Anne shook her head thoughtfully. “In novels,” said she, “the hero always rallies and attends his reproofs, and the heroine forgives him in the end. If this young lady is enamoured of you and is a worthy woman, I hope you are not so mean as to resent her because of her circumstances. Otherwise, you can never reach the happily ever after.”
That night, Darcy’s mind still raced, and he found himself unable to sleep. After nearly wearing a hole in the carpet in hisbedchamber, he went down to the library, in the hope that he would find a book that would take his mind off Elizabeth.
How is it that an estate as grand as Rosings has such a paltry library?he thought.Where are the histories? The philosophies? There are not even great works of fiction to be found—nothing by Cervantes, Swift, Johnson, Pope, or even Shakespeare.
He browsed shelves devoted to improving sermons but found no book on building a happy marriage.Do such books even exist?Darcy mused that Lady Catherine ought to have at least one, as she loved to meddle.
With a sigh, Darcy perused a shelf of popular novels.These must be Anne’s books. Ha! It appears that Anne and Georgiana have similar tastes.Darcy amused himself by thinking perhaps he ought to read one of them.Perhaps one of these novels could teach me a thing or two about how a proud gentleman might woo a spirited lady.
He read the titles:Hunsford Happenings,Rich Man, Poor Man, Beggar Man,Part of Something Greater,Seize the Day,In Defence of Honour,Unhappily Ever After,From Hunsford to the High Seas,Lessons from a Dream,Their Share of Conversation,Possessing Equal Frankness,A Bleak Future,Her Ladyship Strikes Back,Sorrow and Regret,At the Edge of Destiny,Unwitting Spellcasters,Winter Storms,Peril and Partnership,The Yellow Sprigged Muslin,Runaway, andThe Morning After. Each sounded more dreadful than the one before. Resigning himself, Darcy took downHunsford Happeningsby Leigh Dreyer and began to read.
He always started with the Foreword; he never understood how a reader could jump into a story without first meticulously discovering what the author believed he ought to know.1 Forearmed with the necessary information, he read the openingline:It is a truth universally acknowledged that mirrors contain a thousand echoes of the beyond.
He knew not whether he would learn anything about courting, but the book at least promised to be a welcome diversion.
Chapter 2: Hunsford Happenings
by Leigh Dreyer
Rosings Park, Kent
Wednesday, the 8thof April, 1812?
Or was it Tuesday, the 7thof April?
The morning felt…wrong.
He awoke with his face crushed into a book—some Gothic romance that he would not hesitate to put away. Georgiana was quite mad to enjoy such utter nonsense. He must speak to MrsAnnesley about his sister’s appetite for the tales—better she should spend her days with poetry if she required the fantastical.
He tossed the book to the side of the bed and shut his eyes, as if it were that simple to fall back to sleep, to his dreams of walking with Elizabeth through the park at Pemberley, smiling at her across the dinner table in London. Then somehow the fog would clear, and he would receive clarity. Instead, however, the morning confused him. Not in any way he might name with dignity. Drunken escapades at school aside, he had experienced this state of muddled thought before—and those occurrences could all be linked to his cousin Richard. Blast Richard, his smuggled French brandy, and his fascinating tales of the army over a glass (or three) after dinner. Suffering his aunt’s presence was enough, but now he would suffer whilst his cousin found humour in every moment of his discomfiture, for Richard would recognise the signs as soon as Darcy was served his egg.
Rosings was, by design, the same every day: the same breakfast, the same footmen at precise distances from the walls, and the same silent threat of Lady Catherine’s disapproval hovering like a draught.
And yet—
The birds chirped louder and longer than they ought.
Darcy stared at the canopy of his bed as if it had personally offended him.
His valet entered, efficient and unruffled. “Lady Catherine has invited the party at Hunsford to dine this evening, sir.”
Darcy sat upright, so quickly that Hines paused mid-step. Darcy’s mind snagged on the words as on a nail. The party at Hunsford. Dinner at Rosings.
He recalled the dinner table of the previous evening, where MrCollins praised the window coverings with such devotion that one might assume he had been engaged to them. He remembered Lady Catherine offering opinions as though the world had been built to receive them.
And afterwards—
Darcy’s stomach tightened.
Afterwards, he escorted Elizabeth from Rosings.
Afterwards, he proposed.
He dragged a hand down his face and prayed that the building megrim would not last long.
Hines held his coat. Darcy shoved an arm into it without looking, as if clothing could anchor him to sense.
“I am surprised her Ladyship should invite them two nights in a row,” Darcy said, striving for calm.
