Chapter 13

Thirteen

Tuesday, April 14

Frequent downpours intermixed with sleet prevented Darcy from walking to the parsonage. Putting servants to the bother of preparing his carriage in a deluge for such a short distance was unthinkable. As unthinkable as calling on Elizabeth Bennet while looking like a drowned rat and feeling not much better. Consequently, he cursed the foul weather that suspended his wooing of the young lady and left him in the company of his aunt, his cousin, and the drowsy Mrs Jenkinson.

In disgrace due to her suspicious outings to Gilchrist's cottage, his cousin sat in sullen unresponsiveness while Lady Catherine gave way to violent indignation.

"Think, Anne! You are an heiress, the wealthy daughter of the late Sir Lewis de Bourgh, a niece of the current Earl of Matlock, and granddaughter of his predecessor. A woman of the upper classes does not cavort with a gardener! Your conduct has become most vexatiously provoking, and you are forbidden from visiting that man ever again."

Darcy agreed with his aunt. Why, such a class difference would make an alliance between Elizabeth and himself seem almost like one of equality! The thought gave him pause. Apparently, one's opinion of one's own consequence is not easily damped.

To escape the womenfolk, he went to the billiards room and played alone, cursing Colonel Fitzwilliam's superiors for calling him away. Then he sequestered himself in the library with the groundsman who, until a replacement for Gilchrist could be hired, agreed to temporarily add the head gardener's duties to his own responsibilities.

Wednesday, April 15

Darcy met with the estate manager to ensure the farms were well run and the tenant cottages in good repair. They discussed the problem of the late planting and adjusted their plans for a profitable autumn harvest. When the man left, Darcy turned towards the window to ruminate and glare at the accursed raindrops running down the pane. The curtains captured his attention, and he would have sworn they used to have a pattern stitched upon them. He sprang from the chair. Blast! It was past time to interrogate Mrs Jenkinson and Dubois.

After he had requested her presence in the library and asked a few leading questions, Anne's elderly companion shook her head and expressed concern about the goings-on.

"So very peculiar, is it not? And so suspect, too. Now, Mr Darcy, if you will excuse me, I must ensure your cousin's comfort." Shuffling her way to the door, she grumbled about the weather.

Darcy sighed. He had gleaned nothing, other than the fact that coldness and dampness had an adverse effect on the woman's rheumatism.

The abigail's interview proved to be another awkward affair. The refined lady was not only a French émigré but some sort of relation of Darcy's late uncle, Sir Lewis.

"I cannot help you, Mr Darcy," she said in her appealing accent, adding a Gallic shrug for good measure. Dubois then reminded him that she reported and answered directly to Anne, but she agreed the disappearances were a matter of great interest to her. "Comme c'est très mystérieux!"

Darcy had known questioning two such genteel ladies would be pointless.

Thursday, April 16

A variety of sporadic precipitation continued to fall, but Darcy craved escape. His spirits were jaded from writing odious business letters, rereading books, playing cards with the ladies, and listening to all the nonsense being uttered by them. He longed for playful impertinence, and as he explained to his aunt, he felt an overwhelming desire to call on the Collinses.

"How can you be so asinine as to think of such a thing, Darcy? I shall not hear of it. You must stay here and entertain Anne."

His cousin leant forwards in her chair. "If you do go, would you be so kind as to fetch a package for me? Miss Bennet should have something for Dubois."

Darcy agreed with alacrity while gaining his feet.

"Sit down!" Her ladyship gave a dissatisfied sniff when he did not comply. "The weather is ghastly. You will not be fit to be seen when you get there."

"A gentleman cannot always be within doors. I have grown restless. The parsonage is not far."

"I do not understand this sudden urge to call upon those people in this weather when you could stay here, warm and dry, and in more exalted and cherished company." With a twitch of her head, indicating her daughter, Lady Catherine gave Darcy a significant look that signified nothing at all to him. At his blank expression, she heaved a sigh. "Oh very well. At least, take a footman with an umbrella. If nothing else, he may have some sense."

Excusing himself, Darcy bounded up the stairs, and upon reaching his apartments, removed his coat. "Jonesby, I wish to exchange this waistcoat for the one that, according to you, matches my eyes…not that I am such a dandy to care about such things. Quickly, man."

Darcy shrugged off the buff-coloured waistcoat and waited and waited. "Jonesby, what the blazes is taking so long?"

The embarrassed valet returned from the dressing room empty-handed, save for a gold coin he handed to his master. "My apologies, sir. The indigo waistcoat appears to be missing. I distinctly remember unpacking it and storing it in the clothes press. However, when I looked in the appropriate drawer, all I found was that guinea."

Darcy heaved a heavy sigh. The theft was different from all the other disappearances, and someone clearly had no notion of the cost of a simple waistcoat. A guinea! To quote Dubois, how very mysterious.

