He went back to the parlour for his case with an air of professional unease better suited to a man who had been shown something he could not put into his books.
Elizabeth lay still for some time after he had gone.
She did not dispute what he had said. She did not need to. Every time Jane laid the mineral cloth against the bandage, a warmth that was not the water’s came up to meet it—a second heat, a quiet, specific activity beneath the skin, as though the flesh were being worked on by some intelligence below the instruments of any surgeon in Derbyshire. Something was mending her from underneath. It had been mending her since the first day. Aldridge could measure only the outside. She measured the rest, and said nothing, because she was not certain the experience was reliable and less certain how to speak of itwithout sounding credulous. Aldridge did not need her testimony. Darcy, who had heard every word through the open door, needed hers least of all.
It was into this knowledge, half refused and half hoarded, that the afternoons of the following days arranged themselves.
The parlour arrangement took hold so naturally over the next four days that everyone in the house spoke of it as if it had always been so. There was no bed upstairs Miss Bennet could be moved into without putting Mrs Marsden out of her own, and the carrying alone would have undone work it had taken the better part of a month to mend. The leg ruled the bed, the bed ruled the parlour, and the household had therefore learned to bring the rest of the house to her.
Miss Darcy, well enough now to come downstairs for an hour each day, took the chair by the south window with whatever books or letters she brought with her. One afternoon, she even declared her hands well enough to attempt a bit of embroidery, though the effort was short-lived. Mr Darcy, when Hadley and the steward’s books released him, joined his sister in the parlour bearing the papers he had most recently been pretending did not interest him enough to share. Jane moved between them with trays and the careful balance of a woman determined that the smallest domestic rhythm betray no hint of private disorder.
Because habit is dangerous where desire means to grow unnoticed, the house accepted the arrangement before any one person admitted what it made possible.
On one such afternoon, Darcy came in from the study carrying a folded survey map, a packet of letters, and an expression suggesting the letters had disappointed him while the map might yet redeem the day. A small writing-table had been drawn close to Elizabeth’s bedside, the meadow ledger propped against it, the household book beside.
“You arrive,” Elizabeth said, glancing up, “like a man bringing intelligence from a war where the enemy has proved more numerate than expected.”
He laid the letters aside. “The enemy is London. It has again mistaken speed for disorder and delay for prudence.”
Georgiana, said, “That generally means the solicitor has written seven lines to tell Fitzwilliam what he already knew and charged him for the effort.”
Darcy looked at his sister. “Nan reads my letters more accurately than I supposed.”
“Nan reads everyone more accurately than they suppose,” Georgiana replied, and laughed—low, bright, the sound still new enough to be noted.
Darcy watched her. The look on his face as he listened was one Elizabeth could not name without trespassing on his tenderness.
Elizabeth turned her eyes firmly to the page.
He crossed to the writing-table and opened the map over the ledgers. Elizabeth moved the household book aside to make room. The movement brought her hand against Darcy’s where he was smoothing the upper edge.
Not a brush of sleeve this time. Not the accidental passing contact of book or cup. Skin to skin, brief and unmistakable.
Both drew back at once.
The retreat was so slight Georgiana, bending over her book, may not have caught it. Jane, busying herself with the tea tray, saw everything. Elizabeth knew she saw because the tray gave the faintest hard click against the table before Jane caught it.
“I beg your pardon,” Jane said, though no pardon had been asked.
Darcy moved the letters aside for the tray. “There is no offence.”
Georgiana stifled a yawn. “No tea for me, Mrs Marsden. Nan will say I have done too much if I stay another quarter-hour,” she said, when Jane offered her a cup. “And unfortunately, Nan is often right.”
Nan came, fetched the shawl, took the book, and Georgiana left the room. Darcy rose soon after and took up the letters to return to the study. Jane spoke before he could reach the door.
“Mr Darcy?”
He turned.
“Yes?”
“My sister ought not sit propped so long tomorrow. The swelling worsened last night, though she did not confess it until Mrs Hadley had already scolded her. If you mean to bring papers, let the visit be briefer.”
The words were reasonable. Elizabeth heard in them what was not said—If you mean to continue this, make it look less like pleasure and more like care.
Darcy heard something, too. Not the full ache, perhaps. But enough to straighten very slightly before he answered.
“Of course. Thank you for telling me.”
