“I am certain Mr. Darcy was unable to restrain his friend any further,” I said to Jane as we took our positions in the drawing room, as if gentlemen interrupting our breakfast was a common occurrence.
Both gentlemen entered, bowing to Mrs. Gardiner, Jane, and me. While Darcy’s bow was formal and smooth, Bingley resembled a hen fluttering over her chicks.
He greeted Jane especially fervently, looking over at Darcy as if waiting for permission to speak.
Jane, for her part, blushed becomingly and waited for the tea service before inquiring about the health of Charles’s two sisters.
I wasn’t sure where to look, whether at Darcy who stood stiffly like a sentinel or at my sister, until my aunt said, “It is such a fine morning, and the children have been desperate to show off their latest… archaeological discoveries in the garden. Elizabeth, perhaps you and Mr. Darcy would be so kind as to oversee them? I believe the drawing room might be better served by a bit of quiet.”
She took up her embroidery and arranged herself next to the window, an iron-clad chaperone, while Darcy offered his arm so we could escape the drawing room.
The air outside was crisp, smelling of damp earth and coming spring. I felt strange, as if he had purposely come to escort me into the garden and I knew I had to converse or he would feel awkward.
“Mr. Darcy,” I began, stopping a distance from the corner where the children had built Sir Bertram a fort. “I have not properly thanked you for repairing the breach. It meant a lot to me that you stepped beyond a gentleman’s duty to consider whether there had been a misunderstanding.”
He stopped, his profile sharp against the grey stone of the wall. “I am afraid you credit me with too much. I merely noticed and took action. It was as I suspected. Bingley’s sisters had not conveyed Jane’s presence in London to him, and they had professed themselves friends of your sister, so it was not improper of her to call on them.”
“Yes, they had expressed great sadness that their brother had wished to repair to London. Business, they had said, and…” I shook my head. “It no longer signifies. You were kind to Jane and to our family. I recognize it as such.”
He looked down at his boots, then back at me. “I do not consider it kindness to correct a wrong. It is simply… duty.”
I led him toward the children. “Was it also duty to bring Sir Bertram to this humble home?”
“No, it was a pleasure.”
“Quite,” I agreed with a smile I could not hold back.
“Mr. Darcy! Mr. Darcy!” Samuel gasped, waving a trowel. “Bertram found a worm! Does a knight eat worms, or is it beneath his station?”
Darcy, never breaking eye contact with me, knelt onto the wet grass with a natural grace that made my breath catch. “A knight,” he said gravely, accepting the wriggling earthworm from Samuel’s dirty palm, “must be a man of the people. I suspect he finds it a delicacy.”
Meanwhile, four-year-old Rose hugged his knees. “I love Sir Bertram the mostest of all. Mr. Darcy, can I marry him?”
“Ewww… you can’t marry a tortoise,” Samuel jeered. “Knights don’t get married so they can fight.”
And Darcy petted Rose with one hand and mocked a sword fight with Samuel with his other arm.
And I stood there, staring at him and thought,He belongs here.
“Cousin Lizzy, I need a handkerchief,” Alice shouted after Samuel put the worm on her sketchpad. “He dirtied my picture of Sir Bertram jumping over a molehill.”
“Mr. Darcy, Thomas got marmalade on Sir Bertram’s belly, and he is dirtying his cape,” Rose cried. “I want to marry a clean tortoise.”
“Well, then, I suppose we must get you cleaned up, good man.” Mr. Darcy bent down and picked up the tortoise, and the children followed him like a pied piper back to the drawing room while I went to fetch a handkerchief.
I caught a fragment of Jane’s conversation as I walked by. Bingley was explaining his leave-taking last November.
“I would have called to say farewell, but I allowed myself to be persuaded that my call would not be welcome.”
“But, Charles, why would you believe that?” Jane asked. “Our family has always been most welcoming.”
I could not linger, and hence I did not hear his response, or perhaps he did not make one, because Darcy had entered the drawing room with Sir Bertram wrapped in a towel. He set the tortoise down on the carpet and Bingley, seeing him, exclaimed, “Bertram! Good Lord, is that old Bertram? Darcy, you gave away Bertram? You absolutely did. This was your father’s tortoise. You loved this creature. I remember you lecturing me for a quarter of an hour at Pemberley because I fed him a piece of my biscuit.”
“The biscuit was a custard cream, and Bertram has no constitution for custard.”
“He survived it perfectly well.”
“He was ill for three days. My housekeeper sent me a written complaint.”
