He tilted his head. “One forgets what they are meant to represent, half the time. They never look seaworthy. Unless… perhaps I have grown too skeptical?”
“Neither do half the men they resemble,” she said.
His laugh was more surprised this time. “And yet, we stay afloat.”
It was a good line. She should have enjoyed it. But her gaze flicked again to the edge of the gathering.
Darcy had not smiled. Not once.
Someone had moved theflower arrangements.
Elizabeth stepped aside to avoid brushing against a spray of holly and orchids that had not been in that corner an hour ago. Her sleeve still caught a thorn. She muttered something under her breath—not quite a curse, but close—and turned straight into a familiar line of shoulder and neckcloth.
“Miss Bennet.”
Darcy stood directly in front of her, tall and composed and somehow more in the way than any man ought to be in a public room.
“Mr. Darcy,” she said. It came out level, which felt like a small triumph. “I did not see you there.”
“Evidently.”
A pause hung between them, made worse by the fact that she had no glass in hand to hide behind. She did not even have a program to study. He, of course, had one glove on and one off, as if he had been caught mid-moral judgment.
“I trust you are enjoying the salon?” she asked.
“As much as one can amidst such... lively company.”
Her brow lifted. “You complain now that it is lively? I thought you preferred spirited discussions.”
“When they are of substance.”
And there it was. Thattone.
“Forgive me. I had not realized we were measuring degrees of substance against laughter now.” She crossed her arms, then dropped them, annoyed with herself.
He glanced past her shoulder, toward the sculpture hall. “Some laughter disguises discomfort.”
“And some discomfort disguises bad manners,” she shot back, just a little too fast.
Darcy’s mouth twitched, but not toward amusement.
Before she could press her advantage—before she could so much as breathe in to add something sharper—an arm looped through hers.
“Miss Bennet!” Lady Strathmore, radiant and clearly pleased with herself, patted Elizabeth’s hand as if it were a small dog and gestured to a girl standing beside her. “Oh, I was hoping to catch you between gentlemen. You must meet Miss Ashford. Such a lovely girl. And her cousin Miss Barrymore is seated near the duke. I think the three of you would get on splendidly.”
Miss Ashford curtsied sweetly. She was perhaps nineteen, with soft features and a well-coiffed fringe. Elizabeth returned the gesture and the smile, both precisely calibrated.
“Miss Ashford,” she said warmly. “An honor.”
Lady Strathmore turned to Darcy, beaming. “You know her cousin, I think?”
“I do.”
Elizabeth noticed the tic of his jaw. The faint tilt of his head downward—deference, or dread?
They stood in a neat rectangle, polished and correct, for three excruciating minutes. Miss Ashford mentioned a pamphlet she had read last week and could not finish. Lady Strathmore interrupted to ask if the oranges had arrived from Brighton. Elizabeth tried not to stare at Darcy, and failed once.
Darcy took his leave with a bow so exact it might have been traced.
