Georgiana smiled at him and waved, “Richard just told a most ridiculous story, about how you cannot lose at billiards.”
“No, what? Of course I can lose.”
“I can’t beat you — Georgie, I’ve played a thousand games against him, and not once has he lost.”
“Then why do you continue to play?” Darcy asked. “He wins one time in five. We are close enough for the game to remain interesting, while distant enough for it to be clear who is the superior.”
Georgiana laughed and embraced him.
Darcy then handed over the wrapped bracelet. “I saw this and thought you might like it.”
She opened it and smiled at the bracelet. “I do not deserve this.”
“Nonsense.” Darcy waved his hand. “Nonsense. Of course you do.”
“You have been so kind to me since—” She sighed. “I know that you are kinder than I deserve.”
“Nonsense.” Darcy shook his head again, and embraced her back.
Colonel Fitzwilliam said, “Of course he is. He is an excellent brother and friend. Though I’ve on occasion seen him to be less kind to people than he ought to be.”
“Such as?” Darcy replied sharply.
He’d felt an odd sort of reserve and distance in his relations with Colonel Fitzwilliam since the weeks they’d spent together in Netherfield. The officer had disappointed Elizabeth, and after she had refused him for his sake — or at least so Darcy surmised.
He did not actually know.
Colonel Fitzwilliam waved his hand around. “You say it yourself. Your good opinion once lost is lost forever. By Zeus — you know I’ll not argue individuals in front of Georgie.” So saying, he tweaked the nose of his cousin.
Georgiana squealed, laughed, slapped his shoulder, and pulled away to study her new bracelet. “I can in factlistento the most shocking things.”
“Youcan. But Darcy cannot.”
“I have no cause to fear anything you might say about me,” Darcy replied. He quickly and evenly buttered a roll and took a bite of the freshly baked bread. “You do not mean anything in particular though.”
“An idle thought of people we knew in Hertfordshire crossed my mind — ah, and I see you grimace. See, Georgie, I told you that he could not manage such a conversation.”
Darcy was in fact grimacing.
Once it had become clear that no engagement between Colonel Fitzwilliam and Elizabeth was waiting upon the proper time to be announced, Darcy had considered returning to the neighborhood around Meryton to try courting her again, and asking her if ithadbeen Colonel Fitzwilliam who she had loved, and if now that he had proven to be a flighty suitor, she might choose him instead.
There were always two considerations that stopped Darcy from doing so.
The first was a little pride: He had offered himself, and he would not offer himself again simply because he believed her to be unable to marry the man she preferred.
The other more significant consideration was that her sister had married Mr. Bingley. And Mr. Bingley had demanded that he marrythatwoman.
Darcy believed that he would never be able to think ofthatwoman with anything approaching calmness of heart or mind.
“Oh, you mean Mr. Bingley! And his awful, awful sister,” Georgiana said. “I do miss Mr. Bingley. He always laughed so much, and was so friendly, and he made the room always seem a bit brighter.”
“And then he tried to force me to marry his sister.” Darcy growled. Suddenly he could not take another bite of his meal, and the food looked heavy, overly cooked and disgusting to him.
“Eh, I don’t think that is quite fair,” Colonel Fitzwilliam said. “And see the grimace, Georgie? That is how your brothertellspeople that he does not wish a subject to be discussed. No matter how often he says that he will happily hear any subject, you can see the lack of happiness clearly.”
“That I am not happy about the subject does not make meunwillingto listen to a discussion of it.”
“By the gods of war!” Colonel Fitzwilliam laughed. “Of course you are willing to war. To angrily rant and rave upon how you were mistreated, and how your behavior is unexceptionable in every way, and how there was no way that any reasonable man could have acted, except in precisely the way that you did — all this despite the simple point that I am a reasonable man who would not have cut Bingley so sharply and permanently.”
