“Itwouldcost you —”
“My fortune is mine. My name is mine. My sister is mine to defend. The estate is mine to settle. My cousin would stand for me at any altar in England knowing what I told himin the dark on his pallet last night. I have counted the cost, Elizabeth. I have done nothing but count the cost since I rode down through the village an hour ago. I do not refuse it. I will not have you refuse it on my account.”
“You do not know yet what will be said! You do not know what will be written. You do not know what Mr Collins will ask of your aunt—”
“My aunt may write what she pleases. My aunt has been writing what she pleased about my mother for forty years. I am asking you to marry me, Elizabeth. The asking is not undone by your fear of what I shall pay. Pay me back later, if you must. Pay me now by saying what you would say if the only person you had to consider were yourself.”
She shuddered and covered a tearful gasp. “I… I cannot do that this afternoon.”
“You can.”
“I cannot. Mr Darcy—please. Give me until tonight. Or—give me an hour. Give me until I have spoken to Jane. Give me until I have slept. I love you, sir. I am saying that because you ought to know it before I have refused you any further. But I cannot—I cannot answer you yes or no in this hour. Please. Give me until I am not afraid.”
TheI love youlay in the room like a piece of furniture neither of them had put down.
He did not move. “Yes.”
“Yes?”
“Yes. You shall have your hour. You shall have until you are not afraid. But Elizabeth —”
He did go closer, then. Not to touch her. Within a pace of her.
“I shall ask again. As often as you need it asked. Tonight. Tomorrow morning. Every morning the road takes another man up to my gate. Until you give me an answer I can hear in the voice you would use if you did not love me. That is the only refusal I shall accept.”
She blinked, and a shower of tears tumbled from her eyes. She used the heel of her hand to brush them away. “Then I shan't refuse again.”
The words bore the shape of surrender. He heard in them, however, not submission but exhausted courage gathering for one necessary act. “Very well,” he said.
A carriage wheel sounded in the yard.
She startled hard. The hand at the back of the sofa came up to her throat. The breath went out of her in a small sound she did not stop.
He was at her before he had taken account of moving. He had her against him with one arm round her shoulders and the other hand at the back of her head, and his face against her hair, and the first thing he said was her name.
“Elizabeth. Elizabeth. Only a wheel. Only a wheel. The back gate, not the front. Hadley would not have admitted a stranger through the back. You are safe in this house. Listen to me. You are safe.”
She did not at first speak. Her hand had got hold of the lapel of his coat at the front, and she had not marked it.
“No one is going to come to you. Not while I am in the country. Not while Fitzwilliam is in the kingdom. Not while Hadley is on his feet. Hear me, Elizabeth. You are safe in this room and in this house.”
She nodded, very small, against his shoulder.
He kept his arms where they were a few seconds longer than the safety required, and another few seconds longer than the safety could have been pleaded for; and then he set her back from him with his hands on her shoulders, looked at her once, and let her go.
He stepped back. “Lock the inner door if you are alone this afternoon,” he said. “No one is to answer questions from the lane. If any message comes by hand, it is to be brought to me unopened.”
“You issue orders very handsomely when frightened.”
The line was Elizabeth’s old weapon and old offering both. It should have lightened the room. Instead it made the tenderness beneath all the rest unbearable.
“And you make levity look almost like courage when cornered,” he returned.
“Almost? You are severe.”
“I am trying not to be worse.”
He left before the attempt could fail.
