Elizabeth knew from how Darcy sighed that, rather than bringing him any joy, this reminder of Wickham’s death again made him think about how he had now permanently lost a man who had once been one of his dearest friends. She placed her hand on Darcy’s arm and rubbed a small circle around.
He looked back at her with that sweet, heart stopping smile of his. Those serious eyes that were so appreciative of her.
“Oh, you two are so saccharine! Like doves and other love birds. Everyone says you are as pretty a couple as Charlie and Janey. But I don’t think so.”
“No?” Elizabeth asked with a laugh.
“Jane is quite too angelic, I knowyou,Lizzy. I remember that time you substituted the salt for the sugar just as a joke. Janey would never have done that.”
“No!” Elizabeth cried. “Do not reveal my every poor deed to Darcy.”
Darcy looked at her with those eyes that he had when he wanted to kiss her.
But in addition to Lydia, Mary was also trailing them, wearing a light dress due to the warmth of the day, and holding a book out in front of her. She’d glance up every half a minute or so, both to check her footing, and to ensure that the two of them were not engaged in any behavior that was unbecoming a couple which had not yet made the marital oaths to each other.
“I have loads more stories about Elizabeth,” Lydia said cheerfully to Darcy. “But I shall only reveal them if you buy me a ribbon. Papa isn’t even letting me have the rest of my allowance for the month.”
“Despicable,” Darcy replied solemnly. “Not even your allowance?”
Lydia shoved him too, rather like she had shoved Elizabeth. Elizabeth smiled to see how she was starting to treat Darcy as also a member of the family, and she liked to see how Darcy accepted that gesture of disrespect as the friendliness that it was, rather than becoming offended or awkward.
A minute later he said, “It is very difficult for your father, you know.”
Lydia harrumphed.
“You have learned a lesson, and youknowthat you learned the lesson. And besides, in the end you didnotchoose to go with the scoundrel, yet at the same time you must confess that you showed that your judgement lacked something.”
“I wouldn’t make thesamemistake again.”
“The set of mistakes that it is possible to make is quite wide. A promise that you would not make any given mistake is not sufficient to make your guardian happy. It is hard… The thing is, Lydia, your father would feel it deeply in his heart if anything really bad happened to you — he likely already does, even though nothing very bad happened.”
“Yes, but can’t he just trust me? I swear, I won’t do anything likethatagain.”
Darcy smiled. “It is his duty to worry and be scared. You should be a little tolerant of him.”
With a huff, Lydia groaned. “But it’s notfair.”
Elizabeth laughed again.
Later that afternoon, after ribbons, gloves and bonnets had all been purchased for Lydia, they walked back towards Longbourn, with Lydia and Maria Lucas walking ahead of them in close conversation. Mary still trailed slowly behind them, her nose still in a book of sermons — Elizabeth really did not understandhowshe could find that particular book to be so fascinating as to be worth reading on a walk, but she did not begrudge her sister. After all, Elizabeth had been known to walk about the gardens more than once, or more than even a hundred times, with her nose in her own book.
She snuggled herself close to Darcy, holding his arm, and smiling as she felt a deep sort of satisfaction and delight at being seen by everyone in the neighborhood walking by the side of such a handsome and tall suitor. “I was delighted to see you made an effort to cultivate even Lydia’s friendship.”
“She is a perfectly fine girl,” Darcy replied. “Merely young and with an excess of high spirits.”
Elizabeth took Darcy’s hand and kissed it. “And you seem well on your way to becoming friends with Papa — sitting with him in the book room, going shooting, the two of you with Charlie.”
“He says you are his favorite, and I gain the sense that though you love both your parents, that—”
“I confess my mind is a bit more similar to my father’s.”
“I have in truth always rather admired your mother since that morning at Netherfield, while Jane was sick, when she gave us the tale of those years in Manchester.”
“In truth? I rather would expect you to despise us for the connections to trade — I know Caroline expected you to. She was most embarrassed to have you hear such a tale directly.” Elizabeth flushed. “I confess that I might have been a little embarrassed also.”
Darcy smiled at her. “Let me think how I might say this — I do not, even now, really understand your father’s choice to enter and remain in trade — but it is impossible to not admire anyone who will sacrifice and work consistently in the name of some aim they find important. Someone who chose to live under reduced circumstances for an extended period of years so that he could achieve something great at the end of it. Besides, it is clear that for him there was joy in the whole thing.”
Elizabeth nodded. “That is how I always thought of that story.”
