His Good Opinion: A Mr. Darcy Novel

by Nancy Kelley

  He paused, giving her the opportunity to speak, to tell him he must not go on. She must know what I am to say next. If she stops me now, I will know her feelings are unchanged. However, her only response was a sudden blush, and he took courage in her silence.

  "You are too generous to trifle with me. If your feelings are still what they were last April, tell me so at once. My affections and wishes are unchanged, but one word from you will silence me on this subject forever."

  For a moment he heard nothing but the sound of his own heart pounding in his ears. Elizabeth looked at him and moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue. "I... my feelings last April were so wrong... I did not know then what I spoke of. I view you quite differently now.... In truth--that is, I wondered--oh, I almost feared you might not care for me still."

  She turned away then, but he had seen enough of the happiness in her countenance and heard the joy in her voice that allowed him to piece together her jumbled sentences into an acceptance. My Elizabeth--you are my Elizabeth now, he thought to himself in exultation.

  After a moment he became aware that it was his turn to speak. "Miss Elizabeth, allow me to assure you that I will never stop caring for you. I would be glad to spend the rest of my life proving that to you, if you will allow me."

  She looked at him then and smiled, and the expression in her wonderful brown eyes made his heart race. "I will."

  Darcy gently, hesitantly, took her hand in his. "I would have there be no further misunderstandings between us. Elizabeth, will you agree to be my wife?"

  Elizabeth looked down at their joined hands and then up at him. Her voice was firm when she answered. "Yes, Mr. Darcy."

  Darcy knew he should never forget this moment as long as he lived. How beautiful she looked with the sun warming her upturned face. The soft breeze played with her one of her curls, and he lifted a hand to brush it from her face.

  Then, with trembling hands, he raised her fingers to his lips. "Elizabeth," he breathed, unable to say more. Her eyelids fluttered and she swayed into his embrace. Darcy brushed a kiss across her forehead, and her soft sigh nearly did him in. "I believe we should return to our walk, my dear," he said with great reluctance.

  Elizabeth straightened and attempted to retrieve her hands, but he kept her right in his left. "No, I think I will keep this for now," he murmured, and she flushed scarlet.

  They walked a ways before either of them regained the power of speech, but finally Elizabeth looked over at him with teasing eyes. "I fear Lady Catherine will not be pleased with our current understanding."

  He laughed slightly. "I am afraid not. She has always believed I would marry Anne, though I never gave her any reason to believe it."

  "She came here the other day..." Elizabeth's sentence trailed off, and Darcy wondered at her uncertain expression.

  "Yes, she told me."

  "So she did visit you then! I half-feared that she might."

  "Why did you fear it?"

  Elizabeth did not answer, and he knew with a sudden surety what she had thought. "Elizabeth, surely my behavior in the last few months has shown you I no longer share her beliefs."

  She tilted her head in consideration. "Yes... I suppose it was simply insecurity; a fear that as your aunt, her words might carry more weight with you than they had with me."

  "Indeed, her visit did sway me--though not in the way she wished. It taught me to hope, as I had scarcely ever allowed myself to hope before. I knew enough of your disposition to be certain that, had you been absolutely, irrevocably decided against me, you would have acknowledged it to Lady Catherine frankly and openly."

  She laughed. "Yes, you know enough of my frankness to believe me capable of that. After abusing you so abominably to your face, I could have no scruple in abusing you to all your relations."

  Darcy's jaw dropped a little. Her memory of that scene is far different from mine. "What did you say of me, that I did not deserve? For, though your accusations were ill-founded, formed on mistaken premises, my behavior to you at the time had merited the severest reproof. It was unpardonable. I cannot think of it without abhorrence."

  Elizabeth's fingers tightened around his, and Darcy could hardly believe the chagrin in her voice when she spoke. "We will not quarrel for the greater share of the blame annexed to that evening. The conduct of neither, if strictly examined, will be irreproachable; but since then, we have both, I hope, improved in civility."

  "I cannot be so easily reconciled to myself," Darcy said. "The recollection of what I then said, of my conduct, my manners, my expression during the whole of it, is now, and has been many months, inexpressibly painful to me."

  He stared straight ahead, but instead of the idyllic country lane, he saw the parsonage at Hunsford. "Your reproof, so well applied, I shall never forget: 'Had you behaved in a more gentleman-like manner.' Those were your words. You know not, you can scarcely conceive, how they have tortured me--though it was some time, I confess, before I was reasonable enough to allow their justice."

  Her expression was full of surprise. "I was certainly very far from expecting them to make so strong an impression. I had not the smallest idea of their being ever felt in such a way."

  Those words, spoken to reassure, only deepened Darcy's self-disgust. "I can easily believe it. You thought me then devoid of every proper feeling; I am sure you did. The turn of your countenance I shall never forget, as you said that I could not have addressed you in any possible way that would induce you to accept me."

