Charlotte came and sat beside Elizabeth. “Well,” she said, taking her hand for a moment before letting it go again, “you have managed to make your first full week in Kent rather more eventful than I intended.”
Elizabeth laughed, though softly. “You must forgive me. I had not the least notion of providing entertainment.”
“I am not thinking of entertainment. Does it pain you very much?”
“Less now than it did at first.”
“That is something.”
Charlotte regarded her for a moment longer, and Elizabeth knew her too well not to recognise the curiosity she was choosing, out of kindness, to restrain.
“You need not look so discreet,” Elizabeth said. “I know very well that the whole thing must have appeared ridiculous.”
“Not ridiculous,” Charlotte returned. “Only memorable.”
Elizabeth turned her head slightly against the chair and closed her eyes for a moment, not from fatigue alone, but from the wish to put some order into thoughts which had become less manageable than usual. “It ought to have been merely awkward,” she said at last.
Charlotte said nothing at first, but Elizabeth could feel that she was listening closely. “And was it not?” she asked after a moment.
Elizabeth opened her eyes again. “No. But what it was, I hardly know.” The honesty of the answer surprised her almost as much as it could her friend.
Charlotte’s expression altered, though only a little. “Then I think,” she said, with her usual calm good sense, “that you need not decide it today.”
“No,” Elizabeth replied, though the quiet certainty of what had unsettled her remained. “Perhapsnot.”
When Charlotte left her at last to rest, the room grew still enough for thought, and thought, now that it had the opportunity, did not spare her.
She had known for some time that her opinion of Mr Darcy had changed. Respect had come first, and gratitude after it, and from both had grown a degree of ease which would once have seemed impossible. Yet what had passed that afternoon did not belong to either. She could not think of his lifting her in his arms, of the carriage ride back, or of the quiet attention with which he had watched her without feeling again that same disordered awareness.
It was not merely that he had acted kindly. He had acted as though her comfort were of immediate importance to him. As though she were important to him.
Elizabeth turned her face toward the window, where the late light had begun to soften against the glass, and told herself with all the firmness she could command that nothing had yet happened that should alter the whole course of her judgement. A man might be attentive without feeling deeply. A woman might be grateful without danger to herself. There was no wisdom in giving consequence too soon to what might still be explained by circumstance. Yet even as she attempted the argument, she knew it lacked its former strength.
Something had changed, but she was not yet ready to name it, nor to believe that Mr Darcy might feel as much as herself.
Chapter 18
Like everything else at Rosings, the breakfast table was conducted with the stiff formality and pomp Lady Catherine considered essential. Once arranged, nothing varied without notice. The servants moved with quiet precision, every dish appearing at the proper moment. Conversation followed the same rule.
Darcy had long been accustomed to such arrangements, and on former visits had submitted to them without effort. This morning, his attention was somewhat less than wholly engaged by what passed before him.
Seven days had passed since the accident. On each, Darcy had indulged himself in a visit to the parsonage.
At first, he had told himself that a visit the next day to ascertain Elizabeth’s health and offer to bring anything that might aid her was a required courtesy. Though meaning not to stay long, Elizabethhad looked so very pleased to see him and had so readily engaged in conversation that by the time he thought to look at his watch, Darcy found he had stayed considerably longer than any idea of good manners could excuse.
Though, he thought as he walked back to Rosings, Elizabeth certainly had not seemed to mind.
On the next day, though wishing to see her again, Darcy had not wished to intrude. He therefore firmly told himself that he must not visit her that day, and he would have kept to this prudent intention, if Georgiana had not mentioned very much wishing to see Elizabeth and try to cheer her spirits. Darcy told himself that he could hardly send Georgiana by herself, and therefore went with her with a clear conscience.
He spoke little on that visit, but watching Elizabeth and Georgiana already talking like old friends — like sisters — was its own reward. By the end of the visit, Georgiana had asked if they might call each other by their first names, and Elizabeth had agreed with what he could only call delight.
He had gone the next day likewise, as Colonel Fitzwilliam mentioned that he intended to go. Between Elizabeth’s sparkling wit, Fitzwilliam’s jolly humour, and Darcy’s own rather drier jests, they had laughed themselves half sick.
Though reproaching himself a little for thestratagem, Darcy had set out for the parsonage the day after without telling anyone where he was going. Pleasing as it was to see Elizabeth’s charming manner and good sense in conversation with those he loved most, he found he wanted her to himself.
Each day that followed had been more pleasant than the last, and on the previous, Darcy could no longer resist temptation, and had made a fixed engagement to come again in the course of the morning. Nor could he regret it once he had. Elizabeth had said little, but her encouragement had been plain in the delicate curve of her smile and the sudden softness in her eyes.
Darcy smiled to himself at the breakfast table, remembering it. The week had resolved what he had once allowed himself to question. There was no longer any uncertainty.
