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A proper heroine would have gone into a sad decline at this point. Indeed, Elizabeth stayed in bed until lunch the next day. She had decided the night before that it would provoke fewer questions from her aunt if she continued to feign illness for a while. During her first miserable hour of wakefulness on the next morning, Lizzy castigated herself for her poor reaction to Mr Darcy’s advances on the previous day. She had behaved very much like a green girl, which for all her learning, she supposed she was. She should have given him a slap and then gone off to the study to compose herself rather than biting him like a child.

Clearly Mr Darcy had been overset by his aunt’s embarrassing revelations. Just as clearly, he thought that Lizzy was still on the catch for him and had sought employment in his house on that basis. Why had he not believed the forged letter? Presumably he had already suspected her imposture. Maybe he had thought the letter a diversionary tactic? Perhaps she had raised his suspicions when she fled the room so abruptly after Mr Bingley’s arrival? No doubt the cameo had finally given her secret away. Oh, why had she worn it on Saturday?

Elizabeth also regretted her harsh words to Mr Darcy. She shuddered upon remembering her declaration that he was ‘the last man in the world’ she would marry. This was far from the truth and Lizzy knew it. Her words had sprung solely from her fear and outrage at being overpowered by him. Who would have thought that an invalid could be so strong? Elizabeth had insulted him gravely. She knew that a proud man like Mr Darcy would never forgive her for such an insult. More importantly for her own conscience, her outburst had been unfeeling and harsh, coming after the embarrassment of his aunt’s disclosure. She could not help thinking that he might have interpreted her words as a jibe against his infirmity, which had not been her intention.

Nonetheless, as her solitary confinement dragged on, Elizabeth’s mind kept returning to the state of Mr Darcy’s health. He had denied being stricken by syphilis. As far as Lizzy knew, such diseases left their mark upon a man in the form of a rash, which she had seen no sign of. She resolved to look it up in the library as soon as she might.

By lunchtime she could stand her isolation no more. When Sally came to enquire if she would like a tray, Elizabeth declared she felt much better and would join her aunt for lunch—so much for the decline.

Darcy had spent the first few minutes after Elizabeth ran from the room mentally berating her. After finally doing the right thing and asking her to marry him, she had assaulted him!

He had immediately recalled an incident in his childhood when he had accompanied his father on business to the Heythrop country. At seven, Darcy had never before seen a fox hunt. It was not a pastime his father indulged in. Instead, his father had been in the area visiting the house of a country attorney on some business for an old retainer. Left temporarily to his own devices, Darcy had been playing outside with some pebbles when he had encountered the fox. Clearly exhausted, she had been slinking along beside a stone wall, searching for a way through. Later he had realised that she was trying to evade the dogs that chased her. The pack were still a baying mob in the distance and Darcy had not yet connected them to the harassed fox.

When she had stumbled near him, Darcy’s heart had gone out to the vixen. He had scooped her up like a cat to stroke her thick fur. She had not objected at first. When the pack came scrambling down the street, Darcy had been more alarmed for himself than anything and had climbed upon the stone wall to evade them, cuddling the fox to him. Seeing freedom on the other side, the vixen had nipped him and fled.

When his father came out into the street to check on him upon the advent of the baying hounds, he had at first been relieved to find his son and heir safe on the wall. But when Darcy proffered his bleeding hand and related his story, his papa had given him a truly memorable smack on the behind for his foolishness, then taken him off immediately to the doctor. His father had been anxious for days that Darcy would fall prey to some dread disease, which his bewildered son had realised years later would have been rabies.

Nursing his throbbing hand after Elizabeth’s recent assault, Darcy pondered how apposite that memory was—he had belatedly got the dread disease and another nip from a vixen, but not in the correct order. Of course, it did not take Darcy much longer to realise he had thoroughly deserved the second bite as well as the first. His hand was not bleeding from Elizabeth’s attack. He thought, with some irony, he was fairly sure he was safe from rabies. He could only be glad that his father had not been there to cuff him for his stupidity. It had been ungentlemanly of him to propose in the way he had.

When Farley came hurrying up the stairs, Darcy hid his injured hand under the blanket, more from guilt than anything else.

