When Darcy came close to her, clearly expecting her to turn towards him as she ordinarily did, she could not.
Everything was wrong.
And to make it worse, as soon as they left, she threw up, and Darcy tried so hard to pretend to care about her, and he worried over her, called the maid, had her sent up to her room to rest with biscuits and tea, and he promised to call the apothecary if she needed it.
Elizabeth wanted to scream in rage.
And then she felt cold again.
She was very likely with child.
The math now was nearly certain. It had been at least seven weeks since her last bleeding, her breasts became more tender each day, she was frequently tired, and every other symptom matched to the merest detail what she’d been told to observe.
It was, of course, possible that she would be proven wrong, or lose the child before it advanced far enough that she needed to tell Darcy, but the likeliest prospect was that she carried her husband's child.
This morning that thought had given her a sort of warm, confused glow. And now it disgusted and frightened her.
At least she wouldhavea child, who she could pour all of her interest into, like her mother had poured her energies intoimagining her daughters well settled.
There was nothing else left to her that her husband could not take away.
Chapter Twelve
The morning after his family left Darcy wondered if he’d somehow made Elizabeth angry with him.
He also was sleepy, he’d grown used to falling asleep with her, and it was now hard to sleep alone in a cold bed without anyone to hold, and without the reassuring sound of Elizabeth’s steady breaths.
She had been sick and after the carriages departed cast up her accounts suddenly in the entryway. That scared him. It wasn’t good when people got sick. They sometimes died. Mama died.
Long breaths. Let that fear go. He in fact had no special reason to worry about Elizabeth’s health, his wife was a healthy young woman who showed no signs of frailty.
It had only been one night.
She hadn’t wanted to join with him last night, and she had sent him back to his bedroom, claiming it would help her sleep and recover.
He needed her again.
Elizabeth had come down for breakfast, but beyond a few mumbled commonplaces, they had not said anything.
That was also different. He’d gotten used to hearing her voice. At first during the week in London, and later on the road, she had sometimes been quiet in this way. But in the three weeks since they returned to Pemberley, life had become what he’d imagined it would be with Elizabeth. Cheerful, full of clever conversations, full of opportunities for sparkling debates, teasing, and chances to make her laugh and to laugh himself.
Friendly. Warm. Like nothing he’d felt since Mama had died.
And it was all gone this morning.
Elizabeth looked more ill than she had the previous day, her face pale and white. She had bags under her eyes, and she only ate a few bites. She left early for a walk, and waved off Georgiana and himself when they offered to join her, saying that she had a headache at present and just wanted to see if it would take its leave if she walked in circles without saying anything.
Darcy considered that an odd way of dealing with a headache, but he suppressed his urge to force Elizabeth to sit near the fire, covered in blankets until she felt better. Darcy thought that nature generally pointed the best direction to the body for recovery, and if Elizabeth felt that she ought to walk in the cold to refresh herself, then that was more likely to do good than anything else.
Darcy retreated to his desk.
He had a full stack of papers. The work of the estate that had collected over the two weeks of the house party, plans for the spring, plans for investments, a proposal that one of his neighbors had made for an additional school to be opened that would be shared by the children in the eastern part of Darcy’s lands with the children of his own tenants.
All of the words swam before his eyes.
Anxiety for Elizabeth. And an unpleasant feeling that something was deeplywrongbetween them, which sat in his stomach until it curdled.
Giving him a welcome break from his worries, Mrs. Reynolds entered the room with a cautious knock.
