These Three Remain (20 page)

“What is it? What do you mean?” Darcy leaned over, reluctantly following his cousin’s gaze out of the window.

“Old Collins, waving like mad from the parsonage gate. Now I call that a proper sendoff! I only wish…” Fitzwilliam’s voice fell silent as the carriage whisked them past their aunt’s ducking and waving clergyman.

Darcy leaned back against the squabs. “You ‘only wish’ what?”

Fitzwilliam colored. “My curst tongue!” he castigated himself and then looked over apologetically to his cousin. “I only wish I could have done you the service you requested of me and spoken to Miss Bennet yesterday. Had she been home, I would have, at once! I am that sorry, Fitz!”

“Do not be hard upon yourself.” Darcy shook his head. “In the end, it likely will matter little.” He looked away then, his gaze ostensibly upon the passing scenery. “I doubt I shall ever have occasion to encounter her again.”

“F
itzwilliam?” Georgiana’s voice, lifted in soft query, drifted across the wide expanse of the breakfast room table of Erewile House, mounted the hurdle of the
Morning Post
Darcy had erected between himself and his sister, and settled with tentative, questioning grace squarely on the page before him. The concern he detected in it was very like the look that had shaded her face the night before as they had once again dined in a silence dictated by the distraction of his thoughts. He was home, but his journey, rather than a return to London, had taken on the nature of a flight from Kent; and Darcy had mounted his own steps more with relief at sanctuary found than with joy at family and friends rejoined. In truth, since that humiliating evening in Hunsford’s parsonage, he desired nothing more than to be left alone. Not even Georgiana’s gentle presence, or her quiet efforts to make him comfortable, could he tolerate for long. His anger with himself for holding his duty so cheaply and his indignation with Elizabeth for doing the same with his honor seethed continually within his brain and held his chest in a steel band. No, the anguish of it was for him to bear alone; it was certainly not for the ears of a much younger sister! Perhaps, if he considered his reply long enough, she would take the hint and press him no further.

“Brother?” her voice gently probed again.

Reluctantly, Darcy lowered the paper and looked cautiously into the sweetly deferential but determined countenance at his right hand. This particular dual aspect of Georgiana was appearing with an increased frequency since his homecoming. Darcy had no difficulty in putting it down to Brougham’s doubtful influence while he had been away in Kent, for it had been “Lord Brougham this” and “His Lordship that” ever since Darcy had descended from the carriage Saturday evening. It was now Wednesday. He was heartily sick of it.

“Yes, Georgiana?” The tight irritation in his voice did not go unnoticed, and he would gladly have strangled himself to prevent the wilt and withdrawal that now shadowed his sister’s eyes. Darcy carefully laid the paper aside and reached deliberately for her hand. “Forgive me!” He sighed. “I fear I have not been myself.” He was answered with a wry little smile and the delicate squeeze of her fingers.

“No, dear brother, you have not.” Georgiana regarded him with pitying curiosity. “Was Aunt Catherine
very
difficult this year?”

“Her Ladyship was…herself…” Darcy shifted uneasily as he released her hand and leaned back in the chair. “Or, perhaps, a little more ‘herself’ than usual. It was well that you did not accompany us,” he added and then fell silent as another’s face crossed his vision. Rigid with anger, Elizabeth’s contemptuous eyes slashed at him.
“Your arrogance, your conceit, your selfish disdain…”
Good God, how many times had he relived that galling litany? He closed his eyes. Thank Heaven, Georgiana had not been witness to it! The thought alone made his stomach turn. Now, for the first time, he experienced the burning self-reproach with which his sister had had to contend after she was made to understand Wickham’s betrayal. At least Georgiana could plead naïveté; whereas he — how had she put it? — a man of sense and education, and who had lived in the world, had no such luxury! How could he have been so besotted, so taken in? No, he had not been, nor was he yet, himself; and Darcy was in nowise confident that he would ever know that particular state again.

“Fitzwilliam?” Her deepening concern, now painfully evident in Georgiana’s voice, almost made him wince. Her solicitude he knew to be tender and unquestionably prompted by love, but that his demeanor had exposed him, given her cause to pity him, mortified him to the bone. Sorely tempted to ward off her solicitude with another ungenerous reply, Darcy abruptly pushed away from the table. Clearly, he was not fit company for anyone today!

“I beg you will excuse me,” he said over his shoulder as he made for the door.

