Realizing how they must appear to her neighbors, engaged in a serious conversation with a relative stranger on the dance floor, she forced a smile. “How long do you mean to stay at Netherfield?” she asked, in a tone just curious enough to pass for casual.
“Only a few weeks. I am here for Mr. Bingley’s sake.”
“And not for the delights of Meryton society?”
He tilted his head. “The room is certainly… enthusiastic.”
She laughed. “That was almost generous. Shall I make note of it in my diary, perhaps?”
“By all means,” he said gravely. “I am certain it will become a cherished memory.”
His countenance was so severe, she nearly thought him serious. A closer look however, revealed a slight upward tick in the corner of his mouth.
“Well done, you!” she said with delight. “It seems there is hope for you after all.”
Their hands met again. She noticed—though she tried not to—that he held hers a fraction longer than the steps required.
The music turned to its final strains. They circled once more, his boots polished to a mirror shine, her shoes worn nearlythrough at the heel. The contrast struck her all at once: how finely made he was, how distant his world from hers, how absurd this entire moment was—and yet how natural it had begun to feel.
The last notes faded.
They stepped apart, bowed and curtsied. Elizabeth’s breath caught—just slightly—as she rose.
“Thank you,” she said, her voice polite but distant once more.
He met her eyes. “It was my pleasure.”
And for the first time all evening, she believed it.
Chapter 11
The following morning dawned gray and misty, the kind of weather that discouraged any exertion more ambitious than pouring another cup of tea. Still, the Bennet breakfast table was unusually full for the hour. Even Lydia had come down in decent time, eager to replay the previous night’s excitement.
Elizabeth sat with her boiled egg cooling beside her plate and her head somewhere else entirely. Her thoughts drifted between the figures in her account book and the deeper puzzle of Mr. Darcy—tall, gloved, self-contained, and now impossibly entangled in her imagination despite her best efforts.
Mr. Bennet, who was at the head of the table with his face buried in the newspaper, gave a grunt of disapproval.
Elizabeth, without looking up from buttering her toast, said, “What is it now, Papa? Was your name misprinted in the society pages again?”
He snorted in amusement, but his voice was surly as he replied, “No, merely an opinion piece about the army allowing soldiers the right to practice Catholicism—again. Rather like beating a dead horse, I say.”
Jane glanced up mildly. “I thought that decision was made months ago?”
“In March,” he replied. “And apparently we must all continue to feel very strongly about it, whether we did at the time or not.”
“Ah, yes, back in the spring—an excellent season for heresy. Everything else is already in bloom.” Elizabeth smirked at her father in an attempt to lighten his mood.
Mary, who had been stirring her tea with all the severity of a temperance preacher, set down her spoon with a decisive clink. “Well, I for onedidfeel strongly about it then—and I do now. Allowing Popery to flourish in His Majesty’s army is nothing short of national suicide. Next, they shall be handing out rosaries with rations and replacing sermons with incense!”
Kitty blinked. “But I thought incense smelled nice?”
“It is idolatrous,” Mary said firmly. “Catholics, Methodists, all the Dissenters—they draw people away from the truth with their noise and their indulgences. It is treason against God and King, and no society can survive when it panders to false religion.”
Elizabeth lifted an eyebrow and sipped her tea. “I did not realize a Catholic soldier praying for survival on the battlefield was such a threat to the Crown. Does a French bullet strike more accurately when it follows Latin?”
Mary flushed. “It is the principle of the thing. Tolerating heresy is as great a sin as practicing it. And those who excuse it shall find themselves no less damned.”
Mr. Bennet lowered his paper with theatrical slowness. “Ah, well done, Lizzy. You have driven the most pious of my daughters into wrath. A rare feat. Do see if you can provoke sloth next.”
