Page 78 of The Servants’ Matchmaking

The reading list was still tucked inside. It had grown considerably.

Below McKeever's original warning about Miss Burney, another line had appeared in Sarah's uneven, careful hand: The lady judged the company and returned for more.

McKeever had answered, in his own precise script: The gentleman required correction but retained his position.

Then came a dated list of incidents, laid out with the meticulous satisfaction of two people who had enjoyed every minute of keeping it.

Cowper. South terrace. Blue shawl in the hall. Longbourn reading parcel. Duet for Miss Darcy.

At the very bottom, Sarah had added, in a hand grown more confident over the months: No false messages. No danger intended. One storm regretted.

Elizabeth sat down hard at the library table and laughed until Darcy came in from the estate office to investigate.

"What has happened?"

She held the page up for him. "Your servants have been keeping records. And they have been a great deal less idle than either of us believed."

Darcy read the additions over her shoulder, his expression sliding from suspicion into outright disbelief by the time he reached the blue shawl in the hall. "McKeever suggested bringing it down so your mother would inspect the repair."

"They wanted my mother to praise Sarah's repair in front of you," Elizabeth said. "Whether the lesson was meant for you or for me, the design lacked a certain elegance."

He traced the list with one finger, down through the Longbourn parcel and the duet chosen for Georgiana. Each new entry made his mouth go more severe. His left eyebrow, without his permission, climbed steadily toward outright amusement.

"They ignored my explicit instructions," he said.

"Repeatedly, and with real enthusiasm. Your eyebrow looks positively proud of them."

Darcy brought it firmly under control. He did not quite manage it, and that, Elizabeth thought, only proved her case more thoroughly than anything he could have said.

Sarah had finished her training in June and accepted Elizabeth's offer of a place at Pemberley, at wages higher than she had earned at Netherfield and entirely her own choice to make. Elizabeth had asked her twice before she let herself believe the answer was real.

McKeever remained Darcy's valet, unshakeable as ever. He and Sarah conducted themselves with faultless propriety in front of anyone who mattered, and passed news through household channels no master alive could hope to untangle.

"We should speak with them," Darcy said.

"Together."

"In my study."

"The morning room. Your study will make the whole thing feel like a trial."

"It is a trial."

"Then I shall preside over it."

Elizabeth rang the bell. The footman carried separate summonses below stairs. Sarah arrived first, a basket of mending balanced on one hip because she refused, on principle, to appear idle in front of her mistress even for a reprimand. McKeever came two minutes later, carrying a letter Darcy had never asked him to fetch, presumably as camouflage.

Both of them stopped dead in the doorway at the sight of the blue list lying open on the table. Sarah looked at McKeever. McKeever looked, with great interest, at the window.

"Sit," Elizabeth said.

Neither of them moved an inch.

Darcy stood near the mantel, arms folded. "Mrs. Darcy asked you to sit."

They sat.

The rank in the room had not gone anywhere, whatever comfortable fiction they had all been living in for the last few minutes. Sarah and McKeever depended on this household for their living, and an employer's gratitude, however warmly meant, could bind a person as tightly as it claimed only to reward them.