He smiled again, bowing respectfully. “Miss Bennet.”
Kitty watched him walk away. She did not believe that she would ever feel in Mr. Darcy’s company the familiarity she did in Bingley’s, but from that moment she found that she desired his good opinion. She vowed to herself that she would indeed strive to no longer be the girl that was always waiting for a recrimination of her behaviour or the girl who was never listened to because what she said was imprudent or silly, never respected because her actions did not warrant it. She knew exactly where to begin and went in search of her sister. She owed Elizabeth a very heartfelt apology.
She found Elizabeth with Mrs. Thorney, Mrs. Ashton and the children. “May I speak with you, Lizzy?” Kitty inquired quietly.
Elizabeth looked at her sister and saw an expression entirely lacking in petulance or ire. “Kitty, you look very happy,” she said as they moved away from the group. “For the first time since arriving to Pemberley you look truly pleased.”
“It is your husband’s doing,” Kitty replied, delighting in Elizabeth’s evident surprise.
“You do not like my husband, what can he have to do with your becoming smile?”
Kitty told her sister of the surprising conversation she had held with Mr. Darcy. “Lizzy, I am sorry. I have been petulant and mean spirited and said awful things when I arrived,” she concluded with remorse.
Elizabeth was filled with gratitude for Darcy’s kindness and ashamed to recognize that she had lacked the same kindness towards her sister; she had been too fixed on finding her faults to have charity. “You have been, rather, but I have been equally scolding and lecturing.”
“A little, it is true,” Kitty giggled.
“I am sorry, Kitty,” Elizabeth reiterated. “I have not been a very considerate sister. I have offered no more than reproaches and left you to yourself. Please forgive me.”
“This is a day for apologies. After he spoke to me with such kindness, I apologized to Mr. Darcy for having thought him an unpleasant man. I was sure he would be angry, but he only smiled and apologized to me, for not making me feel more welcomed in my sister’s home.”
“You see!” Elizabeth said with playful satisfaction, “I told you he was the finest of men and you would not believe me.”
“You truly love Mr. Darcy, don’t you, Lizzy?”
“I do, very deeply.”
“How could I have thought otherwise?”
“Perhaps because I never gave you an opportunity to know better, did I? I have never confided in you as I have in Jane. You have never confided in me as you have in Lydia. Let us become better sisters to one another.”
Kitty smiled with such evident gratitude and pleasure that Elizabeth vowed she would not be such a neglectful sister to Kitty in future. They were neither of resentful dispositions, and forgiveness between them required no more than sincere words and a warm embrace. Kitty remained with Elizabeth for another half an hour, and they both delighted to have left behind the strained, distressing irascibility and to have found again the sisterly ease they had always known at Longbourn as girls.
❖ ❖ ❖ ❖
Whilst Kitty was happily repairing relations with her sister, she inadvertently neglected to meet Georgiana for a walk as they had earlier agreed. After waiting patiently for her companion to no avail, Georgiana collected a block for sketching and a parasol and went out to stroll beneath the beautiful lime tree avenue that lined the great lawn behind the house. She liked to sit and draw on the bench near the end of the avenue. As she walked along the avenue, a picture of lovely innocence, Lord Enfield met her in the lane. He bowed elegantly and asked to join her on her promenade. She blushed profusely, but did not know how to politely decline.
“Are you intending to draw, Miss Darcy?” he inquired indicating her block.
“I am,” she replied softly and looked down, blushing again. She was not accustomed to being the object of a gentleman’s attentions. She had only ever experienced George Wickham’s attentions, and those had been from a man she had remembered fondly from when she was a girl, a man who spoke to her of her beloved Pemberley and of her father in gentle and soothing tones that made her feel easy in his company.
“Are you as accomplished at drawing as you are at the pianoforte?”
“I could not say, sir. I do like to be occupied.”
“You play very beautifully, Miss Darcy. It is a true privilege to hear you perform.”
“Thank you, your lordship.”
