––––––––
The ball was formally opened and mostly underway by the time they gained entry. The Bingley sisters had insisted on going an hour later than specified on the invitation card and as a result the whole party had to wait for half an hour and a quarter to pass before they set off. The journey had taken another quarter of an hour.
"We wouldn't be late Charles," Mrs. Hurst had declared daintily when her brother deigned to complain. "We will be fashionably late and what better way to impact our superiority?"
And that was it. Their arrival was well timed to intrude upon the ball in a way that would ensure their entrance was noticed by all and sundry. To the immense satisfaction of the ladies and annoyance of Darcy and Bingley, their fineries were immediately remarked upon and the comeliness of the party excessively praised. Whispers rent the air about their polish and fashion that got Caroline and Mrs. Hurst walking on air. The ball was as lively as a marketplace and everyone, it seemed, was having a great time. They were heralded into the room by the butler in the house with great flourish; causing eyes to follow them as they made their way in. Immediately, Sir William Lucas came to wait on them and show them to a table. The women basked in the attention and magnanimously commented on his house, clothes and round look. To say the congenial portly man was pleased would be a gross understatement.
With the ball starting on such a pleasing note, the ladies were in high spirits and their disposition was more favourable to the country folks. It didn't take long for Caroline to be asked for a dance. Bingley, upon arrival, set himself to immediately be on the watch for Jane Bennet and set off for her as soon as her dancing partner released her. Mr. Hurst took his wife to the dance floor and Darcy was left to his means. Unknown to the rest of his party, he had been on the watch for Elizabeth Bennet most discretely but he was yet to glean a sight of her fair self.
Seeing no other alternative than to walk around the room as was his habit anyway at such gathering, he stood up to do exactly so. His prance took him to an assembly of gentlemen in deep conversation about the state of the country. There was a single lady in their midst and Darcy was none too surprised to find Miss Elizabeth sparring words with a Colonel Forster with whom Fitzwilliam had made an earlier acquaintance at the very first assembly they attended upon their arrival at Netherfield.
"I tell you, sir, that it is ignorance rather than mere poverty that spurs these attacks on industrial machinery employed in the factories," she was saying most passionately. "Perhaps, if these people came to the realization that an acquired knowledge of the craft of the same machinery they break so carelessly might land them a good employment, their protests might come to an end."
Fitzwilliam did not hesitate to join into the conversation. It was the perfect opportunity to engage Elizabeth Bennet in a discourse with him, albeit indirectly and he would not shun such presentation. "I would agree with Miss Bennet here but for the statement about learning about the machinery craft. These men understand that the machinery has come to displace them from work; their protests stem from this knowledge and they sought to do anything in their power to stop this from happening- though, of course, engineering and the sciences has come to stay in England much to their imminent disappointment."
The party turned to look at him and he couldn't help but beam at his own grandiloquence. He positioned himself to the left of Miss Bennet who was shooting small daggers at him with her dark eyes, but he smiled grandly in her direction. He couldn't imagine why she frowned so fiercely; he had only buttressed her point, had he not?
"Well said, Mr. Darcy," Colonel Forster said, slapping him rather hard on the back, "and from one who hitherto has felt no need to join any sort of conversation so far, too."
Darcy took the jibe in good stride but felt instant regret when Colonel Forster took it upon himself to introduce him to the gentlemen present in the gathering. The conversation moved to safer grounds when the ball was commented upon and Elizabeth took it upon herself to badger the colonel to host a ball at his residence. The man tried his utmost to talk his way out of the demand but Elizabeth would not let him be until she wheedled a promise out of his mouth. The ball was obviously the purpose for her entrenchment in the midst of the gentlemen; because after extracting the promise, she took her leave of the assembly, thus leaving him with his purpose of entering the discussion unfulfilled.
It took another hour before he could extricate himself from the gathering whereupon Caroline seized him for a dance.
The ball was nigh drawing to an end when he spotted his evasive mistress at a table with another lady; Miss Charlotte Lucas, the daughter of their host for the night. The two were involved in a conversation that got Miss Elizabeth's brows knitted in a frown; and he could speculate that he was the topic of such unfavourable disposition when she glanced up to see him approaching and the frown marks deepened. Miss Charlotte said something to her and she set her jaw most determinedly and turned to him just as he reached the two.
"Did you not think, Mr. Darcy, that I expressed myself uncommonly well just now, when I was teasing Colonel Forster to give us a ball at Meryton?" she asked him with a glimmer in her eyes that informed him to proceed with caution.
