Page 58 of The Matchmaker’s Mistake

“You must sit with us, Lady Anne,” Lady Finch said. “My husband refuses to attend anything sung in Italian.”

Miss Finch smiled. “Papa says a man cannot properly admire what he does not understand. I told him this principle would empty half the clubs in London, but I fear this did not persuade him.”

His mother laughed, and even Darcy found himself smiling.

Miss Finch was exactly as had been promised. She was handsome, sensible, well-connected, and genuinely pleasing. By every measure his mother valued, she was the best candidate she had yet selected. Darcy knew it. He liked Miss Finch.

And still, nothing in him moved.

The failure was not hers. It was his, for his stubborn heart was fixed on a woman who would never return his feelings.

Lady Finch, who until now had said very little, mentioned to his mother that they were refurbishing the house in Berkeley Square. New chairs were to be delivered in February. The sharp look his mother sent him told him clearly not to gloat.

“The spaniel is a mystery,” Miss Finch was saying, and Darcy forced himself to pay attention. “Nobody in the family has ever owned one. Papa says it must have belonged to the painter, for it appears in half the portraits of the county.”

He nodded. “It is an interesting supposition.” But his thoughts were elsewhere—on that gravel walk beside the Serpentine, where Miss Elizabeth Bennet had spoken kindly of his sister, and he had answered with more feeling than he had intended.

Mrs. Gardiner and her nieces walked in the park on Tuesdays. Only five more days.

“Do not you think so, Mr. Darcy?”

“In the main,” he said.

Miss Finch paused, then smiled. “I shall take that for the answer of a gentleman who has been asked the wrong question.”

His mother’s eyes lifted.

Darcy was obliged to smile. “I beg your pardon. I was inattentive.”

“Yes,” said Miss Finch, without offence. “But not unkindly so. We did draw you away from your purpose when you arrived home.” She turned the subject herself, neatly and without making him pay for the lapse. That only made things worse, for she deserved a polite audience.

The Finches rose at the proper time, Darcy and his mother did as well. Lady Finch and his mother settled the concert between them while Miss Finch gave Darcy her hand.

“It was nice to meet you, Mr. Darcy,” she said.

He bowed over her hand and thought that in some other winter he might have been grateful to meet her. But not this one.

Not two minutes after the Finch ladies had gone, his sister’s head appeared around the drawing room door. “Is it over?” she asked in a hushed voice.

“It is over,” his mother said, and Darcy was uncertain whether her words were meant in more than one way. He could hope.

“Did you like her?” Georgiana asked.

“I did,” Darcy replied.

“Is it not time for you to practise your music?” his mother inquired.

Georgiana shot him a sympathetic glance and was gone.

His mother took up her work basket and found her needle. She sat, and for a while she worked. She did not dismiss him, and so he remained standing, the better to escape when she did.

“Well,” she said. “I shall say it before you do. There is nothing wrong with Miss Finch.”

“Nothing whatever,” Darcy agreed.

“She is handsome.”

“She is.”