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He sat beside her, leaving room for the ribbon between them.
"I can do those things."
"Not perfectly."
"Probably not."
"Good. I am unlikely to manage perfection myself."
Outside, something heavy struck the passage wall. Bingley apologized to the chair, then to the footman carrying its other end. Elizabeth leaned against Darcy and laughed until the feeling that had tightened around the room began to loosen.
He took her hand. For once he had nothing further to prove. She let herself enjoy the quiet after the laughter, his fingers resting around hers, the envelope forgotten on the table. When she kissed him, no one supplied a count from beyond the door.
A knock came only after a respectable interval. Mr. Bennet stood outside with a large portfolio sent by express from Lady Catherine.
"I have been assured it concerns flowers," he said. "I thought it best to warn you."
It concerned flowers, guests, upholstery, the disadvantages of narrow doorways, and the unfortunate inadequacy of every venue except Rosings. Lady Catherine had nonetheless written Longbourn: their choice across the last page and enclosed instructions for transporting the arrangements there. A postscript announced that she and Anne would set out within the hour behind it.
Charlotte, joining them from the garden, read the instructions over Elizabeth's shoulder. "She has accepted defeat with four pages of specifications."
"It is generous of her."
"It is. You may still refuse the swans."
"I already have."
Darcy discovered a note on his former weather tables. His aunt had observed that he rated storms for dramatic effect but did not separate that rating from the occasions upon which they interrupted a conversation. "A fair criticism," he said. He put it away without revising a single column.
Jane returned with a new list, very short: candles, clean chairs, a place for Lydia if she came. Elizabeth read it and reached for the pencil.
"And a quiet quarter of an hour before the ceremony. With you."
Jane added it. "No one will be admitted unless you wish it."
The wedding preparations resumed. Bingley brought back a clean chair, tested its legs, and offered it to Elizabeth. She sat down. It was a considerable improvement upon being a diagram.
CHAPTER 26
On her wedding morning, it was raining with an energy Elizabeth would have admired in any less persistent acquaintance.
She turned her chair toward the dressing table. Jane would be coming, and the rain had received quite enough of her attention.
Jane came in carrying a small box instead of a writing board. Inside lay the pins Elizabeth had misplaced the previous evening. She set it on the dressing table and closed the door.
"Our quarter of an hour," she said.
Elizabeth looked at her sister. For a moment she did not know what to do with the time she had asked for. There was no decision to make, no line to resist. Jane took a pin and waited beside her chair.
"Will you help me?"
"Of course."
Jane had arranged her hair often enough that Elizabeth knew the light pull before each pin found its place. It brought back evenings before assemblies, when she had believed the worst thing that could happen was an indifferent dance partner. She looked at her sister in the mirror.
"You are happy with him?"
Jane did not need the name. "Yes. We shall be married next month, and he has promised that I may organize the linen without publishing the results."
