A Most Civil Proposal

by C. P. Odom

  “With the general intent of the document, yes,” he said seriously. “While I have some suggestions regarding specific language, the areas covered are as comprehensive as I think possible. To start, this statement could use a modest change to make sure there is no confusion. If I might suggest . . .”

  The three spent half an hour discussing areas in which Mr. Gardiner and sometimes Elizabeth had questions, some of which occasioned an adjustment of language in order to make the intent perfectly clear and remove any ambiguity. At the end, Darcy thanked them and said that he would have his solicitor incorporate the revisions before returning the documents for Mr. Gardiner’s signature.

  Darcy was disinclined to leave immediately and toyed with the idea of asking Elizabeth to take a walk, but he had to have the draft documents back to his solicitor as soon as possible for the final copies to be drawn up. So reluctantly, he made his farewell to her uncle while Elizabeth accompanied him down the stairs to the front door. He turned around to tell her goodbye, standing on the floor by the door while she remained on the first step, and he was astonished as she leaned forward suddenly to give him a quick kiss on the cheek.

  He looked at her while she looked back, merriment dancing in her eyes, and he smiled slowly. “I did warn you, Miss Bennet,” he said softly as he reached out for her. She did not pull back as one arm slid around her waist and the other around her back as he pulled her close, though she did nervously lick her lips with the tip of her tongue. Even though she stood on the first step, he was still taller than she was, and she watched him as he lowered his mouth to hers.

  At the first touch of the exquisite softness of her lips, Darcy felt the most sublime sense of completion come over him as his mouth claimed hers, and their kiss deepened as he pulled her fully against him. He felt her hands come up to grasp his lapels as his right hand explored the wonderful slimness of her waist, marvelling at the beautiful symmetry of her figure and the warmth and softness of her flesh under her dress. He felt her kiss him back, and a thrill went down his spine as dreams that he had despaired of ever seeing fulfilled were finally realized. He opened his mouth as he kissed her even deeper, pressing harder against her yielding lips, feeling her respond, and his left hand came up to the back of her slender neck to stroke his fingers along her velvety soft skin. She raised her arms and put them around his neck, pulling him down to her, urging him on, and he felt her shiver as his tongue slipped into her open mouth, caressing those yielding lips from the inside. At last, he lessened the pressure, gradually pulling back, though he still nibbled her lower lip with his own lips and tongue while he felt her quiver again. Finally, he drew back completely, seeing her eyes half-closed, and the thought that she could feel passion for him, when added to his own desire for her, made him suddenly long to explore all the hidden secrets of her body right there in her uncle’s entry.

  I can wait, he told himself firmly, pulling her close in an embrace, and tucking her head on his shoulder while his hand stroked the silky softness of her hair. He felt her quickened breath slow to its normal rate though his own breathing was far from even.

  “Elizabeth,” he murmured into her hair, drawing in the clean scent of her with just the slightest hint of perfume. If she only knew how much I want to pull out her hairpins and let that mass of curls fall naturally to her shoulders, she would flee up the stairs this moment.

  “I almost believe that I am dreaming when I think that we shall be married in just four days,” he said softly. “I am the most fortunate of men.” The tickle of her warm breath on his neck was exhilarating, as was the feel of the slim line of her back as his hand moved slowly up and down its length from waist to shoulders. Finally, regretfully, he loosened his hold on her and stepped back to look into her eyes. They were no longer half-closed, they were wide open and sparkling, and the hint of a smile on her lovely face was such that Darcy determined that he must somehow capture that look in a portrait.

  “I told you that I would depend on it, sir,” she said lightly, and he laughed as he leaned forward to kiss her forehead.

  “I must go, but I do thank you for your faith in my promise. I look forward to seeing you tonight.”

  “Yes, tonight.” She suddenly looked worried.

  “What is it? Surely you cannot be feeling any anxiety about meeting my uncle and aunt?”

  “But your uncle is Lady Catherine’s brother, is he not? I suppose I fear that he will be like her.”

  “He is not. Remember, your uncle is your mother’s brother, and he is completely unlike her, is he not?”

  “True, true.” She sighed. “Poor Mama.”

