Page 14 of The Heroic Mr Darcy’s Bad Manners

Elizabeth

Elizabeth’s sojourn to town proved an endless source of entertainment. She accompanied her relations to Lady Cowper’s ball and kept a vigilant eye on the entrance whilst conversation flowed around her. She was obliged to contribute, occasionally, as Lord Limerick had many acquaintances. Some young men, and some old indeed, sought an introduction to the unknown lady in his party.

She was watching for the arrival of a certain gentleman, and after less than fifteen minutes, Mr Darcy strutted into the ballroom. Like a peacock, he turned the heads of all the young ladies in attendance—he was so very handsome, particularly his eyes and his Apollo-like form. It could not be denied that he was worldly and educated as well; it was a shame his character was lacking.

She turned away so as not to be recognised, mustered all the energy of her character, which was generally fertile in resources, and made herself pleasant to her company.

From the corner of her eye, she saw Mr Darcy engage a young lady for the next set. Elizabeth was unprepared for the pain the common display brought to her heart. She was obviously still besotted, and, perhaps, would always be because the love was too profound to be disregarded. Elizabeth sighed and bowed her head. If it could not be conquered, she must bury it deep in her heart.

“Lady Elizabeth, Mr Brummell has requested an introduction.” Her grandmother smiled.

“The lauded dandy?” Elizabeth whispered in astonishment. That would give her something to boast about to her father, who would certainly laugh and make sport of her.

“A fine gentleman,” Uncle Henry added with the barest hint of irony. “He is a great friend of the Prince of Wales. I was introduced to him at the Charleton House fete in June,” he further explained.

“Certainly,” Elizabeth acquiesced, and once the introductions were made, he engaged her for the next set.

Brummell was above six feet tall from head to toe with a handsome face, and Elizabeth was not ignorant of the honour he bestowed upon her, nor the notice they drew as they entered the line.

“You are an accomplished dancer,” he flattered her after a few minutes of dancing in silence.

“Thank you, but I must credit my excellent partner.”

Brummell smiled. “You should see me where I shine,” he observed.

“And where is that?” Elizabeth enquired politely.

“During my daily baths,” answered the fop in all seriousness. “I soak for at least an hour every day.”

Elizabeth quashed the impulse to giggle. “Oh my! Every day? Have you no concern for washing away the protective layer of perspiration and subjecting yourself to diseases entering your body through your pores?”

“Certainly not!” the fop scoffed. “It is quite the opposite. Rinse away the grime and the germs will surely follow.”

“Indeed, it must be so,” Elizabeth replied. “You will not find me guilty of such extreme ill-breeding as to differ in opinion from the esteemed Mr Brummell.”

They separated and assumed new partners. Elizabeth came face to face with none other than Mr Darcy and bolstered her courage to fight the tremulousness that threatened to overcome her. The stubborn infatuation still rendered her as possessed by an affectionate heart, even though the subject of her admiration had trifled most cruelly with her feelings and had taken unfair advantage of her youth and lack of experience. First love was a stubborn affliction indeed.

“Lady Elizabeth!” he exclaimed in his usual beauteous tone whilst all colour drained from his face.

“Mr Darcy,” she greeted in a high-pitched voice she hardly recognised. But she had sworn to treat him as an indifferent acquaintance. As a direct consequence of this promise, she offered him a small smile as she would every gentleman she encountered.

The gesture clearly startled Mr Darcy, and he stumbled. “I beg your pardon. I am not usually this clumsy, but your ethereal presence would make any man trip over his own feet. Whilst you dance truly gracefully—so feminine and ladylike,” Mr Darcy uttered to her surprise. It was not like him to pay her compliments. Could he be mocking her? She must have frowned or something equally disbelieving because he closed his mouth so abruptly that his teeth clattered.

Fortunately, their rendezvous was short. She was handed back to her partner and that was that. A sigh of relief escaped her. It was not so bad to meet Mr Darcy as indifferent acquaintances; at least he was more civil.

The dance ended, and Mr Brummell escorted her back to her relations who were surrounded by eager gentlemen waiting to be introduced. Elizabeth smiled wryly to her partner. She was not too vain as to recognise why she was suddenly the belle of the ball.

