Chapter 18

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

"I might not be going to Brighton," Lydia told her sister, "but I am not going to lose all that allowance. If I must tell Papa myself that she kissed him, so I shall."

"What would Papa do about that?" Kitty asked with a little shake of her head. "Lizzy could tell him how you have kissed almost all of the officers."

"Have not!" Lydia retorted staunchly.

"Lizzy caught you kissing Denny," Kitty reminded her. "And I think she knows about that night we all played blind man's bluff."

Lydia's only reply to that was a slight huff of breath. It was a concern though; if Lizzy was made to marry for a mere kiss, then so too would be her sisters. She crossed her arms over her chest. "Very well then. We need more than a kiss in a maze."

"I do not even see Mr Darcy anywhere," Kitty said, looking over the room.

"Nor Lizzy. I saw her dance the first with Philips, but I have not the least notion what became of her after that."

"Oh, I know where she went."

"What?" Lydia grabbed her sister's arm. "Where is she?"

"I do not know precisely," Kitty said, wrenching her arm free. "But she planned to do some sewing below stairs."

"Sewing below stairs?" Lydia gaped at her. "What? Why?"

"I was listening to them talk this morning in their bedchamber. Jane hates her wedding gown, so she is going to wear Lizzy's gown and Lizzy will wear the one she hates. But it needed some alteration first. So she is below stairs tonight, taking care of that."

"Let us go and see if we can find her," Lydia decided. "And then we shall see what we can do to win this bet."

The Bennet girls knew Netherfield very well. The family who had once owned it, the Darlingtons, had had children much of an age with the Bennet girls, and many a happy day was spent playing games in its halls and begging cakes from its kitchen. Lydia, therefore, knew exactly where to go, and she and Kitty were there within minutes. They were not quite at the door when they heard the rumble of a male voice from within the small room that had once been a larder. Lydia gasped and grabbed her sister again, making her stop in her tracks.

"They are in there together," she mouthed to Kitty. Kitty replied by shoving her fist against her mouth as if to suppress giggles.

It took Lydia only seconds to decide what to do. Motioning to Kitty to stay where she was, she tiptoed over to the door and engaged the latch.

"Run!" she mouthed silently at her sister, and so the two flew silently down the hall and up the stairs. When they reached the top again, the sound of their voices safely subsumed into the music, both girls burst out laughing. "If she stays in there with him long enough," Lydia said with a final hiccupping giggle, "she will have to marry him!"

"Let us go tell Papa we do not know where she is and that we are worried about her," Kitty said with a delighted giggle.

"Did you hear that?" Elizabeth asked.

"It sounded like someone latched the door." Mr Darcy went to it, attempting to open it.

"Perhaps it is merely stuck?"

He applied his shoulder to the door, to no effect. Then he turned slowly and met her gaze. "It seems we are locked in."

"Mrs Nicholls or one of the footmen must have come by and done it, not realising I was still in here," she said.

He turned back to the door, pounding it with the flat of his hand. "Halloo! Is anyone out there?" He repeated it several times more, but not a sound was heard without.

"Save your voice, sir," Elizabeth said at last. "And your hand. I do not hear anyone out there. Someone must be…playing a trick, perhaps." She believed she had heard a giggle, quick and instantly muffled, right after the sound of the latch. Probably Lydia, she thought , exacting her revenge.

Mr Darcy nodded and ran his hand across his mouth, a gesture that he did, Elizabeth had noticed, when he was thinking. He came back to where she still sat and took his chair again. "We may be trapped in here for some time," he said gravely.

She nodded.

"Will your mother miss you?"

"I am not certain. At some point later in the evening, Jane was meant to make an excuse for me to return home—so that I might sew her gown without my mother knowing. And you?"

He grimaced and shook his head. "Likely the first I would be missed would be by my man, much later tonight."

"We are well and truly trapped, perhaps all night." She chuckled weakly, but it turned into a sigh. "So much for my good reputation."

"Obviously I would…" He frowned, shaking his head, and uttered a little groan. "I want so much to marry you, but the last thing I wish for is your father to force you to accept me."

