Page 16 of You Willfully Misunderstand Me

He paused, staring at her a moment longer before saying, "Good night, Miss Bennet."

She could not explain why hearing him address her so felt unexpectedly comforting and intimate. Before she let her thoughts run away from her, Elizabeth replied, "Good night, Mr. Darcy."

With that, he gently closed the communicating door, and she heard the quiet click of the latch echoing across her room.

***

Elizabeth busied herself with the ordinary rituals of retiring, grateful for occupations that required no thought. She loosened her bonnet, brushed the salt from her travelling dress, and arranged the garments she would need in the morning; these simple acts helped somewhat to ease her agitated spirits.

After she had completed her evening rituals, she looked around the chamber once more. It was an inviting and warm space. Someone, Mrs. Kewley, no doubt, she imagined, hadplaced fresh lavender upon the dressing table, its fragrance mingling pleasantly with the scent of burning oak. The quilt, laid across the large bed was plainly handmade, but it felt soft beneath her hand, and she wanted as the fire cast danced shadows across the ceiling beams.

It ought to have been comforting, but instead, everything reminded her that she occupied a room she had no right to be in. She was not Mrs. Darcy, and she should not be in this space. Elizabeth extinguished all but the bedside candle before kneeling briefly in prayer. Rising again, she drew the curtains, though little could be seen beyond the dark outline of the sea.

She could see that the wind had strengthened; it moaned now, moving around the cottage, and worked to set the casement to tremble within its frame.

Mrs. Kewley had said the weather often changed without warning, she reflected. With a final glance around the room, Elizabeth walked over to the bedside table, and extinguished the candle. Darkness settled over the chamber.

***

In the adjoining room, Darcy's preparations were even shorter. He removed his coat, folded it neatly across the chair, and placed his pocket watch on the little writing desk. The room afforded scarcely enough space for more than the narrow bed and a small hearth, but it was warm and dry, which was all he could want for.

Indeed, he preferred it, as the smaller chamber spared Elizabeth every possible embarrassment, while also allowing them to preserve the appearance expected by their unsuspecting steward and wife.

He lowered himself onto the bed. The mattress was firmer than that he was used to, and its blankets considerably plainer, but after the fatigue of the day he could not have wished for greater comfort.

Darcy had extinguished his candle, but noticed Elizabeth had not, as the outline of a candle flame snuck under his door frame.

He lay upon his back, listening. Aside from the soft hearth and a dying fire, beyond the wall, he could hear Elizabeth moving around in her bedchamber.Elizabeth, he supposed,was beginning to prepare to retire. The thought ought to have brought him peace to know she was safe, but it only reminded him of how extraordinary their circumstances had become.

Only a few months before, he had stood before her at Hunsford and asked her to become his wife. She had refused him with a frankness he now acknowledged he had richly deserved. Although, at the time, he had been furious at her refusal, and poured his sour feelings into a letter that, upon reflection, he hoped she had burned.

His lovely Elizabeth, to be so close to her, sleeping under the same roof, was a mixture of bliss and torture. She, though perhaps unwillingly, entrusted herself under his protection, and unknown to every soul on the island, the same she now held, was the very one she had vehemently declined to bear.

It was a fiction, he said to himself, and it must remain one. And yet, Darcy could not deny that hearing others call herMrs. Darcyhad awakened feelings he had tried to forever bury, as he knew they were beyond his reach.

He closed his eyes. No, he must remember why the deception existed. It wasn’t for his comfort, or his hopes, but for her safety.

***

Sleep, however, refused them both. Separated by little more than a paneled wall, Elizabeth and Darcy lay awake in silence, staring into the darkness, each acutely conscious of the other's unseen presence.

At one point, Elizabeth wondered whether he slept, and Darcy wondered the same of her. Neither imagined the other wakeful, and neither guessed that the thoughts occupying them were remarkably alike.

While inside, the pairs thoughts stirred constantly to what the other was doing or thinking, outside, the wind gathered strength. What had begun as an uneasy breeze became a steady gale sweeping in from the Irish Sea. It drove itself against the cliffs with mounting fury, sending great plumes of spray high into the night air. The cottage shuddered almost imperceptibly, its ancient timbers answering each gust with a familiar groan.

Far beyond the sheltered harbor, the sea had ceased to resemble the gentle waters that had borne the Liverpool packet boat safely to shore only hours before. Towering swells marched out of the darkness, one after another, lifting anchored vessels until their mooring lines strained like drawn bowstrings. Rain arrived in violent sheets, obliterating every trace of moonlight, while the barometer fell with alarming speed.

In cottages scattered along the coast, old fishermen were roused from their beds. Several dressed without a word and made for the harbor, lanterns swinging wildly in the wind.

They had seen storms before, many storms. But never one that pushed itself forward quite like this.

An old harbor master stood upon the quay, his cloak snapping violently behind him as he peered into the blackness beyond the breakwater.

"Sea’s angry tonight," he muttered. Another shook his head.

"Nah,” His weathered face had gone pale. "Tis’nt angry." He watched another enormous wave explode against the outer rocks, sending shattered water higher than the harbor beacon. "Tis’ at war that."

Before dawn, the storm would batter the Isle of Man with a violence no living resident had ever witnessed. Piers would splinter beneath the relentless surf, merchant vessels would be driven aground, and every packet bound for England would remain imprisoned in harbor.