Page 20 of A November to Remember

Caroline’s spine snapped straight, the cushion discarded. She leapt to her feet, rushed to the gilded mirror above the mantelpiece, and pinched her cheeks until they bloomed with rosiness. She adjusted the neckline of her gown, tugging it half an inch lower, and turned to face the door.

“Louisa, sit up,” she hissed, arranging her features into a mask of delight. “Mr Hurst, kindly stop breathing so loudly. The gentlemen are here.”

The drawing-room doors opened, and the gentlemen entered.

Caroline launched her combined assault, which required the agility of an acrobat and the mental fortitude of a politician. She had spent the last two hours preparing three distinct traps.

“Mr Darcy! Lord Keathley! Colonel!” She swept forward, her voice a melodious trill. She pivoted to Darcy first, gesturing towards a leather-bound tome she had strategically placed on the central table. “Mr Darcy, you shall be delighted. I sent an express to London just for you, and the book has arrived! Observations on the Drainage of Marshlands and the Rotation of Turnips. I opened it this morning and was captivated. I thought of your magnificent fields at Pemberley immediately.”

Darcy stared at the book, then at Caroline, his expression mirroring that of a man who had just been offered a plate of raw turnips. “I thank you, Miss Bingley. Though I confess, my estate manager is quite adept at turnip rotation. I am not involved in the marshlands personally.”

Caroline did not miss a beat. She spun on her heel, her silk skirts whipping around her ankles, and targeted the viscount.

“Lord Keathley!” She produced a glossy sheet of paper from under a porcelain figurine. “A new fashion plate from Bond Street! Is it true that the Duke of Devonshire has abandoned the Hessian boot in favour of a tasselled slipper for morning wear? I told Louisa, ‘Only a man of Lord Keathley’s unparalleled metropolitan elegance could verify such a shocking development!’”

Viscount Keathley took the fashion plate between two long fingers, his eyes dancing with amusement. “Tassels, Miss Bingley? Good heavens, I should hope not. Tassels are for curtains and horses. Though I must say, transitioning from the drainage of marshlands to metropolitan footwear is a conversational vertigo I find quite invigorating. You are a marvel.”

“You flatter me, my lord,” Caroline breathed triumphantly. She then whirled a full one hundred and eighty degrees, her breathing growing shallow from the exertion, and addressed the colonel.

“Colonel!” she cried, lunging to a silver dome on the sideboard. She lifted it with a flourish to reveal a pile of sliced roast beef and a loaf of fresh bread. “A man of the sword requires robust sustenance after braving the country elements. I instructed the cook to prepare this purely with your stamina in mind.”

“Outstanding,” Richard grunted, abandoning his companions and bypassing Caroline to reach the meat. He forked a slice of beef and shoved it into his mouth. “You are a woman of vision, Miss Bingley.”

Caroline beamed, her chest heaving. She had done it. She had successfully pandered to a landowner, a viscount, and a perpetually starving soldier within the space of forty seconds. It was a masterpiece of calculated flattery, even if her calves were beginning to cramp from the rapid pivoting.

Charles bounded into the room behind them, smiling into the void.

“Oh, Caroline, you missed the most fascinating call!” he announced, dropping into an armchair. “The Bennet family is truly exceptional. We had the most stimulating conversation.”

Caroline’s smile stiffened into a rictus grin. “Did you, Charles? How... nice. I imagine Mrs Bennet detailed the history of her linens, or perhaps the butcher’s prices?”

“Not at all!” Charles beamed. “Miss Elizabeth Bennet was there. She had just returned from a walk and she and Keathley engaged in the most brilliant debate. And then, Caroline, you will never believe it!”

“I am sure I will not,” Caroline muttered under her breath.

Her brother missed the venom entirely. “They spoke of Plutarch! She made a brilliant point about Alcibiades. He could adopt the customs of any society, but he could never master his own vanity.”

“A country miss holding forth on Plutarch?” Caroline let out a brittle laugh. “How inappropriate. I suppose she read it in a discarded book and repeated it to sound clever. I am sure Mr Darcy put her firmly in her place.”

She shifted towards Darcy, expecting the comforting sneer of his disdain. Instead, he was staring out of the window, his jaw clenched, the tips of his ears bearing a suspicious shade of red.

“Actually,” Charles laughed, slapping his knee, “Darcy agreed with her!”

Caroline grabbed the edge of the table to steady herself.

“I beg your pardon?” Her voice dropped out of its soprano register.

“He agreed with her!” Charles repeated happily, as though he had not just dropped a cannonball into his sister’s world. “He stepped right up and said she was correct. He used Plutarch to support her argument. It was magnificent. I have never seen Darcy agree with anyone outside of his immediate family so swiftly.”

Caroline saw bright colours behind her eyes, and what looked like a rhinoceros.

Darcy did not agree with country nobodies; he barely agreed with her, and she spent her life twisting her opinions into agreeable muffins just to suit him. For Fitzwilliam Darcy to publicly concede a philosophical point to a woman who had an unhinged mother...

He is smitten. The realisation hit Caroline straight to the head. The equation had just grown infinitely worse. Darcy was not merely a target anymore; he was a prize actively slipping from her grasp.

“Well,” the colonel said around a mouthful of beef, mercifully breaking the ringing silence in Caroline’s ears. “This was nice, Miss Bingley. I shall take the rest to my chambers. I sincerely hope Colonel Forster’s fare will be equal to yours on Friday.”

“Ah, yes!” Charles sat up. “Colonel Forster of the militia is in Meryton. He invited us to join him for dinner.”