"Then perhaps we ought to get ahead of him." The words just came out of her, with no forethought whatsoever, but as soon as she said them, she knew it was right. Her boldness made her flush, even as elation made her heady and weak-kneed.

"Get ahead of him?"

Her mouth had gone very dry. There was too much within her to know how to say what she wished to say; indeed, she was only just beginning to know it herself. She took a breath, then another as the first did not seem to perform its office. "If we were engaged first, then my father would have no cause to do anything, except maybe scold me a little."

He stared at her. "What do you mean?"

She laughed and looked away, suddenly shy. "I mean…you know what I mean."

"Do you mean that, perhaps, if you were forced to marry me, it would not be too much of a punishment?"

"I mean that I do not require forcing. The only thing which forces me to marry you is…is the leanings of my own heart."

He extended one arm, so she put aside the gown and the needle and the thread and reached her hand to join his. He used it to pull her towards him, and she found herself nestled against his chest, halfway onto his lap.

She could hear the rapid pounding of his heart, and it made her soft inside, thinking that she had caused it to do that. "What I mean to say," she said softly, "is that I have fallen in love with you."

He took her face in one hand, holding her tight with the other, and kissed her deeply. It surprised her, and thrilled her, and took her breath away, particularly when he punctuated his kisses with words of love and devotion, spoken against her mouth and cheek.

She hardly knew how long it was until they stopped kissing and resumed speaking. He wished to know how it was that her feelings for him had changed.

"Do you remember at Hunsford Parsonage when you said that you liked me against your will, your reason, and your character?"

"I said many foolish things that night."

"No, but I have at last understood you! You meant to say that sometimes the person who seems to suit us the least is the very person who in talent and disposition is most perfect for us." She smiled. "And that person, for me, is you. You may be quiet while I am lively, and serious when I am gay?—"

"I have long understood that your liveliness is just what I need to perhaps soften my own severity, and improve my manners. And I have hoped that there are things within my own nature that could add to your character as well."

"Your superior understanding of the world," she supplied. "And your excellent judgment. I have long known I could not marry a man that I did not respect as my superior—Mr Collins taught me that immediately—and even when you angered me, I still had to respect you for your honour and your probity, among other things."

He was vastly pleased she had said so; she could read it in his face. "You have said more than I might ever have dreamt of on entering this room." He glanced around. "This delightful, charming room that I shall forever honour. But I must say one more thing to you, and that is simply that I love you, dearly and completely, and will make it always my foremost object to see that you are happy."

"I love you too," she said. "And it will be my glad delight to see to your happiness for all of my days."

"You locked them in?" Wickham asked Miss Lydia.

He had not been invited to the ball—likely Darcy had seen to that —but Miss Lydia had urged him to come regardless, saying that so long as he arrived late enough to miss the reception line, no one would notice him among the officers. He had to, after all, to see how Darcy was doing. He had determined that, if need be, he would do as he must to ensure Darcy got the girl, so that he would get his money.

But it seemed dear Miss Lydia had taken care of things in his stead.

"I did!" she replied unrepentantly. "They fight all the time. They will either kill one another or end up in love, I am sure of it."

Wickham wondered when it was that Miss Lydia had become so perspicacious. "Well, let us go see how things are proceeding."

Very shortly thereafter, they were tiptoeing down the hall below stairs, by the kitchen. They both listened for a time, hearing nothing at all coming from within. Wickham had just turned to ask Miss Lydia whether she was certain they were yet in there when he heard it—a little breathy moan of pleasure.

Miss Lydia's eyes flew wide, and she looked like she might burst out laughing, so Wickham grabbed her by the hand and they ran, silently, a short distance away where they could speak without fear of being heard. As soon as she could, Miss Lydia burst into giggles.

Wickham barely stopped himself from kissing her. Vexatious as she was, she had singlehandedly won the bet for him. He knew not to what extent the pot had grown, but reckoned he was in for a sizeable piece. Would Hurst, he wondered, know the fullness of it? Or could he be perhaps contented with some part of what he was owed so that Wickham himself might enjoy the rest?

