Horse and rider returned several hours later, thoroughly exhausted but in complete charity with each other. Darcy slid his tired frame from Nelson’s back and pulled the reins over the animal’s head as the stable boys hurried over to guide their fearsome charge back to his stall. Mellowed by the exercise, Nelson allowed them to approach, eschewing his usual show of temper toward underlings and confining himself to giving his master a shove and a demanding whicker. Laughing wearily, Darcy reached into his pocket and extracted some sugar lumps, then waved them before Nelson’s attentive face. Too tired to put up with such foolishness for long, the horse dove straight into Darcy’s chest, requiring his treat. Grunting under the force of the blow, Darcy opened his hand and Nelson neatly lipped the lumps. Darcy rubbed at his chest as his horse crunched on the sugar and then, with a last firm pat, handed the reins over to the waiting lads. But before he would move, Nelson nosed gently over his master’s chest and face and, by way of apology, blew lightly into his ear.
“Accepted! Unprincipled brute! Now off with you, and mind, you be civil to those lads.” With feigned meekness, Nelson followed his young keepers into the stable yard, and Darcy turned to the hall. He was very late for breakfast now and, he noted with grim satisfaction, very dirty. It would be impossible to appear at table for quite another hour, long past a reasonable time for them to wait for him. Spying Stevenson in the hall, he commissioned him to deliver his regrets to his hosts and then headed for the soothing tub of hot water Fletcher would soon have ready for him.
He was no more than halfway up the stairs when a door below opened.
“…very kind, Mr. Bingley, but it must be so. She will be quite well by then, and we have trespassed on your hospitality long enough.” Elizabeth’s clear voice drifted up to him.
“Trespassed, Miss Elizabeth! I hope you will not think of it so, for we do not. I would not have Miss Bennet’s health imperiled for the world, certainly not for some mistaken notion of overstaying your welcome. We are, after all, neighbors, and must…uh…care for each other as we would ourselves.”
Darcy heard Elizabeth’s delightful laugh in her reply that “you have not quoted Scripture precisely, Mr. Bingley, but with your application of last Sunday’s sermon, I can find no fault. Such diligent attention makes one all anticipation what will be the result of tomorrow’s.” Darcy pressed his fingers to his mouth, smothering the chuckle that threatened to escape and reveal his presence. When the danger was over, his hand dropped but unconsciously began to rub again at his chest, the tightness once more afflicting him.
“Then you are determined to leave tomorrow?” Darcy recognized the wheedle in Bingley’s voice, a sign that his persuasive powers had reached an end.
“Oh, fie, Mr. Bingley! You would cause me to feel a complete ingrate, but you must know I am immune to such machinations. You forget that I have three younger sisters who regularly employ similar tones. I am well versed, sir, in resisting wheedles.”
Bingley’s rueful laugh echoed in the hall. “You know me too well already, Miss Elizabeth.”
“Too well to believe that you do not know how sincerely you are thanked and how gratefully you are regarded by your Bennet neighbors,” she replied softly. “Truly, you have been most kind to my beloved Jane and to me.” She paused for a moment, then added, “Now, I must go up to Jane, and if she continues well, we will both be down later this morning. Mr. Bingley.”
As stealthily as possible, Darcy leapt up the remaining steps and, with quick strides, rounded the corner to the passage that led to his suite of rooms. Once through the door, he closed it carefully, making no sound, and let out the breath he’d been holding. She leaves tomorrow then. His eyes swept the chamber as if in search of something, he knew not what. Then, with a groan, he pulled the bell rope, sat down heavily in the large wingback chair, and worked at the buttons on his coat. A godsend, really. She has been here long enough! The buttons loosened, he attacked his neckcloth, pulling fiercely at the ends and yanking at the knots. And you like her more than you should…He paused in his struggle with the yard of linen and let his hands drop. Like her! Poor fool, you cannot even be honest with yourself! He rose and paced the length of his chamber, opened the dressing room door, and, finding no activity within, marched back to the bell rope and pulled at it again. He had no more than flung himself back into the chair when Fletcher opened the dressing room door.
“Mr. Darcy, your —”
“Time and more that you should have made an appearance! Is my bath ready, or must I carry the water up myself?” he bellowed at his valet. The look on Fletcher’s face smote Darcy to the core, and for a space of a few breaths, master and servant beheld each other in frozen silence.
“Fletcher, would you be so kind as to forgive me my lamentable manners and totally unjust words? You have served me well and faithfully these seven years and do not deserve my bad temper.” The valet’s shoulders relaxed ever so slightly, and he bowed his glad compliance. “Good man,” Darcy responded gratefully, and got up from the chair. He walked past the valet into the dressing room, where the first buckets of hot water were being lowered into the bath. Fletcher reached over and carefully pulled his master’s coat off his shoulders and down his arms. The offending neckcloth was gently removed. Darcy sat down while a kitchen lad worked on his boots and his valet arranged his kit.
“That will do nicely, Fletcher. Give me, say, twenty minutes.”
“Very good, sir. Nothing else I can get for you, sir?” Darcy shook his head wearily. “I did hear a bit of news, sir.”
“Indeed? And what is your ‘bit of news,’ Fletcher?”
“The Misses Bennet will depart for their home tomorrow after Sunday services.” Fletcher opened the servants’ door to the dressing room. “But perhaps you already have heard.” Darcy looked up sharply at his valet, but Fletcher was already safely on the other side of the door.
The walls of Badajoz yet stood after a day of incessant artillery bombardment, and the command to withdraw had just been dispatched to the company commanders when Darcy heard the library door click open. He had come downstairs to find the public rooms empty of both the Bingleys and their guests. “Taking the air up at the folly, sir” had been a footman’s answer to his query of their whereabouts. So, with the house wonderfully serene, he had taken his book to the library and settled in for an hour of “following the drum” until his host returned.
The door was directly behind him, so at the sound he called over his shoulder, “Charles, this is indeed incredible! You must let me read it to —” A flash of yellow sprigged muslin at the corner of his eye immediately informed him that it was not Bingley with whom he shared the room. Darcy looked up to see a vision of loveliness before him, the sunlight glancing through the library window causing her gown to glow softly and highlight the auburn of her hair. He swallowed hard. Steady on…not the slightest sign!
“Miss Elizabeth,” he said tonelessly as he rose from his chair. His perfunctory bow was answered with a curtsy its equal.
“Mr. Darcy, pray do not let me disturb you.”
“Madam.” Darcy bowed again and resumed his seat. Fumbling awkwardly, he opened his book to the passage he had been about to offer Bingley and stared hard at the page, all his senses on edge until she should either find her book and sit down or, please Heaven, quit the room. He forced himself to look no farther than his paragraph, but the soft tread of her slippers, the rustle of her gown, and the faint scent of lavender teased his resolve and kept him more aware than he wished of where she was in the room.