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Chapter Twelve

H e had read the same paragraph three times.

Once with disinterest, once with rising irritation, and once—pointedly, furiously—as if sheer will might force the words to rearrange themselves into something useful.

They did not oblige.

Darcy shut the volume with a cracking of leather binding and stood.

He had not opened that particular treatise on estate management to learn anything new—only to reassure himself that something in the world still functioned by rules.

Bingley had no Latin grammars, so he found the next most logical option.

But even that had betrayed him.

The sun was out, weak and indifferent. The air had sharpened overnight. And if he remained cooped in this house any longer, he might put a quill through the next person who said the word “ball.”

He pulled on his coat.

Bingley was elsewhere—out delivering invitations, or listening to Caroline Bingley debate drapery colors for the third time that week. Darcy left a note, called for his horse, and took the long way into town. Partly for the quiet, partly to delay what he had already decided to do.

He would make… social calls today.

Without Bingley to protect him.

The very thought made his stomach turn flips.

He had already drawn up a mental list—Charlotte Lucas, Miss King, those twin nieces of Mrs. Goulding who giggled in tandem like chickens. Ordinarily, he would not give any of them more than a bow in passing. But he was running out of time.

London was not yet in season. Most of society’s daughters still lingered at their family estates, like overripe pears on a too-still branch. By the time the best options began to reappear in Mayfair, it would be January. And he could not wait until January.

So he would try.

Make the calls. Show his face. If nothing came of it, he would go to London next month, make the rounds, and if need be—return to Hertfordshire to pick from the ashes.

He hated the thought.

He was halfway to the bookseller’s when he saw them.

Elizabeth. And Wickham.

She was laughing at something—truly laughing, head tilted, eyes lit, and not the polite sort she used in drawing rooms. Wickham had said something that pleased her. And worse— he looked pleased by her .

Darcy slowed.

They had not seen him yet. The lane curved gently ahead, framing them as if the entire town were a stage for this single scene.

He did not move. He told himself he was merely deciding whether to cross the street. But his feet remained planted, and his pulse had already begun to quicken.

Wickham leaned in slightly. Not too close—but enough.

Elizabeth said something in return—something teasing. He knew the tone.

Darcy felt it like a dagger behind the ribs.

He watched until they turned down the next street and vanished from view.

Then—without meaning to—he followed.

He told himself it was for Georgiana’s sake. Wickham was a liar. A practiced one. And Elizabeth had always been sharp—but even sharp women could be charmed.

The two of them stepped into the sweet shop. Darcy crossed the lane and paused beside the milliner’s window.

He saw nothing inappropriate. No touches, no whispers. But the ease between them… that was worse.

Darcy stood there longer than he should have. He stood there until he sensed himself the object of curious stares and an obstacle dodged by at least two men on horseback.

He sighed. Wickham or no Wickham, he might as well get this over with.

T he Misses Hartfields were prettier than he remembered. Or perhaps not. It was difficult to tell through the haze of excruciating small talk and the sheer volume of wallpaper in the drawing room.

They were nieces of Mrs. Goulding, returned from a brief visit to Cheltenham and now “enjoying the rural air,” which, based on their tones, they considered only slightly preferable to the plague.

Their names, Eugenie and Lavinia, suggested a childhood full of pianoforte lessons, too many sugar lumps in their tea, and cats.

And their voices sounded exactly like young women who read The Mysteries of Udolpho and practiced fainting poses in the mirror.

Miss Eugenie Hartfield—the elder by a year, or possibly just better at pretending she was—sat stiffly near the window, hands folded so tightly her knuckles were white. Miss Lavinia, the younger, had twice adjusted her hair while speaking and once dropped her fan on the hearth rug.

Mrs. Goulding was delighted to receive him. He could tell by how many times she said so. “Such a surprise! Such a treat! You must forgive us, we were not expecting company today—well, not this sort of company!”

Darcy bowed.

She offered him the least uncomfortable chair. He declined tea. He accepted a biscuit. He instantly regretted it.

The Misses Hartfield exchanged glances. Miss Lavinia attempted a comment about the weather.

“It is very bright,” she said, as if accusing it of ruining her complexion.

“Yes,” said Darcy.

A silence followed. The sort that made clocks tick louder and polite death seem like an appealing option.

