Chapter 5

CHAPTER FIVE

E lizabeth found her way to the ground floor easily enough, but discovering a door through which to make her escape onto the grounds proved to be more difficult than she had anticipated. Finding a mysterious lack of servants to direct her, she instead let herself tentatively into several different rooms in hopes of either discovering a way out or someone to request assistance from, but she was thwarted at every turn.

In the first two rooms—unused parlours papered in cool hues with elegant designs; the late Lady Anne showed a decided preference for blues, greens, and ivory—there were only windows, and she was not about to get caught letting herself out of one of those. There was no ladylike explanation for such an action when Pemberley, presumably, had a number of suitable doors at hand. She left these without even bothering to cross the threshold.

Another room turned out to be a closet. She moved on quickly.

Finally, she let herself into what she had initially believed to be the library—even though she had no notion of how she might have found herself in that particular part of the house again—but it turned out to be another private study. If she had to guess, she would say that it was directly beneath the one off the gallery, though her sense of direction was obviously of no use at Pemberley. Had she accepted the position of its mistress back in the spring, she would have insisted that someone make her a map of this confusing place to carry around with her.

Although intended for a similar purpose, this room was a decided contrast to the study Elizabeth had already seen. Where the other had obviously been designed to meet the requirements of a lady, this one was more masculine in quality. A large, heavy-looking desk built from a dark mahogany was placed at one end of the room, partially surrounded by loaded bookshelves at its back and sides, and an empty hearth was carved into the wall at the other. In between, there was a cosy sitting area of four bottle-green leather chairs surrounding a fur rug.

To her deepest horror, Elizabeth realised that she had stumbled into Mr Darcy's private sanctum.

As she placed one foot behind her, ready to flee and pretend she had never been there, a flicker of warm sunlight snared Elizabeth's attention. She raised her eyes to the far wall where the source could be found: a bank of nearly floor-to-ceiling windows surrounding a pair of glass doors! Considering the view of the lake through the panes, she knew that these would lead her out onto the grounds.

Elizabeth hesitated only a moment before reversing course and stepping fully into the study, gently and quietly closing the door to the hall behind her. I have no intention of disturbing anything , she reminded herself as anxiety tightened in her stomach, but I must get outside and find my aunt and uncle!

She crossed the room on eagerly quick feet, intent on escape. She dodged around one of the green leather chairs, gaze fixed upon the cheerily gleaming doors ahead of her, and imagined the relief of warm sunlight bathing her cheeks once she was free of the manor house. How sweet the fresh air would taste!

Perhaps because her pace was so hurried, she stumbled over nothing and had to pause to catch herself, arms flailing for purchase on any nearby surface. She was saved from ignominy by the edge of Mr Darcy's desk, and thankfully, her balance was regained without injuring any of the contents of the room.

"Very graceful, Lizzy," she grumbled, grateful that the inexplicably absent servants had not appeared only to witness her clumsiness. She chuckled darkly at the notion that she might have the secret ability to conjure others by the power of her mortification. It certainly felt that way at times.

As Elizabeth righted herself, the glossy, dappled surface of a painting hung behind Mr Darcy's desk caught her eye. It had not been visible from the hall entrance because of the way it was sunk within the wall of bookshelves surrounding it, but it was, in her inexpert opinion, an exquisite composition, one that held her spellbound for several seconds. Distantly, she wondered why it was not on display in the gallery upstairs.

She at first thought that it was another likeness of Mr Darcy and his sister—perhaps explaining her strange fascination with it—but the pair in the portrait, upon second consideration, were a touch too old to be the current master and the young Miss Darcy. The man, however, bore a striking resemblance to the Mr Darcy she knew, so she supposed that he must be the elder Mr George Darcy, Fitzwilliam's father. It was easy to deduce from there that the woman then must be his mother, the dearly departed Lady Anne Darcy.

The couple was posed together in a traditional configuration—he standing behind with his hand on her shoulder while his lady sat upon a sofa in the French style—and they appeared united as master and mistress of Pemberley. There was no sign of their children, so she supposed it must be a wedding portrait—an assumption which was borne out by Lady Anne's youthful appearance and the outdated cut of their clothing. They looked elegant together, regal even, as they gazed benevolently upon their beholder. Elizabeth imagined, with a pang, that they brought much comfort to their son as he toiled over estate business.

Mr George Darcy was irrefutably handsome, just like his son, with a touch of grey at his temples that was nothing if not distinguished. She suspected that Mr George Darcy, with the crinkles at the corners of his eyes and the gentle smile he had also passed down to his progeny, would have known better than to offer an insulting proposal and expect acceptance.

Lady Anne Darcy, seated before her husband on an embroidered sofa with a pug lounging on her lap, was much younger by comparison, perhaps no older than Elizabeth was now. Her own hand, resting upon her husband's as he touched her shoulder, bespoke genuine affection, and the lady's eyes showed a certain merriment that seemed unfeigned to Elizabeth.

"Would they have approved of their son's choice?" Elizabeth wondered aloud to the painting as much as to herself, gazing upon the faces of what could have been her in-laws. "Or would they have shared Mr Darcy's opinion—that I am beneath their consequence?"

She sighed, unaccountably saddened by the thought that these long-dead strangers might have disliked her. Mr George Darcy, like his son, came from a long line of wealthy gentlemen, originating at the time of William the Conqueror, as detailed by Mrs Reynolds earlier in the afternoon. Lady Anne, of course, was the daughter of an earl and entitled to her share of pride. She hardly looked as haughty as her sister, Lady Catherine, but she surely would have considered herself above a nobody from Hertfordshire.

"And what would they have thought of my refusal?"

Thump.

Elizabeth jumped several inches off the floor and spun around, looking for the source of the noise that had startled her—a frequent occurrence since finding herself alone in this maze of a house. With her hands both braced upon the desk at her back, she surveyed the room but found nothing that immediately looked out of place. No servant come to chase her away. Only…a book. On the floor.

Quivering slightly from the fright, Elizabeth released her hold on the desk and crossed the room to approach the displaced leather-bound tome that rested in front of the hearth. It appeared to be the Darcy family Bible, and it lay splayed open along its binding, its pages spread for perusal. Its stand, from which it had apparently fallen, stood stoically to one side of the great fireplace, empty of its charge.

Elizabeth knelt down, intending to pick it up and return it to its place, and her eyes caught some of the words on the page.

We willexult and rejoice in you;we will extolyour love more than wine;rightly do they love you.

Elizabeth, who had been reaching for the Bible, retracted her hand as if she had mistakenly placed it in the fire. Her heart thudded against the inside of her ribs as she stood up and backed away a pace. Of all the verses in all of Christendom, how could the tome have opened to that one just as she was contemplating how the elder Darcys would have considered her as a prospective daughter-in-law? It was a perfectly respectable verse, one that might even have been comforting to her were she not suddenly worried that, far from being alone, her steps were being stalked by an invisible presence. Elizabeth rubbed at her arms, still encased in the sleeves of her spencer, feeling goose-flesh erupt across her skin.

I must leave. Now.

Abandoning the book where it lay, Elizabeth rushed to the glass doors, wrenched one open, and virtually threw herself out onto the lawn.