Page 23 of An Offer of Marriage (Engaged to Mr Darcy #7)

AN OFFER SHE COULD NOT REFUSE

“ L izzy!” Jane nearly flew into their shared bedchamber. “Lizzy, Mr Darcy is here.”

Elizabeth’s heart plunged. “He is? Now?”

Jane nodded. “Let me help you.”

Elizabeth knew that she referred, no doubt, to her hair which was untidy and her gown which was nothing of note. “Being quick to attend him will mean more to him than any gown I own, Jane.”

“Pray, allow me to neaten your hair, at least.”

Elizabeth slid off the bed and went to the dressing table, pressing her hand against her stomach in a vain attempt to suppress the butterflies which had taken up residence therein.

He had come. At last. But why? She wanted to believe this was a good sign, an indication that he was willing to hear her out, but something within her felt it was impossible.

Elizabeth could feel the trembling of her dear sister’s hands as she attempted to rearrange her hair into something more pleasing; evidently Jane too felt the anxiety of the situation .

She was nowise feeling confident as she descended the stairs. Jane led her towards Mrs Gardiner’s front parlour, but before the door was opened, Elizabeth paused, taking a deep breath.

“Go, Lizzy,” Jane whispered. “It will be well, I am sure of it.”

“Ah, Lizzy, there you are,” said Mrs Gardiner as Elizabeth entered.

Elizabeth offered a faint smile in her aunt’s direction, but her eyes were on Mr Darcy, sitting with one leg crossed over the other in a large armchair.

His face was set in grim lines and he did not look at her, his head turned towards the window.

As she advanced into the room, he turned his head and rose, then offered a begrudging-looking bow in reply to her and Jane’s curtseys.

Jane lightly touched Elizabeth’s back, no doubt wishing to offer some sort of comfort. It somehow made her wish to cry instead, but she did not. Unsure what to say to him, she offered a meek ‘good day’ then moved to perch on the nearest chair.

Her aunt stood and joined Jane. “Mr Darcy has asked to speak to you alone, Elizabeth. Jane and I will be in the back drawing room, should you need us.”

“Thank you,” Elizabeth murmured, her eyes still on Mr Darcy. He had re-taken his seat and again was not looking at her. She felt very certain that a reconciliation was not at hand and girded herself mentally for whatever was to come.

Her aunt and sister departed with the barest whisper of their skirts, and for interminable minutes, there was silence. Elizabeth at last ventured to say, “You wished to speak to me?”

“Yes.”

And yet, he did not utter a syllable. He rose and walked towards the window, looking down on Gracechurch Street below, his hands clasped behind his back.

After another substantial pause, Elizabeth decided to speak, to offer an apology, as she suspected he had never read those she offered in her letters.

“If you would, sir, allow me a moment, I wish to offer an apology for my unguarded words to Charlotte on the evening of your proposal. I assure you they were not meant in earnest.”

He seemed to barely have heard her and certainly gave no response to her apology. Instead he began perambulating the room with long, slow steps, his head turned towards the many windows, his hands still clasped behind his back. Eventually he announced, “Your antics have had a price.”

“My…antics? What antics were those?”

“Outside of White’s. I am not sure you could have sought a larger, more influential audience for your nonsense if you had taken to the stage.”

“I did not seek any audience, sir,” Elizabeth said, suppressing the flush of anger which rose. “I was merely walking down a street.”

“And ran off like a lunatic when I tried to speak to you.”

“Forgive me, but I must observe that it was you who ran out of your club shouting.”

He ignored that bit of reason. “At such a time of day no less! Everyone and anyone was thereabouts. You could not have been insensible to the damage you must have done to your reputation…and mine.”

Elizabeth took a deep breath, not wishing to again observe that he had also made a scene. As it was in all cases, it was the woman whose reputation bore the damage, not the man’s, no matter that Darcy felt his reputation was also affected.

“I am sorry it happened,” she said evenly .

“You should not have been following me,” he said.

“I assure you I was doing no such thing. I had no thought whatever for seeing you, speaking to you… I was merely shopping with my uncle who wished to buy me a trinket or the like to raise my spirits.”

