Page 29 of Tempted (Heart to Heart Collection #2)

Chapter 29

Brooks’, London Two weeks later

“D arcy! I heard you were not coming to Town for Christmas this year. How are you keeping, old chap?”

Darcy had scarcely stepped from the cloakroom and glanced up when he heard his name. “Bellamy. Good to see you, my friend.”

“Likewise, likewise. By-the-by, damn shame about Fitzwilliam. I am sorry, Darcy. How is the family?”

“Holding up, thank you.”

“I am certain the earl is quite broken up about it all. First losing his father, then his brother. The Fitzwilliams were always a close bunch.”

“Yes, but he is managing. He is Matlock now, and he does as he must.”

“Indeed, indeed. Do you know, I finally heard back from my cousin about two months ago. Never expected it to take that long, but he is well. Sends his condolences about Richard.”

“Was he among the men who were captured, then?”

“Yes. Did a nasty turn with malaria, but thank goodness he did not come down with sleeping sickness.”

Darcy clenched his jaw. “A good thing, that is a sure death sentence.”

“Oh, do you know, he said there was a fellow in the prison camps who survived it.”

“No.” Darcy squinted. “I thought none survived sleeping sickness.”

“Even so, one did. They said he was an idiot afterward, never recovered his senses.”

“And what became of him?”

Bellamy shook his head and made a dismissive gesture. “He did not say. More than likely starved to death or something of that nature. His brain was gone, my cousin says. Completely unaware, could not look after himself even to drink a sip of water.”

“Did he say who it was?”

“No, he said it was in another part of the camp, and they were not told the name. No one ever saw him after they were liberated.” Bellamy curled his lip. “Bloody Dutch.”

“Afrikaners, you mean. They do not think of themselves as Dutch anymore.”

“Whoever they are, they do not fight by the rules of war.”

Darcy snorted. “There are rules? I thought the only rule was you have to kill more people than your enemy.”

“But ambush! Lying in trenches and attacking men in their beds! There, that is not a fair fight. But do you know, I heard Kitchener turned the tables on them rascals.”

“How so?”

“My cousin says they found some leverage to keep those buggers from cutting all the telegraph lines and supply routes. They capture the women and children, see, and the soldiers eventually lay down their arms to protect their families.”

Darcy’s stomach recoiled, and he froze in horror. He had been there himself, and still had not seen this. “You speak of the rules of war,” he hissed. “The women and children are innocents!”

“Come, Darcy, they’re not harming them. I hear they are treated quite fairly, but they are not free to go until their husbands and sons leave off this nonsense. Brilliant plan, I say.”

“It is barbaric. How should we claim to be any better than the enemy?”

“Now, do not turn moralist on me, Darcy. Think, man—the women and children are kept secure and protected. Far safer than living in a field of battle, I say, and they have plenty of food and good treatment.”

Darcy scoffed. “I will believe a report like that when I hear it seconded by those imprisoned.”

“And how many of them would die if the war dragged on? Better to take measures to end it, I say. War is not a pretty thing, Darcy.”

He tightened his mouth. “No. If you please, Bellamy, I have had enough talk of war to satisfy me for a lifetime.”

Bellamy straightened his lapels and cleared his throat. “Yes. Well… ahem. I hear talk that congratulations are in order at last, old boy. Will we be seeing the fair Miss de Bourgh this Christmas?”

Darcy released a taut breath. “Perhaps. The earl meant to see to some business in London, and she considered coming from Matlock at the same time.”

“Jolly good! I say, we are having a small gathering for Twelfth Night. Nothing elaborate, of course, and I know you have a dozen other invitations, but I hope you will consider joining us.”

“I should be very happy to, but naturally, I must discuss any plans with Miss de Bourgh.”

“Of course, of course. Well, been a pleasure, Darcy. I must be going, but do consider that invitation, will you?”

Darcy promised once more that he would, and even turned over the notion there on the spot… for all of ten seconds. Then he blew through his lips and decided he was not in the mood for cards that morning, after all, and called for his driver to take him home.

