Page 42 of The Servants’ Matchmaking

Jane asked it plainly, without a trace of teasing, and Elizabeth found she could not answer with a joke the way she wanted to. Darcy's apology had mattered to her. His warning about Wickham had mattered more, because he had limited it so carefully. He had protected Georgiana's confidence while still giving her father a choice worth making. And at Longbourn he had done nothing grand at all. He had simply kept coming back.

"There may be," Elizabeth admitted.

Jane reached over and touched her hand. "Then let it become what it becomes, Lizzy. Servants cannot decide it for you."

"Nor storms?"

"Nor mothers."

They both glanced towards the door as Mrs. Bennet's voice rose through the house, calling for Hill and complaining about something before poor Hill had even had the chance to answer.

"Especially not mothers," Jane said, and this time they both laughed.

Darcy came again that afternoon.

He found Elizabeth in the shrubbery with Mary, who was reading aloud from a moral essay and objecting, with some heat, whenever the wind turned two pages at once and forced her to backtrack. Darcy listened for several minutes with an attention so grave that Elizabeth nearly laughed outright.

Mary paused for breath. "The author confuses discomfort with virtue," Elizabeth said.

"Self-denial may strengthen character," said Mary, wounded.

"So may good sense. And good sense has the advantage of being warmer."

Darcy looked away. Not quickly enough to hide the amusement from Elizabeth, who had grown rather good at catching it.

Mary shut the book with a small, offended snap. "I shall ask Papa what he thinks."

She marched off towards the house, quite certain she had the last word.

"You have corrupted my sister's certainty," Elizabeth said.

"I spoke not one word."

"You agreed silently. I am told your silence carries rank."

They walked on together, the house still visible through the bare, leafless branches overhead.

"Bingley tells me you received the Cowper."

"With annotations. McKeever denies any romantic purpose whatsoever, and Sarah denies ever recommending the repaired path. Their innocence, between the two of them, is remarkably elaborate."

"I could forbid further correspondence through my library, if you like."

Elizabeth considered this with more seriousness than it deserved. "Do you wish to?"

"No."

"Neither do I."

The admission sat between them, small and unmistakable, the way a single dropped stitch can unravel an entire sleeve if you look at it too long.

Darcy stopped beside the laurel hedge, and something in the way he stopped told Elizabeth this was not an idle halt. "Miss Elizabeth. I have kept my promise. I have not repeated my offer."

"You have not."

"May I go on calling here, after the ball?"

Her pulse moved at her throat, quick and traitorous. She disliked that he might see it, and disliked still more that some part of her hoped he would.