Pamela Aidan - Duty and Desire

“I had meant to receive you properly,” she murmured against the haven within which he still held her. “I had meant to be quite formal, you know, and say, ‘So, you are home, Brother’ and ‘How was your journey?’” She pulled back from his embrace. “But it all flew out of my head when you came and stood over me. Oh, dear, dear Brother!” The smile she bestowed upon him gave Darcy’s heart to turn again within his chest, and once more he could not speak.

“Will you have some tea now before you dress for dinner? It is all here on the table.”

“Y-yes,” he managed to respond, “tea would be perfect.” He released her with reluctance and allowed her to lead him down onto the divan beside her. The dimple they both had inherited from their father peeped out from her softly rounded cheek as she set about pouring. It deepened yet more as she turned to present him his cup.

“There, you have not been gone so long that I have forgotten how you like it, but do tell me if I have remembered amiss.” He took the cup and sipped at it cautiously, determined to pronounce it perfect regardless of the taste. But there was no need of prevarication. It was just as he liked, and for some inexplicable reason, that fact seemed to loose a wave communicating sweet relief from the heavy, haunting guilt he had carried since spring. The sigh that escaped his lips was unquenchable. Georgiana laughed softly but, at the curious light that arose in his eyes, lowered her own to her cup in some confusion.

“You have remembered exactly, dearest,” Darcy hastened to assure her, hoping to see the dimple again, but Georgiana remained preoccupied with her cup. Although a hundred questions concerning her transformation fought one another to be voiced, he hesitated to broach the subject, fearful that its mention would shatter the wonderful peace that sheltered them at this moment. It would be better not to stray outside the bounds of polite social intercourse, he decided, until he was more sure of her condition. “Should you like to hear of my journey home?” he inquired gently, “or would you rather hear of London?”

At his question, her delicate chin rose slightly, but she still did not look at him, preferring instead to examine the intricacies of the tatting of her napkin. “Truly, Brother, I should like most of all to hear of Hertfordshire.” Her gaze flickered quickly to his face and then away. Darcy could not guess what she saw there, for his surprise at her request was complete, and he had had no opportunity to school his features.

“Hertfordshire!” he repeated, somewhat hoarsely. Something inside him clenched, and a sudden remembrance of lavender and sun-kissed curls sent shards of longing to pierce and shred what remained of his equanimity.

“Yes,” she replied, her dimple returning as she tilted her head and looked directly at him. “Your letter from London told nothing of the ball. Was it well attended?” The reanimation of her manner put Darcy in a quandary. How devoutly he wished to forget Hertfordshire or, at least, to relegate it to those times when he was safely alone and able to come to grips with the memories it conjured up. So quickly its mention had discomposed him, sending him into places he dared not go without great care. Yet this dangerous subject was the one thing that his sister most desired of him!

“Yes,” he answered her, looking away, “it was extremely well attended. It was not long before I began to believe that the entire county was in attendance.” He hoped his dampening tone would discourage any further probing.

“And Mr. Bingley? He must have been pleased that so many honored his invitation.” Georgiana smiled in anticipation of her brother’s affirmation of Bingley’s pleasure.

“Bingley was quite pleased.” Darcy paused, ostensibly to indulge in more of his tea but, in truth, to order his thoughts. “I should say that Miss Bingley was pleased as well. At least at the start of the evening,” he amended. A questioning look appeared on Georgiana’s face, but she did not pursue his qualification. Her interest, as he would discover, lay elsewhere.

“Did he dance with the young lady you wrote of? Miss Bennet?”

“Yes,” Darcy replied curtly.

“Did he show her any particular attention?” Darcy looked closely now at his sister but he could detect no ulterior interest in Bingley’s affairs in her bright eyes. No, she does not ask this for herself, he decided. She does not think of him as anything other than my friend.

“He very nearly made a fool of himself over her, I regret to say,” he replied in a voice rather more harsh than he had intended, “but he has come to his senses and put Miss Bennet behind him. I do not believe he will return to Hertfordshire,” he ended firmly but softened at his sister’s paled countenance. “It was nothing very shocking, Georgiana, just poor judgment on his part, I assure you. He is well out of it and a wiser man for it.”

“As you say…but poor Mr. Bingley!” Georgiana’s face clouded, and she looked down into her cup. After a few moments of silence between them, wherein Darcy deemed the subject closed, he put down his own cup and, relieving Georgiana of hers, possessed himself of her hands. They lay soft and compliant in his strong, corded ones, and she did not resist as he brought first one and then the other to his lips in tender salute.

“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.”

Sitting 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.