Page 59 of The Vanished Bennet Sister

"I am clarifying that the gratitude is disproportionate to my contribution. What I did was not difficult to arrange."

"Your contribution included Bow Street officers and their carriage, the presence of mind to arrange all of this in a single evening, and the willingness to go visit the day before that and be dismissed for your trouble. I would not call that disproportionate."

A flicker of amusement crossed his features. "You have an apt memory for occasions on which you have been unjust to people."

"I do have a good memory for occasions on which I have been wrong because I like to hold myself accountable. Thank you for siding with that."

Kitty had found an urgent interest in the pattern of the curtain fabric. Lydia bent her head over the needlework studiously.

Mr Darcy set down his cup deliberately. He turned to her with a glance she had not seen from him before, or rather, she had seen its parts, but not this specific arrangement.

This was, she realised with a slight adjustment of her expectations, an expression that held uncertainty within it. Fitzwilliam Darcy, who navigated the world as though he had always been sure of his position in it, looked, at this moment, unsure and…nervous.

"Miss Bennet," he said. "I have something I wish to say. Something I am not assured that I have communicated clearly, or at all, in the way I intended, and which I find I cannot allow to remain unspoken any longer."

"What things?" she murmured, a wave of anticipation building up within her.

"I am deeply in love with you. I have been for some time. Longer, I think, than I was willing to acknowledge to myself, which I recognise does not reflect well on my self-awareness. But I know it now, completely and without question, and I wish to say so."

Kitty’s jaw fell open and Lydia reached over to close it, her own eyes as wide as teacups.

Elizabeth took in the formidable surface of his face. What was visible beneath that exterior, was less composed and more real. Affection. Honesty. Dedication. Responsibility. She felt any remnant of inhibition, if it ever existed, dissolve.

"I am glad you said it plainly," she responded. "You have not always been easy to read, Mr Darcy, and I have not always read you accurately, but I think we are both better served by directness." She met his gaze head-on. "I am in love with you as well. The reason why I failed to realise this early is because admitting it would have required me to revise a number of opinions I had formed rather strongly."

A soft look appeared on his face, closely followed by a bright smile that was considerably more to her preference.

"Then I should very much like to ask you something."

"You may ask."

"Will you marry me?" He appeared to consider briefly whether elaboration was appropriate and decided it was. "You would have Pemberley, which I should tell you contains the finest library in Derbyshire, and I am sure you would appreciate that specifically. You would have Georgiana, who already thinks so well of you, and who would benefit enormously from your company and your willingness to make her conjugate French verbs when she deserves it. You would have Colonel Fitzwilliam, who is invariably good company and who will take your side in any argument simply to be contrary, which means you will almost always win." He stopped, and when he resumed it was in a quieter register, full of emotion. "And you would have me. Which I offer with considerably more humility than everything else on the list, because I am aware that I am the variable of most uncertain value, and because I find, somewhat to my own surprise, that your good opinion is the one I most wish to secure."

Elizabeth laughed, a ringing joyful sound.

"You do not need to present further inventory. I had already decided before you began listing benefits."

"Have you, really?"

"Certainly. The library is an advantage I will not pretend I am indifferent to. But I would accept you without it, and I would like you to know that."

He reached across the space between them and took her hand, which was in somewhat imprecise alignment with the conventions that governed interactions between a couple in stages of courtship, but she did not care in the slightest.

From the sofa, Lydia spoke up, no longer content to remain a silent audience: "Well, I would say Mama's ambitions for the season have been thoroughly vindicated. She said it would be a success and she was not wrong, was she? Two engagements and a near-kidnapping. Very productive."

"Lydia," Elizabeth said.

"I am only making an observation. Moreover, Kitty agrees with me. You do, don't you?"

"I do, indeed," Kitty said, grinning widely.

Mr Darcy, who had not yet released her hand, said nothing. He appeared content and disinclined to disturb the direction of the conversation by adding to it.

Elizabeth smiled at him with as much happiness as her heart could muster, which turned out to be endless amounts. Then she thought about that morning in early January when she had stood at the window in the drawing room tracking accounts in her head as the season stretched ahead.

She had come to London for Jane's sake, and her mother's sake, not knowing what else would result from that single course of action.

She knew now.