Darcy did not reply.
Obviously.
But he was fairly sure that the way in which he did not reply only gave his cousin further confirmation as to the correctness of his guess.
“Well, that hardly sounds so unrespectable as a chambermaid. I’d visit you if you married a chambermaid. Any case, I win this game.” He yawned. “Mind if I sleep here? Too late to be wandering through the cold, dark, no doubt icy streets while seeking my own lodgings in a less fashionable quarter.”
Darcy rolled his eyes. “You know you are always welcome.”
“Then I’ll venture to say it once more: I think you are in love with this girl from how you appear — I can tell the signs. And if you are in love with her, you ought to marry her, no matter what her family is like, what her deficiencies are, and what other considerations might lead you to hesitate.”
Darcy thought about this after it was just him sitting by the fire.
He admired the brandy in the glass, turning it this way and that in the firelight. Maybe his cousin was right.
He ought to marry a woman who he loved.
And even if he had not beenblightedby his illness and the resulting difficulties, he had suffered. He deserved some compensation — and marrying as he wishedwouldbe a very good compensation for his suffering.
He always did what the Darcy name required… but perhaps he should for once, in one, and only in one, significant matter, act to please solely himself.
Darcy was a man who was scrupulously honest with himself, and that honesty required him to admit that at times a man might permit himself an indulgence without damaging his general character and credibility in the world. And at times he might even deserve such an indulgence.
To make a wife of a diamond picked out of the muck of the Bennets’ pigsty.
To make a wife of a woman who he would be always proud of, though he could never be proud of her connections or antecedents.
This was a worthy choice.
His judgement and his character had seemed opposed to the choice of such a wife, but he now saw that that was a wholly mistaken attitude. He owed his family something, but he also owed himself something.
Chapter Sixteen
Each day Elizabeth spent hours outdoors, enjoying sodden English fog, branches bare of leaf and songbird, and the distance from Mama and her yet undiminished resentment.
She reallyoughtto be there, at home, scolding everyone every time they spoke loudly for bothering Jane’s nerves. Butthatwould also bother Jane’s nerves — in fact, if Jane was to be believed, her nerves rather preferred the comforting noise of home and her sisters to the sodden quietness that the instructions from Mr. Thompson said were necessary for the wellbeing of a blind woman.
Elizabeth looked up at the sky. One cloud was a carriage and four, while another was shaped like France.
Jane couldn’t see them.
But Elizabeth knew that Jane did not want her to feel melancholy, and Elizabeth was in no way fitted for melancholy feelings. She was young, in full possession of her faculties, and autumn had almost flipped into winter.
So few leaves remained on the branches! The piles of leaves on the ground were browning and mulching and slowly turning into soil.
Happiness, such a fragile effervescent thing.
Elizabeth could not keep it away, even when she viewed it as inappropriate and ill timed.
Jane was becoming happier day by day.
That was a reason for Elizabeth to be happy.
That outburst, the chance to rail angrily against the universe, the Almighty, and those around her had paradoxically left Jane better pleased with all three.
The following day Elizabeth saw Jane authentically smile, more than once, and when she cried, she did not hide it from Elizabeth.
Jane’s strength had recovered now to the point where she could walk and stand nearly as well as ever, and they had practiced guiding her up and down the stairs, around the walks outside, and through the dining rooms.
