Lady Matlock swept her shawl around herself and began marching ahead of them, a pathfinder in a sea of silk. “Come,” she said, not looking back. “There is a viscount somewhere in this room. Let us get him safely paired before his mother begins declaring bloodlines from the pianoforte.”
Elizabeth laughed despite herself and followed. Darcy followed with considerably less enthusiasm.
The next quarter hour was an exercise in contradictions: Elizabeth tried to introduce Darcy to two eligible women and had both conversations interrupted—first by Lady Matlock’s commentary (“No chin, poor thing”) and then by an enthusiastic baritone determined to describe the evening’s musical selections in excessive detail.
Darcy, for his part, attempted to present Elizabeth to a junior barrister with excellent prospects, only for the man to recoil visibly when Elizabeth mentioned she enjoyed satire.
“Perhaps I should begin lying about my interests,” Elizabeth said flatly.
Darcy gave her a sidelong look. “And claim what?”
“Millinery. Watercolors. Obedience.”
He coughed into his hand. “Perhaps not obedience.”
“I am told it is fashionable.”
“You would never pass for it.”
She opened her mouth for a tart reply—only to hear the dowager's voice rise again from somewhere behind them: “Do not let her fool you, Mr. Fairley! Miss Bennet is merely clever, not dangerous. Unless you bore her.”
Elizabeth closed her eyes. “I am going to bury myself beneath a tablecloth and never emerge.”
“Too late,” said Darcy grimly. “You are visible.”
She exhaled a slow, measured breath, and then smiled again, all charm and polished edges. “Then we had better keep moving.The night is still young, and we have not yet failed thoroughly enough.”
They moved on—more introductions, more thin smiles, more hidden barbs and waylaid prospects. All the while, Elizabeth tried not to look at Darcy too closely. And all the while, she caught him watching her anyway.
Chapter Twenty
December 6
The ink was stillwet. Darcy watched it bead along the bottom of the page, trembling as though even the letter knew better than to go.
Georgiana sat with her back straight, hands folded, a look of practiced calm on her face. The window behind her was grey with clouded glass, but the fire caught in the curve of her cheek like a false warmth.
He folded the paper once, twice, slowly—an act meant to steady himself as much as protect its contents.
“He did not take the offer,” he said.
She nodded once.
“On the grounds,” he added, more sharply than he meant to, “that he did not find it insufficiently interesting. Or perhaps it did not come with an engraved invitation to blackmail.”
Georgiana did not speak.
Darcy set the letter down. “It was more than fair." He had rewritten the terms twice. Once in anger, once in desperation. Neither would have served. And still, Wickham had refused. “A clean settlement, no questions asked, no names mentioned. He would not even return that much dignity to you.”
“It is my fault. Ididwrite them,” Georgiana said quietly.
He turned toward her. “You were fifteen. And not in possession of judgment then or now to face a man like Wickham alone.” He bit off the rest of the sentence and exhaled. “That was not reproach, Georgie.”
Her gaze dropped to her lap. “It sounded very much like one.”
He stepped forward, gentled his voice. “I am angry at him. Not at you.”
“You are angry that I was foolish.”
