Tact Page 7

  “Anger me! Miss Bennet, I am not so vindictive as to punish the family of the woman I love for my own stupidity in expression.”

  Elizabeth rather doubted this.

  He exhaled and dropped the hand that he had, seemingly without realising it, reached out to her. “If I give you my solemn word, Miss Bennet, that I shall not do any harm to you or any of those that you care for as a result of this interview, will you speak plainly? This situation must be mended. I cannot endure the thought of you docile and believing in your own inferiority, then civilly sending me on my way as though we were indifferent acquaintances. I must be permitted the opportunity to rectify this.”

  She could think of no good reason, other than her desire for peace, to deny him. At her nod, he looked relieved.

  “Very well, then, tell me.”

  Chapter Ten

  She regretted it almost immediately. Her tight rein upon her temper was already under strain and the grim, unbending determination on Mr. Darcy's countenance did not bode well for a brief explanation.

  Reluctant though she was to prolong this private interview with Mr. Darcy, Elizabeth knew that to deny him any explanation would not make him desist from pursuing the subject. He was not a stupid man – it would not take him long to realise that she had a myriad of other reasons, especially if Colonel Fitzwilliam later revealed to his cousin the contents of their conversation the previous morning.

  “As you wish, sir,” she said softly. “In truth, I do not know that I could trust myself to your care as your wife.”

  “I beg your pardon?” exclaimed he, clearly offended. “What evidence have you that can possibly support such an opinion?”

  Elizabeth lifted her hand in a placating gesture. “Mr. Darcy, this conversation may cease just as soon as you wish it to. I am most willing to forget the whole.”

  “You cannot make such an insulting assertion and then leave it unexplained. I have never harmed a woman in my life, Miss Bennet – such behaviour is beneath me.”

  “I did not suppose you to be a violent man, sir.”

  He relaxed marginally. “Explain then, if you please.”

  She hesitated. “I do not think I can properly explain to you what it is to be a woman utterly at the mercy of a man. When I marry I shall be completely dependent on my husband. He may beat me, speak unkindly to me, neglect me, or isolate me, and be entirely within his rights as a husband. If, as I have so often observed, a young husband’s infatuation fades and his admiration wears thin as the years pass…. One might reasonably expect a man in the first flush of love to be the very best example of what husbandly kindness he is capable. Indeed some men are well-nigh blind at first to every fault a woman possesses. If you, the honour of your addresses notwithstanding, are able to speak to me, even whilst proposing marriage, of my faults, and to wound my feelings by speaking so of my family's defects.... I cannot see any possible happiness for me in years to come when my youth and tolerable beauty deserts me and I am left with only your resentment for what I cannot help. If I am to be dependent on my husband's tender care for me, I must see some evidence of tenderness where it is most usually found.”

  As she spoke, Mr. Darcy coloured and began to look ashamed of himself again. Elizabeth added wearily, “You must see, sir, we should not suit. I am sure that you are deserving of some paragon with everything to recommend her.”

  Mr. Darcy shook his head in denial but he surprised her by quietly asking, “And what, Miss Bennet, do you suppose yourself to be deserving of? You have said that I surprised you, for which I am at fault, but what sort of man must one be to win the hand that I so covet?”

  Here Elizabeth blushed hotly at such frankness. “I had not thought of it. I ought not describe an imaginary being. He does not yet exist except as an ideal.” He winced and she pitied him. “Oh, some honest-hearted, kindly squire, I suppose. A good man who adores me. There! Is such a list excessive? Truly I am a vain coward, Mr. Darcy. I think far too well of myself to settle for less and am too afraid of my future to marry simply because I am asked.”

  “You underrate yourself, Miss Bennet,” said Mr. Darcy matter-of-factly. “What other reasons have you to refuse my suit? Come, this is not a comfortable experience for either of us but I must know if there is anything insurmountable.”

  “We are at cross purposes, sir. I speak of these things to convince you of my sincerity, not to provide you with the twelve labours of Hercules that you must complete.”

