Page 36 of The Servants’ Matchmaking

The lane seemed, absurdly, to widen around them.

Lydia called out from the stile. A mounted officer approached from the direction of Meryton. Darcy recognised Denny and braced himself for a conversation about the weather.

Another man rode just behind him.

Wickham.

Darcy stopped dead.

Ramsgate came back in a single cold rush. Georgiana's frightened face. Wickham's easy assurance that no harm had ever been intended by any of it. Darcy had not expected, not for one moment, to see that face again in Hertfordshire of all places.

Wickham saw him too. Surprise disturbed his smile for less than a second before it smoothed itself back into place, practised as breathing. Elizabeth noticed both. The recognition and the recovery.

"Mr. Darcy?"

"The gentleman with Lieutenant Denny is known to me." His voice came out flatter than he had intended.

"Not favourably, I think."

Darcy looked at her. She had read the whole truth off his face in a matter of seconds. Sarah's opinion of her mistress's powers of observation, he thought, has been, if anything, too modest.

The officers reached them. Denny greeted the ladies with easy good humour. Wickham bowed with perfect, practised grace.

"Darcy," he said.

"Wickham." The single word came out clipped, and Darcy did not much care that it showed.

Kitty and Lydia stared between the two men, delighted by a tension they could not begin to understand.

Wickham turned his charm on Elizabeth. "I have not yet had the honour."

"Mr. Wickham, Miss Elizabeth Bennet," Denny said, and introductions followed all round.

Darcy held his ground. He would not abandon Elizabeth to a man whose charm worked fastest, and best, in the absence of contradiction.

Wickham spoke of his recent commission, granted through Colonel Forster's recommendation, and declared that the country promised very agreeable society indeed. His manner invited confidence the way an open door invites a draught. Elizabeth offered only a civil reply, and nothing more.

When the officers rode on at last, Lydia declared Wickham the handsomest man she had ever laid eyes on in her life. Kitty agreed at once, with one unnamed exception she refused, giggling, to reveal.

Elizabeth resumed walking. "You stayed."

"I did."

"You wanted to leave."

"Very much so."

"Why did you not?"

Darcy looked towards the road where Wickham had already disappeared, dust still hanging in the air. He could not tell her Georgiana's history. Not here. Not like this. He would not, however, let silence curdle into something like a lie.

"Because his manners conceal a character I have good reason to distrust. I cannot give you another person's private history. But I can tell you plainly that I would not place my own sister's welfare in his hands — not for a single afternoon."

Elizabeth's expression sharpened, all trace of teasing gone. "That is serious."

"Yes."

"Will you tell Mr. Bingley?"