Page 18 of He Insulted My Entire Family Before Proposing

"It can be."

He looked at her with sudden frustration. "You agree with me and yet condemn me."

"Because you mistook our faults for permission to despise us."

He had no immediate answer.

Elizabeth turned toward him. "I know my family, Mr. Darcy. I know every absurdity. I have been embarrassed by my mother, exasperated by Lydia, disappointed by my father, and bored into Christian suffering by Mary. You are not wrong because you noticed. You are wrong because you converted noticing into superiority."

The words struck him. She saw the old pride rise, meet something newer, and retreat with poor grace.

"That is just," he said.

"It is also generous. I might have said you were insufferable."

"You have said it before."

"Yes, but I enjoy variety."

He laughed then. Not much. Enough.

The sound unsettled her. She preferred him grave. Gravity made him easier to accuse. A Darcy who laughed at himself, even a little, was a complication.

"At dinner," he said, "you gave me an opening."

"I gave you a test."

"I know."

"You nearly failed."

"I know that too."

They had reached the edge of the shrubbery. From there they could see the front of the house, where Kitty was chasing a ribbon blown from Lydia's bonnet and Mrs. Bennet was directing a footman with the urgency of a military campaign.

Darcy watched the scene. Once, Elizabeth knew, he would have seen only vulgarity. Today his expression was more difficult to read.

"I cannot make your family other than they are," he said.

"No one has asked you to work miracles."

"Nor can I pretend all conduct is equal."

"I would distrust you if you did."

"Then what do you require of me?"

The question was direct. It deserved a direct answer, though direct answers had a way of revealing more than one intended.

"Respect," she said. "Not admiration for every foolishness. Not blindness. Respect. If you think my mother vulgar, remember she is a woman with five daughters and no secure future for any of them. If Lydia is silly, remember no one with authority has troubled to guide her. If my father laughs when he should act, do not punish Jane for it. Do not punish me. And never again call interference protection because the woman harmed was too gentle to object where you could hear her."

Darcy's face had gone very still.

"You ask much," he said softly.

"No. I ask what you would have given anyone you already considered your equal."

The difference stood between them.