Page 6 of Friendship and Forgiveness (Mr. Underwood’s Elizabeth & Darcy Stories #7)

It was an almost torturous sensation for Darcy to watch Elizabeth assiduously pursue his cousin’s attention in the drawing room that night.

Surely she did not admire him.

He… he hardly could express why , but he had not imagined that Elizabeth might be the sort of woman who would be charmed by Colonel Fitzwilliam’s facade. Nor had he imagined that Colonel Fitzwilliam would pursue Miss Elizabeth.

The fire had been kept too warm all night, that must be why her cheeks often glowed red.

She was too clever, too sensible… too… passionate about listening to music for his cousin. And too prone to laughter. And too excellent at finding a perfect turn of phrase.

Sadly, Darcy could not wholly convince himself that there was no chance that Colonel Fitzwilliam would like Elizabeth. She was in fact precisely the sort of woman who every man would like and admire. No matter who they were, no one could fail to be drawn by the liveliness of her bright eyes, the dancing expressions of her smiles, the way she laughed at Colonel Fitzwilliam’s quips, or the intently challenging way she sometimes argued with Darcy.

A flower.

Like those ridiculous scented flowers grown at too much expense that Miss Bingley littered the whole of Netherfield with — primarily, he knew, so that she could prove to him that she was perfectly capable of keeping a comfortable set of apartments.

If he had any interest in marrying, Darcy would begin to think himself in some danger from Miss Elizabeth. But, of course, he had no such plans. Not while matters with Georgiana were still so unsettled, and besides, Elizabeth’s family was too close to trade for it to be accounted a brilliant match.

Yes, yes. He could be in no danger of falling in love with Elizabeth, because twenty thousand pounds chiefly derived from trade was simply insufficient for his Darcy pretensions.

He still found himself irresistibly drawn to the conversations between Elizabeth and Colonel Fitzwilliam, even though Miss Bingley determinedly tried to distract him with her play of being the perfect host who would do anything for him.

He did not sleep well that night, and he woke with a gritty taste in his eyes.

The next morning found Miss Bennet to still be quite ill.

Feverish, having slept poorly, with sore throat, stuffed head, aches and chills.

Darcy quite hoped that he would not catch sick from her either, but he supposed he should not worry very much since the apothecary had been quite insistent that he saw no reason for alarm.

Not that apothecaries, physicians, philosophers or philanthropists understood the mysterious workings of the human body well enough for a sane or rational man to put much reliance on their judgement of the likely course of an illness. Darcy chiefly took his expectation that Miss Bennet would be well from the simple point that colds and flus were frequent — a necessary, if unfortunate part of experiencing civilized life and regular communion with other humans — but they were infrequently fatal or possessed of serious consequences.

Bingley however was quite distracted, and he paced the drawing room for twenty minutes after the apothecary left, muttering, “Poor Janey! Poor Janey! I do hope she gets well quickly. Are you all really sure that we should not call a physician from London?”

“Physicians make everything worse,” Colonel Fitzwilliam said decidedly. “Everything. Never call one if you do not mean to die.”

Bingley’s boots stamped loudly on the floor as he continued to pace. “But if there was something he might do, and he did not, I would—”

Colonel Fitzwilliam replied, “Jove, you are as flush as any gentleman I’ve ever seen with interest for that girl — for my part she is the prettiest creature I’ve ever seen. Excepting of course other equally pretty creatures. No wonder you wish to see her well cared for.”

“No, it is not that.”

“Come good fellow. You grew up with her, did you not? Can you not admit that she is pretty?” As he said that Colonel Fitzwilliam poured out a second cup of coffee for himself. The enticing aroma filled the room and drew Darcy to the table to make his own second cup.

Bingley flushed, paused, and paced again. “Do you both really think she will recover without a physician?”

“More likely without one than with one.” Colonel Fitzwilliam repeated his dictum about them. “I’d never trust any doctor who isn’t ready to saw my leg off at the drop of a hat.”

