Page 27 of Mr Darcy’s Inconvenient Wife

“Then she and I agree about something at last.” The corner of her mouth moved, though it was not quite a smile. “I would not have thought it possible.”

She put the pen down and embraced her sister. Darcy stayed where he was, looking at their two names side by side in the parish register. Hers was not dry yet.

He knew better than to read anything into it. All the same, he did not move until the parson coughed and closed the book.

Chapter Thirteen

Elizabeth

“Edinburgh first. Then the Highlands, if the snow holds off. Jane has never seen a mountain, and I have promised her at least a dozen.”

Mr Bingley waved his cup as he said it, and a little of the chocolate went over the rim. Elizabeth caught his wrist before the rest could follow it onto his new waistcoat. He thanked her, laughed, and did very nearly the same thing again a minute later. He had been laughing at everything since the vestry. She suspected he would go on laughing until the carriage came for them, and very likely all the way to the border.

“A dozen is a great many mountains, sir. I hope Scotland has enough to go round.”

“Oh, I am told they have plenty to spare.” His eyes went to the other end of the dining room, where Jane stood by the window with their mother, being kissed by every lady in Meryton in turn. He had looked for her like that every few minutes since they came back to Longbourn, as though he wanted to be sure she had not been carried off. “We shall not be home before February, or March.”

Elizabeth kept smiling. She had known for two months that Jane would go. It was a different thing to hear it said aloud over the wedding cake, with the Longbourn silver set out and the fire roaring and her mother already telling people how much she would miss her.

“Then you must both write,” she said. “Otherwise I shall have to rely on Mama’s account of you, and she will have you living in a castle by Twelfth Night.”

Mr Darcy stood at his friend’s elbow with a plate of cold ham he had been holding for some time without eating any of it. He looked down at it now with great attention. Elizabeth was almost sure he was trying not to smile.

“Letters are all very well,” said Mr Bingley, “but you must come to us. As soon as we are settled in the north, Jane means to send for you. She told me so this morning. You will not refuse her?”

“I have never refused Jane anything in my life. That is exactly why she should not be trusted with such power.”

“Then it is settled.” He brightened still further, which Elizabeth would not have thought possible. “And Derbyshire is hardly out of the way at all. We could go and see Pemberley, if the owner would let us in.”

They both turned to Mr Darcy. He put the plate down on the sideboard.

“I should not count on it,” he said. “I have heard the owner of Pemberley is a very proud sort of man. Haughty. Thinks a great deal of himself. I am not at all sure he would allow it.”

He said it with a perfectly straight face. Only the corner of his mouth gave him away.

Elizabeth folded her hands. “I have heard the same. They say he will not speak to anyone below a baronet, and only dances when somebody holds a pistol to his head.”

“Then I am afraid you have no chance at all, Miss Elizabeth.”

“I would not give up yet. He might be persuaded that a visit would give him the chance to be disagreeable to more people at once than usual. I understand he is very proud of it.”

Mr Darcy laughed. It was short and low and it seemed to surprise him as much as it did her. Elizabeth had not expected it, and she laughed too before she could stop herself. Mr Bingley looked from one of them to the other with his mouth a little open, which only made it worse.

“I have not the least idea what is so funny,” he said, “but I shall take it as a yes.”

Across the room Jane lifted a hand to him. He went at once, with a bow that was a good deal quicker than it was graceful, and bumped into Mr Bennet’s chair on the way. When Elizabeth turned back, she found Mr Darcy watching her.

“Your sister looks very happy.”

“She is.” Elizabeth hesitated. He had not let her thank him on the road, and he had not let Jane’s thanks come to much at the church. She tried once more anyway. “And some of that is your doing, whatever you say. If you had not ridden out after that woman with me, I do not like to think what Jane would have believed this morning.”

He did not answer straight away. He looked past her, out of the window at the frost still white on the lawn where the sun had not reached it.

“You give me more credit than I deserve,” he said at last.

It was very nearly what he had said on the road. She thought it modest of him, and liked him for it, and was a little startled to find she liked him at all. She was still turning that over when she heard the rustle of silk behind her.

“Miss Eliza! You have kept Mr Darcy all to yourself for an age.” Miss Bingley was smiling so warmly that Elizabeth almost looked round to see who else she meant. “Will you not walk with me a little? I have hardly said two words to my new sister’s family all morning, and I am sure we have a great deal to talk about.”