Lady Rebecca surveyed Marianne for a moment before pacing the room, her fingers steepled before her, smiling like she had just been crowned Empress of all Christendom. “It is too delicious! Two cousins left disappointed in love, and each unexpectedly acquainted with the man who abandoned the other. And each, perhaps, feeling terribly guilty that they cannot loathe the gentlemen in question.”
Mr. Willoughby turned to Marianne with a look of astonishment, and he glanced back at the door, which Mr.Bingley was likely still standing sentinel on the other side of. “Can it be?”
Marianne gaped at him. “Could it possibly?” And then, she burst out laughing, tears of relief pouring from her eyes. “Oh, thank the Lord! What agonies my conscience has suffered!”
“I daresay Miss Bennet’s conscience has been similarly affected,” Mr. Willoughby mused. “Perhaps that is why her sister was so cross with me. But I dare not presume….”
“Oh, but she shall have my blessing,” Marianne said, coming around the side of the desk to extend her hands to him in friendship. “I might have feared it was her fortune that tempted you, but you have spoken with such sincerity – and it is so strange, but I have not the slightest sense of envy. I only hope you make haste in repeating your lavish praise to Jane.”
“Would you perhaps write to her? I might convey some message to her in London – you have directed all your letters to the wrong address, by the by, and the error was only lately rectified.”
Marianne turned back to the desk, and frantically gathered the materials to compose a hasty missive conveying her wholehearted support of Jane’s choice, should she indeed choose Mr. Willoughby. She made no mention of Mr. Bingley, and in the pit of her stomach she still felt some anxiety, which would only be assuaged by telling him directly of what she had come to feel for him.
When the ink was sanded and dried, Marianne folded the letter, wrapping her fingers around his as she placed the missive in his hands. “I suppose… we may yet be cousins.”
“If your devoted protector does not murder me first,” he quipped.
Marianne hardly knew whether he meant Lady Rebecca or Mr. Bingley, nor did she care. Swept up in her relief andher genuine delight at Jane’s future happiness, she impetuously embraced Mr. Willoughby. In a louder and more felicitous tone than she had taken during their conversation, she cried, “You have made me so terribly happy! How glad I am that Lizzy forced you to visit!”
And then the door flung open, and Mr. Bingley hastened into the room. “Marianne, you cannot do this! I know all about his depravity!” He went to the desk and opened a drawer, retrieving a pistol. “I challenge you, sir….”
“No, no he does not,” Lady Rebecca said, scarcely able to articulate her words as she laughed wildly. She moved to stand beside Mr. Bingley and laid her hand atop his, slowly pushing his arm downward. “We were just congratulating Mr. Willoughby, who has explained to us that he is not guilty of all that we presumed – which is a great relief, since he means to return to London and pay Miss Bennet his addresses.”
“What?” His arm sagged, and after gaping at them all in turn, Mr. Bingley laid his weapon down atop the desk.
Looking exceedingly smug, Lady Rebecca beamed at him. “You recall Miss Bennet, surely.”
“Yes, of course. I… I wish her all the best. But… is he not a villain?”
“He is not,” Marianne said. “I am satisfied with his explanation for all that once dismayed me; indeed, as much as I am looking forward to the faerie forest ball, I have every reason to wish my cousin joy.”
The significance of her words was not lost on Mr. Bingley, and he smiled broadly at Marianne. “Oh – yes – I completely agree.”
“Perhaps you and she were not so well suited, after all,” Lady Rebecca said. “But we need not tell Darcy that he was right all along.”
Marianne might have been indignant at this observation, were she not insensible to all but the man she had come to love so dearly. It was not until they were alone together that she noticed Lady Rebecca and Mr. Willoughby had left the room. She just stood still, utterly stupid, gazing at Mr. Bingley. At last, she could allow herself to feel everything she had spent weeks trying to suppress, and it was beyond anything she had imagined she felt before.
At last, Mr. Bingley began to laugh. “Marianne…. Last night…. I hope I did not impose myself on you.”
“Not at all. I have never been so overcome… until now, I suppose.”
He took a few steps closer to her. “And if I were to kiss you again?”
Her gaze fell to his lips, and she shivered at the recollection of their softness. She forced herself to meet his eye again, and smiled wickedly. “I know you are a gentleman,” she said coyly. “If you were to do such a thing, it could only mean that I had given you an answer to a particular question – a question which you may perhaps ask amidst the romantic splendor of a ballroom, perhaps.”
He looked momentarily mortified but nodded his assent with a rueful smile. “And if I were to kiss your hand, might we rejoin our friends before the card party is broken up?”
“That sounds an ideal way to pass the long hours until this evening’s festivities.” Marianne drew in a breath of excitement as he lifted her hand in his and brought it to his lips. The hours until the ball would be long indeed, and yet it was a thrilling prospect.
It was only when they rejoined their friends that Marianne recollected her sister, and searched the room for Elinor. She was playing a lively game of Commerce with ColonelFitzwilliam and the Goulding spinsters, and she looked up at Marianne with a query in her gaze. Marianne answered by linking her arm with Mr. Bingley’s as they moved through the room, seeking out an empty table.
Ere long, the party began to disperse, for their guests all intended to return home and dress themselves for the evening of dinner and dancing before they reappeared at Netherfield in two hours’ time. When only five remained in the parlor, Lady Rebecca declared she was not yet ready to go upstairs and begin her toilette. She bid her brothers and her dearest friends all sit with her, and wickedly entreated Marianne to explain the rules to Margaret and Julia’s impudent game,Thunderation.
As they played, Marianne also gave her sister an account of Mr. Willoughby’s visit, and then Marianne was treated to the surprise and delight of discovering what Elinor had been about at the same time. She and the colonel were treated to hearty congratulations and a great deal of familial teasing.
Elinor wished to keep the engagement quiet, for her mother would not be in attendance at the ball, and deserved greater consideration than being the last to hear of the betrothal. Marianne consented, and exchanged a look with Mr. Bingley, silently agreeing that they must do the same. She shivered, knowing with a titillating certainty that he intended to propose to her that evening. She supposed discretion was for the best, else it would be wildly indecent for her and Elinor to stay the night, even with Lady Rebecca’s chaperonage.
When at last it was time for them all to go upstairs and dress for dinner and dancing, the three ladies congregated together in Lady Rebecca’s room for their communal toilette. She was full of speculation for what was to come.