“Is everything all right, sir? Miss Gardiner has gone off in the rain.”

This news surprised Darcy, who had thought Elizabeth had merely retreated to the study, as was her wont in crisis. How overdramatic to have fled into the downpour! Now what was she at? Gone to get her attorney? He had already offered her marriage, what more did she require?

“She’ll come back tomorrow,” he said confidently.

But she did not. When Elizabeth had not turned up by ten, Darcy had sent an enquiry to the mews and one of his grooms had come to his bedside to report. The coach had gone to Cheapside as usual, but the lady of the house, Mrs Gardiner, had said there must be some mistake, that her niece had finished yesterday. The groom apologised to Darcy for any miscommunication between the house and the stables.

Darcy had gone cold when he heard that information, feeling like someone had pulled the rug from under his feet. She did not intend to return! His hand immediately sought the cameo, which he had shoved under his pillows. He fondled its cold hard surface and reflected how different it was to his soft warm Elizabeth. A wave of heat passed over his body as the kiss he had stolen yesterday flashed into his mind. The first doubts of his interpretation of events began to prey on his thoughts.

After being pestered by unwanted visitors for the past week, Darcy’s bedchamber suddenly felt lonely and empty. No lovely lady to read him mathematics or sentimental novels. Something was nagging at him about the circumstances of Elizabeth’s employment, which he had not paid much attention to at the time, having told his cousin that he was not interested in a reader, only a secretary. He summoned Farley.

“Farley, I will confide to you that Miss Gardiner and I had words yesterday, and I fear that we have misunderstood one another; that she has no intention of coming back, which would sadden me greatly. Can you remember what Colonel Fitzwilliam had to say about her employment? Did he register the position under my name or his own?”

“Well, I would say your name, sir, since the agency sent the bill here. But Colonel Fitzwilliam said Miss Gardiner volunteered herself when she heard he was looking for someone who could read Latin and Greek.”

“So, she may have believed she would be working for my cousin?”

“She told me on the way upstairs that Colonel Fitzwilliam had advised her only that he needed someone to read to his sick cousin.”

This gave Darcy pause. “Farley, did you notice Miss Gardiner’s reaction when she saw me?”

“No, sir. But I do remember that she wanted to leave after the first day.”

“Leave?”

“Yes, sir; for which you cannot blame her—you being so narky as you were. She said she didn’t think she was suitable for the position and only stayed as a favour to the colonel—him being tired of running back and forth to the agency—till that Oxford fellow should show up. In fact, Miss Georgie was hoping the Oxford fellow wouldn’t turn up at all. She’s become fast friends with both the princess and Miss Gardiner. She dearly wanted Miss Gardiner to stay. You should hear them rabbiting on together downstairs. I never knew that Miss Georgie could talk so much.”

Darcy lapsed into a reverie as he digested this. Georgie had seemed disappointed yesterday upon arriving home to find that Miss Gardiner had already departed for the day. In his isolation, Darcy had not realised that Elizabeth and Georgie had struck up a friendship.

The silence continued so long that Farley began to wonder if the young master had forgotten he was present.

Farley coughed. “I paid Miss Gardiner her first week’s wages, mostly in advance, last Tuesday, sir, as you requested. But I didn’t pay her for yesterday, not expecting her departure. Moreover, I haven’t received a bill for the townhouse model, which I think Miss Gardiner mentioned was finished when she arrived on Monday morning. It may yet turn up, but given she said she commissioned it from a stallholder in Covent Garden, I’m thinking she might have paid cash. Nor have I received a bill for those wax tablets. Plus, she left her boots behind. Maybe I should send Hobbes over to Cheapside with her boots and her pay and get him to ask how much is needed to square any outstanding obligations.”

Now Darcy was feeling truly terrible. Elizabeth had done so much for him, and he had not appreciated it at all! Instead, he had focused resentfully on her imposture. What if her coming to Darcy House had simply been a coincidence rather than a scheme to entrap him? He needed more information and a level head.

“Wait a couple of more days, Farley. I am expecting Finn back any day now. In fact, I cannot imagine what is keeping him so long.”