Miss Eugenie cleared her throat. “Do you ride, Mr. Darcy?”

“Most gentlemen do.”

Another pause. This one came with a draft.

Mrs. Goulding leapt into the breach with heroic determination. “My nieces have always been fond of the country. Of course, Cheltenham is far more refined, but there is something so invigorating about Meryton in November, do you not find?”

Darcy considered several answers, most of them words a gentleman ought not utter before ladies. “It has been temperate.”

Miss Lavinia nodded with the determined zeal of a person who once ate a leaf and called it adventurous. “I enjoy temperate things.”

He nearly asked what that meant. He refrained.

There was a tray of embroidery between them, untouched.

A clock ticked.

Miss Eugenie picked up a book from the side table—halfheartedly, as if it had been planted there just for him to notice. “Have you read any novels lately, Mr. Darcy?”

“I do not often read novels. I prefer something with more weight and intelligence.”

“Oh.” She blinked. “I enjoy the gothic ones.”

He nodded. He could think of no suitable response to that.

“Some are very informative,” she added.

“Instructive,” corrected Lavinia.

“Quite.”

A brief pause followed. One of them shifted in her seat; the other adjusted a ribbon at her sleeve—rose-colored and slightly askew.

Darcy’s eye caught on it. The same hue Elizabeth had worn at Lucas Lodge.

For no reason he could name, the thought unsettled him.

He shifted slightly in his chair and said nothing.

In the corner, Mrs. Goulding began listing their acquaintances in London. He recognized none of them. That did not stop her.

At some point, a cat appeared and yawned at his boots.

He had been there less than a quarter hour.

Darcy stood.

“I thank you for your hospitality,” he said, voice wavering in relief.

“Oh, but you must stay longer!” said Mrs. Goulding.

“You must not rush,” said Miss Lavinia, leaping to her feet as though he had dropped a handkerchief and proposed marriage in the same motion.

“Unfortunately, I have another engagement,” Darcy said, bowing.

He did not. But it was either leave now or leap through the window.

As he took his hat, Miss Eugenie curtsied and said, “I do hope we shall see you at the ball.”

Darcy paused.

He glanced at their eager, terrified faces—one too pale, the other flushed to the ears—and forced himself to answer.

“You may rely on it.”

Then he left.

The air outside felt like freedom.

But his stomach twisted—not from the visit, but from the memory of Elizabeth’s laugh echoing behind him as he turned the corner.

T he moment the officers tipped their hats and disappeared down the lane, Mrs. Bennet burst into a symphony of delighted speculation.

“Well!” she exclaimed, fluttering into the hallway like a general surveying victorious troops. “You did not say you would be walking back with them! Did anyone see you? Hill, did anyone see them coming up the walk?”

“No one was watching the road but you,” Mary said, already attempting to duck away with her borrowed tract on the Virtues of Vigilance.

“Mary, do not be contrary. That man has a captain’s commission, and the other one—Mr. Wickham—he is very well-favored. Lizzy, I had no idea you liked long walks in town so well.”

“I like them best when someone else is doing the talking,” Elizabeth replied, pulling her gloves off and draping them over the hook. “Mr. Wickham is particularly good at it. I scarcely had to contribute a syllable.”

“Well, that is how men ought to be. Denny was quite attentive to Mary when he brought you to the door, I thought. Were they calling on your aunt Philips?”

“They were walking by the door at the same time we were leaving. Coincidence, Mama.”

“I have never believed in coincidence,” said Mrs. Bennet, her tone already tilting toward the register she reserved for ribbon counters and marriage prospects.

Elizabeth made her escape to the drawing room.

Her journal was waiting on the side table where she had left it, tucked between a volume of Cowper and a very uneven pile of embroidery.

She slipped it open and dropped into the chair by the window, where the light still held steady and the noise from the hallway could be tolerated with effort.

Her pencil tapped once on the paper.

Today, I was delivered home like a parcel—complete with ribboned escort and breathless maternal approval.

Denny was Denny—pleasant, forgettable, possibly part spaniel. Wickham was more complimentary than usual. I laughed more than I meant to and began to suspect he enjoys the sound of his own voice the way some people enjoy humming in stairwells—just to admire the echo.

She paused. Tapped again.