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

LEAVING AN IMPRESSION

B y the time she returned to the parsonage house, her departure was no longer a question in anyone’s mind. Mr Collins had called on his patroness early that morning—as he customarily did—and had returned to the parsonage ready to make Elizabeth and her trunk walk back to Longbourn, if need be.

Charlotte was in the guest bedchamber where Elizabeth had stayed, folding her friend’s gowns into her trunk as hastily as she could.

From within the master’s study on the floor below, Elizabeth could hear Mr Collins pacing, his heavy footfalls betraying his upset.

Charlotte was also disturbed; Elizabeth could tell by the way her colour was high and her mouth set in a determined line.

“So you did accept him after all.” It was a statement not a question, and Charlotte did not look at her as she said it.

“No,” Elizabeth said. She thought that Charlotte sounded accusatory, and it nettled her .

Charlotte shot her a look even while she continued busily folding. “Everyone at Rosings thinks you did.”

“I already told you, Charlotte, that he misunderstood my…my silence, for assent.”

“But you did not tell him otherwise?” Charlotte paused, turning to Elizabeth with one hand on her hip. “That was what you said you would do when you left. And now? Does he still misunderstand?”

Elizabeth crossed her arms over her chest and took a deep breath. “Charlotte, the man was beaten by Miss de Bourgh.”

“Miss de Bourgh?” Charlotte barked a mirthless laugh. “You cannot be in earnest. She could not beat a mouse.”

“I am in earnest. Further, he fears that she will…come after me as well. He has made arrangements to escort me back to London for concern of my safety.”

“Well, is not that sweet.”

“Charlotte!” Elizabeth gave an angry huff. “I cannot appreciate your lack of civility towards me right now.”

“Your idea of a joke has caused us a great deal of trouble,” Charlotte retorted.

“This is not my idea of a joke!”

“That is not what you said last evening!”

“I was upset last night and said some things I did not?—”

“ You were upset?” Charlotte exhaled noisily. “Mr Collins is deeply distressed by all of this. Obviously this places us in an excessively difficult position. Lady Catherine is enraged and has said my husband has taken a serpent to his bosom.”

“If Lady Catherine is angry at anyone it ought to be her own nephew. He is the originator of all of this!”

“Why did you not simply tell him? If it is all a misunderstanding, then Miss de Bourgh and Lady Catherine can?— ”

“Because angry people are not always rational or wise! They think I am responsible—as you obviously do—and I think the wisest course is to defer to Mr Darcy’s superior understanding of his own relations. And Mr Darcy thinks it best to depart with as much haste as possible.”

Elizabeth went to the closet and began removing the remaining items for packing. “He stood before me with broken ribs, scarcely able to walk, and told me how it would be. His cousin was by his side, warning me of the urgent need to return to London with them.”

“I still do not?—”

“I can hardly leave with them if I am forswearing all connexion to him!”

“If you travel to London with him alone, then you are engaged to him,” Charlotte said, her voice raised.

“No, I am not!”

“Charlotte?” Maria stood in the doorway, eyes wide and darting back and forth between her sister and Elizabeth. “All is well?”

“No,” Charlotte replied shortly, beginning again to fold and pack Elizabeth’s trunk. “Go see to your things. You are leaving.”

“What?” Maria’s eyes filled with tears. “But why? I had thought?—”

“Just because!” Charlotte shrieked shrilly. “Go pack!”

Without a further syllable, Maria scurried off.

Elizabeth took a deep breath. She could not like how Charlotte was behaving towards her, but she understood her dismay.

Mr Collins chattered and stamped in the room beneath them, and it would be Charlotte who remained behind to hear the censure of her patroness endlessly over the next days and weeks.

Hers was not an enviable position. “Charlotte…” she began.

Charlotte seemed, suddenly, on the verge of tears. She stopped packing and sank onto the bed. “You know how I anticipated her being here. Both of you! And now you will leave, so suddenly!”

“I know,” Elizabeth said, feeling suddenly very tired.

“None of this is my wish or my intention. All is but another excessively egregious example of Mr Darcy’s arrogance.

Just think! If only he had behaved as a typical man might have and waited for a reply before announcing his engagement.

I do not think it has even occurred to him that I never accepted his offer! ”

“It does not seem so, no.” Charlotte shook her head. “You have to go. What you make of this tangle I cannot imagine, but you must go. Excuse me while I go help Maria.”

“Charlotte, please,” Elizabeth said, hearing the tone of desperation in her voice. “I…I am sorry for all of this trouble. I am sure you are correct. Surely Miss de Bourgh cannot be such a danger to me? What if I were to go and speak to Lady Catherine myself?—”

“I want you to leave,” Charlotte replied, somewhat cruelly in Elizabeth’s opinion. “I will sort things out with Lady Catherine. Likely it will satisfy her best if she thinks Mr Collins and I have turned you out.”

After a short, injured pause, Elizabeth said, “Very well.”

With that, Charlotte rose and quit the room.

It required longer than Elizabeth had imagined for Mr Darcy’s carriage to arrive at the parsonage.

She was forced to endure Mr Collins’ sermonising in the meantime—evidently the vicar had decided that Elizabeth must have used some sort of arts to ensnare Mr Darcy, and he meant to implore her to release him.

“A man, of Mr Darcy’s status, must choose a bride from among those who will do credit to his line and his name and…” On and on he droned, stirring up indignation in Elizabeth’s breast—for it was far too reminiscent of the things Mr Darcy had said to her the night before.

What is it about me that these men must endlessly remind me of how disappointing and inferior I am?

