Page 20 of A Question of Character

“You are amused, Miss Bennet.”

“I was admiring your military assistance.”

“The casualties were light.”

“Due entirely to your intervention.”

Mr. Gardiner, catching the tail end of the exchange, laughed. “Darcy, you have now been praised by Elizabeth. Take care. She will expect regular acts of heroism.”

“Then I must pray all future dangers are wooden.”

The bookshop encounter occurred several days later, when rain sent half their intended party scattering toward shelter and the other half into a narrow shop that smelled of leather, dust, and damp wool. Mr. Gardiner had business nearby, Mrs. Gardiner wished to examine a volume of sermons for her sister, and Elizabeth had long ago learned that few storms were so inconvenient they could not be improved by books.

Mr. Darcy discovered them there.

Or perhaps, Elizabeth thought as he entered and removed his hat, Gracechurch Street and its environs had developed a habit of producing him whenever the day required improvement.

“You are caught in the rain?” Mrs. Gardiner asked.

“I believe the rain caught me,” Darcy replied, giving his hat to the shop boy, who looked awed to be entrusted with so fine an article. Darcy thanked him with no air of condescension, and the boy flushed with pleasure before fleeing to a peg near the back.

Elizabeth had seen him do such things often enough now to know they were not performed for admiration. He spoke to servants as though they existed fully before he had need of them. It was a small thing, perhaps. Yet many people revealed themselves in small things because they forgot to guard them.

“Have you come in search of sermons?” Elizabeth asked, lifting the volume her aunt had chosen.

“Not willingly.”

“I commend your honesty.”

“If I have offended the clergy, I hope they will forgive me.”

“My cousin Mr. Collins would be deeply wounded.”

Darcy’s face altered, and she was nearly certain he had no idea who Mr. Collins was. “Then I must be grateful Mr. Collins is not here to hear me.”

“You would be less grateful after five minutes in his company.”

Mrs. Gardiner gave Elizabeth’s arm a light tap with the sermons. “My dear.”

“I am being generous. Three minutes would suffice.”

Darcy’s laugh was low enough that the bookseller, who had been pretending not to listen, lost his place in a stack of invoices.

They wandered among the shelves while the rain struck the windows in silver threads. Darcy recommended a history of Derbyshire families after warning her that it contained at least two chapters of unnecessary pride from a gentleman determined to prove his ancestors had been important before anyone else’s. Elizabeth chose a novel for her aunt, a small volume of poetry for herself, and a book of maps for the Gardiner children, who had recently taken to arguing over whether dragons lived in Scotland.

“Do they?” Darcy asked, examining the book before offering it to the bookseller.

“Certainly—farther north than my uncle has traveled.”

“Then the map is incomplete.”

“I shall write to the publisher.”

Mr. Darcy insisted upon paying for the maps, declaring himself an investor in geographical accuracy. Elizabeth objected, Mrs. Gardiner objected more properly, and the youngest Gardiner boy decided the matter by accepting the package from Darcy and asking whether dragons ate soldiers.

“Just the foolish ones,” Darcy answered.

The child considered this. “Then they may eat Peter.”