"With great energy," he allowed, "but it is always a subject which makes a lady energetic."
Her lips thinned at the last comment and she regarded him with a curious look. "You are severe on us," she told him.
He was left with nothing to say to that—or most appropriately nothing to say that would improve her apparent dislike of his character though this, he could ascribe no reason for.
"It will be her turn soon to be teased," Miss Lucas remarked, taking herself off. "I am going to open the instrument, Eliza, and you know what follows."
Eliza, Fitzwilliam thought in increased fascination, the sobriquet aptly suits the bearer. At present, the look she let upon him was abandoned in favour of frowning at her friend.
"You are a very strange creature by way of a friend! Always wanting me to play and sing before anybody and everybody! If my vanity had taken a musical turn, you would have been invaluable; but as it is, I would really rather not sit down before those who must be in the habit of hearing the very best performers."
"But you must, Eliza," Miss Lucas persevered, "for if you do not do this for me, someone else will and that person might not be half as good as you are."
Elizabeth sighed in resignation and said; "Very well, if it must be so, it must."
With a glance towards Mr. Darcy that told him that she was not through with him yet, she said, "There is a fine old saying, which everybody here is of course familiar with- 'keep your breath to cool your porridge' - and I shall keep mine to swell my song."
He watched her go toward the musical instrument thinking about the night at the tavern and how she failed to recognize him still. He must not have made a particularly lasting impression on her memory then. The thought that she pretended crossed his mind but he dismissed the thought immediately. Nobody was as good as that—at least not to him, Fitzwilliam Darcy. He had a discerning eye and it was with the same eye that he had figured the plans of the scoundrel whose activities he was even now closely monitoring during his stay at Netherfield. Turning his attention to Elizabeth, he allowed that her performance was pleasing though she could do with a bit more lessons for excellence. Two songs later, she hurriedly left the instrument to her immediate sibling Mary, who it seemed had been impatiently in want of playing at the display the entire time he sister was at it.
As Mary applied herself at the instrument, Darcy expected Elizabeth to come back directly for him but he couldn't be more wrong. He was obviously forgotten as she made her way to the table where Miss Lucas was now seated with others of her sisters. In a bit of annoyance at the slight he knew really had to be deliberate, he squared his shoulders and endeavoured to listen to the sorry tunes coming off the instrument that Mary domineered. The third Benne sister was playing a concerto and her performance actually excelling more than her sister's was exerted with such affectedness and obvious display of vanity that it rendered the music quite insipid to Darcy's hearing.
Perhaps, he thought pensively, he was only biased in his judgement because of his preoccupation with the other sister. At the end of the concerto, the last of the Bennet ladies applauded her loudly, engaging the same from their companions; some officers and other Lucas ladies present at the ball. Shortly, the entire team of officers and ladies took to a corner of the room to dance. At this time, Fitzwilliam was infinitely bored; having been thwarted in his objective of attending the ball and left to his own device by Bingley, his sisters and brother in law. He was not quick to notice that Sir William Lucas had come to stand beside him, else he would have made his exit before the man opened his mouth to address him.
"What a charming amusement for young people this is, Mr. Darcy! There is nothing like dancing after all. I consider it as one of the first refinements of polished society."
Fitzwilliam considered himself hoodwinked into a conversation for the second time in that evening and he wasn't feeling particularly charmed by the happenstance.
"Certainly, sir; and it has the advantage also of being in vogue amongst the less polished societies of the world. Every savage can dance."
The benevolent smile on his host's face irritated him to no end. "Your friend performs delightfully," the man continued and Darcy turned to see that Bingley indeed had joined the dancing fray. "I doubt not that you are an adept in the science yourself, Mr. Darcy," Sir William challenged.
The challenge captured his attention to look into the man's blue-eyed gaze wherein he saw a wealth of merriment at his expense.
"You saw me dance at Meryton, I believe, sir," he ventured to ask.
"Yes, indeed, and received no inconsiderable pleasure from the sight," said the man most pleasurably before he added, "Do you often dance at St. James's?"
To that, Darcy had an unequivocal answer: "Never, sir."
His host was not a man to be easily warded off by such taciturn reply, however.
"Do you not think it would be a proper compliment to the place?"
"It is a compliment which I never pay to any place if I can avoid it."
The conversation seized for a while and just when Darcy would have turned on his heels, Sir Williams piped up again.
"You have a house in town, I conclude?"
Darcy bowed slightly, seeing no need to answer otherwise. His companion saw that as an invitation to continue with his line of thought.
