It was not cowardice to skulk in the gardens rather than seek her out—was it? They could not speak in Lady Catherine’s bedchamber, for goodness’ sake! And even if she left her post and he found the means for private conversation, what on earth was there to say that he had not blurted out already?
He still had no answers—not even when, patently braver by far, half an hour later Elizabeth came to find him.
Darcy sifted through the oppressive fog of convoluted thoughts for any words that might suit the purpose as he watched her picking her way towards him through Lady Catherine’s misty garden. A slender form wrapped in a dark cloak that billowed behind her—very much like another apparition, the impression enhanced by their eerie surroundings.
All manner of sentiments warred in his breast as he sought to conquer the crippling mix of yearning and mortification brought by the hazy memory of last night’s visitation. All the words he might have selected—inadequate as they were—fled at her approach, just like the small flock of easily-frightened sparrows disturbed from their hideout in the topiary. He chased after them nevertheless—the words, not the sparrows—with as little success in catching the first as he might have had with the latter. And before he could do else but bow and say her name, the civil and socially acceptable “Miss Bennet” this time, she shocked him further with her unexpected expressions of contrition.
“Mr. Darcy, I came to apologise for my conduct yesterday—”
“There is no—” But she would have none of it.
“There is every need. I took advantage of the situation in an unpardonable manner. I should have instantly corrected your misapprehension.”
“Pray do not trouble yourself over it,” Darcy interjected, more forcefully than he had intended. It was beyond him to take his own advice, but as he fought to suppress a grimace, he also sought to lose some of the sternness, lest his tone be construed as resentful or reproachful. He was vaguely successful in his efforts when he added, “Sadly, there is nothing either of us could say or do to erase the wretched episode, much as I would wish to.”
“You would?” she tentatively asked, her voice very subdued.
“At this point in time, more than anything,” Darcy retorted hotly. “You already think so very ill of me and you certainly did not need another reason.” He saw her open her lips to speak, but he would not be dissuaded from firmly adding, “For all that it is worth, pray let me assure you, I do not make a habit of intemperance to the point of losing my senses.”
“Oh, I know that!” she hastily replied, then grew hesitant again. “I am distraught you were driven to it yesterday. But you have not lost your senses. Just … your reserve.”
“That is very nearly as bad!”
“You think so?”
“Do you not?”
She shook her head, once; then her eyes flashed up at him and she put her negation into words.
“No. I think reserve serves very ill sometimes, and this is one of the occasions. I should not wish to let reserve prevent me from saying what must be said.”
“And that is?” Darcy cautiously inquired.
“That I am heartily ashamed of how abominably I have acted,” she replied with energy, her troubled eyes not veering from his. “I have allowed vanity to lure me into grievous misjudgement. I cannot apologise enough for abusing you in defence of an infamous villain.”
The look in her eyes and the warmth of her declaration made his chest tighten. His breath caught and his heart lurched insanely into joy, before he checked the misguided emotion and spoke up to absolve her from unmerited self-reproach.
“You could not have known any of the particulars and suspicion is not in your nature. I suppose …” He sighed and reluctantly resumed. “I suppose I should have told you sooner. Put you on your guard against him. Yet—”
“You had your sister’s reputation to consider. I understand, and I thank you for your trust in revealing this to me. You may be assured, I will not breathe a word of it to another soul.”
Darcy nodded in quiet gratitude, and all that he could say was:
“Yes. I know.”
Her glance drifted to the mound of verdure to her left—to her joined hands—her feet. A deep shadow was settled in her eyes when she finally looked up again. “Your sister … Is she…recovered?”
Darcy’s eyes narrowed into an involuntary wince.
“No,” he replied curtly as he looked away. Somehow, the respite from trying to ascertain her thoughts in every play of emotion on her features moved him into elaborating. “She is not. She seeks to put up a brave front and go on as she always had, but the pain is there still; the insecurity, the injured feelings. She cannot hide any of this, much as she tries.”
“Yes. I know your meaning. I have seen it—”
She broke off, and this time it was Darcy’s turn to voice her thoughts for her.
“In your own sister,” he said, only to see her bite her lip, her countenance a picture of the deepest sadness.
The last time she had spoken to him of Miss Bennet’s disappointed hopes and broken heart, it had been with bitterness and barely restrained anger. The pained look she cast him now was a thousand times worse. Her distress—his—Bingley’s—Miss Bennet’s—who was served by the never-ending misery? He knew the answer now. No one. Except perhaps Bingley’s sisters. Just as he knew that his was the greatest share of the blame. Bingley would have ignored his sisters’ ambitious request that he attach himself to a lady of greater consequence and fortune. It had been his own belief in Miss Bennet’s indifference that had carried the most weight.
“You wish I had not interfered,” Darcy said, and he could see her nod.
“I do.”
“So do I.” It was the truth, God help him, and she might as well know it. “Ever since you told me of your sister’s true sentiments for Bingley, I cannot think without abhorrence of the pain I have unwittingly caused them both—of having played the villain’s part there. It is not a welcome thought.”
“I should imagine not.” She sighed. “But you still wrote that you have not yet learnt to condemn your motives.”