“Ugh.” Bingley shook and grimaced. “I do not wish to imagine Jane’s leg being sawed off.”

“But you do wish to imagine her legs?” Colonel Fitzwilliam waggled his eyebrow.

“I’ll not hear you say anything about Jane!”

Colonel Fitzwilliam raised his hands. “Greatest respect to her. But admit it. You do think she is pretty?”

“Jane is the most beautiful angel in the world! — and you’ll not bother her.”

Bingley growled at Colonel Fitzwilliam, who laughingly raised his hands. “So you do not think of her as only a sister?”

“What? Do not be absurd. I think of her as Jane. She is simply Jane.”

Darcy was beginning to realize that Bingley’s attitude towards the eldest Miss Bennet was in fact different and more intense than how he thought of the pretty women that Darcy had seen him flirt with before.

Such a match was a sensible one. Jane was a dear family friend who he had known for so very long, and the daughter of his father’s old business partner. Such a marriage would be to the satisfaction of everyone, were it to occur.

Darcy grabbed a sugary lemon tart from the table and went to lean against one of the windowsills to watch the two of them argue.

In response to Bingley’s glare, which was considerably more determined than Darcy was used to seeing his friend ever act, Colonel Fitzwilliam said, “Well then, it appears I am to have nothing to do with Miss Bennet. Pity though — sick girls are always the prettiest. Everyone says so. But I suppose I’ll have to content myself with bothering Miss Elizabeth, even though she seems to radiate good health. More's the pity — but I think she is more to my taste in any case.”

Bingley laughed at that, showing that his defensiveness only extended to one of the Bennet girls. “Lizzy is too clever for you.”

“I like clever women.”

Darcy felt a sort of anxiety, and he looked at Colonel Fitzwilliam who had his ordinary mocking grin. Did he actually mean to take a serious interest in Elizabeth?

She really couldn’t like him. Colonel Fitzwilliam was losing his hair.

But Darcy knew that his cousin was a confident, vigorous man, with a sort of easy charisma.

There was a laughing reply from Bingley that Darcy barely heard over his mounting anxiety.

“Miss Elizabeth is a great reader,” Darcy suddenly heard himself saying. He was pressing his neatly trimmed nails into the palm of his hand. The lemon tart he’d just eaten mixed acidly with the strong coffee. “You hardly could get along very well with such a person.”

“Ah, simple soldier you mean? But even the simplest soldier might wish to have some touch of higher thoughts and interests to enliven his life.”

Darcy frowned.

It would be a reasonable match for his cousin. He ought to be happy at the thought of his cousin fixing on someone to at last marry. He should not feel a gaping anxiety that verged on terror at the thought of Elizabeth marrying someone else.

Colonel Fitzwilliam looked at him in a peculiar way. He added in a far more serious voice, “I do not think that Miss Elizabeth has any interest in me . Though she is a very fine woman.”

“No, no,” Darcy said. He stood and with effort unclenched his jaw. “You must not judge yourself beneath your desserts — she spoke chiefly with you all last night. That sort of persistence must mean she has some interest in you.”

Tilted head, too clever eyes. His coat finely fitted around wide muscular shoulders. Darcy hated the way his cousin made him feel transparent and as though he had no depths to hide his thoughts within.

Bingley laughed. “I don’t know about that. Lizzy seemed to simply enjoy herself. And you as well. Nothing there, I think. Not that I would be offended, Colonel Fitzwilliam, if you and Lizzy made a match of it. I’d be rather happy about it. I just don’t expect it from last night.”

“Oh?” Colonel Fitzwilliam raised an eyebrow. “See, Darcy, Miss Elizabeth has no interest in me . Nothing is clearer than that a woman speaking to a man does not mean that she is in love with him. For example, Miss Bingley spoke to you even more persistently than Miss Elizabeth spoke to me, and I cannot imagine that she has any interest in you.”

Bingley coughed.