“Thank you, Mr Brummell. It has been a pleasure and an honour.”

The gentleman left for the card room with Uncle Henry, and another young man approached whom her grandmother introduced as Viscount Crawford. Elizabeth thought she recognised the name but could not place it.

“Was that Mr Darcy I just saw you dancing with?” the viscount queried.

“Briefly, yes, but my partner was Mr Brummell,” she boasted.

“A very fine gentleman.”

Elizabeth nodded and supposed he was speaking about the lauded friend of the Prince Regent, who was frequently mentioned in the newspapers as the arbiter of gentlemen’s fashion.

“I cannot hold a candle to Darcy’s noble face and impressive stature, but I still have the nerve to request a set.” The viscount offered her his arm, Elizabeth accepted, and they moved to the line.

“You admire Mr Darcy?” Elizabeth probed, baffled at this turn. She was still not absolutely certain that the viscount had not misspoken and meant Mr Brummell.

“Admire! You may depend upon it. He has not his equal in all of Europe. I speak of him altogether, as to his beauty, his manners, and his talents. Mr Darcy, owing to his extreme reserve and excessive shyness, has never desired to be known or to be favoured but by his own particular friends. Yet, I know few so capable or so distinguished. His voice is remarkably fine, and his language is always persuasive and eloquent. He would have made an excellent politician if his vanity had bent in that direction. Mr Darcy, of course, would deny it vehemently and refute any claims of excellence of speech.”

“How can he be shy?” Elizabeth doubted.

“Your question should be why it becomes him so well. I dare say any other man would be awkward, but Mr Darcy is at his most graceful when he is utterly embarrassed. I have known him since he was a boy, and the ladies have been running mad for him since he was fifteen years old!”

The viscount laughed and looked as if he remembered some funny anecdote.

“Mr Darcy did not dare to look any lady full in the face until well after he had come of age. It was the loss of his estimable father that forced him into society, and not so seldom his friends had to ply him with brandy to encourage him to dance.” Lord Crawford smiled, and so ended his praise of Mr Darcy.

“Dare I accuse you of not being entirely in earnest and suggest that you might be prone to exaggeration.” Elizabeth had a hard time believing a word the viscount said.

“Look at the breadth of his shoulders before you join the hue-and-cry against me,” the viscount said, grinning.

Elizabeth laughed merrily, and the badinage continued with the pleasant viscount until their set ended.

When the ball was over, Elizabeth had been engaged for every set and spent a pleasant supper with Lord Winterbourne. She had not seen a trace of Mr Darcy and supposed he must have left for another engagement.

“What a splendid evening,” Grandmother gushed in the carriage on their way home. “You were in high demand this evening, Eilís. I am all anticipation for when the Season begins in earnest.”

“I owe it all to Mr Brummell for singling me out,” Elizabeth demurred.

“Nonsense!” Uncle Henry growled as their conveyance rolled to a halt in front of Limerick House. “You won them over on your own merit. Who would object to such beauty and wit combined?”

#

Elizabeth awoke as the noon sun reached her face. In her exhausted state, she had forgotten to close the curtains. Too tired for company, she ordered a tray to her room and anticipated a few pleasurable hours reading in the window seat. But her mind was too unsettled. The words floated round the page in a disorderly fashion as her thoughts kept returning to a certain gentleman. There was no reason to lament what could not be, but she could cherish the memories, particularly the feelings Mr Darcy had aroused in her when they had flirted at the masquerade ball and the exquisite view from the top of a tree… A thrill had flowed through her veins, lighting every nerve in her body. The idea worked quite well to separate her childhood hero and the unmasked dance partner from the Mr Darcy who had entered the Meryton assembly. She almost convinced herself that they were not the same man. The evening’s success had assured her that Mr Darcy’s cruel rejection did not reflect upon her attractions but rather the gentleman’s disposition to disapprove of everyone beneath him in consequence. He had spent half an hour in Mrs Long’s company without speaking as much as a word to her. Mrs Bennet had been convinced it was because Mrs Long did not own a carriage. The irony of the fact that Elizabeth and her family now outranked him made her giggle. She was not made for misery and welcomed the improvements to her spirits most heartily.

