Page 68 of Dear Friend

Miss Bingley's smile faltered. “You appear remarkably well informed on the subject, Mr. Darcy.”

“I have spoken with Miss Elizabeth of her friend.”

There was nothing in the admission that required concealment, nor was it a lie. Though Darcy had read the letters Elizabeth intended for Miss Harding, Elizabeth herself had spoken to him of Julia upon Oakham Mount, and he had no reason to pretend otherwise. Yet Miss Bingley's expression altered sufficiently to tell him that the intimacy implied by such a conversation had not escaped her.

“I see,” she said after a moment. “Then I daresay you have been given a considerably fuller history than the rest of us.”

“On a matter concerning Miss Elizabeth's closest friend, I should think Miss Elizabeth herself a more reliable authority than neighbourhood gossip.”

“I daresay you would.”

“I would.”

A brief silence followed.

Mr. Hurst, who had thus far shown considerably greater interest in his dinner than in anything being said around him, looked up from his plate. “I like the Bennets well enough myself. The younger one, Kitty, is it? She has a very fine laugh.”

Mrs. Hurst turned such a look upon her husband that even Hurst appeared to understand its meaning. He returned to his dinner without further comment.

Bingley reached for his wine with the unmistakable relief of a man who wished the subject finished. “Well, whatever anyone else thinks of it, I have said what I meant to say. I intend to marry Jane, if she will have me, and I do not intend to argue the matter further tonight.”

Mrs. Hurst gave an exasperated sigh, while Miss Bingley's expression suggested that Bingley had announced not a potential marriage, but a catastrophe.

Bingley drank from his glass before turning deliberately towards Darcy. “Forster means to have the officers out for a shooting party before the month is done. I told him you would likely be persuaded to join us.”

Darcy accepted the change of subject gladly enough, and within minutes Bingley had succeeded in drawing the conversation towards shooting and the merits of several neighbouring estates.

Darcy contributed when required, but his thoughts returned more than once to the conversation just ended.

Julia Harding's name had been spoken at Netherfield.

That alone ought not to have troubled him. Elizabeth had never concealed her friendship with Julia, and there was nothing extraordinary in a neighbourhood remembering a young woman who had lived among them and then departed unexpectedly.

What troubled him was how instinctively he had defended Elizabeth's account, and how easily he might have said more.

There were now two histories of Julia Harding in his possession. One Elizabeth had entrusted to him herself upon Oakham Mount, believing him entirely ignorant of her friend. The other had come to him months before, through letters never intended for his eyes.

Tonight, he had relied upon the first to conceal the second.

It was not a lie.

Darcy reminded himself rather severely that this did not necessarily make it honest.

~

The gentlemen retired unusually early that evening, the long afternoon at Colonel Forster's having left even Bingley disinclined to prolong the day. Mr. Hurst followed not long afterwards, leaving Caroline and Louisa together in the drawing room.

For several minutes Caroline said nothing. She had been unusually quiet since dinner, turning over a thought which had first presented itself as no more than an irritation and had since become something considerably more troublesome.

“Louisa,” she said at last, once they were alone, “did you notice what Mr. Darcy said at dinner?”

“I am rather more concerned with what Charles said.” Mrs. Hurst looked up from the fire. “Of all the young women he might have met in London, with families and connexions suitable to his own, he means to settle upon the daughter of an obscure country gentleman.”

“I cannot believe he will actually do it.” Caroline shook her head. “He has known her scarcely a month. Once we return to town and he is among sensible society again, I daresay he will recover himself.”

“He seemed remarkably decided for a man expected to recover himself.”

Caroline frowned at that unwelcome observation. “Charles has always been easily carried away. But I was speaking of Mr. Darcy. Did you hear what he said about Miss Harding?”