Page 49

She hesitated before saying “I wondered how much of your judgement rested upon acquaintance, and how much upon connexion—or our lack of it.”

Darcy understood her then. “You are speaking of your aunt and uncle,” he said. The couple was now speaking with Miss Bingley.

“Yes,” Miss Elizabeth said, “for you appear tolerably content in their home.”

Darcy knew immediately that she had used the word tolerable intentionally. He sighed inwardly. “I am.”

“You did not expect to be, however.”

“Your mother spoke of the match as a settled thing before half the guests at Netherfield,” Darcy replied. “You cannot think me unreasonable for wishing to protect⁠—”

Miss Elizabeth’s needle went through the cloth and remained there.

He might have said that regardless of her family’s worth, the connexion would not elevate Bingley’s status. That Bingley had always said he wished to fulfil his father’s wishes that the family move up in society and Darcy had been attempting to remind him of that. But that would not have been right, not entirely. For Bingley was already enamoured of Miss Bennet before he had returned to London and it had not been Darcy’s place to interfere. Bingley had rightly pointed out that neither of them had families who always behaved with propriety. It had been unreasonable. A little, anyway. “My judgement was based upon insufficient information,” he confessed.

Some of the tension left her face, which made him feel better.

“That is quite an admission, Mr. Darcy. I thank you for it.”

At last there was the faintest trace of yesterday’s teasing, and Darcy seized the opportunity. “I am attempting to improve,” he told her with a wry smile.

Her brows lifted. “Are you?”

Darcy nodded. “I have lately been given reason to do so.”

“May I ask something else?”

“Of course.”

She set her needle down. “You watch me.”

Darcy did not speak. He did not even move.

“You have done it since Hertfordshire. Charlotte Lucas mentioned it first, and then I began to notice as well. You did so at Lucas Lodge, at Netherfield when I came to attend Jane, even at Mr. Bingley’s ball.” Her brows drew together, and there was something vulnerable in her tone as she said, “You were angry when you saw Mr. Wickham with my sisters and me that day in Meryton.”

The name made his heart ache a little.

“I cannot give you an account of Mr. Wickham,” he said. “I can tell you only that there is one, and that it differs from the one you have no doubt heard.”

“It would help me to know what that account might be, but I accept you do not feel you can offer it.” Miss Elizabeth smoothed her skirt. “But you began this behaviour of looking at me before Mr. Wickham arrived in Meryton, and I have wondered what exactly it is you are looking for.”

He clasped his hands in his lap. “I had not realised it was so marked.”

“It is very marked, sir, and not precisely admiring. We have canvassed your thoughts about my family. I suppose I would like to know whether your judgements about me are the same. Is that why you stare?”

There was a great deal Darcy might have said. He had not been judging her in the way he had judged her family. He had simply been unable to stop looking at her, but he could not say that in her aunt’s drawing room, not with so many people about. He was not certain he should say it anywhere.

“You were not being judged,” he said at last.

She waited. When he did not continue, she frowned and took up her needle again. “Then I confess I am without any explanation, Mr. Darcy,” she said, without looking up.

“Mr. Darcy,” Miss Bingley called from her seat a little further away. “What are your plans for Christmas?”

Darcy tamped down his frustration. “They are yet unsettled.”

“Perhaps you might join us with your sister, if your family is not in town.”

“My sister is with the Matlocks, Miss Bingley. If they come to town, we will celebrate together. I am expecting a letter any day to tell me whether they will arrive before Christmas or early in the new year.”