She did not see her relations till she ventured down in the afternoon. Lord Limerick was out on business, but her grandmother returned at two o’clock. Elizabeth hastened to the hall to greet her, feeling lighter than she had in weeks.

“Are you well, Eilís?”

“Oh yes, very well indeed,” she replied to her grandmother’s query.

“Let me order tea and refreshments. I have something I wish to speak to you about.”

“Certainly,” Elizabeth agreed and followed her grandmother into the parlour. She had no idea what the lady wanted to address, but her mien was serious.

“I have visited Miss Eudora Darcy,” her grandmother revealed once the refreshments had been served. “She assured me that Mr Darcy spent months searching for you after the masquerade. It was most unfortunate that we took down the knocker that night, though that could not be helped. He called the next morning, and every morning after that until some urgent business called him away. When he returned, we had left for áth Dara, and you had returned to Hertfordshire. You know the rest…”

“If he truly wanted to make himself pleasant, he should at least have treated me with respect,” Elizabeth protested.

“Do you not believe he would have treated you with humble deference if you had sought an introduction? You had the advantage of knowing who he was, whilst he had thought that you were a tall, red-headed beauty who had absconded to your Irish estate without a thought about your beau. If I have understood the chronological order of the assembly correctly, you had more than an hour to make yourself known to Mr Darcy before he made his uncharitable remarks. You obviously have a turn for masquerading because he never recognised you. You must acknowledge that, in this instance, it worked to your disadvantage.”

Elizabeth was startled that her grandmother would put the blame at her feet for the heartache she now suffered. She would dearly like to exculpate herself from the charges. Had she done them both a disservice and acted coquettishly, or worse—like a child? The possibility caused considerable agitation and provoked her to defend herself.

“If I were to form an attachment to any gentleman, he must treat every lady of all layers of society with respect. I cannot esteem one who rejects a lady based on her lack of beauty or consequence, without any regard for her character. Besides, it was not only that which earned my disapprobation. He cruelly mocked my mother’s lack of understanding.”

“Much like your father?” her grandmother enquired. “Well, you are not wrong, but have you considered that his feelings for Eilís would have made the attempts of his friend to engage him with other young ladies unpalatable? I shall leave you to contemplate. I must get ready before the theatre this evening. At my age, that is not a small feat.”

Her grandmother left, and Elizabeth sat stupefied for a few moments before she too hastened to her chamber and rang for her maid.

Once the ladies’ preparations were complete, the three residents of Limerick House left for Drury Lane. It was a crush, and friends of the marquess delayed them so much that the play had already begun when they entered their box. Elizabeth looked at the people next to them. A married couple, she surmised, of exceptional beauty. The pair was in that regard well matched. A lady from the box beyond greeted the gentleman, who she then learnt was Lord Ponsonby, but the gentleman completely overlooked her, and his wife bent her head as if in mortification. Elizabeth regarded the snubbed lady, who was uncommonly beautiful and appeared to find humour in the insult. The fair-haired gentleman beside her turned his head in her direction, and Elizabeth gasped. She even heard his voice suggesting loudly to the entire party that they should dine at his house after the performance. There was no chance she was mistaken.

“Grandmother! Mr Bingley is here. Look, in the box beyond Lord Ponsonby’s.”

Maeve Bennet lifted her opera glass and directed the device at the aforementioned box. She lowered it slowly and nudged Elizabeth.

“Pray, do not consider greeting Mr Bingley when he is enjoying that particular company.”

Elizabeth glanced at the box. There were four gentlemen and four ladies, none of whom were known to her. She could see nothing amiss. They were fashionably dressed and appeared amused by the comedy being performed on stage.

“But why?” Elizabeth complained. In her mind it was the perfect opportunity to establish why Mr Bingley had not returned to Meryton, though his business, at this particular moment, did not appear to be that pressing.

Her grandmother leant in and whispered in her ear, “The short gentleman is respectable enough. He is the Duke of Argyll.”

“A duke!” Elizabeth interrupted. She could not fault the amiable Mr Bingley for his exalted friend.

