Page 196 of What Change Entails

“What is it, then?”

“Experience with overbearing ladies.”

A faint laugh escaped Miss Bingley before she could prevent it. The sound died quickly.

For a moment they were two women in the same room, both too proud, both wounded in different places, both unwilling to yield the field.

Then Miss Bingley gathered herself.

“I have said enough.”

“More than enough.”

“Yes.” She went to the door, then paused with one hand upon it. “You may think me jealous. I am. You may think me disappointed. I am that also. You may think me unkind.”

Elizabeth said nothing.

Miss Bingley’s hand tightened on the brass knob. “But I am not mistaken about society.”

The door closed behind her.

Elizabeth remained by the window.

For several minutes she allowed herself the luxury of anger.

It came hot and welcome. She did not doubt him. That certainty had survived every kindness, every confession, and every look he had given her. What she doubted was herself. Could affection truly withstand years of whispered comparisons, careful exclusions, and relations who believed he had lowered himself by choosing her?

Miss Bingley was jealous. Miss Bingley was wounded. Miss Bingley had wrapped old pain around fresh spite and offered it as wisdom. She did not know Mr. Darcy’s heart. She had mistaken his civility for encouragement and his sister’s gentleness for weakness. She had underestimated Elizabeth, Georgiana, Lydia, and very likely every person at Pemberley who did not arrange themselves according to her preferences.

Elizabeth would not give her that victory.

She would not doubt a man who had asked, with such raw hope, whether he had any. She would not forget his hand trembling against her cheek, his voice speaking of ardent love without pride, his willingness to humble himself where once he had demanded.

No.

Miss Bingley did not know.

Elizabeth moved back toward the glass.

Her reflection floated faintly there, superimposed upon the garden. Dark eyes. Wind-touched curls barely contained with pins. A face not very different from the one that had once stared at Mr. Darcy across a parsonage room and thought him the last man in the world she could ever be prevailed upon to marry.

She had been so certain then.

So certain.

That was the wound Miss Bingley had found, though she had not named it correctly.

Not trade.

Not Lady Catherine.

Not whispers.

Elizabeth could endure whispers.

The fear was simpler and more humiliating.

What if she had misunderstood him again?