He stood near the foot of the stairs, speaking with the landlord in low, decisive tones. He held his gloves in one hand and his hat tucked beneath his arm. There was nothing in his posture of the man who had been forced to spend several nights in inferior lodgings. He might have been exchanging polite conversation in a drawing-room, so steady and collected was his manner.
She heard the landlord mention something about a mail coach.
“I shall not see your household disadvantaged by our presence,” Mr. Darcy said, in a tone that carried clearly to Elizabeth’s ear. “You have been taxed more than enough by the storm. See your own people supplied first, and my party and my servants after them. If there is any shortfall, you must charge it to my account and make it up when times are easier.”
The landlord, who had been wringing his hands in a practised manner, brightened visibly. “You are very good, sir. Very good indeed. Anders and Johnson have been of the greatest service in the stable, I must say. I am sorry they have been obliged to share the kitchen pallets with my own lads.”
Mr. Darcy averred, then turned and saw Elizabeth upon the bottom stair.
Their eyes met. Whatever regret he might have felt for last night’s exchange, it did not appear in his face. He bowed with impeccable correctness.
“Miss Bennet.”
“Mr. Darcy.”
There was a brief pause, as though each awaited a further remark from the other and both were determined not to provide it. Mrs. Hobart descended behind Elizabeth in a swirl of cloak and cap-ribbons, her expression that of a general surveying a battlefield.
“Mr. Darcy,” she said. “I see that you are prepared to depart. Shall we?”
Elizabeth could have sunk through the floor.
Mr. Darcy frowned. “In another quarter of an hour, madam.”
“I am sure you know best,” Mrs. Hobart replied. “Come, Princess Elizabeth.”
Mr. Darcy’s gaze flickered at the title. Elizabeth thought she saw, for an instant, a flash of something more than mere annoyance. Then it was gone.
Out in the yard, the cold seized them at once. Elizabeth drew her pelisse more closely about her. She could feel the snow, which had fallen again in the night, crunch beneath her boots. She had watched Mr. Darcy endure Mrs. Hobart’s complaints with more patience than Elizabeth herself possessed, had seen him speak to the innkeeper and his wife as though they were equals worthy of respect. It made no sense to her. Mr. Darcy showed consideration to everyone else. How could he be so honourable in every particular save his judgement of her?
Their carriage stood prepared. Anders and Johnson were at the horses. Elizabeth saw at once that the traces had indeed been inspected and rebuckled. The animals tossed their heads, their ears pricked for the road. There was something reassuring in the efficiency of it all. Whatever else might be in confusion in her life, Mr. Darcy’s carriage, at least, was well managed.
Mrs. Hobart produced a succession of small matters that required attention: a misplaced reticule, which was discovered upon the seat she had vacated; a bottle of cordial, which must be wrapped in flannel lest it break; a letter she had forgotten to give to the landlord and that must now be entrusted to a boy, with elaborate instructions. Each delay was trivial in itself, but it had the effect of stretching the minutes into a quarter of an hour.
Elizabeth, standing by the step of the carriage, could see Mr. Darcy’s mouth tighten once or twice as he checked his watch. He made no complaint, only went instead to see that his own portmanteaux were properly secured and that the post-boys had received their directions. When Mrs. Hobart at last permitted herself to be handed into the coach, he merely offered his assistance to Elizabeth with a cool politeness.
His gloved hand was steady beneath her fingers. He gave her no more than was necessary; there was no pressure, no lingering. Yet the memory of him saving her from falling in the coach came back with uncomfortable force.
Now, as Mr. Darcy took his own place, Elizabeth could not help but notice that the arrangement brought his long legs uncomfortably close to hers. When the carriage jolted over the threshold from yard to road, their knees brushed. He drew back at once, but the small involuntary contact was enough to send an entirely unreasonable heat creeping into her cheeks.
She felt Mr. Darcy’s gaze upon her and glanced up to find him watching with an expression that was almost . . . confused. Her hand moved automatically to smooth her skirt, and she could not say why the change in his attention unsettled her more than his disdain had. What had shifted?
They travelled in silence. Mrs. Hobart dozed, or at least contrived to appear to do so, with her head resting against the squabs. Mr. Darcy’s gaze now appeared fixed on the landscape outside his window, yet she had the curious sense that he was aware of every movement within the carriage.
The rhythm of the wheels, the sway of the coach, the occasional creak of the leather straps might, in other circumstances, have lulled Elizabeth into a kind of thoughtful calm. But her mind was too busy.
She thought of Longbourn, of Jane’s face as she had watched the carriage depart. Of her father’s hand pressed for a moment over hers when he had placed the little parcel of books in her lap. Of Hertfordshire lying somemiles off the Great North Road. Of Mr. Darcy’s face when he had refused her request the night before: not unkind, exactly, but utterly unmoved.
Mr. Darcy’s proud reserve, his unwillingness to be pleased, his air of criticising all around him—these had combined, upon their first meeting, to form a unpleasant impression. Neither his conduct since, nor his manner since their quarrel, had inclined her to amend that opinion.
And yet.
He had bent when she requested his assistance as a gentleman, even when he did not wish to. And she could not unsee what she had seen that morning: the quiet way in which he had spoken to his men; the care he had taken for his horses; the absence of any complaint about his own discomfort. She could not forget that he had gone himself into the snow to help at the scene of the overturned cart while Mrs. Hobart had insisted that they drive on. He did not boast of these things. He did not even appear to consider them remarkable. He simply did them, as though they were a natural part of his duty.
The man was at once irritating and capable.
The coach went on, mile after mile. Snow lay thinner here; the fields had a patched appearance that suggested repeated thaws and frosts. They passed a hamlet, a cluster of low cottages, smoke rising in thin blue threads from their chimneys, and then a small church with a square tower. A solitary bell tolled as they went by, slow and measured, marking out the hours.
After that, there were only fields again. The hedges grew higher, the road more deeply sunk between them. Here and there, the snow still lay in thicker drifts where the wind had driven it, but the track itself was mostly clear.