"And have you read that one, Miss Bennet?" In the parlour at Hunsford, Darcy pointed to a table upon which rested a copy of Gulliver's Travels .

"Go on, Eliza." Mrs Collins smiled. "I know you are itching to say it."

Elizabeth's eyes lit with mirth. "I did, indeed, read Gulliver's Travels , sir. Rather swiftly , in fact."

Darcy did not care for wordplay in any form, and he was the wretchedest being in the world when it came to courteous falsehoods, but for her benefit alone, he smiled. "Speaking of travellers' tales, did you know that Mr Brinton keeps journals of his many journeys abroad?"

He knew she and his cousin had been at Rara Avis. But for what duration were they there? Had Elizabeth enjoyed the man's company? "I suppose he regaled you with colourful accounts of his visits to faraway lands."

Tilting her head, Elizabeth gave him a puzzled look. "No, he made no mention of such. I viewed a few of his paintings and met a pair of macaws. Oh, and Mr Brinton requested sets with your cousin and me at her ball."

Darcy damped down the tinge of jealousy heating his blood. "Then may I have the honour of standing up with you for two sets, one preferably being the supper?"

He heard a little gasp from Mrs Collins, and upon granting him the requested set and another of his choice, a pretty blush overspread Elizabeth's cheeks.

Dare I request the first or last? Then he remembered promising to dance the opening set with his cousin. Blast! He leant in. "Would you grant me the great honour of your last?"

Still blushing, Elizabeth nodded.

"Well, now that that is settled," said Mrs Collins, drawing Darcy's attention away from her captivating friend, "shall I fetch my husband from writing Sunday's sermon and set up a table for whist?"

"A moment please, if you will." Darcy smiled at the lady of the house. "May I also have the honour of standing up with you for a set?" Both the rector's wife and her friend seemed delighted by his request, and he felt rather proud of himself for thinking of Mrs Collins.

Once the card table was placed and they were seated round it, Darcy had an opportunity to test both his patience and his abilities. He listened with half an ear to Mr Collins's prattle while trying to remember which cards had been played and which ones remained. Such undertakings were made more difficult while sitting across from his distracting partner, the partner he wanted for the rest of his life. He was grateful to Mrs Collins for agreeing to keep score. Darcy was an intelligent, masterly gentleman, but dealing with more than three or four tasks at a time was beyond even him.

Much later, as he stood with the others by the front door and donned his greatcoat, he remembered something else with which he had been tasked. "Miss Bennet, I believe you have something for me to deliver to my cousin's maid."

"Oh yes." She turned away. "I shall return directly with?—"

"For shame, Cousin Elizabeth! Lady Catherine's nephew is not your personal courier!" Turning to his guest, Mr Collins begged pardon on behalf of his presumptuous relation.

There ensued then a bit of a commotion and fuss until Mrs Collins inserted herself into the fray.

"I shall fetch it for you, Eliza." Upon being told its location, she took her husband by the arm and led him away. "Do you not have that sermon to complete by tomorrow for Lady Catherine's approval?"

"Oh my dear Mrs Collins! You are so very..."

Their voices faded away, as did Darcy's surroundings. He had eyes and ears only for the couple's houseguest as she opened the door and glanced skywards.

"Finally, the clouds are clearing away. I can see the moon, a waxing crescent. There might even be a sunrise worth witnessing tomorrow."

While pulling on his gloves, Darcy took care to inform her there was a bench on a hill at the eastern edge of the park, a favourite spot of his, particularly in the mornings. Without thinking, he reached out and gently grasped her bare fingers, wishing he had not bothered with the gloves. Her eyes widened as she looked down at their joined hands, and his burgeoning smile fell flat. Now that I am holding them, dare I kiss her fingers or simply give them a gentle squeeze?

The ensuing awkwardness was dispelled by the return of Mrs Collins. Darcy released Elizabeth's hand to accept the valise stamped with her initials, then he bowed to both ladies.

"Good night. Thank you both for a most enjoyable evening." Plunking his hat upon his head, he stepped out into gathering darkness.

Being a gentleman, he resisted curiosity. Nothing could tempt him to violate Elizabeth's privacy by peeking inside the valise. Its contents would remain another mystery.

He ruminated then on their time together in Hertfordshire, back when he had foolishly thought a connexion to her and her family totally inappropriate. But that connexion, that attachment, that bond, was what he wanted more than anything in the world, and he could not help but reimagine a future together. Unreciprocated love and rejection might have broken his heart, but he would win hers, even if it took a lifetime. Well, not a lifetime. I should like to raise a family with her before we are old and grey.

Whatever boundaries she set would be respected, even though just being in her presence made his heart race. His stomach was often in his boots, and his grasp of the King's English sometimes failed him.

More awkward than when he was a stripling suffering from calf love over some young lady, being in love—truly in love—was a humbling experience.