“At Alderdale, my home, there are many grand vistas pleasing to the artistic eye. My elder sister is an accomplished artist and she assures me the light that falls over Alderdale on a late autumn afternoon is the most lovely there is to be found.”
“No doubt,” Georgiana replied quietly, looking away.
“Perhaps your brother would accept an invitation to Alderdale and you might have an opportunity to judge for yourself. Would that please?” he inquired.
“I go where my brother instructs me to go,” she replied, unwilling to commit an opinion.
Lord Enfield smiled, gratified by such open deference to her brother’s command. “I will be sure to extend the invitation. Your brother and his wife have been most gracious. I have never been so charmed as I have been these delightful days at Pemberley.”
Georgiana smiled, but made no response. She would have been terribly uneasy to comprehend that each blush, each lowering of her pretty blue eyes from his gaze only served to increase the delight Lord Enfield took in her company. He had lived much in the world and the fact that she had evidently been kept very much out of the world only added to her charm. Everything he had observed in her since arriving to Pemberley was pleasing to his ideas of what a wife ought to be: she was naturally elegant, with a quiet gentleness he found particularly appealing. He had not heard her express a single unkind remark or insipid, artful opinion. She was truly accomplished and diligent; she did not lie idly about and had always at minimum a piece of needlework at hand. And then she was handsome, without being a great beauty. He had little trust in great beauties like Mrs. Thorney. He thought such women destined for scandal or dissatisfaction, and had experienced more than once what he considered their propensity for demanding and expecting overmuch.
He turned the conversation to less personal topics. Although he had not the irrepressible powers of seduction of George Wickham, or the winning amiability of Bingley, he was well versed in making a lady easy in his company. Georgiana was soon able to converse with tolerable composure and without blushing at his every remark. Yet she was displeased. She did not wish to be the object of any gentleman’s attentions, and as well found she could not look on a man older than her brother as an object of romantic interest. She was greatly relieved when Kitty at last joined her and broke up the uncomfortable tête-à-tête.
Lord Enfield soon thereafter retired into the house. He found Miss Catherine Bennet an entirely inferior specimen of womanhood. Thinking of his own unattractive and rigid youngest sister, he recognized that all families had someone for whom it was necessary to blush.
If he thought ungenerously of Kitty, she thought no better of the future Duke. Like her sister Elizabeth she was not excessively impressed by rank and she had not lost all talent for disrespect and impropriety after but one conversation with Mr. Darcy. As Lord Enfield walked away, she could not restrain her censure.
“How long did you suffer his company, Miss Darcy? He does not like me. If you do not enjoy his company, you need only make a sign and I shall come and sit at your side and he will quickly dislodge himself. Such a tedious old man, for all the future Duke he may be! My sister Lydia and I always had little signals to save each other from dreary conversations.”
Georgiana smiled and coloured at once. She was reassured to find her discomfiture ratified by Kitty, even though Kitty expressed her ratification in language Georgiana understood to be less than ideal. To Georgiana’s further relief Kitty immediately forgot the tedious old man and inquired after her drawin
g. They spent an agreeable half hour together under the shade until Jane and Bingley came walking by and Bingley swept them along on the wave of his good cheer.
Chapter 29
A Young Lady of Worth
With each passing day Lord Enfield’s attentions to Georgiana became more constant. Until now he had most assiduously avoided marked attentions and he was entirely more likely to be found conversing with Miss Bingley, whose sycophantic attentions proved a useful distraction. He was now always at Georgiana’s side, attending to her music, escorting her to dinner, hovering about the tea as she poured it out, admiring her needlework or her drawings. He had determined that he wished to make Miss Darcy his wife, and he would prefer it be soon, before she was too much exposed to the world. He delighted in her ingenuousness and did not wish it spoilt. Moreover, these days spent at Pemberley had confirmed for him Mr. Darcy’s reputation for propriety and elegance. If Mrs. Darcy was admittedly not of notable birth, she herself was an indisputably charming woman and Lord Enfield understood perfectly that in such cases a woman’s charms quickly and conveniently expunged the collective memory of inconvenient details. It was an alliance that would be auspicious and beneficial for all. It would be, without doubt, the marriage of the season. His Grace would be well satisfied with the choice.
