Page 24 of Old Boots (Pride and Prejudice Variations #3)
I wrapped her in my coat and chuckled at her adorable loss of composure, her storm of relief, the release of feelings I did not know she harboured.
She could not have spoken a clearer declaration to me, and when she was spent and sagging in my arms, I held her more gently and with a chuckle, I teased the last of the tears from her eyes.
“Did you think I loved Jane, you idiot?” I brushed a few strands of hair off her cheek before I kissed it.
“You wrote her a letter,” she said irritably into her handkerchief. “And I came upon you in the parlour before you left for Pemberley, making her promise to write with her hand in yours.”
“I made her promise to write to me should she have need of me. I care for her as much as I care for my own sister. And though she did promise, it was you who wrote and not to me.”
She wiped her eyes, took possession of my arm and said, “Would you believe me if I told you I prayed that letter would fall into your hands?”
“It did. Your father handed it to me in a moment of despair.”
“I am glad he did.” She slanted a quick glance at me before looking up and squinting at the clouds. “Will you marry me, Mr Darcy?”
“My word, but you are abrupt, miss. Are you asking whether that is my intention, or are you in fact making me a proposal of marriage? ”
She looked away as though annoyed, but I sensed the trepidation beneath her bravado. I could not help but smile when she sniffed and said, “I believe I am telling you what I expect of you, sir.”
“In that case, does Easter suit? I have written to my cousin, who is with his regiment on the Continent, to request he get leave for that time.”
She looked at me in a flash of surprise. “Does he know that we are to marry?”
“I did not know myself until you told me so just now. On hope alone, I asked him to come, because I want him to stand up with me.”
“And had I refused you?”
“I would have needed him to console me.”
“Perhaps you might try not to have an answer for everything,” she said.
“I could but no. I mean to stun you whenever possible, which I expect will be at a rate of one to twenty.”
“Do I stun you so regularly?”
“I have often left here dazzled, blinded, burnt, and insensible. You are a bolt of lightning, my love.”
“I am the least comfortable sister, I am afraid. The neighbourhood will be shocked and disappointed at our news. Any day now, they expect to hear that you are to marry Jane, who is a great favourite with everyone.” She stopped abruptly, her face fell, and I smiled to think I could read her as easily now as she had always read me .
“I have spoken of all this to your sister. She assures me of her regard and nothing more, and also of her imperviousness to the speculations of your neighbours. Our news will not injure her. And more to the purpose, when at the lowest point in my life, I went to your father to tell him I had raised expectations that I must out of duty satisfy, he refused his consent.”
“What?”
“He would not allow me to marry on principle alone and maintained his eldest daughter only held me in esteem. He claimed to have rethought the institution of marriage, and he believes that more is required than mere equity between parties. As for the wild expectations of your neighbours, you have him to thank, for he made a great show of saying farewell to Sir William Lucas and showing me off as though I were already his son.”
“Oh Papa!” She chuckled. “But that is just as he used to be.”
“Do you mean a devil? If so, then I assure you, he is fully restored to you.”
She leaned her head against my arm and sighed, echoing my own deep contentment. After a moment, she lifted her face and looked at me appraisingly. “Tell me what you will not tell Jane about our father.”
“He is violently in love with my sister’s companion.”
“What? No. He cannot be! ”
“You may believe that if you like, Elizabeth.”
“And does she return his regard?”
“Increasingly. He is capable of making her laugh, of listening to her with the intensity of interest that is his considerable gift, and when that fails, he has only to hint at some frailty to elicit the lady’s compassion.
And, if that were not bad enough, he has become a fatherly figure to my sister and makes himself so agreeable to her that Mrs Annesley cannot help but look upon him with admiration for his kindness. Did I not tell you he is a devil?”
She briefly resorted to her handkerchief to hear such sweet accounts of her father, and said, “For better or worse, he sounds fully recovered, and oh, how glad that makes me! But really, Mr Darcy, I have never heard more shocking news. Are we to have a new mama? You might have tried to be a better chaperon.”
“I was too busy thinking of how I could steal his daughter’s heart while he was otherwise occupied. Have I managed it, my sweet Xanthippe?”
“You may not insult me by referring to me as a notorious shrew and expect me to feed your vanity, sir. I fell, I admit, but reluctantly and with the bitterest resentment. How dare you make me so miserable, so tormented with such feelings of loss and of longing while trying to be happy for my sister. You, Mr Darcy, not my sainted Papa, are the devil. ”
“Is that so?” I laughed. She had given me permission to act the part assigned to me, and like any self-respecting devil, I kissed her far longer and with a great deal more erotic indulgence than I ought to have.
Only when she shivered, from pleasure, a chill, or both, did I think to return us to Longbourn. Poor Bandit’s tail dragged low to the ground, and on the stoop, I said to Elizabeth, “We are, the three of us, as wet and cold as the day we met.”
“I see you have worn old boots this time,” she murmured. “Will you speak to Jane?”
“If you would like.”
“This is the most missish thing I have ever said, but I believe I would like to lie down for half an hour. I wept too hard, I am far too happy, and you have put me through a horrible ordeal, Mr Darcy.”
“You would not have wanted me to engage your interest in the usual manner, would you? Poetry and parlour visits, sighing over your stitches, and?—”
“Hush,” she said, putting a gloved finger on my lips. “Such insipid courtship would have disgusted me.”
“I am sorry you suffered, Elizabeth. But why did you want me to prolong my visit?”
She shrugged. “I wished you to come to the point with my sister so I could extinguish all hope. I thought I would die of pining for you.”
“Truly, I did not know you had come to care for me. But you must own that you put me through worse. What was I to think when I left here at the holidays without a single look from you?”
“I was trying to douse my passion for you, sir,” she said coldly, prompting me to steal a kiss to warm her lips.
She pulled away and said with the hint of a smile, “Enough! I am frozen and befuddled into allowing liberties and confessing things I never should. Might you take Jane’s poor dog to the kitchen?”