Page 33 of Mr. Darcy’s Fiery Passion

She knew how it looked all the same. The east end stood open to the sky under its scaffolding. Jane's window was gone. Her own window was gone.

Her home was out there behind those trees, and it had no room in it for her.

She stood there longer than she meant to. When she turned, the sun was much lower. The light in the lane had gone from gold to amber.

And she understood, all at once, how far she had come.

It was more than a mile back to the gates. Perhaps a mile and a half. She had come out on anger and sunshine. She had nothing left of either.

Very well, she told herself. Then you will go back slowly.

She started down the rise.

Elizabeth was careful. She watched every rut. She set the crutch, and then her good foot, and then the crutch again.

Halfway down, the bad ankle turned.

It was only a stone, or a little loose earth at the edge of a rut. The ankle rolled under her, the way it had rolled on the night of the fire. She heard herself cry out. Then she was sitting on the bank under the hedge, with the crutch across her knees. Pain ran all the way up to her hip.

She stayed there a long time.

When she could breathe, she tried to stand. She got as far as her knees. She put the smallest weight on the ankle, and the world went white at the edges. She sat down again, hard.

She tried once more. It was worse.

Well, she thought. Well, Elizabeth. This is very clever of you.

The sun touched the top of the hedge. The cold came up out of the ground and into her skirts. Somewhere a rook called, and another answered. Then even the rooks were quiet.

Nobody knew she was here. She had told Thomas she was going for a turn on the drive. Jane would look in the shrubbery. They would look in the park. Nobody would think of the old lane.

She had told one person about the old lane. She had told him in the library, at two o'clock in the morning, and laughed about it.

It is where I go when I do not wish to be found.

In all the years she had walked it, nobody had come looking for her there. She had been very proud of it.

She pulled the borrowed cloak tighter and tried not to be afraid. She was not a fool. She knew what a November night in an open lane could do. She thought of her father. She thought of Jane, who would blame herself. Her throat ached.

Do not cry, she told herself fiercely. If you cry, you will be cold and wet both.

Cheeks wet with what Elizabeth vowed were not tears, she sat under the hedge and watched the light go out of the sky.

She heard him before she saw him.

The footsteps came fast down the lane from the gates. They were too fast for a walk. Someone was half running. A light swung round the bend, low down, at the level of a man's hand.

It was a lantern. It hung from a man's wrist by its ring. The man was tall, and bareheaded, and his greatcoat was open.

He saw her. He stopped dead in the lane. "Elizabeth."

Her name came out of him rough and broken. He was breathing hard. His face in the lantern light was white.

Then he was coming toward her, and she could not bear it. She could not bear for him to see her this way. She was sitting in the dirt, helpless, at the end of her own foolishness. And he had handed her to a footman.

"Mr. Darcy." Her voice came out almost steady. "You need not have troubled. I am quite able to walk."

"You are sitting in a ditch."