his. “Your courage rises, does it, sir? Then I look forward to seeing the proof of it.”
He laughed—properly laughed; she had heard such a laugh from him only twice before in their acquaintance—and he took her hand off his arm and wove her fingers with his. They walked the rest of the way to the bridge without speaking.
At the bridge they stopped. The mere under it was at the place she had waded the week before. The place along the bank where she had come up out of the water was visible from the rail.
“Mr Hadley has counted the lambs,” he said. “There are twenty-three so far, and all thriving.”
“That is very encouraging. The shepherd must be pleased, particularly after the fears of early February.”
“Indeed.”
She looked at the place along the bank where she had come up. “I am glad, after all, that I found this valley, Mr Darcy.”
“You did not find the valley. The valley found you. And I found you.”
“I am glad of all three.”
He did not at once reply. A puff of wind came across the water; she put back the loose hair at her temple.
“You are cold, Mrs Darcy.”
“I am not.”
“You are. The first time I said it on the path, it was a pretext to keep you out of doors longer than the weather warranted. The second time it is a pretext to bring you inside.”
“And which time is the truer, sir?”
“They are both true. They have a particular order of priority, which I propose to take up on the threshold of the parlour.”
