Page 43 of A Most Inconvenient Murder

The rest of the room seemed to blur. Elizabeth saw, as if at a distance, the colonel’s sharp, speculative glance; Charlotte’ssuppressed smile; the horror on Mr. Collins’s face; the stunned pleasure in Mr. Haldridge’s eyes; and the faint smirk on Mrs. Jenkinson’s lips.

The pressure in the room mounted until Elizabeth thought she might scream.

Instead, she stood. Although the movement was not dramatic, in the context of the room, it was revolutionary.

“Lady Catherine,” she said, forcing her voice to remain even, “if you would like to see Mrs. Blackstone’s death truly resolved, then I suggest we wait. Mr. Darcy has sent evidence to Bow Street. Experts will examine it. Until their report arrives, any further accusation is premature.”

Lady Catherine, caught between fury and disbelief, said nothing.

Elizabeth nodded once, then turned and left the room, closing the door behind her with a deliberate, absolute quiet.

The air outside was colder than she remembered, and cleaner. She leaned against the banister in the empty corridor, letting her body cool and her mind reassemble itself.

She heard voices—raised, receding—on the other side of the door, but she did not return.

She would wait, now, for the letter from Bow Street.

And, perhaps, for Mr. Darcy.

Chapter 14

The cold of that morning was of the sort that burned, rather than numbed, the inside of the nose. The air tasted clean, unsullied by the residue of anyone’s expectations.

Elizabeth walked away from Rosings Park at a speed barely short of undignified, hands balled in her sleeves and mouth set in a line meant to repel all curiosity.

The frost, which the sun had not yet wholly bested, encrusted the lower fence rails and the brittle grass tips, so that every step offered a satisfying crunch. Her feet did not, at first, register the pain of it; she had learned to ignore far worse.

As Elizabeth rounded the bend by a hedge of hawthorns, she heard the double rhythm of a second set of steps, a heavier tread which was approaching fast.

She did not slow. If it were a servant, they would yield. If it were anybody else, she would outrun them.

If it were the one person she both most and least wished to see, she would deal with it as she always did: by not flinching first.

“Miss Elizabeth,” said a voice behind her—so close, so suddenly, that she startled before recovering her stride. She did not turn.

“Mr. Darcy.” She made it sound like an accusation.

He caught up, falling into step at her left without so much as a courtesy bow. He was bareheaded, hair mussed by wind; his greatcoat was unbuttoned and wet with dew across the hem.

For several paces they walked in a kind of mutual siege: she, marshaling her words into a defensive line; he, waiting for the first breach.

Another fifty yards passed in silence. She could feel his energy, an anticipation that made the air between their shoulders vibrate. She was determined to keep her eyes forward, to focus on the thin strip of lane between two frost-capped hedgerows, but she failed: a sidelong glance caught him watching her not as a puzzle, or a threat, but with a tension that was almost embarrassment.

She wondered, briefly, if he was also replaying the scene that had just passed. If he also heard, on repeat, the part where Lady Catherine accused her of “rejecting a proposal that would have secured your family’s future, out of pride or, some might say, vanity.”

Elizabeth searched for a speech that would explain, but her mind would only serve her this: the phrase that had lodged like a barb in the flesh of her pride.

“She was speaking of another.” She blurted it out, hating the way it sounded—simultaneously an explanation and a plea.

He stopped short, boots scraping the gravel. “I beg your pardon?”

She stopped, too, but did not turn to face him directly. “Lady Catherine. When she accused me of rejecting a proposal. I told no one. She was not referring to you.”

He made a sound, halfway between a grunt and a gasp. “Who, then?”

Elizabeth closed her eyes, letting the morning air freeze her lashes. “Mr. Collins.”

The silence that followed was so complete she thought that even the birds had suspended their songs.