  “Elizabeth, please do not take this badly, but I met your mother in the hallway at Longbourn after leaving my disastrous meeting with your father, and I found that mere silliness was a refreshing contrast and actually quite welcome.”

  “Yes.” She sighed again. “Poor Papa. I thought that at least I could depend on him. Perhaps I should have sent a letter with you, but I confess I never anticipated the need.”

  “Nor did I.” He chuckled. “And not a single prepared note anywhere on my person!”

  She laughed lightly, and at that, he departed with one last look at her standing on the step, still with that delightful little smile on her face.

  * * * * *

  Dinner that night began most agreeably with Lord and Lady Matlock greeting their future niece and her relations with grace and civility. However, shortly after the parties sat down to table, that most decidedly changed. The first intimation came as Darcy heard the sound of raised voices clearly though the closed dining room door. He frowned, pausing with his soup spoon partway to his mouth as he listened

  Soon the raised voices grew louder, obviously coming down the hall, and his concern was instantly replaced by alarm. Quickly putting his silverware down, he excused himself abruptly. A sharp rapping sound was clearly audible as he strode toward the door, but he was not yet halfway to it when it suddenly flew open. Every eye in the room turned to see Lady Catherine de Bourgh framed in the doorway with Darcy’s butler visible behind her, almost wringing his hands in agitation.

  Darcy stopped dead still, He realized the sharp sound in the hall had been her ladyship’s walking stick slamming in anger against the wood floor. Displeasure was obvious in her face. Clearly, she was enraged beyond anything Darcy had ever seen, having pushed her way past Stevens, ignoring his attempts to waylay her until he could announce her arrival.

  “Darcy!” Lady Catherine cried in a ringing, strident voice. “I have come to talk to you this instant, and I will not be gainsaid by that lackey at your door!”

  “Lady Catherine,” Darcy said coldly, trying to control his anger at her complete breach of decorum, “I have guests at table, and you will remember proper manners or you will leave.”

  But his aunt was past the point of remembering manners or being able to read the understated threat in his voice. “I will not be ordered about! I will talk with you immediately; do you hear? Immediately!” Her voice grew even higher and shriller. She suddenly saw Elizabeth still sitting at the table and pointed her stick. “And that woman! How could you? How could you forget yourself for that . . . that fortune hunter!”

  Elizabeth was shocked by the cold fury evident on her face.

  Can nothing between William and me ever be calm and simple, she wondered, but that was quickly followed by, How could I ever have thought William was like this woman?

  At that point, Stevens had emerged from behind Lady Catherine. “I am sorry, sir. I told her ladyship that you were at dinner and asked her to wait in your study while I informed you of her arrival. But she demanded to see you at once and shoved her way past me. I was unable to dissuade her from interrupting your dinner.”

  “That is quite all right, Stevens. I do not expect that my staff should have to physically manhandle members of my family who appear to have forgotten all good manners. That will be all.” Stevens bowed and vanished back through the door.

  “And
now, Lady Catherine,” Darcy turned back with a glare, “we will proceed to my study instead of continuing this unseemly display in front of my guests.” His voice made it clear that he would brook no dispute. Lady Catherine glared at him and then glared at Elizabeth, appearing as if she indeed intended to argue the point right there, but, after a moment, she nodded jerkily and left the room, her walking stick resuming its harsh clatter. Darcy followed, closing the door behind him.

  Elizabeth looked around the table. Shock and mortification was universally displayed on the faces of the others. Lord Matlock’s face was flushed dark red. “Disgraceful, just disgraceful,” he mumbled in embarrassment since Lady Catherine was his own sister, after all. Georgiana was visibly upset, and Lady Matlock spoke quietly to her. The others were just sitting, looking down and saying nothing. The previously enjoyable conversation had been totally destroyed by the shocking display.

  Elizabeth thought about Darcy confronting his angry aunt, and she suddenly knew where her place was — where she had to be. She rose and excused herself, though it was unlikely that anyone heard her. By that time, Bingley had come around the table and had knelt by Jane’s chair, talking quietly, and everyone else was still too embarrassed to note her departure.

