“I’m sorry. I had not thought to tell you she would be here tonight. I forgot you once admired her.” Darcy handed Charles Bingley a glass of wine, before pouring one for himself.
“Oh, it’s fine, Darcy. Heavens you don’t think I’d still be bothered.” Despite what he said, Bingley did look somewhat bothered and glanced across at the Turners. “He’s a great hulking fellow.”
“Yes.”
“I wouldn’t like to get into an argument with him.”
Darcy agreed. “Maybe we ought to have set him on Frederick Yorke. He’s a shrewd man of business too, I hear.”
“Thank you for your help today, Darcy. I don’t know how I might have managed matters on my own.”
Darcy shrugged. “I felt somewhat responsible, your sister having been under my care at the time. Think no more of it. Where is Mr Yorke?”
“Still in the study. Working his way through your illegal but very fine brandy and growing more belligerent about the whole dowry business by the minute. I don’t think he’ll join us before dinner.”
“Perhaps it is best.”
“She looks happy, Miss Bennet, I mean Mrs Turner,” Bingley said, gesturing across the room to where Elizabeth and Jane were laughing together at something Mr Turner had said.
“Bingley, my dear friend,” Darcy said, “there is an apology I should have made to you a long time ago. I steered you away from Jane Bennet, I convinced you she was unsuitable.”
Darcy was about to go on but Bingley waved away such talk with a sweep of his arm. “I allowed myself to be influenced. I was a grown man, Darcy. I ought to have made my own decisions. I might have returned to Hertfordshire at any time, I did not. And I…all is well now. Cecilia is…” His voice drifted away and Bingley sighed, looking Jane’s way. “She is still very beautiful though.”
“Yes, she is.”
Bingley looked up at his friend but found Darcy’s gaze on Elizabeth Bennet, rather than on her sister, and wondered, not for the first time, about how his old friend always became so peculiarly distracted in that particular lady’s presence.
Time was ticking by, dinner would soon be announced. The evening was not going as Darcy had planned, or imagined. When he’d been winding his weary way down from Scotland he had thought he would see Elizabeth, ask discreetly if she had received his note and she would smile at him in that special way of hers. His fate would be sealed, a proposal offered and accepted.
Instead, there was a drawing room full of the oddest collection of characters, the air was stifled with past relationships and Elizabeth would not meet his gaze for anything above the briefest of moments. She was embarrassed, he knew, and understood, but she was making him uncertain again and he did not want to feel even the slightest doubt.
He regretted not stepping out to call on her this morning. He should have left Bingley and Yorke to sort matters for themselves. It seemed impossible to get close enough to her to say anything private. She was ensconced in a small crowd of ladies. He could not walk right into the middle of it and pull her out. He brooded and waited for several minutes at the window before something happened that gave him cause to be near her.
Sophy Yorke presented Mrs Mountford with a sketch and she exclaimed loudly with pleasure.
“How wonderful! Elizabeth, you must come and look.”
Darcy crossed the room too, intrigued, and was with Mrs Mountford a few moments before Elizabeth. The sketch the older lady held in her hand was one of her favourite niece. It was a very fine likeness of Elizabeth, sat with her knees drawn up and her arms about them, an unusually serious expression on her face. Miss Yorke, he thought, had done a wonderful job of recreating the amber sparks in her dark eyes and her long, fine lashes. Elizabeth’s countenance when she arrived beside him and studied the sketch from over Mrs Mountford’s shoulder was a source of fascination to Darcy. Her head first tilted to the left and then to the right. Her lips pursed, a small frown creased her forehead.
Sophy Yorke was looking at Elizabeth too, slightly worried at her reaction.
“I think you have rather flattered me.” She said at last to Sophy, very quietly.
“Not at all.”
“But when was this?”
“The day of the picnic, I took my book to sketch the view, but found it a little uninspiring. You, on the other hand, were sat still for once. I started it then and finished it later from memory. You do not mind, do you? I thought Mrs Mountford might like it.”
“I do indeed. I adore it, such a preoccupied look on you, Elizabeth, what were you thinking of at the time?”
“I…I cannot remember. Do I…? Is that truly what I look like?”
Darcy suddenly understood her confusion. She was not vain. She had no real concept of her beauty. He wanted to whisper in ear, ‘yes Elizabeth, it is exactly how you look. You really are that pretty. I know I once described you as tolerable and I know you overheard me, but I was a fool and quickly realised my mistake.’ He could not in company, say anything of the sort, so instead muttered something vague about it being an excellent likeness and complimented Sophy Yorke on her talent.
Caroline Yorke wandered over and gave the sketch a cursory glance. “Charming, you must sketch me, my dear sister. Of course, Frederick wants a proper portrait for his study, but something like this would do in the meantime I suppose.”
Mrs Mountford smiled at Sophy Yorke. “Oh this is far better than a stuffy posed portrait. It is so lifelike; it practically leaps off the page. I must get it framed. I wonder if Mr Turner would take it to London for me and have it done there.”
She called Mr Turner over and asked him directly and he smilingly agreed. He took the sketch from Mrs Mountford and whisked it away for safekeeping. Darcy wildly considered jumping on the man’s back and wrestling the precious drawing from his grasp, for he dearly would have loved it for himself. However, the real Elizabeth Bennet was now before him. He caught her eye and nodded towards the window, and thank heavens, the living, breathing Elizabeth followed him as he walked over. At last, they were able to talk, yet all he could manage at first was to ask her if she was well.
“Yes, at least, I am now.”
“Oh. You have been indisposed?”
“No, I meant.” She laughed and shook her head. “It does not matter.”
They both looked at the floor for a while. This will not do he admonished himself, you are a man of two and thirty. Gathering his resolve, he opened his mouth to speak but then she did likewise and they spoke over each other.
He apologised. “Please go on.”
“I had not expected to see Mr Bingley here.” She said.
“Yes. There was of course business to discuss. Now he is here, I see the disservice I did when I interfered between him and your sister. I hope you know I have long regretted it.”
“Mr Darcy, please do not trouble yourself. Jane got over Mr Bingley in time and is very happy now.”
He chuckled. “I rather meant the disservice I did Bingley. She would have made him a wonderful wife.”
“Jane would make any man a wonderful wife,” Elizabeth replied with pride.
Darcy fiddled with his cuffs. He was forced to admit it was one of those occasions when the level of his admiration for her rendered him quite useless. Though he did not now lack the opportunity to whisper words of reassurance, for there was no-one close enough to overhear, the softness of her large, dark eyes, her nervous smile and her pretty little nose, strangled his intent. All he could do was stare hopelessly for a few moments and then dinner was called.