“But, Mr. Lawrence!” Georgiana’s reminder stopped him just as the servant opened the door. Blast! They were to make a final examination of Georgiana’s portrait today. The appointment had been set before he had gone into Kent. He turned back.

“Two o’clock, is it not?” Darcy returned her affirmative reply with a curt nod. “I shall wait upon you at one-fifteen.” Signaling the end of their conversation with a bow, he escaped her unwanted pity for the sanctuary of his study, where he could entertain his brooding anger in peace.

As he drew near the study door, a furious scrabbling followed by a galloping patter forewarned Darcy of an imminent assault upon his person. This soon? He had instructed Hinchcliffe to send the summons only days ago! Slowing, he cautiously approached the threshold and peered within. But instead of a brown, black, and white cannonball launched in wild greeting, there just within the door, sat Trafalgar at perfect attention save for a foolish grin upon his canine jowls. “So, you have arrived; have you!” The first real smile to touch Darcy’s face for almost a week slid across his features as master and hound beheld each other with satisfaction. “And whence come these pretty manners, Monster?” Trafalgar’s hindquarters wriggled but managed to stay, for the most part, on point. Darcy lifted an amused brow at this almost Herculean effort, provoking an undignified whine deep within the hound’s chest. The wriggle became more pronounced.

“For pity’s sake, pet the beast!” Darcy started up, his hand inches from Trafalgar’s broad, silky ears, to behold Brougham leaning comfortably against the study’s mantelpiece.

“Dy!” Darcy straightened, an accusatory tone in his voice. How had his friend gotten past Witcher and entered unannounced? Following Darcy’s look, Trafalgar glanced briefly over his shoulder but then looked back to his master with wide, beseeching eyes. The whine grew louder.

Brougham straightened as well and motioned toward the hound. “No wonder he’d such disreputable manners. You tease him unmercifully, Darcy. It took our entire journey down to bring him to some semblance of order!”

“
You
brought him down?” Darcy stared at his friend in surprise, but recovering, he added, “And I do not tease him!” Trafalgar’s whine threatened to escalate into an unpardonable bark.

“Then do pet the poor creature before he disgraces himself!” Brougham drawled and, without invitation, made himself comfortable in one of the study’s well-upholstered chairs.

Shooting his friend a glance fraught with irritation, Darcy bent and caressed Trafalgar’s soft crown and then twisted his silky ears between his fingers. “Monster!” he addressed the dog affectionately and was answered with a shuddering sigh and a languorous lick of his hand. Laughing, Darcy rose and, followed closely by his hound, took a chair opposite Brougham. When he was seated, Trafalgar positioned himself as near to Darcy’s boot as was seemly and raised his head to regard his late traveling companion with something akin to triumphal disdain.

“Ha!” Brougham marked his charge’s betrayal. “I am now put in my proper place, I see: airily dismissed from polite company like a governess whose students are called upon to perform for their papa!” Brougham’s “For shame!” was answered with a sniff and his “Ingrate!” with a wide-mouthed yawn as Trafalgar settled in closer to Darcy’s leg.

“
You
brought him down from Pemberley?” Darcy repeated stiffly, interrupting the trade of insults. “Why ever did you take upon yourself such an office?”

“It seemed the thing to do.” Brougham’s gaze flitted up from Trafalgar to rest upon Darcy. “I knew from your letter to Miss Darcy that you would make your return on Saturday and suspected that you would wish a private homecoming. Having been forced to cut short a jaunt to Scotland that I had planned before
you
postponed your departure from Kent” — he tipped a curious brow at Darcy, to which Darcy declined to respond — “I decided to take my leave just before your return and asked your sister if there was any service I might do either of you during my short sojourn. Miss Darcy mentioned that you would likely send for your animal upon your return. So, with her help, I obtained your man Hinchcliffe’s authorization and a promise to keep mum about my surprise, then delayed in Derbyshire on my way back from Scotland long enough to retrieve young Master Trafalgar.” Brougham leaned back into the chair. “We enjoyed a most
instructive
drive down together. I would have you know, Darcy, ‘Monster’ is a name not wide of the mark. Due to your undisciplined beast’s execrable behavior, my credit at the Hart and Swan on the North Road is thoroughly destroyed.”