Darcy flushed, and in response to the felt heat in his face, he sat up straighter and prouder. “I have not sought any interest from that source, and I shall not. I assure you that at present I have no intention to flirt, to prance, or to interact in any particular way with any woman. I certainly at present have no plans to marry, nor any interest in any particular woman.”

“Ah!” Colonel Fitzwilliam then replied, “I’d suspected that you had an interest in Miss Elizabeth — something about how you looked at her. But in this case I’ll have no compunctions about monopolizing her attention if she throws them on me again.”

The worst of it was that Darcy could not even glare at his cousin, because that would simply prove his suspicions.

The day was long, and tortuous, as Darcy eagerly wished to see Elizabeth’s face again, but she remained steadily in attendance on her sister. Elizabeth only came down from the sick room in the evening.

Bingley leapt from where he’d sat at cards with Mr. Hurst, Mrs. Hurst and Colonel Fitzwilliam. He exclaimed with real feeling, “How does Jane? Is she any worse in the last three hours?”

Elizabeth shook her head and smiled. “Sleeping now. Still warm, but less than earlier.” She then stretched her arms above her head, pulling the cotton fabric of her dress taut around her bosom, and tilted and turned her head about. “I’ve sat in one posture reading to her for too long.”

It was impossible for Darcy to not shift in place, and orient himself towards her. He was suddenly aware of all his own aches and pains from sitting in one place as he had written his letter to Georgiana. Half consciously imitating her, Darcy also stretched, turning his torso side to side.

“Join us.” Mrs. Hurst offered to Elizabeth, “We just talked about switching the game to loo. We can accommodate you and Caroline.”

Please say yes.

Darcy really would prefer if Miss Bingley would cease bothering him, so he could finish his letter to his sister in peace.

As Elizabeth considered the offer, Colonel Fitzwilliam said to Caroline, “Come now! No more excuse that you cannot play cards because five is such an awkward number.”

“No, no,” Elizabeth said laughing. “I shall not join. I’d much prefer to read a book.”

“You prefer reading to cards,” Mr. Hurst said. “Singular.”

Elizabeth laughed, while Miss Bingley stood up from the little stool that she’d brought to Darcy’s side. “Elizabeth is a very great reader. I’d say she takes little pleasure in anything else, but she can, sometimes, manage to even enjoy a game of cards.”

“I suppose I have no choice but to play to prove my breadth of talents.” Grinning at them all, Elizabeth sat near Colonel Fitzwilliam. “And promise, all, that you shan’t believe what Caroline says: I am not a great reader, and I have pleasure in many things.”

“Do not believe her ,” Miss Bingley replied. “She may take pleasure in many things, and there are few people better capable of finding joy in any situation than my dear friend, but she is without doubt a great reader. It is merely that she compares herself to Mr. Bennet which makes her deny her greatness.”

“Papa is a great reader,” Elizabeth replied. “I am merely a tolerable reader.”

“Every evening at school she sat next to us while we played at cards and gossip, a novel or work of science in hand.”

“Do not let Caroline fool you into believing I was a diligent student!” Elizabeth said, taking up the hand of cards that Mr. Hurst handed out. “It was quite rare that I read anything which Mrs. Castle thought had any value — Caroline was the diligent student. She tired herself to perfect her drawing, her comportment, her music, French and Italian. I chiefly focused on diversion.”

Darcy smiled at Elizabeth.

There was something wholly charming in this refusal of the praise, and the attempt to put it upon her friend. He had seen Miss Bingley’s habits, and Miss Bingley was by far too assiduous in her pursuit of that which would impress those around her to impress Darcy.

With a very becoming flush, Elizabeth looked down and muttered again, “I assure you, Caroline was the best of us. She is — no, no, Caroline. You shouldn’t join. I think five is the perfect number for a game of loo. More and it becomes awkward.”

Miss Bingley had sat back down next to Darcy, having avoided the card game once more. She looked at him, probably hoping to see if Elizabeth’s praise of her had some positive effect on his opinion of her.

It did not.

Elizabeth was charming and natural, Miss Bingley was not.

