Miss Bennet had drawn her chair a little nearer the fire. With nothing left to occupy her hands, she had clasped them together in her lap, the fingerstightly interlaced. She looked up at his entrance at once, as if she had been listening for his step.
“I am told the horses will be ready shortly,” she said.
“Anders is satisfied they can take us on without risk.”
“I am glad to hear it.” Her gaze flicked towards the door, then back to him. “Mr. Darcy, I would like to . . .” She hesitated.
Darcy, who had been frowning, glanced down at her.
“You look as if you have something to say,” she said.
There was no escaping it now.
“I do,” he said. “It concerns what passed at the Lion, and what may follow from it if we are not careful.”
Her hands tightened together. “Then I should spare you the trouble, sir. You have already made your opinion of the matter abundantly clear. I see no profit in hearing it a second time.”
“I beg you to believe that I do not return to the subject from any love of it,” he said. “But the landlord here has it already from the post-boy that there were shots fired in the hollow. He will not resist ornamenting the tale. I would at least prevent him from adding a princess to it.”
“You need not fear that from me,” she said quickly. “I have no inclination to proclaim myself anything but Miss Bennet of Longbourn.”
“In which resolution I entirely support you,” he replied. “I have already directed my men that to every ear you are Miss Bennet, and nothing else. I will ask the same discretion of Mrs. Hobart as often as she requires it. I hope you will not protest.”
She glared at him and said, exasperated, “I shall do my best, sir.”
“Miss Bennet,” Darcy replied, pinching the bridge of his nose.
Her lips twitched and then steadied. “You see? We are already agreed. You do not believe a word of it, and I am resolved not to trouble you with it. What more is necessary?”
He might have left it there. It would have been infinitely more comfortable to do so. But the two dried peas shifted lightly in his pocket along with the Blue John stone as he leaned forward.
“One thing more,” he said. “You must allow me to say that although I still do not believe in your connection to Thurnia, I am no longer persuaded that you invented it.”
She stared at him. Colour rose slowly in her cheeks. “Indeed,” she said at last. “So you think me only a dupe, and not an impostor. That is a delicate distinction, Mr. Darcy. I hardly know whether to be grateful.”
It was a fair hit; he bore it as best he could. “You may call it what you please. I mean only that your conduct since we quitted the Lion has left me in little doubt of your sincerity. What you did in the hollow—what you have done since—is not the behaviour of a woman engaged in a conscious fraud.”
Her eyes wavered, then steadied. “But you still believe it to be folly.”
“It appears like a belief founded upon testimony that may not deserve the confidence you place in it,” he explained. “I cannot reconcile what you say with what I know of Thurnia. When such things are at variance, it is usually the testimony that is at fault.”
“Are you always so keen to rely so completely upon your own understanding when it is challenged?” she asked.
“It is not my understanding alone,” he replied. “I do not presume to set up my judgement against the entire world. But when a fact is asserted that contradicts every authority I possess, I must doubt the fact before I doubt all the rest.”
“And what august authorities are these,” she said, “that outweigh the whole ofmyexperience? My father was a son of the current king, though not the eldest. I am thus a member of that royal family.”
This again. “My acquaintance with Thurnia does not rest on idle rumour,” he said, more stiffly than he intended. “I am acquainted with Prince Adrian from university.” He waited to see how she would respond.
Her brows rose. “You know my cousin?”
Darcy closed his eyes. “I know Prince Adrian, who has assured me there are no Thurnian princesses.”
A furrow appeared just above her nose. “Are you certain your friend is truly a Thurnian prince, then?”
“I am certain.”
“Based upon what evidence?”