Page 8 of Done for the Best (Engaged to Mr Darcy #5)
CHAPTER EIGHT
AN EXCELLENT READER
S ome hours later, Darcy called at the parsonage, his heart encased in lead in his chest but determined to do what was right, to speak the truth to Elizabeth. Mr Collins met him in the vestibule.
“Cousin Eliza has awoken in a difficult temper,” he said.
“A difficult temper? What do you mean, sir?”
Mr Collins went on a long-winded discussion of his opinion that ladies ought to be trained in the art of staying home, of tending the hearth, because ladies given too much freedom and exposed to the outdoors suffered irreversible harm to their dispositions. Darcy’s own cousin Anne was held up as Mr Collins’s model of ideal womanhood.
Darcy regarded him with some amusement. He might previously have been offended or tempted to make a cutting remark to him, but he had taken good care of Elizabeth, offering her every convenience unstintingly. Mr Collins was a man of weak understanding, but he did right by his family—or tried to. He has done better by her than you have , his conscience reminded him.
“So what you are saying, Mr Collins, is that a woman ought to be raised up as if she suffers illness so in the event she does fall grievously ill, she will be better able to bear it?”
Mr Collins opened his mouth to answer then paused, considering it; and into this pause arrived Mrs Collins. She had a smile on her lips though worry had bent grooves into her forehead. “Eliza is in the drawing room, sir. She is very tired and headachy this afternoon.”
“Then let us hope I might suitably divert her,” he said, but it was ill-timed for just then he heard it, the soft patter of a spring rain against the window. He turned to look behind him and saw that the quiet grey of the morning had given way to a gentle but steady rain shower.
Mrs Collins seemed to read his mind. “Indoor diversions have never been Eliza’s delight,” she said with a small laugh. “But perhaps you will hit upon something the rest of us have not thought of.”
Darcy found Elizabeth in the drawing room, and from the strained white of her countenance and the pink hue of her eyes, he deduced she had been crying.
“I am being the absolute worst sort of patient,” she told him. “Ungrateful and wretched. Charlotte ought to just save herself the trouble and toss me out into the rain.”
“Mrs Collins said nothing of that,” he told her, taking a seat next to her on the small worn settee. “Only that you were tired and had a headache. I hope our ride this morning was not to blame.”
She shook her head. “I have found myself struggling terribly with the tedium. I should imagine it is a good problem to have; it must mean my health is improving, and yet it is still too poor to do the things I wish to do.”
“You have always seemed to me the active sort.”
“Much to my mother’s dismay,” she said with a smile. “She did not think it was ladylike that I was so often rambling about.”
“I knew almost immediately of your fondness for a walk when you came to Netherfield to nurse your sister,” he said. “On foot.”
She laughed, lightly, at this mention. “I am not a horsewoman,” she said. “I never have been. So the choices are to become a good walker or stay at home.”
“With the exception of reading—it seemed to me you were fond of reading.”
“I confess I am, although it is rather difficult for me now, more’s the pity. An ideal activity for convalescing, save for those in whom the activity results in an aching head. More than a few pages and the words begin to swim before my eyes.”
“Shall I read to you, then?”
“Would you?”
He smiled. “I would be honoured.” Her return smile lit her eyes, and he was, as always, pulled immediately into her thrall.
“What will you read to me?”
“Whatever you would like.”
“Truly? What if I select some insipid novel?”
He laughed. “Then we will groan and complain over it together.”
They stood, the pair of them, before the shelves in Mr Collins’s study, eyes scanning the shelves for something that would do. Mr Collins had limited taste and interests, it seemed, for his scant few books were nearly all of two subjects—religious instruction and gardening. Every now and again, Elizabeth would take one of the tomes and examine it hopefully before putting it back; Darcy occasionally did likewise.
“Do you like these sorts of books?”Elizabeth asked eventually.
“These do appear a bit too ponderous for the diversion of a spring afternoon.”
“Perhaps we might find something more appealing at Rosings?”
It was a disinterested suggestion; Rosings Park’s library had often been neglected. Sir Lewis de Bourgh had not been interested in reading overmuch, and what he had read, most often, was designed to titillate rather than inform or entertain. Nevertheless, Darcy thought it might do better than what he saw in Mr Collins’s book-room.
A quick glance at the window reminded him of the rain. “What if I ran across to Rosings and brought back a selection for you. Would that do?”
“I hate to ask you to go out into the rain,” Elizabeth said with a worried glance at the window.
He waved his hand. “Think nothing of that. It will be the work of a moment.”
He turned then, intending to be off, but she had further surprises for him: she grabbed his hand, forestalling his progress and sending a lightning bolt of warmth through him. With her gaze fixed on his countenance, she said, “You are too good to me.”
“You deserve far better,” he murmured, giving her hand a little squeeze. How delicate it felt within his own!
She edged closer into the slight distance between them. “Impossible.”
It would have been so easy to kiss her; indeed, she nearly invited it with her lips, tilted into the slightest of smiles, angled towards his own, her dainty, yet strong, fingers grasping his hand. He had never wished to kiss her more.
With great effort, acting against every base inclination he had, he pulled their joined hands towards his lips and gently kissed the backs of her fingers. “I shall be back directly,” he said in a low voice, and then he left her.
The cool spring rain was relief against his face and neck. He crossed the small lane in quick paces, wishing he had a rock to throw or an opponent that he might box or fence; the untamed frustration within him begged for release.
There was no one about at Rosings, which was further relief, as he should not have liked to account for his agitation. Within the library, he leant against the bookshelves and swore. Every day he was in deeper and deeper, and the lies mounted. He needed to make a clean breast of things!
His respirations came quickly. His mind was in tumult—he wanted, no deeply desired , to kiss her, to take her in his arms and press her body against his own, to ravish her, to taste her, to make her his own.But he knew his own guilt. What he did was bad enough, but to take liberties as well? It would be unconscionable. “Everything you are doing is unconscionable,” he growled into the empty room.
When he was with her, when the warmth in her eyes and the smile on her lips were for him—it was everything he had ever wished for from her, and it proved impossible to deny himself. How was a man to begin a confession which would rob him of his heart’s true desire?
He took several deep breaths, determinedly bringing himself under regulation, forcing himself into more wholesome musings. At length, he turned his attentions to the shelves to look for a book, choosing several that were lying about, one of which was his own— Gulliver’s Travels . It seemed like one she might like.
He wondered briefly how it had come to be on the shelf in Rosings’ library but then recalled he had read it on the day he found her. Rather he stared at it uncomprehending, fearing the worst for her.
Recalling that day reminded him that it was decidedly a blessing that she walked and talked among them now. She must be told the plain truth , his conscience urged him.
Walking back to the parsonage, he was reminded of his father. ‘When you must do something difficult, set a time for yourself’, had been his father’s counsel. ‘Never plan to do something at some point distant; choose your moment and adhere to it faithfully’.
Darcy nodded. Very well, then. Not today—she was feeling unwell. But tomorrow, during their ride, it would be done.