  He was thoughtful. “If your refusal is due to doubt in my ability to care for a woman under my authority, I have the means to provide you with tangible proof to dispel it. You had better meet my sister. I will arrange it.”

  “Mr. Darcy!” exclaimed Elizabeth, visibly annoyed, “I should not wish to give rise to the speculation that would cause. I daresay that Miss Darcy is everything delightful and if this were my only qualm it might answer.”

  “Name them.”

  “Sir?”

  “Your qualms, reservations, doubts, and worries that are preventing you from accepting me – name them. If there is aught that I cannot lay to rest, then I shall leave you in peace with only my regret for my failure. It could not be worse than the regret I should feel if I were to retire now while I might secure, with some effort, my happiness for my entire future.”

  Elizabeth was beginning to find Mr. Darcy extremely tiresome.

  “If your sister, sir, of whom you reportedly take such care, came to you with the information that a man had most reluctantly proposed marriage to her but that it was conditional upon her never seeing any of her family again, I wonder what advice you would give her. I daresay that you would be within your rights as her guardian to wonder why you had not been applied to first.”

  He was pale now. “I can only apologise then, Miss Bennet. I have gone about this wrongly. Your points are sound. Honesty compels me to admit that any man addressing Miss Darcy in such terms and without my approval first sought would find himself ejected from whichever of my properties he had made a nuisance of himself in. It was wrong of me to speak so to you, Miss Bennet. I was so intent on minimising the potential damage to my sister that I have inadvertently hurt you. I am exceedingly sorry.”

  “It cannot be undone, sir. You are not able to return to the past and properly write to my father nor seek an interview with my brother. Please, let us part and be done with this.” She stood, glancing at the mantel clock as she did so.

  “Are you unable to forgive me?” he asked bluntly.

  Put in such terms, Elizabeth, who had taken two steps to the door, turned to him once again. “Able to? Certainly. I do not believe I am guilty of implacable resentment but...do you not see that such disrespect is no inducement to accept you? If this is your beginning, what would your ending be? My demurral is not based on fanciful imaginations that you can dispel with pretty apologies, Mr. Darcy. Will you not accept my answer, knowing that I have not given it to insult or anger you but to safeguard my own happiness? Is this not a woman's sole right? The only power we have is that of refusal.”

  “You have a good deal more power than merely that, madam. Have I then, in one atrocious morning, destroyed any hope of success? It cannot be. Do you mean to tell me that there is nothing that I might do that will suffice – even if I should write to your father, this very afternoon to lay before him every instance of my fault and offer my apologies?”

  Her eyes widened but she remained silent.

  “Would you accept my word that I do respect you?”

  “I do not know,” said Elizabeth, now feeling quite out of her depth. She had not anticipated this, that such a proud, haughty man should offer to take such a humiliating course of action.

  “Miss Bennet, only tell me what I must do and I shall do it, but I beg you – most fervently – that you will not condemn me to a life of heartache and misery on account of what may be atoned for.”

  So sincere were his words, so unhappy was his tone that Elizabeth found herself rapidly revising all that she knew of the man. She had not ever thought that he might be the object of her pity nor had she considered that he could speak to her in such tones. Solemnity was in his voice but his eyes were fixed on her with something akin to desperation. She would not accept him, to do so would be foolhardy – but perhaps good might be achieved this day that might heal those who had been hurt.

  “Mr. Darcy, I cannot possibly marry the man who has injured one of my sisters,” she said at length, “yes, I do say injured. I shall not bandy around the thoughts and feelings of my dearest sister for public speculation, but suffice it to say that your actions in persuading Mr. Bingley that my sister is a fortune hunter have caused her significant pain. If...if you will repair your fault in this – I do not say that you must whisk Mr. Bingley off to call on Jane and force him to declare himself – but if you will correct the misimpression you have given him of my sister’s character, then I will consent to a courtship once you have my father's leave to ask it of me. I do not know that I will, even then, be willing to accept you – even if you do not change your mind, but.…”

  Thunderstruck, Mr. Darcy nodded at once. “A fair resolution. I do not know whether to be impressed by your astuteness or to wonder how you could have known.…”

  Elizabeth sighed. “Colonel Fitzwilliam.”