T he charms of Town had faded quickly. That came as no surprise, but he was discouraged to find Georgiana no more enamoured of London’s distractions at Christmas than he was. If he could have at least amused her, it would have been something. Instead, both spent gloomy evenings by the fire or paraded their way through meaningless calls on acquaintances for whom they cared little.

One evening, Darcy was in a particularly sombre mood and found himself longing to read a bit of poetry. Cowper, to be precise. He could certainly see the appeal of the pastoral poetry for one such he had heard Elizabeth’s father to be. A simple man, a man who had spent a lifetime scratching out a living from a hard landscape and waking each morning to the glories of the great Wild.

When all within is peace,

How nature seems to smile;

Delights that never cease,

The live-long day beguile.

From morn to dewy eve,

With open hand she showers

Fresh blessings to deceive,

And soothe the silent hours.

It is content of heart

Gives nature power to please;

The mind that feels no smart

Enlivens all it sees,

Can make a wintry sky

Seem bright as smiling May,

And evening’s closing eye

As peep of early day.

The vast majestic globe,

So beauteously arrayed

In nature’s various robe,

With wondrous skill displayed,

Is to a mourner's heart

A dreary wild at best;

It flutters to depart,

And longs to be at rest.

He lingered and mused over those lines, his vision growing hazy as he tried to imagine everything Elizabeth had told him about her home—and the most central of all was not the rugged splendour that met the eye, but the heart of the beholder… her heart. Yes, he understood it perfectly, or at least, he wished he did.

Discordant and mis-timed notes from the piano interrupted his reverie, and he stared for a moment at his sister as he regrouped his thoughts. She was tapping out something unfamiliar to him, deep lines carved over her brow as she dipped and rocked her head with each drop of her fingers. Occasionally, she would stop and jot something down on a piece of paper, then play a bit more. Often, she would shake her head and amend what she had just written, then work out more notes.

“Georgiana, what are you doing?” he asked at last.

She started with a look of utter innocence, as though she had not realised he could hear her. “Nothing.”

“It is not nothing for you to look so puzzled. Are you composing something?”

She drifted a few light fingers over the keys. “It is nothing special.”

“Nothing special, my eye. Play that last bit again.”

She looked reluctant, but she obliged. Darcy listened to the chopped and ragged notes of a moment ago, now blended and smoothed into an expressive refrain. “It is beautiful. You wrote this yourself?”

“Sometimes, I put together a few measures for amusement. They are nothing important or even particularly good—”

“Stop saying things like that. It was a pleasure to listen to, and that makes it good. You do this often? How long have you been composing your own music?”

She shrugged. “For a couple of years now. Some of the pieces I played for the countess were my creation, but she never knew that.”

“Neither did I. They were charming and bright—I thought they were some new American pieces you had found for teaching Elizabeth.”

She smiled tightly, as if trying to decide whether to accept his words as a compliment. “I wrote that song for her.”

“That song… You speak as if I should know which one you mean.”

“Don’t know how you could not. The one she played at Matlock—you asked her to play it every evening we were there.”

His face burned consciously. “Oh. Yes, that song. Come, now, Georgiana, why have you never mentioned an interest in writing music before?”

“Why should I bother? It is not as if you would let me pursue it.”

He closed the book of poetry with a snap and set it aside. “Do you really think that? Am I the sort of guardian who denies your pleasures out of hand?”

“No, but to learn composition, I would need to study at a conservatory, and I do not prefer London. You have not been amenable to me travelling.”

He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “That was a specific prohibition for a particular reason. If your desire is to fulfil a true ambition, then I absolutely would be agreeable to something. I have even asked you about this before. Is this something you wish to pursue?”

Her finger strayed over the keys as her mouth puckered. “Yes.”

“Then, it is settled. Let us have no more of this assuming my thoughts. If you wish to study composition, then study it you shall.”

Georgiana’s eyes widened in almost girlish delight—a thing he had not seen in better than two years. “Do you mean that?”