Old mannerisms from the days when he was a nervous schoolboy summoned by the headmaster resurfaced unbidden, yet Darcy was in no frame of mind to recognise them as such as he tugged unnecessarily at his waistcoat, his gaze fixed on the ribbon tied under her chin, until he raised it to her eyes with a determined effort.
“That letter” —he valiantly began— “was written in a dreadful bitterness of spirit. I believed myself perfectly calm and cool, but I was severely mistaken. I hope you have destroyed it. There are parts of it which I dread your having the power of reading again.”
“I have not burnt it, but I will do so if you wish,” she whispered softly.
There was a new softness in her eyes as well—was there not? And warmth followed, gradually seeping in. He could almost see it. They used to sparkle with mischief. On that wretched day, they had burned with contempt and anger. This was…
His chest filled with much-needed air, and his senses with the dizzying proximity of the most beautiful eyes he had ever seen. Never so close, in the whole course of their acquaintance. Never so warm either. And never this—a long, unbroken gaze that drew him in and thoroughly robbed him of his caution. The words were out, unfiltered, before he could check them.
“I do. The facts are unchanged, and I will not have you question their veracity. Only the sentiments that went with them. You spoke of my claim that I have not learnt to condemn my motives. In truth, I have learnt a vast deal since the morning when I wrote that letter. Among other things, that I must be lacking in imagination. Even as I saw Bingley pining for your sister after our return to Town, I had not grasped how he must feel. I have lately discovered I should neither wish nor work to inflict that sort of pain on anyone. Least of all, one of my closest friends.”
“Mr. Darcy, I—”
Her quiet gasp and truncated exclamation belatedly returned him to his senses. Wh
at the devil was he doing—saying? A short while ago he had watched her approach through the mist-shrouded garden feeling backed in a corner and mortified in the extreme by last night’s debacle. Yet there he was now blurting out words which might seem calculated to elicit pity—the last sentiment he had ever wished to inspire in her! Before he could sink further into a mire of his own making, Darcy added swiftly:
“Pray, set your heart at rest in that regard. I … I sought to make amends. By now Bingley must have received my letter informing him I was utterly in the wrong about your sister’s sentiments. Knowing him, he will be at Longbourn in no time at all.”
“You wrote to him? Already?” Elizabeth asked with a beatific smile that took his breath away. And then she chuckled lightly. “Poor Mr. Bingley. I fear he will have a wasted journey. I hope he can bear the disappointment.”
Darcy stared, nonplussed. Clearly, he never had a hope of understanding her, for all his prideful confidence to the contrary. There was no rational connection between her light-hearted, almost blissful manner, and the dispiriting picture her words had just conjured.
“I fail to understand your meaning,” he frankly owned. “I thought you implied your sister would welcome his addresses.”
“She would, with all her heart. But she is not at Longbourn. She is still visiting my uncle and aunt in Town. That is to say in … Cheapside.”
She eyed him squarely as she concluded, her countenance suddenly closed and guarded. He silently cursed the cloud that had dimmed the precious brightness of a few moments ago, along with what he had done to put it there—the abysmal choice of words at the time of his ill-starred proposal. His features tightened into a grimace of profound discomfort as he spoke up to give her her due.
“When your sister was taken ill at Netherfield and you came to care for her, my friend most astutely pointed out that having relations to fill all of Cheapside would not make either of you one jot less agreeable,” Darcy quietly offered, then bit his lip. Not so much at the recollection of his reply to Bingley’s warm avowal, little as he appreciated the irony of Fate and the perverse ways it chose to deliver punishment by humbling the prideful. Rather, it belatedly occurred to him he might well have made yet another faux pas and instead of taking it as the compliment it was meant to be, Elizabeth might find his remark vexingly condescending.
He fully expected her to purse her lips and mordantly deliver something along the lines of “How very generous of him—and you—to say so!”
She did purse her lips as she searched his troubled eyes. And before she could tax him yet again for prideful conceit, Darcy hastened to forestall her:
“I should have worded it better. Forgive me. It was … intended as a compliment,” he added, narrowing his eyes and nervously running his fingers through his hair, only to instantly wish that he had not. His headache had only marginally abated.
The little smile that curled her lips and crinkled the corners of her eyes could not do much against the headache, but was vastly more effective on the dull ache in his chest, as was the mildness of her brief reply—when she finally made one.
“I know,” she whispered.
More than anything, it was the mellow glance and the hint of gentle laughter in her voice that emboldened him to continue with a tentative attempt at a self-conscious smile.
“It seems I have a vast deal to learn about passable compliments and avowals from my best friend and my cousin. Fitzwilliam will doubtlessly say that only the greatest fool in Christendom would abuse a lady’s relations in the midst of his proposal.”
“Yes, you mentioned that.”
“Did I? When?”
“Last night.”
“Oh.”
Darcy cleared his voice. This was unsound, wildly hazardous and beyond mortifying, but he had to know.
“Might I ask what else I said?”
“You do not remember…?”
Was there wistfulness in her voice? Or condemnation? Either way, the heat of a profuse blush spread up from behind his collar.
“To my discredit, I must own I cannot tell the difference between reality and fantasy.”
