Page 43 of Strange Happenings at Longbourn (Darcy and Elizabeth Variations #11)
She sipped her tea, aware of her pulse in her throat. “I suppose I should be grateful you are willing to brave the rain for the sake of our peace.”
His mouth lifted just slightly. “I would brave more than rain for that.”
Her fingers tightened slightly on the porcelain handle.
She could not help but think of him riding up to Longbourn this afternoon, his dark coat glistening with rain, his hair dampened and curling faintly at the edges, his expression calm but resolute.
The image settled in her mind with dangerous ease.
“We will need to examine the east wing again,” she said, forcing herself back to the practical. “If there is a hidden room or passage, it could explain the ease with which the mischief is done. And if we can find the entrance…”
“We close it. Or we guard it.”
She nodded, heartened by the firmness in his voice. “But the house will be too full of eyes today, and we have no excuse to wander there without attracting attention.”
Darcy’s gaze slid briefly towards the hearth, where Lydia was now attempting to scare Kitty by dropping her voice to a ghostly moan. “Perhaps not today. But soon. And when that time comes…” He left the thought unfinished, but his meaning was plain—he would be there.
Their eyes held for a moment longer than was polite. Then Mary struck a decisive chord at the pianoforte, startling Mrs. Bennet into a flurry of conversation with Jane, and the moment was lost.
Still, as Elizabeth turned back to her tea, she felt a curious steadiness settle in her.
The storm outside might rage, the mischief-maker might creep in unseen corners, but she was not standing alone against it.
And though she told herself her calm was born of reason, she could not deny that a portion of it came simply from knowing Mr. Darcy sat within reach, his voice and his presence a quiet bulwark against the strange troubles that haunted Longbourn.
It was Mary who, unwittingly, gave them their excuse.
She had been searching for a volume of sermons—Fordyce, no less—which she had left somewhere “quite inconvenient,” as she admitted with an apologetic look.
“I believe I carried it upstairs on Tuesday,” she told Elizabeth, “and perhaps left it on the window seat in the east wing when I was called away to help Mama.”
Elizabeth could have kissed her. “Then I shall fetch it for you,” she said, rising at once. “It will be a relief to stretch my legs.”
Darcy was on his feet before she had quite finished. “I will accompany you. That wing is chilly in this weather, and it would be inconsiderate to send you there alone.”
Mary, either oblivious or entirely willing to assist them, nodded. “Thank you both. It is the green-bound copy with the gilt edges.”
The house was quieter beyond the drawing room, the murmur of conversation fading until only the muted drumming of rain on the roof and the occasional creak of old timbers kept them company.
Elizabeth led the way towards the east wing, the air cooling perceptibly as they left the well-heated heart of Longbourn.
The scent of beeswax polish gave way to something older, fainter—wood that had slept in shadow for decades.
Darcy walked a pace behind her, his steps steady, his presence a weight at her back she found she did not mind carrying.
“It is remarkable,” he murmured as they turned into the long corridor, “how a few feet can carry one from the warmth of a sitting room into what feels like another house entirely.”
“It has always been so,” Elizabeth said softly. “When we were children, Jane would never let us linger here after dark. Lydia liked to pretend she heard whispers.”
“And you?”
She glanced at him over her shoulder. “I did not hear them. But I sometimes…wanted to.”
His brow lifted at that, but he said nothing, only followed her to the far end where the corridor narrowed and bent slightly, as though to avoid some hidden obstruction.
Elizabeth slowed, letting her hand trail lightly over the paneling. The wood here was different—less finely joined, the paint just faintly out of harmony with the rest. She rapped it lightly with her knuckles; the sound came back hollow.
Darcy stopped beside her. “Here,” he said, laying his own hand flat against the panel; its breadth nearly spanned the width of one board. “It is newer work than the rest. You can see the joinery—deliberately set to hide something.”
The closeness of his voice sent a small shiver down her spine. “The old servants’ quarters?”
“It would fit with your aunt’s account,” he said. “But until we find a way in, we can only speculate.” His gaze moved to her face then, and lingered, as though he were weighing something beyond the matter of hidden rooms.
