Page 209 of What Change Entails

“Yes.”

Mrs. Hurst spoke. “Charles.”

He turned.

She looked toward the closed hall, then back to her brother. “Go with Miss Darcy.”

That single concession cost her something. Darcy saw it. So did Bingley.

“Thank you,” Bingley said.

Then he faced Darcy once more. “You had better not fail.”

Despite everything, Darcy almost laughed. “Nor you.”

After he left, the room became active in a manner bordering on disorder. It was selfish, perhaps, to ask Bingley to stay. Georgiana went to fetch a small traveling case despite Darcy insisting she need not concern herself with packing that evening, already speaking of what would be required for the journey. Mrs. Hurst departed to find her husband’s valet and perhaps to avoid seeing her sister. Mr. Hurst asked whether anyone wanted the remaining cakes and, when no one answered, took one for the corridor.

Darcy remained alone for the first time since entering the room.

He drew Elizabeth’s letter from inside his coat and unfolded it again.

Come to me.

Rain struck the windows. Wind pressed against the house. Pemberley, which had been so full when he left that morning, now felt emptied of the one presence he had most wished to find.

No.

Not emptied.

Waiting.

He folded the letter once more and held it until Brisby arrived.

“Sir?”

“Clothes for riding. Dry coat packed. Pistols.”

Brisby’s brows rose slightly. “A long journey, sir?”

“Hertfordshire.”

“Tonight?”

Darcy placed Elizabeth’s letter back into the inner pocket of his coat, close against his heart.

“Tonight.”

He would change horses wherever the road permitted and would sleep in brief, useless intervals while the next horse was saddled. Darcy planned to be at Elizabeth’s side as soon as possible.

Chapter Twenty-Two

The journey from Derbyshire began in misery and became, by slow degrees, merely uncomfortable.

That was not improvement enough to satisfy Lydia.

She spent the first hour denouncing everything; injured clerks, warehouse accounts, rutted roads, carriage springs, and every horse that failed to carry them faster than its fellows. She wept twice, complained three times that Georgiana would forget her, declared once that Horace would perish of grief, and then fell asleep against Elizabeth’s shoulder with one hand still clenched around a handkerchief.

Elizabeth let her sleep.