“With all the present fuss, I would almost prefer to wait.”
He opened his mouth to tell her that was impossible, and then thought better of it. “I would have some concerns about leaving your family to deal with these rumors in our absence without knowledge of our engagement to present in response.”
“Your point is well taken. Very well, we can tell them now. Would you be willing to consider, however, delaying announcing the news at Pemberley? I would feel more comfortable coming there first as a guest, without all the expectations that would accompany me if I were to be known as the future mistress.”
“I would prefer not to delay it long, but I see no harm in a few weeks,” he conceded.
“Thank you.” They smiled at one another in accord. “While you are speaking with my father, perhaps I will join the rest of the family, which should allow my mother to get through the worst of her effusions before you arrive.”
“I had thought that we would tell your family together.”
She laughed. “Do you think that once you walk out of this room and into the library that there will be anything left to tell? But that is only fair; I shall await you here.”
“I will return as soon as I may,” he said, but found that he had to give her one more lingering kiss before he could face the brief separation.
“Mr. Bennet, I am certain that you have little doubt as to why I am here this evening,” Darcy began.
“On the contrary, young man, I have a great number of questions as to why you are here this evening,” said Mr. Bennet.
“You do?” asked Darcy in surprise, then recalled himself. “Pardon me; I meant to say that I would be happy to answer any questions you may have, sir.”
“Good, good, I am glad to hear it. Then perhaps you can explain to me how it has come to pass that you and my daughter have been caught in clandestine assignations when, the last any of us had heard, you found her not handsome enough to tempt you, and she had a healthy dislike of you. I have heard Lizzy’s version of the story; now I would like to hear yours.”
Darcy winced. Was that ill-fated remark at the Meryton Assembly to haunt him for the rest of his life? “Sir, I can understand that your opinion of me may have suffered owing to recent talk; I have no doubt that I would feel the same were I in your place. However, I assure you that my intentions toward your daughter have always been strictly honorable.”
“Indeed.” Mr. Bennet’s voice was sharp. “Mr. Darcy, I do not claim to understand the situation. I know that Lizzy is unhappy and angry, I know that she has expressed in the past some reason to distrust you, and I know that for reasons that are unclear, she has been choosing to spend time with you and apparently to accept your attentions. Under the circumstances, I have no choice but to give you my permission to marry her, just as I told her that I had no choice but to insist that she marry you, but I do not feel under any obligation to be happy about it.”
Taken aback by this unexpected burst of anger, Darcy hardly knew where to begin. He had not expected hostility, and while his initial thought was not to discuss this further until he had a better chance to understand Mr. Bennet’s position, he considered how important her father’s opinion was to Elizabeth, and determined to swallow his pride and persist. “Sir, I believe you are under some misapprehension. Certainly Miss Bennet and I have had misunderstandings in the past, but after I, that is, after we furthered our acquaintance in Kent, we were able to clear up a great deal of confusion, including the truth behind the lies she had been told. We have been on more cordial terms since then. I would encourage you to speak further to her, sir. I do not believe that she is unhappy about anything except the circumstances of our engagement, and it is my goal, sir, to make her happy in everything.”
Mr. Bennet sat back in his chair. “So you feel that it was the time you spent together in Kent that made a difference, then.”
“In a way, yes,” Darcy said cautiously.
“What time that you spent together in Kent?” Mr. Bennet said, his voice like a whip.
Wondering if this was some sort of trick, Darcy said, “In April, when Miss Bennet was visiting her friend Mrs. Collins, and I was visiting my aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh.”
Mr. Bennet looked suddenly tired. “Lizzy has never seen fit to mention seeing you there.”
“You did not know, then?” Darcy said in surprise. “So you have not heard about…” He trailed off, realizing that Elizabeth must not have wanted her father to know about their interactions in Kent. “Or about Wickham, either?” He had rarely felt so completely inarticulate.
“Sit down, Mr. Darcy. This is clearly going to take some time. Perhaps you can tell me now about all the things I have not heard,” said Mr. Bennet icily.
“Perhaps we should ask Miss Bennet to join us to give her point of view.”
“Perhaps not. Now, you were about to tell me about Kent, I believe.”
Feeling like a schoolboy called onto the carpet, Darcy summarized the events of April in a clipped voice, omitting only the venom of their disagreement the night he proposed, and briefly reviewed his history with Mr. Wickham. “When I returned to Netherfield last month, Miss Bennet, no longer being under a misapprehension regarding my feelings towards her, was kind enough to allow me to begin to court her anew.”
“Odd, I had thought it traditional to ask the permission of the father of the young lady involved, Mr. Darcy, but perhaps I was mistaken.”
Darcy had not been Master of Pemberley for five years to accept this sort of insult lightly, even from the father of his beloved. “Perhaps you misunderstand my position, Mr. Bennet. In the interest of future understanding, let me make myself clear: given a choice between protecting your daughter and pleasing you, I will always choose your daughter.”
“Do you believe that she needs protection from me, then?” Mr. Bennet said silkily.
Darcy fixed a steady stare on him, a tactic that worked well on recalcitrant tenants. “That is not what I said, as you are well aware, sir. But if it satisfies you to be angry with me because your daughter has chosen for her own reasons to keep certain facts from you, please feel free to do so. It does not disturb me.”
The corners of Mr. Bennet’s mouth twitched. “I am glad to hear it. If you plan to marry Lizzy, it will be to your benefit to be imperturbable.”
“I am going to marry her, Mr. Bennet, and for her sake, I hope that we can be on better terms in the future.” Darcy laid his challenge out smoothly.
“Treat her well, Mr. Darcy, and we will have no problems.”
“Sir, you need have no concerns in that regard.” Darcy stood and bowed formally. “I believe she is waiting for me, so I shall take my leave.”
Mr. Bennet waved his hand in dismissal, thinking that Lizzy might not have done so badly for herself after all.
Elizabeth had assumed that the interview with her father was a formality, given his words to her earlier, but was beginning to worry as time went on. When at last Darcy rejoined her, she said, “I had begun to wonder if you had forgotten me.”
“Hardly, my sweet. But your father had a number of questions. I am sorry to say that he does not seem to look favorably upon me,” he said, sitting next to her. “I made an important discovery, though, which is that if my flaw is to tell everyone else what to do, yours is to tell them nothing at all. I had not realized that you had left your father completely in the dark about everything that has happened between us.”
“It… has been very confusing; for some time I have hardly known what to say, and I am afraid that when I spoke with him earlier today I was rather… distressed,” she admitted.