“And what is the matter which you laugh at Darcy based upon?” Elizabeth asked.
“His ridiculousness.” Colonel Fitzwilliam winked at Darcy.
“His ridiculousness!” exclaimed Elizabeth. “I have not noticed him to be ridiculous in any way.”
“You do not know him so well. And I think one must have a certain frame of mind to find him ridiculous. Few see him as I do.”
“I certainly do not!” Miss Bingley exclaimed fervently. “I can imagine no one less ridiculous than Mr. Darcy.”
Darcy sighed and rubbed at the back of his neck. He really wished thatshewasn’t the one who was determined to defend him.
“Andthat,” Colonel Fitzwilliam said, “shows howyou, Miss Bingley, despite your lily loveliness, are wholly, and entirely ridiculous yourself.”
Miss Bingley flushed.
Elizabeth said, “But how can we tease Mr. Darcy? Colonel Fitzwilliamsayshe is ridiculous. But all the evidence that he has provided for such a claim is that Darcy was once a child.Thatis hardly a compelling argument. In fact, it is aridiculousargument, from a ridiculous man—” Colonel Fitzwilliam laughed as Elizabeth continued, “So we are left with the conclusion: Mr. Darcy is a man wholly without flaws or defects, and he admits it himself.”
Darcy smiled.
Shewas teasing him.
“I did not admit it.”
“But you do not deny it?”
Darcy sighed. “I have faults enough. But I hope they are not of understanding. My temper is unyielding. I cannot forget the follies and vices of others so soon as I ought, nor their offenses against myself. I am not easily moved by every attempt to assuage my feelings. One might call my temper resentful. My good opinion once lost is lost forever.”
“That is a failing indeed,” Elizabeth replied soberly. The dimples were gone. “Implacable resentment is a failure indeed — and one worse than I imagined. But it is not of any use to me, as I cannot laugh at it.”
“Do let us have a little music,” cried Miss Bingley. “Mr. Hurst, Louisa, you will not be bothered if I interfere with the card game?”
The conversation was then broken up, and Darcy could not be unhappy about that, for he was no longer sure what the tendency of his conversation with Elizabeth meant.
But he was sure from the way that she looked at him that she was unsatisfied with his answer, and his apparent tendency to hate everybody.
The next afternoon they found themselves alone in Bingley’s bare book room. Darcy felt quite awkward. For the first minutes after she’d entered the room where he’d been sitting, he pretended to focus upon his own book. But he really was watching her backside as she frowned over the choices of possible books, glanced at him assiduously not looking back at her, shrugged, smiled, and then picked one and settled in a chair.
Some sensation, a fear of being judged by her, made Darcy speak, “I wish you to understand — I do not simply… choose to hate people.”
She put her book down, and her intense dark eyes studied Darcy’s.
“I mean to say…” he added.
“Yes?” She pulled her chair forward, closer to him. The legs scraped over the wooden floor. She was close enough that he could perceive a scent of rose water.
His stomach felt light and queasy. But in a good way.
“I fear you think that I am in some way cruel or arbitrary.”
“No.” She shook her head, curls bouncing about her cheek. “You are a man of understanding. You must confess to yourself that you sometimes can be mistaken. And you must retain some awareness that change and dynamism characterize the characters of men. What a man was once may be different from what he will be in the future. And beyond that… your speech seemed to lack that Christian charity we all should display.”
“Men rarely change.”
“That is not true! I see so much adaptation, shifts, little bits and pieces of the unexpected in the actions of individuals. You never can completely know a person! They will always surprise you.”
Darcy frowned. He would be a fool to argue with Elizabeth when he admired her, and was beginning to consider making an offer to her. He ought to find some way to simply agree with her, to maintain her good opinion of him.
What he said instead was, “That is a horrible notion. To be never able to predict or rely upon others. I could not stand to believe in such a world.”
