Page 40

Hannah’s voice climbed higher with each clause, her cap slipping further askew as she spoke, until Elizabeth took pity on her.

“Hannah, can you fetch his valet? Vernon, I think, is his name.” Elizabeth had watched the fastidious man on the road, guarding Darcy’s luggage and personal items in the common room.

“Oh, but Mr. Vernon.” Hannah looked over her shoulder. “He is not taking me as more than a common housemaid. Says I put on airs, that I’m no lady’s maid. He is older than Mrs. Reynolds, I shouldn’t say, but oh, ma’am, I shall go find Mrs. Reynolds then…”

“There is no need to.” Elizabeth could not imagine Mrs. Reynolds being disturbed for every tiny incidental. Besides, she was as curious as any cat about Mr. Darcy’s bedchamber—not that she had ever been invited in for a tour. Hannah did not know about their arrangement—or perhaps she did not notice, having never been a lady’s maid who would have handled dressing a wife for the master’s pleasure and then changing the linens.

“I shall fetch it myself,” she said, braver than she felt. “It would take a minute.”

“Oh, would you, ma’am? Only I should hate to be dismissed for walking into the master’s private rooms, even on your account, and Mrs. Reynolds was most adamant when she assigned me; she said, ‘Hannah, you are to serve Mrs. Darcy in all things, but the master’s chamber is the master’s chamber, and if you set one foot across that threshold without express invitation, I shall have you scrubbing the scullery pots until your hands fall off,’ and my hands are already quite rough, ma’am, from the pots I scrubbed before⁠—”

Elizabeth crossed the pale blue chamber, her slippers silent on the carpet. She paused before the white-painted door, drawing a steadying breath. Her heart thudded, absurdly anxious for so small a task as borrowing a brass seal, made momentous only by the knowledge that this was his domain—private, forbidden, and intimate.

She raised her knuckles to knock, paused, and then dropped her hand with a silent scoff at her own hesitation. She was his wife; she was entitled to his seal, even if the rest of their alliance felt like an armed truce.

With trembling fingers, she grasped the brass handle and turned it slowly. The latch lifted with a faint, dry click.

She pushed the door open an inch and peered into the dimness beyond, half-expecting—and half-fearing—to find Darcy standing there in a state of shirtsleeved undress, glaring at her intrusion. But the room was empty, cool, and utterly still.

Exhaling a shaky breath, Elizabeth slipped inside and pulled the door nearly shut behind her.

The chamber was striking—dressed entirely in rich hunter-green walls that absorbed the weak March light, dominated by a massive mahogany wardrobe and a high-post canopy bed draped in dark wool. And the scent of him lingered—clean starch, dry leather, and beneath it, the aroma of sandalwood and something wilder, sharper—outdoor wind and woodsmoke.

Elizabeth took a deep, steady breath and held it, her eyes adjusting to the dimness of the unlit room. On tippy toes, she stealthily crossed to the massive mahogany desk beneath the closed window. There, nestled beside a neat stack of unopened estate ledgers, sat the heavy brass seal bearing the Darcy crest.

She snatched it, trying not to pry and look at the letters on his desk, but especially curious about the amounts he owed, and before she could scurry back out, she caught a revealing column of figures all in red, along with crumpled pieces of paper thrown toward the grate, which was unlit.

A step sounded in the corridor, so she had no time to investigate. Clutching the seal to her side, she darted back through the connecting door, pulled it shut behind her with a soft click, and leaned against it for a long second, her chest heaving.

When she turned around, Hannah was still twisting her apron, her face relaxing. “Oh, I’m glad you are safe, ma’am. Mrs. Reynolds says I worry too much, but I say a girl in service cannot worry enough…”

Elizabeth put her finger over her lips. “I heard steps approaching. Let me pretend I am asleep.”

Hannah covered her mouth. “But if he were to look for his Darcy crest seal.”

“He might believe he misplaced it,” Elizabeth whispered. She held the sealing wax over the candle’s flame, let it drip into place, then pressed the seal firmly. A fanciful “D” surrounded by thorny branches made up the design. “It is interesting that Bingley’s seal is a ‘B’ with a honeycomb while Darcy’s is made of thorns.”

Hannah blinked. “I have never held letters with such fine paper and seals.”

“Now, you will take these letters and find the express rider.”

“Yes, ma’am. I’ll find Thomas—he rides for expresses. Only—” Hannah hesitated, her honest face struggling with something she clearly wished she did not have to say. “Three expresses, ma’am. That’s ever so dear. Mr. Miller handles the household post, but he’s been strict lately about expenses, and I don’t know if he would approve⁠—”

“I am paying for them myself.” Elizabeth opened the small purse she had brought from Longbourn—her own money, saved from pin money and birthday gifts—and counted out what would be needed. The sum was not insignificant. Her father had never believed in expresses, considering them an extravagance suited only to people who lacked the patience to wait for the regular post.

But Elizabeth could not wait. She pressed the coins into Hannah’s palm. “Will you see that they are dispatched immediately?”

Hannah looked down at the money in her hand as though Elizabeth had given her the Crown Jewels. “Yes, ma’am. Right away, ma’am. I’ll make certain they go today, before the light fails.”

“Thank you, Hannah.”

The girl bobbed an uncertain curtsy and vanished, the letters clutched to her chest as if they were treasure. Elizabeth watched her go, then turned to the window, where daffodils still blazed by the lake and the grey March sky pressed down on the park.

She could not stay in this room.

The blue walls, for all their beauty, had begun to resemble the confines of a cell. The roses on her dressing table, however sweet, whispered of extravagance ill-afforded. The fine lawn sheets belonged to a house that could not warm its own hearths.

She needed—what did she need? A book. Something to occupy her mind, something to fill the hours until dinner, something that was not this endless circling of her thoughts.