One afternoon Miss Darcy was alone practicing at the pianoforte, Mrs. Ashton having just left her, when Lord Enfield came into the room. He had observed that her entire expression and manner altered when she sat at the keyboard; on her countenance intensity replaced the customary diffidence and in her movements she acquired a fluidity that he found profoundly stimulating. He came and stood by the pianoforte; she stopped playing immediately.
“Do not stop on my account, Miss Darcy. May I remain? May I have the privilege of observing your practice? I should enjoy studying how your mind works through the music to arrive at such excellent results.”
She raised her eyes to his and a cold chill rushed through her. There was something different in his expression, a forwardness that he had carefully guarded until now and that she could not identify, she only understood that she was entirely distressed by his presence.
“I am done with my practicing for today,” she replied uneasily, standing to quit the room. “If you will excuse me.”
She began to walk away, and as she passed him he halted her passage, grasping her by the wrist. “Miss Darcy,” he began, softly touching her forearm with his other hand. “May I not have a moment alone? Will you not allow me to speak of my deep admiration?” He lifted her hand, intending to place a kiss upon it.
“Sir!” she cried, her colour ghostly.
He held onto her hand; stared into her startled face. He was intensely aroused to find her so entirely innocent that even such an innocuous advance could be alarming to her modesty. “No insolence has been intended, Miss Darcy. All the contrary,” he intoned gravely, at last releasing her hand and stepping aside.
She rushed out of the room in search of Elizabeth, eager to confide the incident and to seek her guidance, but found her surrounded by people, the centre of a lively conversation. She sat down and as she was often quiet her distress was not obvious, and with the passage of time she lost her courage to speak of the discomfiting moment. She did refuse most adamantly to perform that evening, claiming a mild indisposition.
On the following day, whilst strolling in the garden with Kitty, Georgiana saw Lord Enfield approaching. She turned to Kitty, her face pale, and whispered, “What was the sign you and your sister Lydia had to communicate your unease?”
Kitty looked down the path and saw Lord Enfield coming towards them. “Miss Darcy,” she cried. “Speak to your brother if you do not care for that man’s attentions. Mr. Darcy will not fail you. For now, I shall make myself entirely unpleasant and he will be gone in but a moment.”
Georgiana was surprised by Kitty’s praise of her brother, but she took her counsel and having been relieved of Lord Enfield’s company went to her brother and requested a private conversation. She began awkwardly, but with her brother’s gentle cajoling at last expressed her displeasure and discomfiture, whilst avoiding the details of the presumptuous moment in the music room the prior day; she sensed her brother would not take gently to such an impertinence and she wished for relief, not a scandal. With tears flowing, she released her anxiety.
“Perhaps you endorse his attentions, brother, but I cannot abide them. I cannot conceive of him; I would feel always a child beside such a man. But it is more. I have seen now what a marriage can be, what a source of companionship and warmth and affection. You are a happier man now with Elizabeth than I have ever known you to be without her. I would wish the same for myself someday. But not now, brother; I am only just turned seventeen.”
She dropped her face into her hands and cried softly in frustration. She did not know if her brother wished such a course for her and it disappointed her and angered her by equal measure to think he might. Darcy came to her side. “My dear sister,” he said in quiet, tender tones.
Georgiana raised her eyes and was moved by the contrition and regret in her brother’s expression where she was accustomed to seeing only strength and authority. It was unsettling, and yet she seemed to recall that he was indeed a brother, not a father she was required to obey, and this gave her the courage to speak her disappointment with clarity.
“Why did you allow him here to Pemberley if you knew he had such intentions? You could not have imagined that I wished for a suitor? All I have long desired has been to be settled with you at Pemberley. At long last I have that. I would not wish it away tomorrow. You must comprehend that. I do not understand.”