  As she approached the study, she could hear the loud voices inside well before she reached the door. She did not knock; she simply opened the door and stepped inside. Lady Catherine was standing beside Darcy’s desk, glaring at him as he addressed her, his words clipped and cold, “ . . . most disgraceful episode it has ever been my displeasure to witness. In my own house and by my own aunt! Can you give me one reason, madam, why I should not ask you to leave my home immediately?”

  At that moment, Lady Catherine became aware of Elizabeth as she closed the door. Pointing at her with her walking stick, she shrilled, “Her! Get her out of this house, Darcy! I will not have her in my presence!”

  Darcy gave a quick glance at Elizabeth but his attention never left his aunt. “It is infinitely more likely that it will be you who departs my house rather than Elizabeth,” he said icily.

  Elizabeth came up beside Darcy and threaded her arm through his. He almost jumped at the touch. “You should not be here, Elizabeth,” he said urgently. “This is between my aunt and me.”

  “No, William,” she said calmly, “I am where I belong.” She looked up at him firmly. “By your side.”

  Darcy felt a thrilling tingle down his spine at her firm declaration then nodded in agreement and turned back to his aunt. “Now, we were discussing why you should not be asked to leave my house after forcing your way past my butler and most impolitely disrupting my dinner party?”

  “She knows,” Lady Catherine said in fury, pointing again at Elizabeth. “She knows why I came!”

  “Indeed, you are mistaken, madam,” said Elizabeth coolly. “I cannot account for how I could have been the cause for such an appalling breach of good manners.”

  “Miss Bennet,” responded her ladyship in a furious voice, “you ought to know that I am not to be trifled with! You may be as impudent as you please, but I shall be completely sober and frank. After your departure from Hunsford, I thought that I should never have to encounter your shameless behaviour again, but today I learned from this disgraceful announcement in the Times that you have not desisted from your nefarious plots!” She pulled a scrap of paper out of her reticule and waved it at Elizabeth. “I can only assume that you published these lies for the purpose of furthering your plan to connect yourself with my nephew! But it will not work, Miss Bennet! It will not work! I immediately resolved on visiting my nephew so that he could instantly contradict this infamous proclamation!”

  “The announcement is perfectly true,” replied Darcy in a controlled voice. “Indeed, I myself placed the announcement and wrote to inform you of this on Sunday.”

  Lady Catherine gaped in astonishment then turned her blazing eyes toward Elizabeth. “Then you have succeeded in your scheme to entrap my nephew! You are determined to ruin him! But it will not happen! I demand that you immediately and publicly contradict this report!”

  “I will do nothing of the kind, your ladyship. Mr. Darcy made his proposal, I accepted him, and my father’s consent has been given. We are engaged, and it was announced.”

  Lady Catherine rounded on Darcy. “How could you?” she shrilled. “How could you do this to your cousin Anne? Have you lost the use of your reason? I came here thinking that this shameless lady-bird had placed that announcement herself, trying to entrap you, but now I see that she is playing a deeper game! She has used her arts and allurements to catch you in a web of infatuation! Break free of it, Darcy! Break the engagement immediately! You are already engaged to Anne! Remember what you owe to yourself and all your family!”

  “I am not and never have been engaged to Anne,” Darcy said heatedly. “That has been your own delusion all these years. Though we love each other as cousins, Anne and I have never desired marriage. I know that this is her opinion, because we have spoken of it several times. We thought it best to avoid the subject, rather than to confront you openly in the matter. But that was an error; I see that now. I should have flatly laughed in your face years ago.”

  Lady Catherine recoiled in horror. “This is not to be borne! From your infancy, you two have been intended for each other! Is this union to be prevented by a young woman of inferior birth, of no importance in the world, and wholly unallied to the family? It was the favourite wish of your mother! Will you deny the wishes your own mother, my sister, planned when you were in your cradle?”

  “My mother never spoke to me of such an arrangement, madam,” Darcy said in a low, angry voice. “Pray leave her out of any further argument, or this conversation will be at an end.”