Darcy bit down on his lip, his hand twitching to bestow an approving pat on Trafalgar’s unrepentant head, but there was a more pressing debt to settle and a warning to serve. “I must thank you for your watchful care of my sister. You have discharged my request with astonishingly dutiful care, it would seem, for Georgiana has spoken of little else but you since my return.”

“Ah,” Brougham replied, “I see.” Resting his elbows on the chair’s arms, he templed his fingers beneath his chin, regarding Darcy steadily. “You object to my attention to Miss Darcy? I had thought that you welcomed what I could do for her in Society.”

“I would be a fool not to,” Darcy returned evenly, “but she is very young, Dy, and you play the gallant extremely well.”

Brougham’s face suddenly darkened. “Do you accuse me of making a game of Miss Darcy’s favor?”

“I do not.” Darcy regarded his friend piercingly. “I only make mention of her youth and remind you how easily a young girl might be led to imagine herself in love.” At that, Brougham rose from his chair and, in visible agitation, walked the length of the room. Darcy looked on him with wonder. Dy stood for a moment, his back to Darcy, then turned, his face relaxed now into the careless lines Darcy saw when they were in company.

“Of course, it is proper and right for you to warn me, Darcy! It is hereby noted, and I shall endeavor that Miss Darcy not be cozened into believing any such thing. I assure you, she is safe
with
and
from
me; and here is my hand on it!” Dy extended his hand, which after rising, Darcy grasped with relief. “But I find it incumbent upon me to advise you of something as well, old friend,” Brougham added.

“Yes?” Darcy answered cautiously.

“Miss Darcy is many admirable things. She is, indeed, a credit to your care and liberality; but, my friend, she is a girl no longer. Beware you treat her so, or underestimate her understanding, for there is a strength in her which you have yet to see.”

“So.” Darcy drew up haughtily. “Do you now presume to teach me as you have my sister and my hound?” At the word
hound
and his master’s inclination toward him, Trafalgar rose as well and, stationing himself at Darcy’s side, looked up with equal hauteur at their guest.

“Wouldn’t dream of it, old man!” Dy laughed. “No future in it!” The study clock struck the hour, drawing all three pair of eyes to it. “You are to view Miss Darcy’s finished portrait today, are you not?” he inquired when the echo had faded. “I would count it an honor if you would allow me to accompany you, for I confess, I would very much like to see it.”

At last, he was alone! Poised at the closed dressing room door, Darcy listened as Fletcher completed his preparations for the next morning and finally departed for his quarters. With the click of the servants’ door, Darcy relinquished his hold on the guard he had vowed to maintain with the relief of a man who had been unburdened of his commission to hold back the wind. The rush of its sudden release flowed through his frame, and for a moment, the tightness in his chest was diminished. For a moment, he could take a deep breath and believe it was a night like any other. Then thoughts of her came as they had come every night since his return as soon as he was decently alone; and the virulent admixture of anger and anguish in his heart, suppressed during the day, could be read plainly in his every feature.

Wrapping his dressing gown tightly about him, Darcy moved to the hearth and took the chair closest to the glowing embers. It was a cool April, necessitating a fire still be laid at night, and he stretched out his slipper-clad feet to take advantage of its warmth. God knew, Darcy snorted, he had none in himself. No, according to Miss Elizabeth Bennet he was a coldhearted miscreant who rejoiced in ruining deserving young men and blighting the hopes of maidens wherever his disdainful gaze happened to alight! He looked at the chair across the hearth rug and knew that, if he closed his eyes, he would be able to see her there. Smiling grimly, he slowly shook his head. “No, Miss Bennet, I do not wish you here to catalog my many shortcomings.”

Darcy’s gaze shifted to the brandy decanter at his side. No, the potential for warmth in that quarter was tempting, the haziness it would afford even more so; but he would be damned if he would allow her to drive him to drink and turn his life into a common Cheltenham tragedy! His life! His life had been well enough until Charles Bingley had taken it into his head to let a country house and then induced Darcy into overseeing his transformation into a member of the landed gentry. Why ever had he agreed to it? Pity? Boredom? If only he had not succumbed to Bingley’s entreaties, he would not even have entered Hertfordshire last autumn. He would not have met…her. The thought brought a sharp pang to his chest. Even now, would he never have wanted to know Elizabeth, the first and perhaps the only woman who could draw him both body and soul, who could merrily stand against him on a point of contention and yet excite both his admiration and desire?