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Lord Jonah was as good as his word, calling at Derwent House the very next day and spending not less than an hour with Miss Darcy discussing music.

Elizabeth was unable to be present during his third visit, but Mrs. Annesley reported that the pair had been entirely proper in their behavior (if thoroughly inattentive to their companion once focused on the instrument).

Mrs. Darcy shared a smile with the older woman. “Well, I’ve always said that increasing incivility is an excellent indicator of love.”

A week later saw them meeting again at the Hilliards’ ball.

Standing with her brother and his wife, Georgiana’ face lit up with pleasure upon observing Lord Jonah making his way toward them through the crush.

After greeting her companions, he requested Miss Darcy’s hand for the next set and soon the dowagers were wagging their chins over how handsome the pair looked together.

Happily, the young couple remained blissfully ignorant of the intent scrutiny they were receiving.

Mr. Darcy managed to suppress a rather mawkish groan at the sight of his sister’s happiness, though he could not hide his maudlin feelings from his wife. Understanding him completely, Elizabeth laced both hands around his arm and teased him until he managed a weak smile.

Fitzwilliam was about to reassure his wife of his equanimity when her wrinkled nose expanded to such an expression of barely masked disgust that he was left looking around to see if the pigs had somehow gotten loose in the ballroom.

“Good heavens—what on Earth is that smell!?!” exclaimed Lizzy, only barely managing to keep her voice to a whisper.

Darcy admitted that he could detect nothing, but took note of a rather portly fop who had just joined a group nearby. In his experience, such sartorial extravagance was often associated with immoderate applications of eau de parfum and so he adeptly guided his wife in the opposite direction.

For her part, Elizabeth was wild to move, fearing that if she remained one second longer she would be forced to burrow her face in her husband’s coat.

When Lord Jonah led Miss Darcy off the dance floor, both had happy smiles and pink cheeks.

They soon discovered her brother and sister at the punch table where Elizabeth had just appropriated a sprig of mint and was holding its crushed leaves under her nose while teasing her husband over some oddity in their company.

The foursome launched into easy conversation about the skill of the orchestra and the acoustics in the ballroom.

After some minutes, Mrs. Darcy noticed a tall, stately gentleman with greying hair and an impressively aristocratic nose approaching with a plump woman on his arm and followed by two younger ladies closer to Elizabeth’s own age.

Though the gentleman had a serious air about him, the glint in his eye suggested some amusement by the way he was being propelled along by the surrounding females.

When the little group reached the Darcys, Lord Jonah stepped forward to greet his family with genuine pleasure, acknowledging his father with sincere respect and kissing his mother’s cheek tenderly.

“Son, will you introduce your friends to us?”

“Of course, Duke. Allow me to present Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy, the Master of Pemberley, his wife Mrs. Elizabeth Darcy, and their sister, Miss Georgiana Darcy. Mr. Darcy, ladies, may I introduce my father, His Grace the Duke of Grafton, my mother, Her Grace the Duchess of Grafton, and my sisters, the Lady Isabella Tripp and the Lady Violet Hubbard.”

After the various bows and curtsies necessary for such a portentous introduction, His Grace entered into some mild conversation with Mr. Darcy, having heard of that gentleman’s skill with a blade from one of his sons.

After ascertaining some detail of Darcy’s training, the Duke admitted that an injury several years prior now limited his own participation in the sport to observing his sons’ bouts.

Grafton looked at his Duchess with obvious affection. “My wife informs me that I am not allowed to complain, however, as the accident was entirely my own fault. You see, I had decided to ride a young new thoroughbred at our annual fox hunt instead of my reliable old hunter.”

“He was trying to impress his friends,” whispered Her Grace loudly, prompting giggles from the other ladies.

Clearly accustomed to her teasing, the Duke conceded easily.

“The colt was a superb jumper but once his blood was up, he began seeing monsters behind every hedge and fence. In the end, he returned himself to the safety of his barn and left me behind in one of the lower fields with a broken leg. I was quite lucky that my physician was riding with us—otherwise one of the hounds might have mistaken me for the beast of the chase!”

His Duchess continued the story; “That might have been a better solution. As it was, my husband was bedridden for two months and could not mount a horse for nearly six. You’ve never seen a more impatient patient than Grafton with a houseful of guests at the beginning of hunting season!”

