A feminine cry brought him sharply round once more. Bingley’s name had sounded from the Bennet party, for that gentleman had been sighted by the younger sister. Desperately, he stepped his horse forward, just out of the line of the trees so he might see what the young ladies had.
Bingley’s carriage did indeed approach, but the shades were drawn. Perhapsshehad gone to live with her sister! His breath came dizzyingly short and fast as he stared, willingherto step down after Jane Bingley. He saw his friend descend the carriage, turning to hand down the ponderous form of his fair-haired lady—clearly a woman who had taken great pains to conceal her condition by flowing dress. Then the door of the carriage closed, and the horse was led away.
“Wait!”he almost cried, his eyes staring and wild.No!His mind screamed again. It could not be! She could not have taken another, not after she had once smiled upon him! She might have gone to London… yes, that must be so! She might have been sent there by her mother… to secure a husband. Panic blinded his vision and before he knew it, his horse was surging forward again.
Bingley had stopped outside the door of the church to talk with some local gentry, releasing his wife into the care of her family to be seated indoors. Darcy was upon his friend in a moment, staring down from his mount with heaving shoulders and a savage look in his eye, but his tongue stuck rigidly to the roof of his mouth.
Bingley turned in mild surprise at this uncouth fellow who would eavesdrop from horseback on civilised conversation. The other gentlemen were also glancing up at him with disapproving curiosity, but their names had slipped his memory.
“A fine morning to you, good sir,” Bingley greeted indifferently. “I bid you welcome to Hertfordshire. Have you a boy to tend your horse? My coachman is just there—”
“Bingley!” he hissed.
Bingley’s gaze snapped back to Darcy’s, and the hand he had raised in gesture fell weakly to his side. His eyes rounded, and he blinked in astonishment. His tongue, visible in his gaping mouth, hesitantly shaped to form a “D—”.
“Forgive me, sirs!” Darcy stopped him. “I did not mean to interrupt your conversation. I beg you would excuse me.” He leveled a pleading stare at his friend, then yanked the reins to turn his mount away.
Bingley was glancing jerkily between his companions and this mounted mystery. The two other gentlemen each made some uncomfortable excuse to enter the church, and within seconds Bingley was running full tilt after Darcy. “You, there! Pray, sir, stop!”
Darcy did not heed. He trotted on until he had once more gained the shelter of his vantage point, and a moment later Bingley plunged into the trees behind him. “I say, sir, this is dashed unusual. You are very like a man I knew—will you not speak again? Who are you?”
Darcy swung to the ground, tossing the reins haphazardly toward a tree, then bore down upon the shorter man. “Damn you, Bingley, it is I! Do you not recognise me?”
Bingley stumbled backward and tripped over a branch, toppling to the ground. “D-Darcy!” he whispered. “By Jove, itisyou!” He leaped happily to his feet, grasping Darcy’s hands to pump them in unrestrained joy.
“What a shock you have given me! All these months, we thought you dead, and here you stand before me! Oh, how pleased I am, I cannot say! But where the deuce have you been, my good man? So much has happened, I cannot even begin to tell you all. Oh, where shall I begin? By heavens, it is good to see you alive and well!”
Darcy wormed his hands from Bingley’s, grimacing uncomfortably. “Bingley, where is she?” he demanded.
Bingley’s mouth was still open, as Darcy had shushed him mid-stream. “Miss Darcy? Why, she has gone on to Pemberley. The poor child, how delighted she will be to know you live!”
“Not Georgiana! I shall see her soon enough, but not yet. The shock would be too great—she must not be alone when… no, I did not come here to see Georgiana!”
Bingley drew a shuddering breath as clarity dawned in his eyes. “Of course. You would not have….” His eyes narrowed, and he nodded slowly, a knowing smile now tugging at his mouth. “I have often wondered if there was something—”
“Bingley!” he grasped his friend’s shoulders and verily shook him. “Where is Elizabeth?Tell me she has not married!”
“No!” Bingley hastened to respond.
Darcy fell back, his anger melting, and he filled his lungs for the first time in many long minutes. He closed his eyes and drooped against a tree, sighing in relief. “She has not… not married?” he ventured after a moment.
“No,” Bingley repeated. “She went to Pemberley with Miss Darcy.”
“What?” he shot to attention again. “Do you mean that she is there, with Georgiana, even now?”
“She has been some weeks already—why, it must be almost a month now since she left Hertfordshire. It was the colonel’s idea—”
“Fitzwilliam!”
“A capital notion, was it not? Miss Darcy was delighted to have such a friend near, and I daresay it will be a fine thing for Miss Bennet and Mrs Wickham….” Bingley stuttered to a halt again when he saw the dangerous flicker in Darcy’s eyes.
“Mrs Wickham! She is there, too? And that traitorous husband of hers? Surely, he is not there also!”
Bingley sighed. “There is much to tell you, old friend. Come, let us return to Netherfield, and I shall pour you a stiff drink. I suspect we are both in need of it.” He reached to slap his friend’s shoulder, as he had often done in former days, but Darcy recoiled from the touch. Bingley dropped his hand stupidly, searching for some appropriate response as his friend seemed truly to shiver in revulsion.
“I shall not stop at Netherfield,” Darcy declared. “I would stay long enough to borrow a change of clothes and a purse, but I must journey to Pemberley at once. Have you any decent saddle horses?”
“Stubborn as ever!” Bingley mused under his breath. “Darcy, you cannot ride a horse all the way to Pemberley! You will catch your death, or drop from exhaustion. You must take my carriage.”