Colonel Fitzwilliam loudly clapped his hand against his thigh. “Miss Elizabeth, you have convinced me! There is no use, nor point in speaking further with you this evening while such a paragon of good breeding, good achievements, and decorous comportment sits nearby as Miss Caroline Bingley. Miss Bingley, do you not find me a paragon of deportment as well?”

Darcy frowned at that. Whatever did he mean by disparaging Elizabeth?

But rather than appearing displeased, Elizabeth’s eyes brightened and she smiled warmly at Colonel Fitzwilliam. A green creature squeezed Darcy’s chest.

The reply of Miss Bingley to this praise was an annoyed and curt, “ No .”

“Hurt, cut to the quick,” Colonel Fitzwilliam replied. He flipped over his cards and sighed dramatically. “Missed the trick also. I’ve been loo’ed. Misery. You and the cards. I’m dashed to the marrow, shot through — like a fellow I know. Bullet landed right in his heart, plugged the wound, and he was fine for an hour, but when the surgeon poked his finger in the bloody hole—”

“Colonel Fitzwilliam,” Miss Bingley angrily replied, “might you reserve your grotesque war tales for when the gentlemen are by themselves?”

“Simple soldier, madam. Apologies, simple soldier.”

Elizabeth declared, “And as a simple soldier you have overcrossed the lines of convention too far, and must be punished.”

With a grin, Colonel Fitzwilliam sat straighter, and he flicked a finger in a mock salute. “Punished? I am in terror. And what shall my fate be? What unpleasant task must I accomplish for you?”

“Ah,” Elizabeth smiled back at him — that green snake squeezing in Darcy’s chest grew tighter. “You shall choose the next book for me to read. And what is more, I shall curse you to read to me aloud from it — soon as the next round of loo is complete. It must be a good book, proper for the company.”

“Oh, no! Madam, such horror.” Colonel Fitzwilliam laughingly placed the back of his hand against his forehead. “Choose a kinder fate for the poor sufferer — but alas. I see you are without mercy, and—”

“Wholly without.”

“—I have no choice but to perform this low quest.”

Darcy hated himself for the way that he seemed to be unable to either keep himself from half staring at their conversation, or to then properly say something to enter it. He was full of strong emotion, like he was not used to feeling in any way.

Bingley laughed. “I wager you’ll find no great success in my library! I’ve barely enough books to gain the name.”

“I am astonished,” said Miss Bingley, “that my father should have left behind such a small collection of books. What a delightful library you have at Pemberley, Mr. Darcy!”

And it had returned once more. Miss Bingley and her endless efforts to appeal to him by flattering that which was his. At least this was a distraction from his attention on Elizabeth.

“It has been the work of many generations,” Darcy replied without any feeling of enthusiasm for the subject, though ordinarily he loved to talk about Pemberley.

Elizabeth had perhaps given him the key to Miss Bingley’s character with that description of how dedicated she had been to her studies at their ladies seminary: She was a woman who desired to pass any exams the world presented to her.

No doubt she considered him in the nature of such an academic task.

First: Impress her school mistress and the tutors.

Second: Gain a reputation as an accomplished woman.

Third: Make a brilliant match. He would be a brilliant match, and thus she would make him match her whether he wanted her or not. Darcy had a resigned notion that she would continuously exert herself to catch him until he married another, and the matter became impossible.

Maybe he should marry.

Darcy’s heart skipped several beats.

He glanced at Elizabeth, her tanned heart-shaped face was upturned and dimpling as she listened to Colonel Fitzwilliam bantering back at her. At this moment he desperately wished he had his cousin’s facility for charming and flirting with women. He did not even understand how the two of them had settled into speaking so easily when everything Darcy said to Elizabeth was awkward and frustrating.

But, Darcy consoled himself with a soothing thought. What he had was vastly better than Colonel Fitzwilliam’s easy manner and charm: Pemberley and the vast wealth of his estate.

He did not speak much further that night, but he spent the entire time quietly contemplating Elizabeth in a less frenzied, and a more calm state of mind than before.