Page 37 of The Happiness of a Most Beloved Sister (Pride and Prejudice Variation)

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

A s Darcy strode from the dining room, Elizabeth found herself incapable of anything more than simply staring after him, her heart thumping in sympathetic rhythm with his footsteps.

Did that…just happen?

When the front door slammed in the near distance, she jumped, as did most of the others at the table. This seemed to waken everyone from their stupor, for a great swell of chatter arose simultaneously.

“Did you hear what he said?” cried Lydia, awkwardly leaning across the table to address Kitty.

Kitty babbled some nonsense in return that only Lydia seemed able to make out, while Mary began spouting moralistic platitudes—“Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us”—which no one seemed to attend to.

Mr Bennet laughed, albeit weakly, and commended a pallid Mr Bingley on his choice of friends.

Mrs Bennet’s wails rose above all the others.

“Well, I never! What a horrid brute, just as I have always said. He might be the richest man in all of Derbyshire, but he is also the proudest, most disagreeable…” On and on she went with her complaints, insensible of all the other conversations going on about her.

In the midst of this chaos, Jane was still and ashen as a marble statue.

Like her betrothed, she had said nothing since Darcy’s departure and merely sat there looking ill.

To Elizabeth’s eye, it appeared unfeigned for once, and she dimly wondered whether her sister was about to cast up her accounts.

The taut quality of her features suggested she might.

“He must be in love with you, I think!”

Lydia’s exclamation recalled Elizabeth to herself, and she turned to her youngest sister, who was bent over the table and holding herself aloft by her splayed palms. “What?”

“Mr Darcy, of course! It is obvious.”

It was obvious, as was the immediate realisation that she loved him in return.

Any doubt or reservation Elizabeth might have retained over the state of her affections for Darcy was wiped away in a moment.

Specifically, the moment he had cut off Jane’s critical command and shamed her into silence.

What had followed, everything he had declared in her defence, cemented her certainty that her heart belonged solely to him. Dear God, I love him.

It was a revelation. Of course she loved him; how could she ever have questioned it?

Only wilful blindness could explain it. She had been so afraid of loving, of putting herself in the vulnerable position of being abandoned like Jane, that she had refused to acknowledge the affection blooming inside her.

Petal by petal, it had unfolded over the past several months, despite her vacillating between ‘I adore him’ and ‘but I cannot’.

“If I were you, I would go after him and throw myself into his arms. And quickly, before he gets away.”

Elizabeth was on her feet and halfway to the door before Lydia had concluded her admonishment.

Seconds after that, she had cast herself out onto the front lawn, lifted her skirts, and begun dashing towards the stables round the side of the house.

When it came into view, she urged her legs to carry her faster, for Darcy was already accepting the reins of his horse from the groom.

“Mr Darcy!” she shouted, garnering his attention. His head whipped in her direction, and he passed his mount back to the groom before jogging towards her.

They met halfway, and Elizabeth all but crashed into him as Lydia had suggested. Darcy reached out and prevented her from falling over by grasping her elbows and holding her upright. “Elizabeth, are you well?”

She opened her mouth to reassure him, but only a wheeze burst forth. There was also a stitch in her side, which she clutched at with one hand. “I…I…”

“Come, sit down. Do you require wine? Shall I get you some?” His expression contracted in a grimace before he muttered, “I ought not to go inside myself, but I can send a servant for a glass.”

Elizabeth huffed a laugh and led him into the back garden where they could sit upon a stone bench.

They would also be afforded a bit more privacy amidst the roses in full, riotous bloom.

She tugged on his hand to encourage him to sit next to her, which he did with some visible trepidation.

He waited, nevertheless, for her to speak .

When she had caught her breath, she demanded, “Did you mean what you said?”

Darcy swallowed but nodded. “Yes, and I am sorry for it. I ought not to have allowed my temper to get the best of me in such a way.”

“Sorry!” Elizabeth echoed. “You mistake me if you think I ran after you to seek an apology. Far from it. I have never been so affected in my life.”

“Truly?”

She nodded vigorously. “Truly. No one has ever defended me so staunchly before or taken my part against Jane and Mama. The Gardiners have tried, in the past, to cajole them into better behaviour, but to hear someone actually scold them on my behalf…I cannot adequately express to you how honoured I am.”

