Duty and Desire (6 page)

“Do not concern yourself, dearest. He is a man grown and can take his knocks. You know his happy nature. He will recover.”

Georgiana returned him a serious regard. “But what of Miss
Elizabeth
Bennet? Did she correct her opinion of you? How shall I meet her if Mr. Bingley does not return to Hertfordshire or wish to renew the acquaintance?”

Darcy almost dropped her hands in astonishment. “Is
this
the meaning of your distress? You wish to meet Miss Elizabeth Bennet! Pray…why, Georgiana?”

His sister gently pulled her hands from his grasp and, with his eyes intent upon her, rose from the divan and walked to the old pianoforte at the window. She ran her fingers along its smooth, polished side before turning back to him and his question.

“I told you in my letter that I cannot bear to think that someone you admire does not return your admiration and, indeed, thinks ill of you. I would know whether she admitted her error.” She looked to him for confirmation but, seeing his face, hurried to add, “Oh, not in words, perhaps, but in her regard? Did you part on amiable terms?”

“As a gentleman, I cannot say whether the terms were regarded amiably on Miss Elizabeth’s part. That would be for her to affirm or deny,” Darcy replied carefully, his curiosity at his sister’s interest in Elizabeth overcoming his determination to put away all thoughts of her.

“Were they amiable on your part, then?” The innocent, hopeful look Georgiana cast him gave him to wish he had tried more faithfully to follow her sisterly advice.

“I followed your advice to the best of my poor ability.” He smiled ruefully as he joined her at the instrument. “I was as amiable as I am able to be on a ballroom floor.”

“You
danced
with her, then?”

Darcy could have groaned. The more he attempted to conceal, the more his sister seemed to learn. At this rate, she would soon be in possession of the entire story. He looked in wonder at her as she stood there before him, her eyes so alive with interest. Her transformation was astonishing — nay — miraculous, and Darcy meant to know exactly how it had taken place. He would start tomorrow. He made a mental note to interview at first light the woman under whose care Georgiana had overcome so grievous a wound.

He shook his head at her, refusing to answer her question, then smiled down into her upturned face. “My dear girl, if you would have a moment-by-moment account, you must provide me greater sustenance than a dish of tea. Now, what have you ordered for this dinner Mrs. Reynolds spoke of? For I warn you, I am
that
hungry!”

The dimple that cleft his cheek was swiftly matched by its feminine counterpart as Georgiana returned his loving gaze. Softly, she slipped into his arms once more. “Oh, Fitzwilliam, I am ever so glad you are home!”

His arms tightly woven about her, Darcy looked thankfully to Heaven and then, burying his face into her gathered curls, could only find the strength to whisper in reply, “No more than I, dearest. No more than I.”

S
itting back in the chair at his study desk, the corner of his lower lip caught between his teeth, Darcy perused once more the letters of reference he held in his hand. Satisfied that he had committed all the particulars of the first to memory, he laid it aside and proceeded to the second as the baroque clock on the mantel struck a half hour past eight. As regular as that timepiece, the door to the study opened, admitting Mr. Reynolds and a footman bearing a tray laden with Darcy’s morning coffee and toast.

“Reynolds.” Darcy looked up from his reading and motioned the footman to lay the tray upon his desk. “A moment of your time.”

“Yes sir, Mr. Darcy. How can I serve you?” The older man signaled the footman to depart and to close the door behind him.

Darcy laid the remaining letters upon his desk and looked up intently at the most senior member of his Pemberley staff. Reynolds’s knowledge of the inner workings of life at Pemberley was comparable to none, and during and after the elder Mr. Darcy’s illness, his unfailing guidance in all things pertaining to the great house had been as necessary to Darcy as Hinchcliffe’s had been in the financial arena. In short, he was a man who held the Darcy name and family almost as dearly as Darcy did himself, and Darcy trusted him implicitly.

“I find that I must place you in a deuced awkward position, Reynolds, but the matter is of such import that I must ask you to bear with it and assist me.”

“Of course, sir!” Reynolds affirmed his willingness, although his face registered some surprise at his master’s preamble.

Darcy looked away from the kindly face, his embarrassment about the request he was to make acute. “Well, there is no delicate way to put this, so I shall be straightforward with you.” He turned, then, back to him. “What can you tell me of Miss Darcy’s companion, Mrs. Annesley?”