“A Scottish duke, but the ladies are courtesans. It is the three Dubouchet sisters and their friend Miss Julia Storer. The latter is the fallen niece of the Irish Earl of Carysfort, and her mother, the Honourable Mrs Storer, was one of the maids of honour to our king’s royal mother. Miss Storer received the finest education in France and finished at Hampton Court. Soon after, her mother sent her on a visit to Mrs Cotton to help her with her nine small children. Whilst there, the girl managed to entangle herself with her host’s husband. She concealed her disgrace until she was seized with the pangs of labour while paying her respects to Her Majesty in court! Her mother and uncle were enraged by her indiscretion and hastened her off to the country. Her brother even risked his life calling out Colonel Cotton. He was wounded but not fatally so. She yet again abused them by writing to the colonel, who came running, and the scandal was complete. Now she has five or six children and lives in a small remote hovel outside town. I demand that you avoid an introduction to those ladies should anyone be so foolish as to suggest it.”

“Certainly!” Elizabeth promised, but she saw the inequity in disparaging the ladies whilst praising the peer.

“You do not want to be associated with the unvirtuous, frivolous carousers, because your reputation will suffer.”

If this is the superior society in town Miss Bingley boasted about, she could have no reason to look down upon the honest, decent people of Meryton.

From then on, Elizabeth took pains not to look to her right lest Mr Bingley notice her and forward the undesirable introductions. She set her sight directly across the room and met the cavernous gaze of Mr Darcy. He nodded in acknowledgement, and Elizabeth bowed her head in return. He was attending with an elderly couple of distinction, and she could just see the contours of two other gentlemen at the back of the box. At least he has not joined the disreputable party to my right , she thought wryly as the mere notion of him having a mistress sent a pang to her chest.

One of the gentlemen behind him leant forwards, his face catching the light, and she immediately recognised him. What was Viscount Crawford doing with Mr Darcy? By the looks of it, he was no more intimidated by the gentleman than she. Elizabeth directed her eyes and thoughts to the stage, and soon the comedy The Honey Moon engaged her entirely. Mr Elliston played the duke so very chivalrously and was everything a gentleman ought to be to win his fair lady.

A commotion to her right disrupted the performance. A young buck climbed up from the pit into Mr Bingley’s box. He was received with boisterous laughter and congenial handshakes, except from Mr Bingley, who was frowning in displeasure. He might have been duped by an invitation from an illustrious duke and been caught unaware in the clutches of the ill-reputed ladies? He might not even know what they were. With that comforting thought, Elizabeth returned her attention to the play.

When the lights were turned on during the interval, Elizabeth stayed with her grandmother to avoid encountering Mr Bingley and his disreputable companions. Uncle Henry left to fetch refreshments, and Elizabeth used the opportunity to enquire about the viscount.

“Grandmother, please do not look, but opposite our box I spotted Mr Darcy with an elderly couple and two gentlemen, one of which is Viscount Crawford.”

“Yes, they are cousins, and the couple are the viscount’s parents, Lord and Lady Matlock, while the colonel in regimentals is the viscount’s brother. Please do not mention them to Henry as it will only upset him. Lord Matlock and Henry had a fall-out years ago with no hope of redemption.”

Of course, the cousins whom Miss Bingley had told her had suggested the wager that prompted Mr Darcy to dance with her at the masquerade! If only she had remembered that titbit when she had met the viscount at Lady Cowper’s ball…

“I wonder why you chose to introduce him to me if his family is so distasteful?”

“I would not have done so if Henry had not joined Mr Brummell in the card room, but I happen to disagree that children should atone for the sins of their parents. Besides, Miss Eudora Darcy speaks very highly of him, and his brother in particular. If Colonel Fitzwilliam had been in attendance, I would have chosen him, but as he was not, the viscount had to do.”

“Are the Matlocks so very bad, then?”

“Oh yes. I would advise you to avoid them as best you can.”

Her grandmother did not explain, and Elizabeth dared not ask because the lady’s eyes were glittering dangerously. Instead, she expounded upon the play and how amusing it was. Henry joined them, carrying wine to quench their thirst, and soon the interval was over. Mr Bingley and his party never returned, and Elizabeth took pains to avoid glancing at Mr Darcy. She succeeded most of the time.