Page 11 of Yearning

“Miss Bennet,” said the colonel, as she skidded to a stop. “Are you all right? You seem out of sorts.”

She dashed at the tears on her cheeks. They were in the middle of the hallway. The front door was ahead of them both, and a servant was behind the colonel, twisting his hands together. The servant had likely been showing the colonel to Mr. Darcy’s room, or perhaps to a sitting room, or wherever it was the man had been on his way to. She could not cry in front of the servants. “I am quite all right, but I feel a bit overcome, and I think I must take my leave.”

The colonel looked back at the servant. “Thank you very much for your assistance,” he said pointedly.

“Sir,” said the servant, bobbing his head, his voice high-pitched. He scurried around them both and disappeared into the hallway.

Elizabeth shook her head. “If you would not mind, sir, I shall be on my way.” Of course, she was going to have to walk. The Bingley carriage was not due to come back and collect her for some hours yet. Walking sounded welcome to her, however. She liked walking.

“Wait, Miss Bennet, something happened,” said the colonel. “I have not seen you this way, and there has been cause. You have weathered all of this with aplomb, so what happened?”

She shook her head. She could not repeat that to him. It was abominable.

“You likely should not bottle this up, you know? Whatever you are feeling, it is good to express it, if only to sort of let off a little steam, like a kettle, if you know what I am speaking of?”

“Perhaps,” she said. “Rest easy, then, I shall speak to someone else about it, but I cannot trouble you with it.”

“Oh, it’s about me,” said the colonel.

How had he guessed that? And now, she could feel heat rising to her cheeks.

The colonel darted across the hallway, opened a doorway, and peered inside. “Here. It’s empty. We shall be undisturbed.” He held the door open, raising his eyebrows.

She let out something like a moan. Her face was on fire. But she went into the room with him. It was a small sitting room. It contained a piano. The windows faced the street.

He shut the door behind them. “Did Darcy do something? Say something?”

She shook her head. She could not say any of this aloud. She sorted through some way to put it, and she could not, so what she eventually came out with was, “He said he would give me a dowry.”

The colonel’s eyebrows shot up.

Now, the words were simply tumbling out of her mouth. “He said he wanted to set me free, and I said that he was falling on his sword, and he just turned it right around on me and said I was falling on my sword, and I had nothing to say to that, and I just stood there, gaping at him, and he started talking about… about…” She gestured at the colonel.

The colonel looked down, at the tips of his shoes. He cleared his throat. “Such a condescending and typical Fitzwilliam Darcy thing to do, to assume he needs to pay me to take you off his hands.”

Her lower lip trembled. “Perhaps I am a burden to him. I had not thought of it that way, but—”

“You could never be a burden, Miss Bennet,” cut in the colonel, his voice sure and smooth.

She let out a breath.

He lifted his gaze and their eyes met for a moment.

She looked away.

He sighed. He looked up at the ceiling.

The silence went on for some time.

She eventually began to feel something like anger rising inside her. No, not like anger, it was anger. She squared her shoulders and went to the door and thrust it open.

“Miss Bennet?” called the colonel.

She paid him no mind. She marched back to the sick room where Mr. Darcy was still laying in the bed, and she went to his bedside.

His eyes were closed.

“Are you sleeping?” she said in a lethal voice.