  The remembered pain almost overshadowed the current joy until Elizabeth said, "Oh! Do not repeat what I then said. These recollections will not do at all. I assure you that I have long been most heartily ashamed of it."

  There was one more question he had regarding the past, and he posed it then. "What first brought you to change your mind? Was it my letter? Did it, did it soon make you think better of me? Did you, on reading it, give any credit to its contents?"

  She considered for a moment. "I confess I did not wish to give credit to your words at first," she admitted. "You remember enough of my feelings toward you at the time to understand that I would not want to believe anything you said." He nodded, and she continued. "However, when I read what you had to say of Wickham, it was so close to what he himself had said that I began to wonder. Then I considered that you surely would not have said something like that about your sister if it was not true, and I had to accept your word."

  He sighed and shook his head. "I knew that what I wrote must give you pain, but it was necessary. I hope you have destroyed the letter. There was one part especially, the opening of it, which I should dread your having the power of reading again. I can remember some expressions which might justly make you hate me."

  Despite their current good understanding, Darcy looked at Elizabeth with some anxiety. He could not help but feel he did not deserve her, and he trembled lest she might come to the same conclusion.

  Instead, she laced her fingers more tightly through his and said, "The letter shall certainly be burnt, if you believe it essential to the preservation of my regard; but, though we have both reason to think my opinions not entirely unalterable, they are not, I hope, quite so easily changed as that implies."

  Her cheeky good humor brought a smile to his lips, but he could not quite let the subject rest. "When I wrote that letter, I believed myself perfectly calm and cool, but I am since convinced that it was written in a dreadful bitterness of spirit."

  He glanced over at her and saw the way she tilted her head slightly as she considered. "The letter, perhaps, began in bitterness, but it did not end so. The adieu is charity itself." Then she smiled up at him. "But think no more of the letter. The feelings of the person who wrote and the person who received it are now so widely different from what they were then, that every unpleasant circumstance attending it ought to be forgotten. You must learn some of my philosophy. Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure."

  He heard the lightheartedness in her voice
, but the subject had depressed him slightly and he could not think thus. "I cannot give you credit for any philosophy of the kind," he argued. "Your retrospections must be so totally void of reproach, that the contentment arising from them is not of philosophy, but, what is much better, of innocence. But with me it is not so. Painful recollections will intrude, which cannot, which ought not, to be repelled."

  He closed his eyes briefly. "I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle."

  That confession triggered an avalanche of words he could not hold in, and what a relief it was to finally have someone with whom he could share his thoughts! "As a child I was taught what was right, but I was not taught to correct my temper. I was given good principles, but left to follow them in pride and conceit. Unfortunately, an only son (for many years an only child), I was spoilt by my parents, who, though good themselves (my father, particularly, all that was benevolent and amiable), allowed, encouraged, almost taught me to be selfish and overbearing--to care for none beyond my own family circle, to think meanly of all the rest of the world, to wish at least to think meanly of their sense and worth compared with my own. Such I was, from eight to eight-and-twenty; and such I might still have been but for you, dearest, loveliest Elizabeth!"

  He stopped walking and faced Elizabeth, catching her other hand once again and holding both to his chest. "What do I not owe you? You taught me a lesson, hard indeed at first, but most advantageous. By you, I was properly humbled. I came to you without a doubt of my reception. You showed me how insufficient were all my pretensions to please a woman worthy of being pleased."

  Elizabeth's forehead creased and curiosity flickered across her expression. "Had you then persuaded yourself that I should?"

  Darcy laughed, a low, self-deprecating sound. "Indeed I had. What will you think of my vanity? I believed you to be wishing, expecting my addresses."

  To his surprise and amazement, Elizabeth blushed. "My manners must have been in fault, but not intentionally, I assure you." Her smile was earnest, beseeching him to believe her. "I never meant to deceive you, but my spirits might often lead me wrong. How you must have hated me after that evening!"

  Darcy started, and Elizabeth pulled at her hands, trying to get away. He held her closer and exclaimed, "Hate you! I was angry, perhaps, at first, but my anger soon began to take a proper direction."

  She sighed, and he imagined she was looking for a new topic. "I am almost afraid of asking what you thought of me when we met at Pemberley. You blamed me for coming?"

  His jaw dropped and he shook his head quickly, but she saw neither gesture, for her eyes had drifted to the ground. Darcy placed a hand under her chin and tilted her head up. "No, indeed; I felt nothing but surprise."

  "Your surprise could not be greater than mine in being noticed by you," she said ruefully. "My conscience told me that I deserved no extraordinary politeness, and I confess that I did not expect to receive more than my due."