“Oh?” Darcy stopped pacing and looked directly at her. “Well, where is it, then?”

“Where is what?”

“This supposed trinket. What did you buy, where did you put it?” He shook his head disgustedly. “More lies, no doubt.”

“We had not yet gone into any of the shops,” she replied, pushing back the sharper reply she desired.

“In any case,” he said, finally stopping his pacing, “you were observed. As was I. And the gossip is accordingly rampant. I ruined you, your uncle challenged me to a duel if I did not marry you, you have already had a child, mine or maybe not mine, and wish me to do the honourable thing by you both. You and I are already married, secretly, and my uncle is trying to get a divorce for us.”

Elizabeth felt her mouth go slack. “Who would say such things?”

“Everyone,” he said and now sounded more tired than angry. He moved towards a chair that was nowhere near her and sank into it, keeping his body angled towards the window. “The Season would be nothing without a steady supply of salacious tales and misery.”

They again sat in silence for what seemed like forever until Elizabeth offered to send for tea or coffee.

“No. I want nothing. But I suppose…” She watched him swallow hard, his eyes still fixed on the window. “I suppose we ought to just do it.”

“Do what? ”

“For the sake of my honour and name, as well as your reputation, there is simply nothing else to be done. We must marry.”

Such was her astonishment, she said nothing, but he did not require her response apparently.

With his eyes looking any place but directly at her, he began to rehearse to her how it would be.

They would marry as soon as he obtained the licence.

His uncle believed he might be able to obtain a special licence, in which case it would be done quietly, in his drawing room.

There would not be a breakfast, nor a wedding trip, or any of that sort of nonsense.

Just the wedding and then time in town, showing everyone how much in love they were.

He laughed bitterly as he said that. “With good fortune, they will imagine that silliness in front of White’s to be a lover’s quarrel or something of that nature. ”

Elizabeth knew not how to feel about any of what he said.

Clearly he did not wish to marry her, and she?

She did not wish to be jilted, nor to have her reputation sullied…

but did she want to be married to a man who clearly despised her?

Even if beneath the man who hated her was the man who had once loved her so?

She sniffed a little, unable to stop herself feeling the emotion of that thought.

He cannot remain angry forever , she told herself. At some point we will have a reasonable discussion and sort things out. Hopefully.

In any case, it seemed her answer was unnecessary. Once he had finished speaking, he rose from the chair, clearly meaning to leave.

“There is one impediment to your plans.”

He looked at her, the expression on his countenance suggesting he was doing all he could to hold on to his patience .

“I am not twenty-one. You will need my father to agree to all of this.”

“I will have his agreement before nightfall. I leave for Hertfordshire directly.”

“I see,” she said. Another question tugged at her mind. “Will not a quiet wedding done in haste rather support the notion that you were forced into this?”

“I am being forced into this,” he retorted.

It stung more than she would have cared to admit, but at least she was able to repress her own immediate retort that she was being forced as well. “Be that as it may, in my mind, it would seem more suspicious than if we were to?—”

“To what? Marry in Hertfordshire ?” He spoke as if the entire idea of that was absurd.

Tears threatened and she lowered her chin to avoid his notice of them. “Never mind,” she managed to say.

She heard him sigh heavily, and he sounded slightly less angry when he said, “You are not incorrect. People in love, people who are not facing scandal, do not have hasty, concealed nuptials.”

“No, they tend to…have weddings. Proper weddings.”

“I will speak to your mother,” he decided. “And see if she will be able to arrange things within a fortnight, in your home church, with a breakfast at Longbourn.”

Elizabeth nodded, strangely pleased to have earned this small concession.

He moved towards the door. With one last glance at her, he said, “I have no notion of what you will be able to come up with at this point in the Season, but you will need better gowns, and many of them, post-haste. You should spend the next days shopping. I will send Georgiana to help you.”

“I do not require—” she began, but the sound of her voice was lost on him as he strode from the parlour without looking back. At least he did not slam the door.

Elizabeth swallowed hard, tamping down the anger, tears, and every other manner of distress which beset her. Instead she forced herself to see the humour in it. “And here I believed his first proposal was the worst he could do.”