Page 18 of Mr Darcy’s Quizzing Glass

Mr Darcy did the strangest thing. He smiled. Broadly. Oh my. If fatigue revealed him attractive, mirth turned his good looks into something strikingly handsome.

“As have I,” he replied, “although it is my valet or a footman more likely to find a fallen or forgotten book. Such I have been since childhood.”

Pleased by his unexpected confession, Elizabeth joined her smile to his. “My mother has long warned me about reading with only the light of the moon or a mere candle. ‘You will get creases from squinting at the words on the pages’, or so she said, but they have not yet appeared, and my eyes are not bothered.”

His gaze shifted to her eyes. “No, indeed. They seem quite fine.”

She returned his stare for a long moment until each blinked and looked away. “And yours, sir? Have you read too often by moonlight as well?”

Mr Darcy stiffened, his smile replaced quickly by an almost fierce look.

“Please excuse me.”

The door closed quietly behind him.

I have become Miss Bingley, chasing him from the room.

Later that day, Darcy stood near the tall windows of Netherfield’s drawing room, the late afternoon sun casting gold along the polished floor, cursing Miss Bingley’s endless verbosity and his own stubbornness. Just as he thought he was master of himself when speaking to Elizabeth, she had become his inquisitor. Asking about his eyes, hinting about his quizzing glass! He had thought he could easily use his own discernment here, that he could wean himself fully from his over-reliance upon it.

But for her.

Whether or not Elizabeth Bennet was in the same room, whether or not her voice or her glow drew his eye, Darcy could not resist looking for her—at her. He could not stop thinking of her, could not sleep for his dreams of her, and had he his quizzing glass, he could confirm his feelings were just, that she was sincere and as good and worthy and wonderful as she appeared.

She is. I know she is.

And then, he realised with a start, there she was, nearly within reach, standing in the muddy garden. Lively, clever, and luminous, even when dampened by rain, she was examining a tumbledown statue of some homely gentleman whose name was likely long forgot. Her nose was delightfully wrinkled, her eyes dancing with mirth as she gazed at the monstrosity with unmistakable curiosity. How happy she is to be out of doors!

With deliberate calm, Darcy leant closer to the glass. And just then she, bold and mischievous, glanced towards the very windows where he stood before lifting her face to the grey sky. His heart lurched and he stepped back hastily, as if scorched.

For an instant, he had not only seen but fully felt Elizabeth’s presence—her light and pleasing figure and her fine eyes, the bright flicker of her laughter, the quicksilver intelligence that danced behind her gaze, and most astonishingly, the dangerous warmth she had awakened in him. He closed his eyes as it thrummed through him, a feeling more urgent and powerful than any he had ever felt.

And this, through a pane of ordinary glass! A rain-streaked, slightly dirty window!

This is madness.

FOURTEEN

“Miss Elizabeth, you are a most observant young lady, are you not?”

Elizabeth glanced over at her new acquaintance. Admittedly, she had been pleased when Mr Wickham had sought her out and, smiling, joined her on the sofa in her aunt Philips’s drawing room. He was handsome, amiable, and eager to converse with everyone in Meryton, yet she could not like the tone in his voice, one she felt should be reserved for more intimate friends. It reminded Elizabeth of the fawning tone used by Miss Bingley when preparing to throw a barb at her or ingratiating herself into Mr Darcy’s company. It had become far too familiar during those long days recently spent at Netherfield. Since returning to Longbourn, her newly arrived cousin Mr Collins had ensured she received her daily dose of unctuousness.

“I should like to think so. I love to laugh, thus observing my neighbours has long been a favoured sport.”

He chuckled appreciatively before bending his head a bit closer to her. “I am certain you noted the expression of a certain gentleman when he saw me with your sisters in Meryton.”

Oh yes. She had seen Mr Darcy’s frown. Although Mr Wickham was pleasant to look at and speak with, it was only her curiosity about that ‘certain gentleman’ which had led her to smile at the lieutenant and encourage a tête-à-tête. She did not much like cards, but she knew to handle them carefully in conversation with any man Lydia deemed ‘her favourite’.

“Yes, do you know him?”

His grin revealed such a dazzling display of good looks, she half expected to hear gasps and swoons behind her. “Oh,” came his reply, once he had schooled his features to some semblance of rueful solemnity. “I know Darcy quite well.”

Despite such intimacy, clearly things were not well between them, as he went on to recount a childhood spent at Pemberley, well-favoured by Mr Darcy’s sainted father and envied by the son, who revenged himself by revoking the living owed to Mr Wickham. After a sigh clearly meant to inspire more sympathy than she was likely to share, he asked, “Are you well-acquainted with him?”

“Only a bit,” she allowed, wishing to disclose as little of her own interaction with Mr Darcy as she could. “He has been painted by his friend, Mr Bingley, as a man who knows all and everything.”

“Yes, from his privileged birth to his privileged education and such...” Mr Wickham’s hand rose, patting his chest. “Although I was brought up beside him, you will never see me affecting the need for the theatrics of a quizzing glass.”

Again with the quizzing glass! Elizabeth met the discourteous disclosure with some relief. Three nights under Netherfield’s roof and half a dozen times in company elsewhere, and not only had she not seen Mr Darcy with a quizzing glass, but the gentleman had been nearly silent on the subject his friends freely discussed. It seemed he had not brought it to Meryton, but Miss Bingley, and now this officer, was certainly eager to assert his reliance on the object.