"Lizzy must have accepted him. She would never be so wanton otherwise," Miss Lydia said with another burst of giggles.

"So it seems she has," Wickham agreed. Elizabeth Bennet had always seemed to be the fiery sort, Wickham thought ruefully, and Darcy had so long denied himself carnal pleasure, he would be a powder keg to her flame. Who knew what some time in supposed privacy might result in for the pair of them?

"Let us give them about half an hour more. Then you will go to your father and tell him you are worried about your sister. Send him down here to catch them—that should lead to some fun, to be sure!"

"There was something I wondered about," Elizabeth said.

For a man presently incarcerated in a cupboard, Darcy was blissfully happy. He should be well pleased to remain a week if it meant he was with her. Though I doubt I could remain a gentleman for a week , he thought. It will be hard enough if we must stay here until Mrs Nicholls retires for the night.

"What is that?"

"I thought it very strange—did not you?—that your cousin should have been given land and yet seemingly had no interest in going to see it."

"That is true," he said slowly. "I should have imagined he would be travelling to Salt Hill straightaway."

"Salt Hill? He told me it was called Saint's Hill! And I thought it doubly strange when he told me that he had never seen the place despite it being quite close to Matlock and the seat of his own relation. Surely at some point he would have seen the place?"

"No, it is not in Derbyshire. Middlesex, I believe."

"He told me Derbyshire. I am certain of it."

There was something amiss in it all; Darcy could not quite put his finger on it. He had been so very occupied with winning Elizabeth that he had paid no mind to Fitzwilliam and his new land. It was difficult to make himself care about it, however, not with Elizabeth on his lap, absently winding her fingers in the curls at his neck.

"Do you think it is possible..." Elizabeth began slowly. She stopped herself then, saying, "No, that cannot be."

"What cannot be?"

"Lord Saye accidentally said something to me yesterday. He started to say ‘that is why we—' but then he stopped himself and would say no more, save for one other comment about the colonel's intentional cruelty to you—which his lordship described as needful."

"Needful?"

She nodded. "They were both, it seems, excessively alarmed by the notion of you proposing to Miss de Bourgh. To add to all of that, I began to think of how strangely the colonel has behaved towards me, almost as if he wished to give the appearance of wooing me, but not actually wooing me."

"No?"

"Not at all. Either that, or it was the most clumsy attempt to woo a woman that I have ever known." She smiled up at Darcy then and added, "Bar none."

He had to just give her one more little kiss for that.

She then added, "I think it might have been made up."

It took Darcy a moment to understand her. "You think they… No. It is too devious, even for them."

"I do not think there was ever any estate, nor any real wish for the colonel to court or marry me. I think it might have been some scheme to prevent you from proposing to Miss de Bourgh. I simply could not grasp that your own cousin, dear friend that he seemed to be to you, would have conspired to steal me from you, and right in front of you, no less."

Darcy examined the idea. Fitzwilliam had heard much of what happened that wretched night in Hunsford Parsonage. He had listened to Darcy rail against himself, the world, women in general, and the stupidness of society. Then he had told him he needed to get his bollocks out of his reticule, and go and win the lady. Darcy had refused. Then Fitzwilliam had sent Saye in to tell him the same thing. Saye had told him to pull his head out of his arse, and go woo the lady. Darcy had refused.

They had played billiards with the object being that if Darcy lost, he had to go to Hertfordshire and try again with his lady. Darcy won, and told them to bugger off. His cousins had cajoled, persuaded—even threatened him once or twice that if he did not go back to Hertfordshire, they would never speak to him again. He had ignored it all.

Until Fitzwilliam came in saying he would try to win her himself. Then, and only then, had Darcy been provoked into action. He cursed softly.

"He will never admit it," he told Elizabeth. "I do not doubt that you are correct, but we would never get him to tell us so."

Elizabeth smiled, a brilliant smile that provoked him to kiss her again. Amid receiving his kiss, she whispered, "It might be fun to call his bluff."