Page 36 of Yearning

“Is there?” she said. “Danger of what, Mr. I’m-practically-a-eunuch?”

He flushed, looking away.

Abruptly, she turned and walked up the hallway, away from him.

CHAPTER TWELVE

THE NEXT MORNING, Elizabeth went down for breakfast, and Mr. Darcy was not there, which was slightly a relief after that late-night conversation between them.

But then she realized he was leaving, right away, and that his servants were packing his things and putting his chair in his carriage, and she hurried out to try to say goodbye to him.

But he barely looked at her as he was being assisted into the carriage by his two male servants, and when he did, he gave her a look that was all regret.

She fought tears, wanting to stand there and wave until his carriage was out of sight and also wanting to go and beat on the windows of the carriage and scream until she was hoarse because she was so angry with him. But in the end, she did neither. She went inside and her husband said, “I saw you spoke to him yesterday while we were at pall-mall. Was he courteous?”

“Yes,” she said. “Yes, he and I have put all that ugliness from the past behind us.”

“Excellent news, my darling,” said her husband.

But now that Mr. Darcy was gone, her husband did not come back to her bed, and she was not sure if such things were related. Was her husband threatened by Mr. Darcy? Could he tell that she still had feelings for the other man?

They went home after their fortnight.

They were greeted in their home by the dogs, because of course they had dogs, two of them, large dogs, though they had been small little puppies right at the beginning of the marriage. They had grown, however. They were named Prince and Scepter, and they were treated a bit like royalty.

She liked the dogs. They were large, but they were good, and they were loving, always happy to see her and her husband, always there to worm their little heads in for pats.

They settled in, home again, and all was as it had been before.

She was due for her bleeding. It did not come.

She waited and waited, and it did not come the next month either. She began to feel queasy—not always in the mornings, at all times of the day, in fact. It came and went, but it seemed to be a sign. She was pleased, but she was wary. She wanted to be sure before she said anything.

This was mostly because she kept trying to convince herself it was not real. She had wanted this for so long, she could not quite believe it might actually be happening. She was afraid that if she became excited about it, if she accepted it as reality, it would turn out to be false.

Even so, as the weeks passed, she began to think that she might tell her husband that perhaps she was with child.

She never did get a chance, however.

“You have not bled,” he said. “You think I have not noticed. I have noticed. Not since Berkshire. Not since you saw him.”

He was in the doorway of her bedchamber. It was late. She was seated on her bed, and her hair was down. She stood up to face her husband. “Are you accusing me of something?”

“The night before he disappeared, I woke and you were not in the bed,” he said.

“I told you that I went to walk, that I was restless,” she said.

“Did you see him?”

She had concealed that from him. “I… yes, actually. But he is… he cannot get a child on me.”

“Are we certain of that?”

“Quite,” she said. “He does not have… bollocks.”

“Oh, you know this for certain?”

“I do,” she said.