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"So are hearts," says the Colonel, and then looks as though he wishes he had not.

"Mr. Pettigrew," I say. "You must tell me exactly what I am to do. And what I am not to do. I have never lied to anyone in my life for longer than an afternoon."

"Oh, you need not lie, miss." He looks shocked. "Only do not contradict. If he says a thing, let it stand. If he asks a thing you cannot answer, turn it gently aside. Keep him quiet. Keep him cheerful. No shocks. No disputes. No excitements of any kind."

"I am not in the habit of exciting Mr. Darcy."

The Colonel makes a noise into his hand.

"Last night excepted," I add, with dignity.

"Who else knows?" says the Colonel, recovering. "Of the truth, I mean."

"We three." I count them off. "And I must tell Mrs. Collins. I cannot sleep under her roof and lie to her across the breakfast table. Besides, she will have guessed half of it already. She guesses everything."

"And my aunt?"

We all three think of Lady Catherine.

"If Lady Catherine learns that I refused him," I say slowly, "she will go straight up those stairs and tell him so. With great pleasure. And at great volume."

"She will," says the Colonel. "She would consider it a Christian duty."

"Then she must go on believing it." I close my eyes for a moment. "Heaven help me. I must allow Lady Catherine de Bourgh to believe that I have entrapped her nephew."

"If it is any comfort, miss," says Mr. Pettigrew earnestly, "she believes it already."

It is not any comfort at all. But it makes me laugh, which I suppose is nearly the same thing.

The Colonel walks me to the door. On the step, he stops.

"Miss Bennet," he says, low. "You need not do this, you know. You owe him nothing. I would not blame you for walking out of this house tonight and taking the Monday coach."

I look at him. He means it. He is a kind man, the Colonel, kinder than his cousin and easier to like. I liked him from the first evening at Rosings.

"Colonel," I say, "last night I called your cousin arrogant and conceited and selfish. I told him he had ruined my sister's happiness and Mr. Wickham's prospects. I said a great many things, and I said them as cruelly as I knew how." I take a breath. "And then he sat up all night and wrote me the truth, and rode out at dawn in the wet to put it into my hand. And he was thrown, doing it."

"That was not your fault."

"Was it not? He was riding at a gallop under those oaks because of me. Hobbs told him about the bough. You heard Lady Catherine say so." My voice is not as steady as I would like. "I cannot walk away from him while he is lying up there because of me. I will not."

The Colonel is quiet for a moment.

"No," he says. "I do not suppose you will." He bows over my hand. "A fortnight, then. And God help us all."

***

Mr. Collins is waiting in the parsonage hall when I come in.

He is not sitting. He is not standing, exactly. He is hovering, the way a moth hovers at a candle, and when he sees me he flutters forward with both hands outstretched.

"Cousin Elizabeth! Cousin! Is it true?"

I untie my bonnet very slowly. "Is what true, Mr. Collins?"

"Lady Catherine's footman has been here. Thomas. A very sensible young man." He is quivering. "He says that Mr. Darcy says that he is engaged to you."

"I believe," I say carefully, "that is what Mr. Darcy says."