Darcy looked at her.
"I visit people."
"Mr. Darcy," she said pleasantly, "your first introduction to Meryton was that of a gentleman who stood in a corner and appeared unwilling to acknowledge the existence of anyone beyond his own party. You must forgive us for drawing conclusions."
"My first impression," he replied, with a gravity she strongly suspected was entirely sincere, "was formed under particularly unfortunate circumstances. I had spent the greater part of the day travelling. My sister was not in the best of spirits. We were attending an assembly which Bingley had accepted on our behalf before consulting either of us, and I had not enjoyed so much as an hour to compose myself before being obliged to enter a crowded room full of strangers."
He spread his gloved hands.
"It was, in short, a very bad day. Meryton must simply forgive me."
Elizabeth stared at him for a moment, then laughed.
Not the polite laugh she employed in company, but the genuine one, the sort that escaped before she had decided whether to permit it.
"That," she said, "is the greatest number of sincere words I have ever heard you speak at one time."
"You drew them out of me."
"Did I?" She was still smiling. "And are you truly sociable, Mr. Darcy?"
"In the right company."
"Indeed?"
"Yes, indeed."
Elizabeth glanced sideways at him.
He met the look with an expression that was, she felt certain, the nearest approach to unguardedness she had yet seen from him.
The morning lay quiet around them. Below, the valley was slowly awakening beneath the rising sun, the frost retreating from the fields as the light strengthened.
It occurred to her, not for the first time, that Mr. Darcy was considerably less disagreeable than Meryton had first led her to believe.
"I shall look forward to Georgiana's letter, then." She stepped back and began descending the path. "Good morning, Mr. Darcy."
"Good morning, Miss Bennet."
She had gone perhaps twenty yards down the slope before she permitted herself to smile properly.
Far enough away, she hoped, that he could not see it.
˜ ˜ ˜
Longbourn
Elizabeth had been looking forward to a letter from Netherfield at breakfast and was therefore quite unprepared when Mr. Bennet announced, with a degree of amusement that immediately invited suspicion, that he had received a letter from his cousin, Mr. Collins, who proposed visiting Longbourn on Friday.
"Friday!" Mrs. Bennet set down her cup. "That is only three days away."
"So it is." Mr. Bennet seemed entirely pleased by the circumstance. "Lizzy, read the letter aloud, if you please." Drawing it from his coat, he handed it across the table. "It is, I believe, the most entertaining letter I have received in several years."
Elizabeth took the letter whilst her sisters abandoned all pretence of interest in their breakfasts and waited for her to begin.
Dear Sir,
The disagreement subsisting between yourself and my late honoured father always gave me much concern, and, since I have now reached an age at which I may judge for myself, I have frequently wished that some means of reconciliation might be effected between our respective branches of the family.
