Elizabeth laughed. “And so, I was distracted.” She saw Georgiana’s pout at having to listen to them flirt, and said, “Once more. Let us try again.”
This time Elizabeth relaxed, and after their song was done Darcy clapped appreciatively, and Georgiana at once threw them into one of the other pieces they had practiced so insistently. And then yet another.
The clear look of appreciation that Darcy sent her, whether she mangled the notes or sang a quarter octave off tune or not, lifted her spirits, and she found herself making fewer mistakes in her happiness. Slowly she became lost in the music, and in her awareness of his presence, the breaths he took, thesmiles that crossed his face, the way that his free hand floated up and down, matching the rhythm.
Georgiana seemed to let her lead the music, and covered with flourishes any mistakes Elizabeth made, and the younger girl kept the beat always correct.
“Ha!” Georgiana exclaimed when they finished, as Darcy looked at Elizabeth with an expression that made her melt. “You’ve never played so well, Lizzy.”
“Have I satisfied your aim to impress?” Elizabeth grinned at her.
“Oh, wholly,” Georgiana replied.
“Then I shall end this interlude on such a triumph.”
“Lizzy?” Darcy asked. “Do you prefer that to Elizabeth?”
The low way his voice said Elizabeth. It sounded as though he had rolled her name over in his mind so many thousands of times.
Elizabeth shivered. “I like Elizabeth very much when you say it.”
Georgiana looked between the two of them. The girl returned to the piano and sat down, with her fingers at once working on a soft piece of chamber music. Without missing a note she said, “Go talk, talk. I will just play to entertain myself.”
There was something charged in the atmosphere, and Elizabeth hardly understood it… or maybe she understood it very well. She rather suspected that if Georgiana was not in the room, they would have immediately begun to desperately kiss each other.
Always before, even when he came to her in bed, she had kept a barrier between herself and Darcy. A thing in her head always reminded her that she must dislike him, at least a little, and not fail to think a little ill of him.
She felt nothing but a coiled need for him, deep in her stomach. Every time their eyes met, that need became stronger.
She was sure Darcy felt the same.
No mystery! He had listened to her. He had explained himself. He had corrected his error with Bingley and Jane. He had even called upon her aunt and uncle.
Elizabeth could not continue to look directly at him. “I am very grateful that you called on my aunt and uncle.”
“Excellent people,” Darcy replied. His eyes when she met them spoke about an entirely different topic than his words. “I robbed myself when I hesitated. Very genteel. I had been prejudiced against them, because they were in trade, and now I have learned that prejudice was simply another one of my many flaws.”
“I think I have seldom felt so light as when I read as an addendum to Jane’s letter that you had called.”
“Mr. Gardiner is… his conversation is worth pursuing. I would have called again to show them respect, but I dined with them chiefly because I enjoyed it.”
“You dined with my aunt and uncle?” Elizabeth looked at him with a new delight. “I had not yet known that.”
“I imagine that is one of the pieces of news contained in that mountain of letters with the carriage — were you yet informed that we formed a plan for them to visit for six weeks over the summer?”
“What?”
There was a smile in Darcy’s face that suggested that he was delighted that he had the chance to give Elizabeth this information himself.
“I had heard that Jane and Bingley were to stay a long time this summer, but not this plan.”
“The plan is for all of us to come north together in a big caravan after the season ends,” Darcy replied. “I believe Bingley means to stay for two months, but your uncle said that he did not think his business would allow him to extend it past six weeks,and maybe even only to four.”
Elizabeth grinned at him with open pleasure.
Darcy took her hand. “I do worry,” he said smiling, “that you may not see so much of your uncle as you hope. I mentioned to him how well stocked the river was with trout, and…”
Darcy shrugged in a way that made Elizabeth laugh.
