Another laugh. This one quieter.
“He is not the warmest of men,” Wickham offered mildly.
“Oh no,” said Elizabeth. “He is positively glacial. You could store meat in his good opinion and expect it to keep all winter.”
She smiled sweetly, but her mind was already itching with what she would write as soon as Mr. Wickham looked away.
Regarding one gentleman from D-shire:
Glacial.
Possibly composed entirely of waistcoat starch.
May be operating under the assumption that fondness is disease.
Wickham tilted his head. “And yet, for all that, you seemed rather affected to see him. Earlier.”
Elizabeth blinked.
She was not, she thought with growing unease, in control of this conversation.
He was watching her closely now. Not rudely. Not obviously. But with an intensity that suggested every word she had just spoken was being filed away.
She forced a shrug. “We have encountered each other several times. It would be unnatural not to react.”
“Of course.”
“But no,” she said, brightening deliberately. “I do not hold him in any special regard. Unless disdain counts.”
Wickham smiled. “Some would say that is a special regard.”
“I assure you, it is not.”
“Ah.” He looked amused. “And yet, you talk about him rather a lot.”
Elizabeth paused.
Not long. Barely a breath.
Surely, not enough for him to notice.
The air was sharp,and the horses restless.
They had ridden hard that morning—not toward any particular destination, but out of the house, away from the chatter, away from Caroline Bingley's operatic planning of chair arrangements. Away from whatever it was that Bingley could not stop saying about Jane Bennet’s eyes.
“They are not merely blue,” Bingley was saying now, as they took the rise near the edge of Netherfield’s property. “They are—how shall I put it—gentle. Contemplative.”
“Lavender-blue,” Darcy supplied, voice flat.
“Yes!” Bingley lit up. “Precisely! You noticed?”
“I was present. I am not blind.”
“No, but you rarely comment. That is nearly praise from you.”
Darcy nudged his horse forward. “It was merely an observation.”
“You do not like her?”
