Page 36 of The Matchmaker’s Mistake

“Yes. Why not? Mrs. Gardiner was kindness itself yesterday, and Miss Bennet—well.” He smiled helplessly, no doubt finding language inadequate to express his sentiments. “It would not be strange. You know them already.”

Darcy considered Bingley’s invitation. It would be strange. It would, in fact, be a very great mistake.

Gracechurch Street was not a ballroom or crowded drawing room in which distance and civility could be maintained. It would be a family parlour. A fire. Conversation. Miss Elizabeth within speaking distance for longer than a moment at a punch bowl.

“I think,” Darcy said evenly, “that your visit will prosper better without an additional gentleman imposed upon it.”

“Nonsense. Mrs. Gardiner likes you.”

That, unfortunately, was true. Worse yet—he liked Mrs. Gardiner. And her husband.

“Even so.”

Bingley studied him for a moment. “You are well?”

“Perfectly.”

His friend appeared only half convinced, though happiness quickly reclaimed him. “Very well. But I mean to stay longer than propriety allows.”

Despite himself, Darcy laughed. “Go to Gracechurch Street, Bingley, and do as you will.”

Bingley smiled, seized his gloves from the chair beside him, and was gone almost before the servant could properly open the door.

The room felt markedly quieter after his departure. Darcy stood for a moment beside the fire with his untouched coffee cooling once again in his hand.

Then, because he apparently possessed neither judgement nor self-preservation, he found himself wondering whether Miss Elizabeth Bennet was at that moment sitting in the Gardiners’ drawing room. What was she doing? Was she reading, sewing, making lively conversation?

The clock struck three-quarters of the hour.

Darcy moved to the window of his study, which overlooked the paved courtyard behind the house, and watched a wren that was perched upon an empty stone planter.

Mr. Darcy of Pemberley accompanying his friend to Gracechurch Street once would occasion no remark of consequence. His family, and particularly his mother, had long possessed the habit of treating people according to their merits rather than their rank, and a single visit to the Gardiners’ house in Cheapside would be understood merely as civility.

Repetition, however, was another matter. A gentleman might go anywhere once, but a settled habit invited interpretation.

If he accompanied Bingley to Gracechurch Street today, Bingley would wish for his presence every time he visited—at least, until he was sure Miss Bennet would marry him. By then, however, the visits would be regular events. And once the visits became regular, society would not long remain satisfied with the obvious explanation, that he was supporting his friend. No, Bingley’s attentions to Miss Bennet were already sufficiently clear. A second unmarried gentleman regularly accompanying his friend on calls would inevitably produce speculation about the unattached sister, and speculation, once formed, could turn ugly.

It would not be Darcy who suffered from it. Men rarely did. But Miss Elizabeth might. Her name would begin to appear in conversations where it ought not. People would decide she had attracted him, encouraged him, perhaps held expectations of him. And when nothing came of it, the embarrassment would settle not upon him, but upon her.

Darcy could endure discomfort perfectly well. He had been since the party at Lucas Lodge in October, if not before. What he would not do was create more discomfort in Miss Elizabeth than he had already. He would not expose Miss Elizabeth to scrutiny because he lacked sufficient discipline to stay away from a drawing room in the City.

Darcy returned to his desk, where there was a half-completed letter to his steward at Pemberley. He finished, signed, and sealed it, then rang for Hewitt. He took up his pen, but after a moment he set it down again, for there were no other letters to write.

Which left him time to think.

His mother had been protecting Miss Elizabeth from him last night, and Darcy had not objected, for he had no wish to injure her further. His acquaintance with Miss Elizabeth in Hertfordshire had been a brief one. Still, it had been long enough for him to know she was a young woman of unusual quickness.

She intrigued him. And through his idiotic blundering, he had made himself forever ineligible to do anything about it. Though he had no right to feel it, Darcy was forced to admit he had been jealous of Mr. Cresswell. At least, until he saw Mr. Cresswell step away.

Darcy thought of calling for the carriage, but he did not.

When the clock struck twelve, he imagined Bingley standing in the Gardiners’ drawing room saying something pleasing to Miss Bennet. He had not said or done anything stupid in Hertfordshire. Other than leaving it, that was, and allowing his sister to delay his return.

But even that had turned in Bingley’s favour, for Miss Bennet and her sister had come to London to . . . Darcy paused. He did not actually know why they had come, for Bingley had not been in London long enough to cause concern, not even in an anxious mother like Mrs. Bennet.

A light knock interrupted his thoughts.

Darcy turned from the window. “Come.”