"I had once had some thought of fixing in town myself, for I am fond of superior society; but I did not feel quite certain that the air of London would agree with Lady Lucas."
Darcy observed the statement to be one deliberately made toward engaging a reply from him- a reply that was not necessarily favourable towards the country folks. In this end, he saw that he must be a favourite subject under discussion by many in the society. The knowledge did not cause him undue stress; each individual was entitled to his own opinion and if those about him were less than flattering, he could hardly take a cane to their backsides.
He was thinking these thoughts when he observed Elizabeth approach. Before Darcy could blink an eye, Sir William called to her.
"My dear Miss Eliza, why are you not dancing?" he asked and without waiting to hear a response from her, turned to him: "Mr. Darcy, you must allow me to present this young lady to you as a very desirable partner. You cannot refuse to dance, I am sure, when so much beauty is before you."
The frown of displeasure upon the said beauty's face went unnoticed by Sir William as he grabbed her hand and placed it in Darcy's who noticed the frown greatly. Elizabeth drew back her hand as if it was placed on hot coals. She expressed her discontentment to Sir William in some agitation.
"Indeed, sir, I have not the least intention of dancing. I entreat you not to suppose that I moved this way in order to beg for a partner."
Darcy heard the unspoken words that ended her gentle censure- "...least of all, not Mr. Darcy."
"But I would have asked had he not beat me to it," Fitzwilliam embellished. He knew that every woman liked to be flattered but apparently not Elizabeth. The look she pointed in his direction was so disbelieving that he grinned his contrite.
"But you did not," she said, "and even if you had, I would still have refused."
Sir William deemed to intercede on his companion's behalf here to no end but Miss Elizabeth remained uncommonly adamant in her refusal; finally excusing herself most politely. Sir William soon followed suit, granting Darcy respite of the undesired company at long last.
Lest he be besieged by other unwanted company, Darcy took himself to a quiet corner of the room. There he stood alone thinking again of Miss Elizabeth and what he knew of her when Miss Bingley came upon him. From his concerted effort to remain on his own, he knew that she must have singled him out.
"I can guess the subject of your reverie," said she to him, standing shoulder to shoulder with him though she was lesser in height.
"I should imagine not," he chuckled.
"You are considering how insupportable it would be to pass many evenings in this manner; in such society," she proceeded to tell him. "And indeed I am quite of your opinion. I was never more annoyed! The insipidity, and yet the noise; the nothingness, and yet the self-importance of all those people! What would I give to hear your strictures on them!"
Her confidence in her supposition about his thoughts caused him immense amusement in the midst of his boredom.
"Your conjecture is totally wrong, I assure you. My mind was more agreeably engaged. I have been meditating on the very great pleasure which a pair of fine eyes in the face of a pretty woman can bestow."
Never having heard him in such praise of a woman, Caroline Bingley immediately observed her companion's face for signs of seriousness and was flummoxed to see that Mr. Darcy meant his every word.
"Pray tell Mr Darcy - which of the women in this place has got you so enthralled to the magnitude of quietly meditating about her and singing her praises to me?"
Mr. Darcy in likewise spirit with which Charles teased his sister proceeded to fearlessly bedazzle her with his reply.
"Miss Elizabeth Bennet," he announced simply.
A soft gasp followed his announcement and then: "Miss Elizabeth Bennet! I am all astonishment," she declared needlessly. Darcy could see her surprise written clearly across her dissatisfied expression. "How long has she been such a favourite?" she asked him. And then, trying for some semblance of composure, she added. "And pray, when am I to wish you joy?"
He decided that Caroline Bingley could destroy a man's peace of mind and quiet meditation at the very chance she got.
"That is exactly the question which I expected you to ask," he told her in scorn. "A lady's imagination is very rapid; it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony, in a moment. I knew you would be wishing me joy."
Her reply if he actually had considered any romantic illusions to Elizabeth, would sufficiently douse them: "Nay, if you are serious about it, I shall consider the matter is absolutely settled. You will be having a charming mother-in-law, indeed; and, of course, she will always be at Pemberley with you."
Caroline Bingley knew that Pemberley was his sanctuary and he hated any mention of anybody intruding upon it. To her words he made no reply, assuming an air of enduring lack of interest. Observing his silence and mistaking it for complacency towards her, Caroline began to paint horrid pictures of his life as from her opinion with Elizabeth Bennet should he get it into his head to propose to her.
"Why, I can imagine the whole of the family might just move in with her two! They are not so well off in the first place and..."
She must be unaware that he had stopped listening, offering her only his physical presence- for she hardly paused to draw breath in her one sided discourse.