“I only wish I had done so earlier, then. I have borne witness to their indifferent cruelty on many occasions yet said nothing.”

“Not to them, perhaps, but you have ever been my advocate. I know not what I have done to deserve it, but I can assure you that your support is deeply felt.”

Darcy’s hand rose to stroke a finger down the slope of her cheek. “You need only be yourself, dearest, loveliest Elizabeth.”

Leaning into his touch, she sighed and allowed her eyes to flutter closed a moment, basking in the affection she had been so afraid to embrace. She opened them again and confessed, to herself as much as him, “I am so in love with you.”

Darcy’s fingers stilled against her face as the rest of him grew rigid. He stared at her, unblinking, for several seconds before releasing a quivering breath. “You…you love me?”

She pressed his palm to her cheek. “So much.”

“I…” He seemed to choke on whatever word came next. “I had hoped…but to actually be assured of your regard…”

A smile trembled along the line of Elizabeth’s lips, part teasing, part unsure. “If you do not feel the same…”

“Of course I do!” Darcy exclaimed, drawing her into his arms. She inhaled a deep breath of his basil and citrus scent before releasing it into his coat.

“I have loved you these many months, almost as long as I have known you. I did not say anything, at first because I was caught up in my own importance, then because I was unsure whether you reciprocated my feelings. I love you, I love you, I love you , Elizabeth.”

They held one another for several minutes—an hour—an unmeasured length of time—before Darcy pulled back, cupping Elizabeth’s face between his hands. “I have longed to hear those words from you, but are you certain, entirely certain, that you love me?”

“More certain than anything,” she replied, feeling the glow of her adoration for him deep within her.

“I admit that I did not realise it at first, that I was afraid to hand over my heart to any gentleman, but your devotion convinced me that it was safe with you. Who could not wish to be the first object to a man so loyal and true?”

Darcy’s brow creased, and he drew away. “So you are only responding to my feelings?”

Grasping tightly to his hands to prevent him retreating farther, she vehemently denied, “No! That is not it at all. I…oh, I did not explain myself correctly!”

By the drawn contours of his face and the weak quality of his smile, she could tell that he did not believe her.

“Elizabeth, you need not pretend an affection you do not feel merely to placate me. I am already encouraged by your profession of esteem. You may take all the time you need to develop a more tender regard.”

“But I do love you, I swear it.” She wanted to stamp her foot in frustration but feared she would trample his toes as a result. How was it so difficult to dissuade Mr Collins that she did not care for him yet equally impossible to convince Darcy of the opposite? Men were absolutely maddening!

A light thump against her thigh recalled Elizabeth to the flower stone in her pocket, and she was struck with an idea of how to prove her attachment.

She fumbled with the folds of her gown, grumbling curses until it gave way to her search and she was able to plunge inside and grasp the elusive token.

She withdrew it and presented it to him in victory.

“You see? I have kept this on my person since you gifted it to me back in March.

It comes with me everywhere, and I seek it out whenever I require a dose of your steady presence and comfort.

Even before I realised what my love for you was, I kept a piece of you with me.

You have been my rock in the sea of chaos that I would have drowned in if not for your faithful devotion.

“Your affection might have initially called me to think of you in a new way,” she fervently continued, “but it was coming to know you, befriending you, which created a lasting regard. You speak to me as an equal, you are unstintingly kind even to those who do not deserve it, and you have never wavered in your attentions. Before you, I had thought there was no man in the entire world who would both suit me and treat me with care. I meant to end a spinster aunt to my sisters’ children to preserve myself from the sort of heartbreak I feared—until you proved all my assumptions wrong.

I assure you, there is no other man in the world I could ever be prevailed on to love except you. ”

Darcy stared at the flower stone blooming in her palm with his lips parted in wonder. “Truly?”

She set her face into the firmest possible expression. “I have never spoken truer words.”

“If that be the case,” said Darcy, leaning forwards to nuzzle his nose against hers, “then will you marry me?”

“Yes!”

His lips found hers almost as soon as her acceptance slipped between them, swallowing it up in a frenzy of ardour.