  "My object then was to show you, by every civility in my power, that I was not so mean as to resent the past; and I hoped to obtain your forgiveness, to lessen your ill opinion by letting you see that your reproofs had been attended to. How soon any other wishes introduced themselves I can hardly tell, but I believe in about half an hour after I had seen you."

  He and Elizabeth shared a smile at that, and then he said, "Georgiana was particularly delighted by your stay in Derbyshire. She had wished to make your acquaintance for some time, and for the opportunity to land so neatly in her lap was more than she had wished for."

  "She is a sweet, unaffected young lady--exactly what I have always wished for in a younger sister." The allusion both to her own younger sisters and to the fact that Georgiana very soon would be her own sister made her blush again.

  Eager to see that delicious shade of pink spread further across her face, Darcy said, "Georgie, too, has always wished for a sister--she will be very happy when I tell her those wishes are to come true." Her entire face was pink now, and he took pity on her. "She was most disappointed when you left so suddenly."

  "Yes, as were we all. Lydia has not yet learned to time her escapades for the convenience of the rest of the family."

  Her wry humor drew a chuckle from Darcy, but he sobered quickly. "I am sorry this incident happened at all, and only glad I was able to help as far as I was."

  "When did you decide to follow them?"

  "Almost from the moment I learned of the event. I confess I spent most of the time we were together thinking about how I would find them and what I would say to him."

  She stared at him. "Is that why you were so quiet?"

  "I was not aware that I was, but if I was so, then yes, that was the reason. Why, what did you think to be the cause?"

  "I supposed... that is, I knew how repugnant Wickham was to you, and I thought..."

  "Surely you did not believe that would be enough to put an end to my affection for you?" Elizabeth's silence told all, and in a moment of daring, Darcy placed his hands on her neck and caressed her jaw line with his thumbs. The pink of her cheeks deepened once more, but he would not let her look away. "I would never blame anyone else for the actions of George Wickham."

  She smiled, and he ran his hands slowly down her arms and reclaimed her hand. "Your sister perhaps made her own bed, but I could not leave things like that, not when you were so unhappy. Your tears, Elizabeth, will always command me."

  Silent understanding flowed between them, and Darcy knew they need not speak any more of Wickham. He examined his watch and said, "It is nearly dinner time. We should go back to the house, or your mother will wonder where we have been."

  "We are not the only ones," Elizabeth retorted pertly. "What could become of Mr. Bingley and Jane!"

  "Ah, but your family knows they are engaged. No one will wonder if they do not come home until dinner time."

  "I must ask whether you were surprised?"

  Darcy shrugged. "Not at all. When I went away, I felt that it would soon happen."

  "That is to say, you had given your permission. I guessed as much."

  "Come now, Elizabeth, permission? Bingley is a grown man; he can make his own decisions."

  Elizabeth raised an eyebrow. "You did not discuss it with him?"

  "On the evening before my going to London, I made a confession to him, which I believe I ought to have made long ago. I told him of all that had occurred to make my former interference in his affairs absurd and impertinent. His surprise was great. He had never had the slightest suspicion. I told him, moreover, that I believed myself mistaken in supposing as I had done, that your sister was indifferent to him; and as I could easily perceive that his attachment to her was unabated, I felt no doubt of their happiness together."

  Elizabeth smiled slightly, and he knew he had not successfully defended himself. "Did you speak from your own observation when you told him that my sister loved him, or merely from my information last spring?"

  Darcy cleared his throat. Surely the answer she wished to hear was the latter, but he had never been the kind of man who could be guided simply by the impressions and beliefs of another. He hoped she would understand that. "From the former. I had narrowly observed her during the two visits which I had lately made here, and I was convinced of her affection."

  "And your assurance of it, I suppose, carried immediate conviction to him."

  "It did. Bingley is most unaffectedly modest. His diffidence had prevented his depending on his own judgment in so anxious a case, but his reliance on mine made everything easy. I was obliged to confess one thing which for a time, and not unjustly, offended him. I could not allow myself to conceal that your sister had been in town three months last winter--that I had known it, and purposely kept it from him. He was angry. But his anger, I am persuaded, lasted no longer than he remained in any doubt of your sister's sentiments. He has heartily forgiven me now."

  "They are very happy together."

  "Not nearly so happy as we are, my Elizabeth." S
he smiled tenderly at him and placed her hand on his arm, where it remained until the house came into view.

  Darcy then allowed Elizabeth to be swept away from him by her elder sister, knowing there were already far more questions to be answered than he cared for. During dinner he found himself looking so often at Elizabeth that he felt sure someone must notice and comment, but no one did. She did not look at him but once, and were it not for the joy only he could read in that look, he might have feared she regretted her decision.

  Chapter Forty-one

  That evening when they sat down in front of the fire with their port, Bingley opened the conversation Darcy had feared at Longbourn. "Wherever did you disappear to with Miss Elizabeth this morning, Darcy?"