An hour later, the second set of the evening had just come to an end when the doors opened. Lydia, who was standing next to Elizabeth at the punch table, gasped loudly.
“Look, Lizzy,” Lydia hissed, tugging on her sister’s sleeve. “That must be him—Mr. Bingley! And look, who dresses likethat?
Elizabeth followed her gaze across the room to the small group entering through the double doors. Speaking animatedly with Sir William, the master of ceremonies, was a cheerful-looking young gentleman in a light blue coat. At his side was a tall woman with red hair, which clashed horribly with her orange gown.
Behind them was a slightly older woman who could only be sister to the one in orange. She wore a lacy cap on her head, and at her side was a man Elizabeth presumed to be her husband. The man looked bored, and the two women appeared as though there was a foul stench.
And then a final figure stepped through the doors.
He was taller than the others by several inches, broad of shoulder and impossibly straight of posture. His coat was dark, perfectly tailored, with gleaming brass buttons and immaculate cuffs. The white of his cravat was so crisp it might have been starched in heaven, and his hair—dark, wavy, and carefully restrained—seemed the very image of masculine elegance.
He paused just within the threshold, surveying the room with a dispassionate gaze. His features were finely cut, his expression unreadable. There was nothing eager in his countenance, no polite mask of welcome. He looked, rather, like a man who had arrived somewhere he had not wished to be.
Lydia’s eyes grew large. “Mercy. He ismagnificent.”
Elizabeth said nothing.
Kitty joined them at the table. “Which one is Mr. Bingley?”
“I assume the one in the blue coat,” Elizabeth murmured as she watched the newcomers. “He is performing the introductions.”
“But who ishe?” Lydia insisted. “The tall one.”
“I have no idea.”
There was something about him—something that did not merely suggest wealth or breeding, butcertainty. As if the room had shifted subtly to acknowledge his presence, though he had said not a word.
“Do you think he is married?” Kitty asked a tad fearfully.
“Of course not,” Lydia said. “Look at his boots.”
Elizabeth arched an eyebrow. “Is that the usual measure of marital status?”
“Unmarried men polish their boots. Married men do not have time.”
Elizabeth laughed, but her attention never left the tall stranger. He stood now with the others, allowing himself to bedrawn forward, though he neither smiled nor spoke. His gaze drifted across the room without urgency, lingering on no one.
Then, abruptly, it caught hers.
For the space of a single breath, they looked at one another.
Elizabeth felt—not a jolt, precisely—but a flicker of recognition. Not that she had seen him before—she was certain she had not—but that she had seen that look before. Detached. Measuring. As if he were calculating the quality of the company and finding it wanting.
Her chin lifted half an inch.
But the moment passed. He looked away without acknowledgment, and Elizabeth returned her attention to the punch.
“Handsome,” Mary intoned behind her, “but likely arrogant. I would wager he has read no Fordyce.”
Elizabeth smiled faintly and offered her cup to be refilled.
The orchestra resumed tuning. The third set would begin soon.
Across the room, the man in the dark coat accepted a glass of wine from a footman and continued surveying the crowd with the calm disinterest of a man inspecting livestock.
And Elizabeth, sipping her punch as she crossed the room to stand beside Charlotte Lucas against the wall, decided she did not like him.
“Do you know who he is, Charlotte?” she asked her friend, nodding at the tall man.