“Of course, I do. I have been troubled over you for many months now, wondering why you seem so different than the girl I had always known. You have been unhappy—sullen, even. Is this the cause? You thought I would deny your fondest wishes?”

Her face was almost glowing, and she blinked back a rush of emotion. She put her hands to her cheeks. “More than that. I denied them myself. I thought they were impossible—I mean, I am a Darcy! It is not for me to chase will-o-the-wisps. I know what is expected of me, who and what I must be, so I never permitted myself to dream.”

“Well, I hope you will do so now.”

A broad smile swept over her features, and she leapt to her toes, snapping up a bit of her music and twirling about like a child. “Thank you, Fitzwilliam!”

“Oh, do not thank me. Now I do not have to get you a Christmas present.”

It was perhaps the first time he had heard her truly laugh in months.

T here was some satisfaction in retiring to his bed that evening. For the first time in a long while, he felt as if he understood something—even if it was something so simple as his sister’s unspoken ambitions. Why the devil would she not have tested him, asked what was on her heart before it soured her?

He knew the truth, though, and it had made him stale as surely as it had nearly ruined her. He had become too dull, too immovable. Almost like an old man, he lived his life, though he was not yet thirty. Always the safe path, always the rational course. He could not very well change all that—as Georgiana had said, he was a Darcy. And yet…

He thumbed open that book of poetry—he had brought it to his room with him, on some odd impulse—and flipped to a verse that had caught his eye but not his attention until this moment. He tilted it close to his lamp and read.

My mother! if thou love me, name no more

My noble birth! Sounding at every breath

My noble birth, thou kill'st me. Thither fly,

As to their only refuge, all from whom

Nature withholds all good besides; they boast

Their noble birth, conduct us to the tombs

Of their forefathers, and, from age to age

Ascending, trumpet their illustrious race:

But whom hast thou beheld, or canst thou name,

Derived from no forefathers? Such a man

Lives not; for how could such be born at all?

And, if it chance that, native of a land

Far distant, or in infancy deprived

Of all his kindred, one, who cannot trace

His origin, exist, why deem him sprung

From baser ancestry than theirs who can?

My mother! he whom nature at his birth

Endow'd with virtuous qualities, although

An ?thiop and a slave, is nobly born.

Darcy put out his lamp and lay back on his bed, his hands crossed over his chest as he gazed up at the dark ceiling. For over four hundred years, his forebears had watched over and given honour to the Darcy name. For nearly nine hundred, his heritage traced proudly to William the Conqueror, and that was not even to mention the royal blood that had birthed the Fitzwilliam line on his mother’s side. If any had cause to boast in his pedigree, it was himself, but…

But was his family truly greater than, say, a Wyoming rancher’s? Such a man could claim as his progenitors pioneers and warriors, men who carved life and home out of savage wilderness. Lack of pedigree or wealth did not eliminate generations of strength and love and honour.

Darcy turned over to face the window, searching the cold, moonless night beyond for some clue to ordering these peculiar notions rattling his mind. How much of life had he missed out on, while he was so busy tending to appearances and dignity? And how could he break loose from that rut?

It was not as if he could cut everything away, sling a pack over his shoulder and strike out across the continent on foot. Nor would he even desire it—his was a spirit tied as much to its roots as any could be. But was there something simple, some small act of rebellion or nonconformity he could undertake? Something to mark him, to remind him that he need not remain a slave to the past. He scratched his chin in thought, and then, inspiration struck.

Quick as lightning, he was out of his bed and donning his dressing robe, then knocking at the adjacent door to call for his valet. “I beg your pardon, Wilson. I hope I have not wakened you.”

“Not yet, sir,” Wilson replied smartly, but he would not have confessed even if Darcy had dragged him from the best slumber of his life.

“Good, then, I have a rather odd request. I would like for you to shave me.”

Wilson blinked, betraying the first hint of surprise Darcy had ever witnessed from him. “Now, sir?”

“Yes, I have a rather odd notion, and I will not sleep until it is carried out. I would like to do away with the moustache, please.”

The valet’s brows twitched once, then he was all business. “I will call for some hot water, sir.”