“Would that I had an explanation that was satisfactory, Georgiana. I have none. Forgive me. I have placed you in a most trying situation. I have done you a great disservice. Fear not, I will rectify my error. I will speak with the Marquess immediately. Go to your room now and rest, you need not come down this evening if you do not wish it. I will not delay in making this right.”
Georgiana smiled through her tears. She was strangely elated by the frankness of their disagreement and felt not anger at her brother, but a great trust. She embraced him. “You always make everything right. All I desire is to be here at Pemberley with you and Elizabeth.”
“So it shall be for as long as you wish it,” he affirmed quietly, remorse weighing heavy on his heart.
As soon as she left him, Darcy sent Matthews to request Lord Enfield join him in his study. Upon the gentleman’s arrival he did not demure. “I have seen in the past days your attentions towards my sister have become quite marked,” Mr. Darcy stated with little preamble.
“I have not disguised my intentions from you,” Lord Enfield replied evenly as he made himself comfortable in a chair.
“Precisely why it is incumbent upon me to be forthright. I was mistaken to allow your visit on the grounds I did. It was my error and I certainly apologize if you feel you have been misled.”
“I do not understand, Mr. Darcy.”
“We both understood that you came to Pemberley to become better acquainted with Miss Darcy. Your increased attentions are evidence that your intentions are becoming more serious.”
“They are. Miss Darcy is a perfection of grace and accomplishment and discretion.”
“Lord Enfield, I must halt you before you say more.”
“Are you denying me permission to seek your sister’s hand?”
“I am.”
Lord Enfield laughed contemptuously as he rose to stand before Darcy. “Mr. Darcy, you cannot be in earnest! You would reject a gentleman of my station and my income as your sister’s suitor?”
“I am not accustomed to dissembling,” Darcy answered coldly.
“An alliance between our families would be in all manners correct, propitious and desirable,” the Marquess insisted. “It would be, might I be so bold, as brilliant a marriage as you could ever hope for your sister to make.”
“I do not deny that it woul
d be, nor that you have honoured my sister with your compliments. Nevertheless, I cannot at this time consent to your intentions. It has been entirely my error to allow your visit on such terms as you understood them. She is only just turned seventeen and I am not inclined to approve of her entering into an engagement with any person at so young an age.”
“Seventeen is an ideal age for a young lady to marry.”
“I believe it is too young and as her guardian I must always act in what I believe to be her best interests.”
“Do you deny me entirely or only for the moment?”
“For the moment,” Mr. Darcy replied apprehensively. He did not wish to offend the Marquess, who he believed had acted decorously and whose admiration for his sister must be seen as a great honour. Yet he understood now Georgiana would never desire such an alliance.
“Then I shall revisit the topic at a later date. Miss Darcy is the finest young lady I have encountered in ever so long a time and I do not believe I am likely to encounter her equal.”
Mr. Darcy felt it incumbent to be more explicit. “Understand, Lord Enfield, I make no promise and I understand that you have made none either. We are as before. Furthermore, I will have you comprehend that I will never approve a marriage for my sister that she herself does not desire. She will never be asked to marry against her will or her inclination.”
“Mr. Darcy, your forthrightness does you honour as does your prodigious care for your sister. Her innocence and delicacy are I am sure in no small part the fortunate result. When she is eighteen, you can be sure that I will approach you again. His Grace would approve entirely; she would make a very fine Duchess of Harwington. I will depart Pemberley tomorrow. I have seen what I came to see and you have spoken clearly. There is no further need for my remaining.”
The gentlemen shook hands, but the conversation left in Darcy’s mind an uneasiness that battled most forcefully against an equally powerful gratification and pride. “Duchess of Harwington,” he murmured, as the future duke departed his study. Collecting himself, he returned to the drawing room. It was not too long thereafter that Sir Hamish invited him to take a walk outside on the terrace.
To Teach the Admiring Multitude Page 33