She nodded slowly. “Thank you.”
They said nothing more. There was so much Darcy longed to ask of her, to understand, but for the moment, it was enough simply to walk beside her in the gathering dark of evening. Each step, each breath carried meaning and perception, and the weight of her small hand on his arm was more to him than a hundred words.
By the time he brought her back to her door, it was too dark in the entry to determine if she was blushing, but the soft twist to her mouth and the teasing shift of her eyes assured him that she was. “Does Miss Darcy wish for my return on the morrow?” she asked.
He pretended to frown. “No. As a matter of fact, Mrs Wickham, your services shall no longer be required, and I must inform you that I have decided to terminate your employment.”
Her eyebrows twitched. Once, she would have paled and stepped away, thinking only of how she had failed her family. Or, perhaps she might have argued with him, debating him into surrender on the grounds of justice and the virtue of keeping his word. Now, however, she only smiled.
“Excellent. I was going to give my notice anyway.”
“Were you, now?”
She nodded once, allowing her gaze to rove over his face. “But if you wish to call as a neighbour, we are always happy to receive you, Mr Darcy.”
He tipped his hat and bowed gallantly. “It is not impossible that you may see me tomorrow. Good evening, madam.”
Twenty
October 1813
Elizabethclosedthedoorbehind herself as she set out after Jane and Mr Bingley. The lovers had decided upon a short walk on this autumn day, and the duty of chaperoning them fell happily to her lot. It was a far more pleasant task than that which had fallen to Mary—instructing a petulant Lydia on the pianoforte.
A few leaves crunched underfoot as Elizabeth strayed somewhat from the path taken by the couple ahead of her. The day was cool and crisp, and not unlike that day nearly a year ago, when she had peered timidly out of the door of a carriage to examine Corbett Lodge for the first time. She sighed in contentment, relishing the clean scent of winter coming and the earthy aroma of the land turning inward for slumber. And then, a second pair of footsteps joined her own. There was no unnecessary greeting, no callous touch—she simply felt, and he was there.
Fitzwilliam Darcy.
“I had hoped you might join us today,” she said.
“I did threaten to come. Did you not believe me?”
She laughed and looked him full in the face. “Of course, I did, but that does not diminish the fact that I hoped for your company.”
His mouth appeared ready to break into a smile, but he seemed to try to appear nonchalant. “Come, madam, you must be in jest. One does not hope for what one is sure of.”
“On the contrary, I find that my hope is best served when it is set upon a secure foundation. From there, it may flourish, where a hope placed in something uncertain can do little but stretch until it is broken.”
“And where is your hope, Elizabeth?”
She snapped off the stem of a tree as she passed it and idly twirled it about her fingers. “Here. Like a wild sapling cut from its native roots and then grafted into a new tree—here is my home and here are my people.”
He stopped and turned towards her, stepping close. “Do you know, Elizabeth, that mind and tongue of yours have bewitched me from the first time I met you. You see things that I do not, and you can express in a simple phrase what I have tried to describe all my life.”
Her cheeks warmed, and she looked down. “It is nothing. Merely the ramblings of a mind that no doubt wants for discipline and education.”
“No one admitted to the pleasure of hearing you speak could think anything wanting.”
She dared to meet his eyes. They were soft, now—warm and inviting her to step in, to try him and to linger. “Mr Darcy,” she whispered, “I am too often impertinent. It is ill advised of you to encourage that habit in me.”
“Yet, such is precisely my intent. I live in constant anticipation of what you will do or say next. What would you say, for example, if I asked to kiss you?”
“Nothing at all, for I suspect my lips would soon be more agreeably engaged.”
He stood, still and expectant, watching her and saying nothing.
She arched a brow. “So, are you asking?”
“I was trying to decide if I dared.”
