Page 15 of The Widower of Pemberley

Darcy said, “It would not go amiss if you were to play. This is a respectable enough gathering.”

Miss Elizabeth and Miss Lucas both looked at him in a half amused and half judging manner.

When Miss Elizabeth and Georgiana played, the music was beautiful. Darcy listened with great pleasure, and he did chiefly watch Elizabeth. She was a fine singer, with a good voice and passion in her tones and manner.

Much of the party ceased to talk so that they might attend the elegant pair, and Darcy thought that this was in great partbecause of the fineness of Georgiana’s playing, which made him proud.

After Miss Elizabeth and Georgiana finished their performance, one of Miss Elizabeth’s sisters was made to play a reel by another of her sisters, and the group began to find partners for dancing.

Dancing.

Even here, even outside London, all the women wished to dance. They wished to flirt. They wished to appear pretty. Their comparative poverty and the limited scope of their mercenary ambitions changed nothing. All wished to marry well. All were sweaty, stinking, scheming human beings.

Although women were pretty to look at, if he could be shrunk, like Gulliver with the giants, he would find the skin and pores of every woman in this room, even those of Miss Elizabeth, disgusting.

Lord, he hated society, in all its forms. He wished he were elsewhere.

He wished he could simply sit at home.

Drinking.

He had in fact not let himself have more than a single glass of anything in the course of a night since Mary had died. He greatly feared that if he began drinking to relieve his sick feelings, the aching in his gut, he would find great difficulty in ceasing the practice.

To crown the awfulness, Sir William decided that Darcy must wish for conversation, and he approached him to talk about how delightful dancing was. Seldom had a man chosen a subject of conversation more poorly suited to its audience.

As they conversed, Miss Elizabeth walked past, and Sir William suggested they dance.

And to his surprise, Darcy was eager to sharethisdance. He did wish to dance with her. He said as much.

It would be a thing he wanted, an indulgence for himself. To let himself dance, once, with a woman worth looking at, before he found an unpleasant one to marry.

Miss Elizabeth eyed him with an arched eyebrow.

Lovely dark eyes.

She smiled. “Mr. Darcy is all politeness. But I know that he despises dancing. I shall not impose upon him.”

She gave a small curtsey and walked away.

Darcy let out a sigh of either disappointment or relief.

Chapter Four

Elizabeth thought about Mr. Darcy more often than she liked.

That he had flattered her vanity while at the same time insulting her dearest friend made it necessary that her kind thoughts about the gentleman must be mixed with a mild sense of guilt.

Despite this, before events where she knew that Mr. Darcy was to be present, she indulged Sarah and herself by letting the maid spend an extra fifteen minutes making her hair and the light application of rouge on her cheeks just so.

A compelling man to look at! And he found her attractive too—enough to class her as an immoral woman!—that was a more extravagant compliment than any gentleman had ever paid before. She was aware of how he looked at her. His gaze was steady, and she supposed he must be thinking disapproving and cold thoughts about how her lovely form only covered the vile lewdness of a loose woman.

That was said in frustration to Charlotte a day after their dinner party.

Charlotte replied in quite a different manner from the one Elizabeth had expected. “If you can secure him, you ought to do so. I think that he means to marry quickly to provide a step-mother for his daughter. His entailed estate must provide an additional impetus for making his second marriage sooner rather than later.”

“A mother for his daughter! I shall not audition for that role for a girl that I have not even met, no matter how delighted dear Georgie is with her niece—not even if Mr. Darcy looks very handsome in his dark mourning colours.”

“You have a chance to succeed with him. You must know what such a thing would mean for your family.”