Page 12 of The Matchmaker’s Mistake

Mrs. Hurst, sitting between Richard and Sir Geoffrey, took this moment to begin a long story about Bath, in which her sister figured prominently and her husband not at all. Hurst attended to his food.

Milton smoothly drew Lady Macomber out on the subject of her two grandchildren. Her face softened, and for several minutes she forgot to supervise her youngest daughter.

Miss Macomber ate three bites of potato without seeking approval.

Georgiana glanced at him down the length of the table. The look was fleeting, but perfectly intelligible. His sister, who spoke little herself, nevertheless appreciated people who possessed thoughts of their own.

Darcy answered with a slight movement of the eyes that told her he was doing his best under difficult circumstances.

When he looked away from Georgiana, his mother was watching him.

She generally reserved this cool, evaluative gaze for questionable fashions, inferior physicians, and family members who failed to cooperate with her perfectly reasonable plans.

He sat back feeling like a schoolboy whose examinations had been delayed but not dismissed.

The ladies withdrew and the gentlemen took their port. His mother’s small dinners ran to a strict schedule, so they would be allowed thirty minutes at most. When the end of that time approached, Sir Geoffrey left the room to join his wife and daughter.

Hurst grunted something and ambled off in search of . . . well, Darcy was not certain. More food, perhaps? Tea?

“Pleasant family,” his uncle observed, when they were alone.

Darcy nodded. “Yes.”

“Girl seems amiable.”

“Yes.”

“Not for you, though.”

Darcy shook his head. “No.”

Richard stretched his legs beneath the table. “I thought the potatoes went very well.”

“Richard,” his father warned.

“They had cream,” Milton added, and he and Richard laughed.

Lord Matlock looked between his sons. “My sister was right to seat you both at a distance.”

“She underestimated the reach of family loyalty,” Richard said.

Darcy finished his port and stood. Thirty minutes’ reprieve, he thought, was not nearly long enough.

They entered the drawing room while Mrs. Hurst was relating a detailed account of the damp lodgings they had suffered when in Bath.

Darcy took the seat his mother had selected for him beside Miss Macomber and, determined to get through the evening without embarrassing himself, introduced literature.

“What have you been reading lately, Miss Macomber?”

“I have lately been reading—” She paused. “Mamma, was it Mr. Scott?”

“It was Mr. Scott, dearest. The Lady of the Lake.”

“I have lately been reading The Lady of the Lake, Mr. Darcy.”

“And what did you think of it?”

“I thought it very fine.”