Page 20 of Mr Darcy’s Inconvenient Wife

“That is nonsense.”

“So I told myself.”

“Then you were right. Bingley would never do such a thing. He could not keep a secret if his life depended on it. When he bought Miss Bennet's wedding present, he had told me all about it four times before it was even wrapped.” He shook his head. “If he had stayed away to meet another woman, I would know it. Once he might evade me, but not as often as this woman claims. I can account for his whereabouts most days. I was here with him a fortnight and have been again since Sunday last.”

“And before you came?”

“He spent a week with me at Pemberley. Before that he was at his house in Scarborough.” Something eased in his face, very slightly. “Unless this Nicola is a great traveller, she has been carrying on her affair across half of England, without my ever noticing her.”

Elizabeth looked down at the handkerchief. The forget-me-nots were creased from her pocket. She smoothed them flat with her thumb and put it away again.

“She knew so much about him,” she said.

“Miss Bingley knows much about her brother and would pass the information on gladly.”

It was so obvious that Elizabeth was cross with herself for not seeing it first.

“Then perhaps I ought still to speak to Mr Bingley,” she said slowly. “When he comes home.”

“You may, if you like.” Mr Darcy glanced up at the house. “But I do not see what good it would do. He could not disprove the story any better than I have. It would only make him wretched on the day before his wedding. We would do much better to find the woman herself, and make her tell us who sent her.”

We. Elizabeth let the word pass.

“I would not know where to begin looking.”

“She left not long before you came. There is only one road from here that will take her anywhere she is likely to want to go, and that is the road to Meryton. All the coaches leave from there.”

“She was on foot when she left Longbourn,” Elizabeth said. “I saw her from the window, walking away down the lane.”

“Then she cannot have got far.”

Elizabeth looked back across the white fields she had just crossed, and then down the long drive to the gate and the high road beyond. If it was improper to come to Netherfield alone, it would be far more improper to leave it again in company of Mr Darcy. Her mother would have a fit. Miss Bingley would have a better one.

She found that she did not mind much about either of them. Jane mattered more.

“Very well,” she said. “We must go after her.”

He bowed. Neither of them moved for a moment. Somewhere behind the house a dog was barking, and the gravel crunched under Elizabeth's boot as she turned towards the gate.

Then Mr Darcy offered her his arm.

It was nothing. Any gentleman would have done the same for any lady with half a mile of frozen road in front of her. Elizabeth looked at it a moment longer than she ought. The last time she had taken his hand, they had danced together in this very house, and she had spent the whole dance wishing herself anywhere else.

She laid her gloved fingers on his sleeve.

They walked down the drive together without speaking. Elizabeth kept her eyes on the road ahead and watched for a velvet bonnet. She was far more aware than she liked about the man beside her, and of how he had shortened his stride to match hers without being asked.

She had walked all the way to Netherfield to have the truth out of one gentleman. She had never imagined she might end the morning grateful to the other.

She did not know in the least what to do about that.

Chapter Ten

Elizabeth

They had not gone fifty yards down the drive before Mr Darcy stopped.

“This will not do. She has half an hour’s start of us, and we are strolling as if we were on our way to church.” He looked back at the house. “We shall do better on horseback.”