Perhaps they ought to wait until someone wished to join them? Miss Elizabeth had suggested the garden as a socially acceptable walk when a gentleman and lady found themselves without a chaperone. Within those high walls unattended, her reputation could prove less staid if someone were to see them enter or leave.
“It is grand indeed,” Darcy said as he gazed at the white tipped expanse of foliage before them glistening as the sun emerged from behind a cloud. “Your sisters will doubtless wish to try it.”
There. He had been subtle. Hopefully that hint did not cause any dissatisfaction with him. Her joy, her approval, those were things he wanted more than he could understand.
He hardly knew her; he ought not feel as he did.
“Yes, I believe they would,” she smiled up at him, her cheeks pinked from the cold. “Your cousin and Mr. Bingley might enjoy it as well. In the meantime, there is a smaller garden on the other end of the house, perhaps we might see what is there?”
Were they truly near strangers? When they talked it seemed as if they had never been so… as if, beyond reason, they had been friends forever.
Directing their steps toward the other garden, they strolled at an easy pace; the fluttering of birds and the sparkle of the day fine enough to entertain in their brief moments of silence.
The sleeping garden displayed no flowers, though in its size, shape, and ornamentation, its spring beauty could effortlessly be imagined.
“And your sisters and you work with your tenants directly?” Darcy awed, their talk having turned to those activities which most often took their time. “Contend with the running of the estate in every area?”
“Mary works with me more than the rest; not that they are not active and hardworking, merely that Mary and I tend to see to the tenants, the crops, the buildings, that sort of thing,” Miss Elizabeth said as they paused to admire the statue of a warrior in chainmail. “Jane oversees the running of the house and the bookkeeping–I can manage such things, yet she has such skill with numbers that Imayhave bargained to let her do that work. Our youngest sisters, Catherine and Lydia, well, they help Jane usually… though I cannot sing their praises enough. Both work long hours to help where they may; even beyond our home.”
Chuckling softly, Darcy turned from the statue to view Miss Bennet, her brow raised as her eyes flitted toward his mouth.
“I am impressed, truly,” he hurried. “I laugh only because it is as we spoke last night, of that odd world we live in between that of sibling and parent. I am as proud of my sisters as you are of yours–even if the reasons for my pride are bound to differ, the feeling is the same. Your sisters are fortunate to have you.”
“As are yours,” she answered before moving toward another statue, the harp playing figure recalling a young biblical David. “It is strange however to see that we are not alone in such pliable relationships. It is easy enough to realize that, with all the many people here and abroad, there must be siblings taking on the role of parent. It is another to peer through a window which, in certain lights, allows one to see both inside the life of another and back toward oneself–like when the rising sun is faint and the candles inside paint a picture of all that is within on top of the world outside. When we talk it is just that way. Our lives are as different as a woodland and a parlour, yet at times, I have seen my world overlain yours.”
Shaking her head Miss Elizabeth frowned. “It is ridiculous. I apologize, Mr. Darcy, for rambling as I have. Ought we go in?”
“Miss Elizabeth,” he assured, his hand coming to rest on her arm as she moved to return inside, “we are much the same. Leastwise, what we have endured, for better or worse, it has bridged the difference. The truth is rarely ridiculous.”
“Darcy,” his cousin remarked from the edge of the garden, Darcy’s hand falling from Miss Elizabeth’s arm, “I am charged with a message from Lady Charmane; it seems the final guests have arrived early and she wishes to introduce all.”
“Of course,” Darcy answered, his arm held out for Miss Elizabeth. “I trust your ride went well? You were not gone long.”
“Bingley fell into a stream early on, I fear,” Fitz said, his lips pulling upward though he fought it well. “Between the wet and mud and cold Miss Bennet insisted we return and ride again tomorrow once we were certain he suffered no ill effects.”
“I look forward to the tale in greater detail,” Darcy noted, a small smile forming as Miss Elizabeth and he began to make their way through the garden.
For some moments they walked in silence, Fitz to the house long before they reached the garden’s edge, until a gentle pressure on his arm drew his attention to Miss Elizabeth.
“Thank you for your words, Mr. Darcy. They are appreciated. Truly.”
“They were honest, as I hope you realize your words were.”
“I suppose they were,” Miss Elizabeth acknowledged as they neared the house. Stilling by the door, her eyes sparkled gaily, “I do hope that, if the tale your cousin relays is a good one, you will share it? Mary may share a fine one, but Jane is unlikely to; she will be too worried for your friend to see the humour at first.”
“Of course,” he chuckled as he opened the door for her, his eyes fixed to her as she passed through.
Her presence eased something in him… and wonderfully unsettled him. His heart had leapt about since he first noticed the vivacity in her look, in her speech.Taking a deep breath as he followed her in, he tapped down his emotions.The pace at which his heart moved would not be borne. Though they had met years before, little more than a day had he known her. Truly, but a moment in a life.
Friendship. Conversation. Time. Those were key. If he fell for Miss Elizabeth Bennet it would be staid. Controlled. And HE would be the one to tell himself when it was respectable to lose his heart. Only then.
Chapter 14
Staffordshire, England – 1812 – Day 2
“It is a pleasure to enjoy the acquaintance of so many fine ladies,” Lord Ramsgate remarked as the guests of Lady Charmane sat down for tea; Mr. Bingley and Lord Brayburn still absent.
“I imagine life at Dartmoor is too quiet for an active man,” Lady Charmane said as she passed him his tea. “A young man such as yourself requires action I suspect.”