By the time Mr Darcy’s carriage arrived at the parsonage, she was well-prepared to release him on the spot.

Alas, she was reminded of her need to appear as his betrothed when he stepped out and she saw a new wound, still bleeding slightly, on the side of his face near his temple.

Had there been more violent madness? Elizabeth did not dare ask about it.

The colonel stepped out behind him and went to see to the loading of the ladies’ trunks. Mr Darcy thrust his hand towards her, evidently meaning to hand her into the carriage.

“Mr Darcy, sir! A moment if you will!” Both Mr Darcy and Elizabeth turned to behold Mr Collins trotting towards them, already inexplicably out of breath.

Elizabeth had a brief moment when she thought he might have come to be helpful with the trunk, or to console Charlotte and Maria who looked alternately grieved and baffled by the goings-on.

“Sir?” Mr Darcy gave Mr Collins a look that to Mr Collins must have seemed encouraging.

Taking the briefest of moments to puff out his chest, Mr Collins said, “Though it pains me to slight my own cousin, I must tell you, sir, that such a female possesses many arts and allurements which, at times, become bewildering to even the most clever of men. As Eve once tempted Adam…”

On and on he went, and neither Mr Darcy’s most severe look, nor Charlotte’s gentle entreaties, could silence him.

When the colonel re-entered the carriage, Elizabeth assumed the trunks were fastened as they ought to be and thus hastily bid Charlotte adieu and climbed into the carriage.

Maria scrambled in after her. As soon as she entered, Maria pressed herself anxiously into a corner and opened a book, evidently meaning to spend the next hours pretending she was not there.

Mr Darcy entered behind them, the door was closed, and in too little time for Elizabeth to credit, they were moving down the lane.

“I am exhausted,” the colonel announced and, with little more than that, was asleep.

How is it possible , Elizabeth thought as the parsonage house disappeared from view, that merely a day ago I walked this very lane with no thought for anything other than collecting cherry blossoms for Charlotte’s parlour?

She looked at the man who was the principal cause of the jumble, feeling herself boil with vexation.

It will not do , she reminded herself. He is injured.

He deserves at least some little pity for that.

The most recently acquired wound was yet bleeding but he, staring angrily out the window, appeared insensible to it. She removed her handkerchief from her reticule and leant across the carriage. “Sir, you are bleeding.”

Without a word, he took her handkerchief and pressed it against the wound, but said nothing, just kept staring out the window.

Elizabeth waited and then gave up on any expected civility and shoved herself back into the squabs.

So much for kindness , she thought, and decided she would pass the time by mentally rehearsing the speech she would give to release him.

They were passing a little hamlet called Aperfield, and Elizabeth was looking out the window and thinking how much it seemed like Meryton when, apropos of nothing, Mr Darcy announced, “As you might have supposed, there was another…problem at Rosings.”

Maria by this time had fallen into a light doze, her book nearly falling from her lap. Perhaps her slumber was what he was waiting for?

“I am sorry to hear it,” Elizabeth replied as she took Maria’s book from her and gently closed it. “With your cousin, I should imagine?”

Mr Darcy nodded.

“Poor girl,” Elizabeth said. Mr Darcy gave her a look she could not interpret. She thought he had an air of censure about him. No doubt the only injuries he considered worth sympathy were his own.

“Your wounds will heal in due time,” she informed him, a bit loftily. “Hers may be less obvious but are clearly as deeply felt and much more enduring.”

“You are correct in that,” he said. Then with an almost-smile, he added, “Your compassion is one of the things I love most about you.”

His words made her blush and sapped her indignation.

She hurriedly turned her face to the window and made some inane remark about Aperfield.

It was stupid, to say the least, but he had wholly discomfited her.

He had said more, and more ardently, the evening prior, but what came after it had obscured her comprehension of his actual feeling.

It seemed he truly did think himself in love with her .

Does he think I am in love with him? How am I meant to tell him, no, I am not, and I shall not marry him?

“You should know that I have had some laudanum myself, just to make it through the drive.” He winced as they bounced, that very moment, over a rut in the road.

“My ribs. Even breathing is painful. If I seem somewhat…dazed or sleepy, that is why. Well, that and the fact that neither Fitzwilliam nor I slept much last night.”

“In truth?”

He nodded grimly. “My cousin and I stayed together in my bedchamber, imagining there was greater safety in numbers. Alas?—”

His words were interrupted just then by his cousin’s snore, so loud it made her jump. With a faint smile, he said, “You see yourself now why I did not rest peaceably.”

She smiled but said nothing to that.

Suddenly he let out a sharp laugh followed by a wince and a grab at his midsection. “I was only thinking what rich irony all of this is.”

“Irony?”

He paused a moment, a rueful half-smile on his lips.

“I…I said things last night that…well, I did mean them, but I said them more harshly than was intended—about your family. For whatever reservations I have about your relations,” he said in a tone that was almost teasing, “I must own that I have never feared, even slightly, that any of them would thrash me.”

“No, they would not,” she replied with a tight smile.

It was something—or so she supposed—that he recognised that his own relations were less than perfect, even if in so doing he again insulted her family.

“Though I must own that my cousin Philips and I have had our fair share of scuffles, and I have drawn blood on him more than once.”

He smiled, but it was faint. His eyes appeared to be growing heavy, and as she watched, he took the sort of breath that people take when they are trying to remain awake.

“Pray do not stay awake on my account,” she told him.

Mr Darcy’s eyes were already drifting closed. Sleepily, he mumbled, “I will just close my eyes for a minute or two.”