Elizabeth looked away first, bending towards the narrow window seat at the turn of the corridor. Mary’s sermons were not there—only a film of dust and a small heap of what looked like dead ivy leaves. She brushed her gloved fingers over them, then straightened, aware of Darcy watching her.
“I suppose we shall have to tell Mary her book is lost to the ages,” she said lightly.
“Not lost,” he returned, his tone quiet but sure. “Merely misplaced until the right hands find it.”
The words, though plainly about the book, touched something warmer, more perilous.
Elizabeth felt her breath slow, the air between them charged with unspoken things.
She could hear the rain pattering against the small leaded panes, could see the faint sheen of damp on the dark wool of his coat where the shoulders had not quite dried.
“We should return,” she said, though her feet did not move.
“Yes,” he agreed, but he did not move either.
For a moment longer they stood in that dim stretch of corridor, the hollow panel before them, the weight of the rain-wrapped house pressing close.
Then, as though some unspoken accord had been reached, they stepped back into motion—side by side now—retracing their way towards the warmth and light.
Elizabeth was aware, absurdly, of the faint brush of his sleeve against hers as they walked.
It was nothing accidental, inevitable in a narrow hall.
And yet, when they reached the threshold of the drawing room, she found herself unaccountably reluctant to part from the cool quiet of the east wing and the man who had shared it with her.
They stepped back into the drawing room to find it much as they had left it—though Lydia and Kitty had now taken possession of the hearthrug, with their heads together in conspiratorial glee.
The warmth hit Elizabeth like a soft wave, scented with tea and Mrs. Bennet’s favored rosewater.
Darcy lingered near the door a moment, his gaze sweeping the room in that habitually measured way of his, before following Elizabeth towards the tea table .
“Did you see it?” Lydia pounced before they had gone three steps, her eyes bright with anticipation. “The ghost? Did it scratch at the walls? Did you hear moaning?”
Elizabeth’s lips twitched. “We found no ghost—only dust, draughts, and the absence of Mary’s Fordyce sermons.”
“How disappointing,” Kitty sighed. “We hoped you might come back pale and trembling.”
“I think you mistake your wish for my welfare,” Elizabeth said dryly.
Darcy, standing just behind her, inclined his head to the younger sisters. “If your ghost inhabits the east wing, Miss Lydia, it must be a remarkably polite spirit—there was no sign it had moved about without permission.”
Lydia frowned, uncertain whether he teased her or not. “Oh, but I shall prove it exists before the ball,” she declared, undeterred. “Then you must dance with me out of gratitude for solving the mystery.”
Elizabeth caught the faint curve at one corner of Darcy’s mouth and felt a spark of warmth in her chest. That small, private amusement was worth more to her than a dozen polished compliments.
Mary, seated by the window, looked up from her embroidery. “ No book, then?”
“I am afraid not,” Elizabeth replied, moving to her side. “It must have found its way into some other hiding place. We did discover, however, that part of the paneling there is newer than the rest. Perhaps you should keep your sermons in more conventional places.”
Mary’s brows rose at that, but she nodded gravely and bent back to her work.
Mrs. Bennet, catching only fragments of this exchange, looked up sharply. “What were you doing in the east wing, Lizzy? You know it is draughty there.”
“Searching for Mary’s book, Mama.”
“Oh! Well, so long as you did not take cold.” Mrs. Bennet poured another cup of tea, already turning her attention to Darcy. “And you, sir—how good of you to brave that part of the house. I do hope you will not suffer for it.”
Darcy assured her that he was quite well, his tone polite but his eyes finding Elizabeth’s for a heartbeat longer than civility required. She felt the warmth climb into her cheeks and quickly busied herself with adjusting the tea tray.
The conversation soon shifted back to the weather—how the rain might hinder preparations for the Netherfield ball, how the roads might become impassable if the frost came too soon.
Elizabeth listened with half an ear, her mind still turning over the feel of hollow wood beneath her knuckles, the subtle shift in Darcy’s voice when he had said, “until the right hands find it.”
It was an innocuous remark on the surface. And yet she could not shake the notion that he had meant more—that perhaps he had not been speaking solely of Mary’s sermons, or even of the sealed room.