She dropped her gaze and a severe blush crept into her cheeks as well, giving such a glow to her beloved countenance that yearning swelled to take over his heart and easily prevail over the mortification.
“That bad, was it?” he found himself asking with a rueful little twitch of his lips that masqueraded as a smile.
She did not return it, but her eyes shot back towards his, and they glowed too.
“You said you dreamt of me. Every night since November. With excruciating clarity.”
“That was badly put, and far from the truth,” Darcy replied with fervour, deciding he might as well be hanged for the whole hog now that they were so far beyond equivocation. “The clarity is not excruciating. In truth, it brings a measure of comfort. As last night did. And I should thank you for your kindness.”
Lord above! There he was again! What had come over him and taken command of his wretched tongue? Darcy sighed in profound exasperation as he ran his fingers through his hair once more, forgetting he had already deemed it patently unwise. But the giddiness that overcame him had little to do with the nervous gesture. Rather, it was promptly ascribed to the rightful cause: the small hand that came to rest on his sleeve and press his arm in an unexpected offer of reassurance and comfort.
Instinctively, Darcy reached to cover it with his. Thin fingers, delicate and very cold. His hand curled around them as he desperately sought to rally whatever was left of his scattered senses before he said the wrong thing at the wrong time—again!
Her soft reply put paid to all his efforts:
“I would not wholeheartedly agree with your cousin’s censure. My ill-judged defence of Mr. Wickham must have been more than sufficient provocation for some of your remarks.”
Had Darcy been able to spare his nemesis more than a moment’s thought, he might have found it quite extraordinary that for the first time since their early days at Cambridge the mention of his name brought pure and unadulterated pleasure. She was willing to excuse his ungentlemanly outburst on account of her defence of a loathed, suspected rival?
Yet the dizzying heights of hope were not heady enough to render him less than truthful.
“You are too generous. But that cannot justify my speaking of our … of the envisaged union as a degradation in the same breath as professions of ardent love and admiration. That was sheer ineptitude and, as you have rightly pointed out, selfish disdain for the feelings of others. I aimed to assure you of the strength of my regard, that it was not the work of a moment, nor passing inclination but deep devotion conquering any and all difficulties. Had I thought more of your feelings and less of mine, I would have seen it was the worst possible manner of offering marriage.”
Her hand was no longer on his sleeve. He had gathered it to cradle it in his as, once more, he found himself drawn deeper and irremediably lost in dark eyes specked with golden amber.
The amber suddenly began to shimmer under a film of tears, and when she blinked, a glistening droplet escaped to run over her cheek. His free hand came up, and Darcy brushed the single tear with his thumb. Her skin was very soft and very cool, the earlier blush gone without a trace. Pale cheeks, impossibly wide eyes, a puff of air—the beginnings of a sigh—escaping from trembling lips.
His hand froze with the desperate effort of not reaching to cup her chin and tilt it up, nor winding into her auburn tresses to draw her close and claim those trembling lips with his. His breath caught and Darcy drew his hand back by a fraction, lest he succumb to the achingly sweet temptation, but could not quite bring himself to drop it yet. Rational thought governing words and actions was slipping further and further from his grasp—and Darcy lost the battle altogether when his poised hand was covered with hers and pressed against her cheek.
A sharp intake of breath—his?—hers?—filled the air between them, and every hope of sanity and guarded conduct vanishe
d with it. His lips crushed on hers with all the accumulated hunger of the many months of longing for the exquisite indulgence, with all the despair of the agonising days since he had lost her.
If this was madness, then so be it. Sense had nothing to recommend it anyway, not when measured against this sweet insanity that spiralled into absolute perfection when her hands came up to clasp his shoulders, then tangled into his hair, and when her lips matched the wild fervour of his as they responded to his kisses. He clasped her closer—could not even tell how he had come to take her in his arms—and still devoured her lips, past caring and well beyond the reach of reason.
Of all the powers under Heaven, there was only one that could make him stop; and that was the compulsion to plead, “Elizabeth, let me start again. Do it right. Court you. Make you love me. Persuade you I cannot live without you and I cannot even bring myself to try. I—”
She stopped him with a kiss—with several—and between them she eagerly whispered, “Yes!” And then again— “Oh, yes. I will.”
Barely daring to believe his ears and allow awed delight into his already brimming heart, Darcy drew back to search her eyes and seek the desperately needed confirmation:
“You will allow me to court you?”
Her eyes were very bright and still shimmering with unshed tears, and their glow took his breath away. But it was her words that brought him reeling onto the brink of a brand-new world:
“I will marry you,” she fervently replied. “Let it be said it was a whirlwind courtship. Let it also be called unwise. But in mere hours, I saw deeper into your heart than in several months of my slow and misguided wisdom.”
His hungry lips found hers again—a blissful, tangible reality in a world that had become almost too perfect to be true. It was some time until he could bring himself to draw away again, but no further than to rest his brow on hers. He was a fool to ask, now that he had everything he had ever dreamt of, he knew as much. Yet he also knew he had to.
The Darcy Monologues: A romance anthology of Pride and Prejudice short stories in Mr. Darcy's own words Page 10