  “Miss Bennet, you forget your place!” her ladyship cried, rounding on Elizabeth in fury, but the younger woman refused to be intimidated. Darcy started to step forward, but Elizabeth placed her hand on his arm, and he stayed back and stood silent. “Be warned! Even if you manage to succeed in attaching yourself to my nephew, do not think to benefit from it! You will be ignored by his family and friends, censured, slighted and despised by everyone connected with him! Your alliance will be a disgrace! Your name will never even be mentioned by any of us!”

  Darcy was surprised at Elizabeth’s sudden, impudent smile. “These are heavy misfortunes, madam,” she replied cheerfully, “but even if all you foretold came to pass, I believe that Mr. Darcy and I will be quite happy and will, on the whole, have no cause to repine.”

  Lady Catherine erupted in fury at being mocked by the younger girl. “Obstinate, headstrong girl!” she shrieked. “I am ashamed of you! Is this your gratitude for my attentions to you last spring? Is nothing due to me on that score?”

  “Your ladyship’s behaviour,” Elizabeth relied coldly, “has been such that I feel relieved from any obligations of gratitude that might have been warranted had you behaved in the manner of a true lady.”

  Lady Catherine recoiled as if she had been slapped, but Elizabeth continued coolly. “Allow me to say, Lady Catherine, that the arguments with which you have supported this extraordinary application have been as frivolous as the application was ill judged. You have widely mistaken my character if you think I can be worked on by such persuasions as these. And I cannot understand why you think you have the right to interfere in your nephew’s life, nor do I think forcing your way into his home in such an unseemly manner will enable you to carry your point.”

  Her ladyship’s eyes glinted with hatred as she leaned forward. “Insolent, selfish girl,” she hissed, “if you were sensible of your own good, you would not wish to quit the sphere in which you have been brought up.”

  Elizabeth’s chin rose in defiance. “In marrying Mr. Darcy, I shall not be quitting that sphere, madam. He is a gentleman. I am a gentleman’s daughter. So far, we are equal.”

  “That may be, Miss Bennet, but who was your mother? Who are your uncles and aunts? Do not imagine me ignorant of t
heir condition!”

  “Whatever my connections may be,” said Elizabeth with an impish glance at Darcy, “your nephew has told me that he has deemed them of no significance. If he does not object to them, they can be nothing to you.”

  “Correctly said, my dear,” growled Darcy. “My patience is near exhaustion, Lady Catherine. I am still of a mind to have you ejected from my house.”

  “You would not dare,” the older woman hissed.

  “Do not push me, madam. I have been greatly provoked tonight.”

  “Provoked? Have I not been provoked by your taking this . . . this fortune hunter as your Bird of Paradise when you were visiting in my own household? In the same house as your cousin Anne? Will you pollute the shades of Pemberley with this scheming, selfish girl?”

  Lady Catherine was shocked by Darcy’s sudden burst of derisive laughter. “Fortune hunter? Madame, you are as ill-informed as you are witless! Do you not know that your own household was the source of these baseless rumours?” At the shocked look on her face, he leaned forward and snarled, “Yes, your own household! Have I not informed you for years of how the mistreatment and ill management of your staff would one day lead to disaster? And now it has occurred!” he concluded with a cold smile that had no mirth in it.

  Leaning toward his still speechless aunt, Darcy growled, “And fortune hunter? Silly, foolish, woman! Do you think I could give credence to any such charge when Elizabeth refused my proposal that night at the Parsonage?”

  Lady Catherine gaped in disbelief.

  “Yes, refused! Turned me down flat! Try to spin that into a ‘fortune hunter,’ madam! Just try!”

  Darcy regained a measure of control, conscious of Elizabeth’s firm pressure on his arm, mindful of her courageous loyalty in the face of such hostility. “I had hopes that I might in time have persuaded her to accept me. But gossip from your dishonourable staff spread to London and even into the scandal sheets. So, to protect Miss Bennet’s reputation, which is of the highest, madam, I was forced to renew my proposal before it was time, and she was likewise compelled to accept it before she would have otherwise wished.” He smiled coldly at his aunt. “So you see, Lady Catherine, we would not be engaged at this moment if it were not for your inept management of your own household! Does it not console you to learn that you are the author of your own misfortune?”