Collins subsided, not entirely satisfied but sufficiently aware of his position as a guest to pursue the matter no further, and returned to his breakfast.
Mrs. Gardiner set down her fork and said, pleasantly, "I see."
Mr. Bennet looked at her for a moment, then at Elizabeth. Folding his newspaper under his arm, he said to the parlour maid, "Send a tray to my book room. I am not to be disturbed," and withdrew.
Some time later, from his window, Mr. Bennet observed Elizabeth and Mrs. Gardiner crossing toward the northern field, Elizabeth dressed as she always was when calling on the tenants. He watched them for a moment, considered the matter, and decided she was about her usual business. There was no reason to interfere. He returned to his book.
They met Darcy on the lane beyond the east field, which was where they had agreed to meet, and which neither of them made the slightest attempt to pretend was accidental. He took her hand the moment she reached him and did not let go.
"He has banned you from the house," Elizabeth said. Her voice was steady. Her eyes were not.
"What happened?" Mrs. Gardiner said. "Tell me exactly."
Darcy told them. He kept his voice even and his account precise. Clarity was easier than anger. He told them what Mr. Bennet had said, and what he had said in return, and the shape of the refusal, and the accusations that had been made, and the pleasant implacability with which they had been delivered.
"He said Elizabeth's grandfather," Mrs. Gardiner said at last. It was not quite a question.
"Yes," said Darcy.
"But—" Elizabeth looked at Mrs. Gardiner with confusion.
Darcy was looking between them. Mrs. Gardiner finally explained. "Elizabeth's grandparents died before she was born. Both sets."
"Then—" Before Darcy could finish his thought, the sound of running footsteps reached them. Kitty came around the bend at a pace that was nearly undignified and entirely unlike her usual careful self, her bonnet pushed back and her face urgent.
"Aunt Gardiner," she said, breathless. "An express has come from Gracechurch Street. Mama sent me directly."
Mrs. Gardiner looked at Elizabeth, then at Darcy, with the swift calculation of a woman rearranging everything she had intended to do and finding the rearrangement painful.
"Go," said Elizabeth at once. "We will follow."
Darcy had already stepped forward. "My carriage is at Netherfield. You may have it within the hour, or tomorrow, whenever you need it. You have only to send word."
Mrs. Gardiner pressed his hand briefly, looked at him for a moment, and then turned toward the house at a pace that made Kitty hurry to keep up.
Elizabeth turned to follow, then turned back. She stepped into his arms without hesitation.
"I am afraid," she said. "For my aunt. For myself. For us. For all of it."
He held her, briefly and firmly. "I know. But go. I love you, and we will find a way."
"I love you too," she said.
She stepped out of his arms and followed her aunt without looking back.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
They heard the house before they reached it.
Mrs. Bennet's voice carried across the drive with the full force of a woman in the grip of a conviction she considered self-evident, and the conviction, as Elizabeth, Mrs. Gardiner, and Kitty quickened their pace up the path, appeared to be that Mr. Gardiner was dead.
"I know it, I know it, I have always said that business would be the end of him, and now here is this letter and nobody will open it and tell me what has happened to my brother, and if you had any feeling at all, Mr. Bennet, any feeling whatsoever—"
"My feeling," said Mr. Bennet's voice from somewhere within, "is that the letter is in your brother's own hand, which argues rather against the hypothesis of his death. I would also point out that it is addressed to Mrs. Gardiner, whose correspondence I have no intention of opening, feeling or otherwise."
Elizabeth and Mrs. Gardiner came through the door into a drawing room that had arranged itself around the drama with the practised ease of a household long accustomed to it. Mrs.Bennet was on the sofa. Mr. Bennet was in the doorway with his book under his arm. Jane stood at her mother's shoulder. Mary had not yet looked up from her volume, though she had moved it slightly closer to her face. Lydia was eating a biscuit.
Mrs. Gardiner crossed the room, took the express from the table where it had apparently been placed for maximum visibility, and opened it.