Once the laughter subsided, the gentlemen’s conversation turned to horse breeding while the Duchess addressed the ladies; “About once a month, I offer to have my husband’s bed moved out to the stable, he spends so much time there.

I sincerely hope that your husband has already danced with you, Mrs. Darcy, because mine will not release him until they have dissected the ancestry of every last horse in both their stables and anything new coming up for sale at Tattersalls. ”

Elizabeth exchanged a genuine smile. “Honestly, I’ve rarely seen Mr. Darcy so happily engaged in conversation at a ball.”

Georgiana could not help but interject, “Oh, but Elizabeth—he has improved so much since he met you. My cousins tell stories of how he would stand in corners and do nothing but glare at everyone.”

Lizzy laughed; “Yes, I fear that was precisely what he was doing when we first met, and I will confirm his success—I had absolutely no interest in speaking to him for many months after that!”

The Duchess had observed enough to be well-pleased by the open affection exhibited by Mrs. Darcy for her husband.

She had seen too many of the matches among her circle turn miserable, marriages of convenience that placed great weight on wealth and connection but rarely considered compatibility of personalities.

She was very sure that her youngest son could never be happy in such an arrangement and was determined to know more about the Darcy family. “You are recently married, Mrs. Darcy?”

The lady blushed a little. “Our first anniversary is at the end of the month.”

“And how did you meet?”

“Mr. Darcy’s friend had leased an estate adjacent to my father’s in Hertfordshire.

We met at a country assembly where he was glowering at the local populace and refused to dance with any lady not in his own party.

I fear that it took me some time to get over that first impression.

” Smiling at the memory, Elizabeth caught the eye of her husband; he raised an eyebrow and she shook her head slightly.

While Lord Jonah and Miss Darcy moved on to discuss a recent operatic performance with his elder sister, Lady Violet took advantage of the pause in conversation to insert her own question.

“Mrs. Darcy, I believe that you are acquainted with my friend, Miss Lily Davenport, now Trevor… or rather, the Viscountess Hampden, I suppose I should say.”

Elizabeth could not help but be pleased. “Such a small world! How do you know Lily?”

“We were dear friends at school.”

The Duchess smiled affectionately at her daughter. “Ah yes, one of your fellow jardinières .”

The Lady Violet blushed a little in embarrassment but felt obliged by Mrs. Darcy’s puzzled expression to explain; “Four of us arrived at school with ‘floral’ names—Miss Lily Davenport, Miss Lavender Owen, Lady Marigold Pettigrew and, of course, myself. The older girls mocked us, but in the end we discovered that we liked each other so well that we were happy to own those very names they considered to be Aunt Sallies.”

Elizabeth laughed aloud and offered, “Well then, someday I hope that you will allow me to introduce my aunt and uncle, the Gardiners.”

This easy conversation was broken up not long after when some other personages arrived to claim the attention of the Duke and his Duchess. Before she turned her attention away, however, Her Grace managed to set a day for the Darcy ladies to call upon her.

And so it was that, on a Friday morning not many days later, Mr. Darcy opened the door to his wife’s study, having knocked but hearing no response. He was not tremendously surprised to find her standing at the open window, looking out onto the rear garden with an unfocused gaze.

Guessing at her mood, Fitzwilliam stepped behind her so that he might rest his hands on her shoulders. “I believe that I can guess the subject of your reverie.”

Lizzy nearly jumped out of her skin but found that the look of boyish satisfaction that lit up his face at surprising her made it impossible to reprove him. She settled for a raised eyebrow. “I should imagine not.”

He grinned at the challenge. “You are considering how insupportable it would be to spend many more days in this manner—in such society! The insipidity and yet the noise; the nothingness and the self-importance of all these people! In short, you are wishing that we might leave for the country as soon as the trunks can be packed.”

Elizabeth laughed aloud, thinking not for the first time that if she had understood Mr. Darcy’s true preferences with regard to town and country when they first met, they might have come to an understanding much earlier in their acquaintance.

“Your conjecture is totally wrong, I assure you. Though I cannot argue with the notion; the air in London is particularly disagreeable this autumn,” she said and moved to close the window.