“Mrs. Annesley, sir?” Reynolds’s eyebrows shot up. He slowly rocked forward on his toes and back again before answering. “Well, sir…She be a fine woman, sir, quietlike and dignified.”

“And…?” Darcy prodded, as uncomfortable with insisting upon more answers as Reynolds was in giving them.

“And what, sir?”

“The woman has been in residence for four months,” Darcy observed grittily, annoyed with the man’s obtuseness. “There must be more you can tell me of her!”

Reynolds frowned from under his bushy, white brows as he brought his finger to his stock and pulled at it. He took a few more moments to clear his throat. Then, pulling himself up painfully straight, he addressed Darcy in a tone fraught with disapproval. “I don’t hold with gossip, Mr. Darcy, as you should know. Don’t listen to it and don’t pass it.” He squinted down into his young master’s countenance and, seeing the dissatisfaction etched upon it, added carefully, “All I will say is, she don’t give herself airs, and she’s kind to all the staff, from top to bottom, sir.” He fidgeted a little under Darcy’s silent, searching gaze before bursting out, “Miss Darcy is wonderful fond of her.” He looked for a reprieve from any further expectations and, finding none, seemed to wrestle with himself for a few moments before confessing finally, “And I bless her, Mr. Darcy, bless her morning and night for what she’s done for Miss; and there, sir, is the end of it.”

“That will be all then, Reynolds.” Darcy dismissed him, his lips quirking at what was, for his butler, a spirited defense of the lady. Mrs. Annesley had Reynolds’s approval, and there was much in that. Perhaps he could put more credence in the degree of glow issuing from those references that lay before him concerning the lady. He reached over and poured some of the fresh cream into his cup, then filled it to the brim with the fragrant brew before picking up the two letters again and searching out the third. Bringing his coffee to his lips, he blew on it gently as he committed the facts of the third letter to memory. The contents of the letters were not unknown to him. He had read them just as diligently upon their arrival five months before, when he had been frantic for a new, trustworthy companion for Georgiana. But this time he looked for something more revealing of the lady than impeccable qualifications and unexceptional testimonials from past employers. That “something” still eluded him.

He tossed the letters down again and rose with his cup to contemplate the soothing view from the window. Before his passing, this study had been his father’s private preserve, its carved, wood-paneled walls a place of mystery during Darcy’s childhood and a place of judgment during his adolescence. It was an intimate room and had served as the estate’s book room until three-quarters of a century before, when a new, grandly appointed library had been included in his great-grandfather’s plans for Pemberley’s improvements. Now, although the study continued to house treasured tokens of Darcy patriarchs, it served principally as an archive of Darcy’s personal book collection as well as the papers and folios that recorded the business interests and estate affairs of the family since such records had been kept.

Added to the masculine amenities of sturdy chairs and tables, displays of exquisitely crafted edged weaponry, and hunting prints was a superb view out the study’s several windows. His shoulder propped against a frame, Darcy stared into the sunken garden laid out many years ago by his grandmother. It lay bedecked in a shimmering gown of snow, its pristine whiteness in artful contrast to a variety of evergreens within the garden’s design and the red-brick walk that meandered delightfully about it.

As pleasing as was the view, it soon disappeared from before Darcy’s eyes, transcended by visions of Georgiana at supper the night before. The dinner she had ordered was more than satisfying, consisting of many of his favorite dishes and a fine wine that had complemented all. The table had supported a tasteful arrangement of flowers and greenery, prepared, he discovered upon his mention of it, by her own hand. She had blushed faintly in pleasure at his approval and thanked him with a graciousness of temper that he had never surmised from her in the past.

Their conversation had been of local matters: children born to his tenants, deaths in the village, the harvest festival in Lambton and the annual service of thanksgiving at St. Lawrence’s a month previously. All the while he had observed her, gingerly testing the extent of the changes in this new creature that was his sister. There were moments still of shyness and hesitancy. His teasing remarks were occasionally answered with a glance of uncertainty; yet she had replied to his questions concerning their tenants and neighbors in sure tones, a gentle, newfound compassion suffusing her countenance as she spoke. By the end of their meal, he could only sit and marvel at her.