  “What?! I cannot see how….”

  Elizabeth impatiently explained, “Of course not. He did not know I was Jane's sister.” She wondered if she ought to cease speaking but then burst out, “How could you have hurt her so? She is the sweetest and the truest hearted woman in all the earth, never even dreaming that a gentleman could treat her so shabbily as she has been treated – I have known her all my life so I ought to know!” She angrily dashed away a tear and groped for her handkerchief, turn
ing away to dab at her eyes.

  “Do not...Miss Bennet, please do not. I have erred – you must know better than anyone the hidden feelings that I have clearly misjudged...I admit my fault freely but I….”

  Almost against her will Elizabeth felt the stirrings of amusement in the face of Mr. Darcy’s panicked expression and, testing a theory, permitted a small sob to escape and muttered an excuse that she had evidently missed too many walks of recent.

  “Miss Bennet, please. I can bear your reproach but it pains me that I have been the cause of your distress. I shall amend all.” He rose to his feet and paced. “I must.” He made a circuit of the room and knelt at her feet.

  Amusement vanished.

  “Mr. Darcy, do get up, sir. I am merely overwrought and my head is aching. If the maid or the Collinses come into the room I shall be very hard pressed to dream up an explanation.”

  He rose and studied her face. “I do not think I have made such a mull of things in all my grown years,” he murmured, musingly. “I shall leave you now, Miss Bennet. I have your permission to call upon you in Hertfordshire?”

  She nodded, “Provided you rectify the situation with Mr. Bingley, yes, you may call.”

  “And once I have done so, I may request your father's permission to court you?”

  “ If you still wish to by then,” said she, thinking that a few days reflection might bring her a reprieve. Mr. Darcy might easily regain his confidence in his own superiority and congratulate himself upon his escape. She would certainly not be hoping for his call.

  He almost smiled then and his eyes held a curiously tender glow that she could not comfortably bear, “I will still wish it, Miss Bennet. I am quite determined. I shall do all that I can, use every resource that is within my reach, and learn every painful lesson well. I will not give up until I have won you.”

  Chapter Eleven

  It was a far humbler and wearier Mr. Darcy who left the parsonage that afternoon. The confident young man who had knocked on the door less than an hour ago seemed a hazy dream. He departed through the threshold with less hope than he had expected to feel, yet at the same time felt less despair than was rightly deserved.

  Once he was in the lane that led him back to Rosings, he swung his gold-topped cane at an errant flower, and crimson-hued petals sailed through the air, over the parsonage wall and out of sight.

  His disappointment was great and his regret acute – he had expected, with a certainty that now shamed him, that they would walk this route slowly together to tell his relatives the good news. He had not considered her relatives, nor had he dwelt upon the proper order of things – that her male relatives ought to have been informed first….

  Another cheery crocus met its end by his stick.

  It was irrelevant for now to think of what he had wanted. It had been inconceivable for a young woman in Miss Bennet’s position to refuse him. He had not thought it possible.

  She surprised him constantly, had done almost from the first, in fact. Miss Bennet did not behave or speak as he was used to a lady behaving or speaking. There was an almost mannish intelligence about her, a brilliance that he had never before encountered in any of her sex. He found himself constantly wondering what sweetly coated conversational cannonball she would next launch. Elizabeth Bennet was never boring. A tender half-smile crept across his face, swiftly replaced by a grimace.

  The worst of the situation was that he could not reasonably blame her for refusing him. His guilt felt heavy on his own shoulders. He had not behaved well, neither had he spoken well – it was little wonder that she had looked so wounded by the end of his botched and ridiculous speech.

