Page 97 of The Matchmaker’s Mistake

“Well enough. It lies on one of the roads outside of Bakewell on the way to Matlock, easier to access when riding. In spring the banks are full of primroses. Later in the year there are bluebells in the wood above it, though they are seldom as blue in paintings as they are in my memory.”

“There,” Richard said. “That is exactly the sort of thing I meant. Darcy is a valuable man to have nearby at an exhibition such as this.”

“Richard,” Georgiana said, half reproving and half amused, “you must come and see the flower studies with Miss Bennet and me. There are lilies and carnations and so many others.”

“I shall follow where you lead, Cousin,” Richard said. “I am eager to discover what flowers look like when they are not outdoors.” He tossed Darcy a look that said he had done his part and then he followed Georgiana and Miss Bennet.

Darcy found himself beside Miss Elizabeth again, with Mrs. Gardiner only a few feet away.

It was not privacy, but it was a considerable improvement upon silence.

“Are the flowers truly bluer in Derbyshire than they appear here?” she asked. “For these seem very like the ones I have seen.”

“It is not that they are bluer, I suppose,” Darcy said. “Only that a painter is unable to capture the coolness of the wood, or the damp ground, or the way the blue changes almost to purple when the light and shadows move. He preserves only a static moment.”

Miss Elizabeth looked back at the painting. “Then the artist has been given a difficult subject.”

“Indeed. Derbyshire is full of such difficulties.”

She glanced at him then, and for one brief instant her expression was almost what it had been on Thursday, before⁠—

Then a party of ladies drifted up to them, one of them declaring that the mountains looked the same in every painting. By the time they passed on to the next landscape, Miss Elizabeth had stepped back to her aunt.

Darcy did not attempt to follow. He had learned something, at least. Whatever stood between them had not erased her cleverness or her humour. It had not made her indifferent. She was capable of turning towards him still, but something was telling her not to do so. There was still an opportunity for him.

But it was not enough.

There was not a great deal of time before Mr. Aldridge’s return. Darcy would have to speak to Miss Elizabeth in private, and clearly that was not going to happen here. There was one place he might do it: Gracechurch Street. There she would be on her own ground, where she could be comfortable enough to either answer or turn him away as she pleased.

The problem was that he had no idea how to ask for an invitation without appearing too forward. He wandered back to the first landscape, the one with the light Miss Elizabeth had not been certain of.

“Mr. Darcy.” Mrs. Gardiner had come up at his elbow without his hearing her. She nodded at the painting. “Do you like this one?”

“I do. It is very good.” He looked again and said what he had meant to tell Miss Elizabeth. “It is more than good. The prospect is taken from my uncle’s land, above the river, and the painter has captured the light perfectly.”

Mrs. Gardiner stood for a moment to study the picture. “I have never toured Matlock, but it is not so different from your own grounds at Pemberley.”

“We are a little farther from the Peak, as you know. But the landscape there has its own beauties.”

Without turning to look at him, she said, “You did not come for the paintings today, I think, even those of Derbyshire.”

It was a great relief to be spoken to directly. “No.”

“You have taken more notice of one lady this last hour than of every canvas on these walls, and she has taken great care to pretend she has nothing to say.”

Darcy clasped his hands behind his back and stared at the painting without seeing it. “I believe I have done something to distress your niece,” he said. “However, I do not know what it is, and I cannot mend it when I do not know what I have done. That is the whole of my concern.”

There. He had confessed, which was both mortifying and relieving. Fortunately, Mrs. Gardiner did not pity him, which he could not have borne.

“Then you had better come and see us.” She was still not looking at him. She might have been recommending a reliable coal merchant for all anyone passing by would know. “We are at home on Thursday. Come at one, and without your sister or cousin, I think. You are quite old enough to knock on a door by yourself.”

Mrs. Gardiner had offered him the invitation he had not known how to ask for, and he was deeply grateful for it.

“I can only promise you tea,” she said, tugging at the hem of her glove. “But I have never known Elizabeth to be cold without a reason. She can, however, be proud, and quick to judge, even sometimes mistaken, as we all are.”

It was not a guarantee. Darcy understood that. Even so, it was the first solid ground he had felt beneath his feet in four days.

“At one o’clock,” he said.