She had risen when the last cover was removed to leave him to a glass of port, but he had refused, declaring that surely she
must
have a piece to play for him after all these months and
several
letters professing her diligence. She had laughed, her happiness in his company transparent in her face, and allowed him to lead her back to the music room, where she had played for him a full half hour. Then, bringing forth his much-neglected violin, he had joined her at the pianoforte and they’d played duets until their fingers ached.

Darcy looked down at his left hand, flexing it against the remaining soreness, but a sound at the door brought his head up. His lips pressed into a firm, straight line. The lady was early, but all to the better. Perhaps he could now get some answers.

“Enter,” he called, but the only response was a shuffling of the doorknob and a strange tapping noise. “Enter!” he called again, and the doorknob turned just enough to allow the door to fall away slightly from the frame. Confounded, Darcy straightened and took a step. “What the —?”

The door suddenly burst aside on its hinges, and a large blur of brown, black, and white launched itself across the floor. Darcy bolted to his desk and dropped his cup before the whirlwind could come upon him. “Trafalgar — sit!” he bellowed and braced himself for certain impact, but the moment the words left his lips the hound’s hindquarters hit the polished wood floor. The animal skidded the last several feet, his front feet wildly pawing for purchase before coming to rest against the toe of Darcy’s boot. A large pink tongue flickered over the black tip before the animal raised deliriously happy eyes to his master’s face.

“Mr. Darcy! Oh, sir…I am so sorry, sir!” Darcy looked away from the ridiculous grin of his errant beast to behold one of the junior grooms standing in the doorway seesawing from one foot to another while wringing his cap between his fists. “I was bringin’ ’im in, as you ordered, Mr. Darcy. He gave me the slip, sir. He’s
that
canny.”

Darcy looked down at Trafalgar, who meanwhile had turned his head back over his shoulder to observe the groom’s recital. If he had not known better, Darcy would have sworn the animal was laughing. He shook his head. “You may leave him with me, Joseph, but should he escape you again, march him back to the steward’s entrance rather than letting him into my study. He must be made to learn
some
manners.” Darcy leaned down and grasped the hound’s muzzle, lifting it to his gaze. “That is, if you wish to continue a
gentleman’s
companion.” Trafalgar snuffled a bit at his tone but then barked his agreement, sealing it with a surreptitious lick of Darcy’s hand.

“But, Mr. Darcy, I never let ’im in!”

“You did not open the door, Joseph?”

“No, sir; never, sir! He was in your study afore I reached the hall corner.” Both men looked sharply at the hound, who was totally occupied at the moment with exhibiting behavior appropriate to a beast belonging to the most discriminating of gentlemen.

“You mean to tell me that he opened the door himself?” Darcy demanded incredulously. The young groom twisted his cap again and shrugged his shoulders.

“Excuse me, but it is quite possible the hound
did
open the door on its own,” a smoothly modulated, feminine voice interrupted gently. “I have seen it done as a trick, although the animal must first be trained to it.” The groom moved away from the door and tugged his forelock at the lady as she came around him. She smiled and nodded to him before turning to Darcy and making her curtsy. “Mr. Darcy.”

“Mrs. Annesley!” Darcy glanced at the clock, which faithfully displayed the fact that the time was indeed nine and his appointment with Georgiana’s companion was upon him. This was definitely
not
how he had envisioned their interview to begin. But the consternation he was feeling at being caught off guard was deftly hidden. “Please come in, ma’am.” Darcy stepped back and indicated a chair.

The lady inclined her head and entered the study, walking gracefully past the groom. Trafalgar looked at her with interest and rose to carry on an investigation, but the impulse was quelled by a stern look from his master. He lay down instead at Darcy’s feet, his muzzle on his paws and his eyes flicking from one to the other in anticipation.

Mrs. Annesley appeared to Darcy much as he remembered her from five months before, save, perhaps, for the amused twinkle in her eye as she surveyed Trafalgar, who had taken upon himself guard duty of his master’s boots. Last summer, Darcy had looked not for a merry heart, but for a steady character, whose motherly understanding and firm principles might rescue Georgiana from the depths of heartache and self-recrimination into which she had fallen after Ramsgate. Apparently, the lady had possessed such a heart in addition to his requirements and had succeeded beyond all his hopes. Whatever her method, he thought, he was prepared to be extremely generous.