  By the time she had answered him, he had formed a desperate resolution to evade, at all costs, an absolute refusal. It was imperative that Elizabeth Bennet become his wife. The thought of her living in the world without being constantly in his society was intolerable. He set about persuading her, with the same logical reasoning that had served him well at university, that he ought to be given the opportunity to try again.

  His anger at his own wretched stupidity had been temporarily pushed aside – the time for self-castigation would come, but that precious opportunity for private, frank conversation with such a woman was not to be squandered.

  Darcy reached Rosings rather more quickly than he had meant to, so lost in his thoughts as he was. His mind was a jumbled mess that needed to be put in order before he decided upon a definite plan of action. Mr. Bennet must be written to, Bingley must be dealt with, not to mention Aunt Catherine….

  He was interrupted in his musings by Colonel Fitzwilliam coming out from the library and calling him in. His cousin did not look at all pleased.

  “Darcy, a word in private if you will.”

  “ Now, Fitzwilliam? I have many things to do at present.”

  “Yes, I think now,” said he, with decision.

  “Very well, but only for a few minutes – I have important letters to write.”

  “What I have to say will not take long.”

  Curious now, Darcy followed the colonel into the room and waited expectantly.

  With very straight shoulders, his cousin faced him squarely. “Miss Bennet.”

  Guardedly, being made by this much more uncomfortable than he would care to admit, Darcy responded cautiously, “What of her?”

  “Miss Bennet was the young lady you separated from Charles Bingley during the winter.”

  Wondering what more he would have to face before the day ended, Darcy spoke. “Yes. I misjudged the situation. She did not appear to care for him.”

  “I must tell you, Darcy, I was most put out with you yesterday for putting me in such a...in such an awkward position as to make such a sweet young lady as Miss Bennet weep on account of my own errant tongue. She was greatly upset. It was abominable.’

  “Was she? I am sorry for it. She informed me that I had been incorrect in my assumptions just this afternoon.”

  “Oh,” said the colonel, feeling as though he had arrived at the close of a battle rather than the beginning. “Well, it was very bad of you, Darcy.”

  Darcy nodded, almost absently. His mind was on other matters and it infuriated his cousin.

  “Darcy! You must give this matter your attention! You simply cannot be so blasé about reducing a gentlewoman to tears; I know I am not. She deserves better.”

  “Yes, that is certainly true. I did not think she would be so upset. She knows I cannot bear to see her cry.”

  “What! Explain, man! Can it be possible that you have feelings for the lady, then?”

  Mr. Darcy responded in haughty tones, “It is hardly your business, Fitzwilliam, but yes, as a matter of fact, I have asked her to marry me.”

  “Wha-at?!”

  “Do lower your voice, cousin.”

  “Oh!” he exclaimed loudly once again, then reduced his volume as requested. “You have astounded me, Darcy. Er...you do not appear to be...that is...I mean.…”

  “She refused me.”

  “Oh,” said the colonel, deflated. Then, “How extraordinary,” he said slowly, “On account of the Bingley business?”

  “Partly, yes. I did not...express myself well.”

  “Well. I suppose natural nerves and...I'm sorry to hear it, cousin. She’s a marvellous woman, of course, can't say fairer than that.” Realising belatedly that praising the female who had rejected his cousin was not a good idea, the colonel attempted to be comforting. “I ...er...daresay some fish don't want to be caught, eh? I'm sure there will be another young lady in a few months time and….”

  “No,” said Darcy, shaking his head decidedly. “I shall convince her to change her mind. She must.”

  “Darcy, if she's not wanting to be caught by you, then that's that. Some trout will come for a bit of dry bread but some need to be baited better with a nice fat worm, such as your humble servant. In fact, I have been considering myself….”

  “Fitzwilliam,” spake the master of Pemberley with terrible finality, “there are two things of which you ought to be aware. Firstly, that Miss Bennet is not a fish and even if she were, this hook is very well baited, I thank you. Secondly, if you have any intentions towards her, you had better bid them farewell.”