Page 2 of Darcy's Guarded Heart
After parting with Charlotte, Elizabeth made her way down the lane at a brisk pace, arriving at the house a little out of breath. The sun was beginning to set, and a sharp breeze reminded her that it was already late October. Before she knew it, the long dark days of winter would be upon her. Not that she minded. She had always been fond of the cold season, especially when it snowed. There was something singularly enchanting about Christmastide in the snow. And after that, her other favourite season would follow spring. She loved how the world awakened anew after the cold of winter.
There was something peaceful about it.
She narrowed her eyes when a decidedly unpeaceful sound spilled from the open windows of the drawing room. Her mother’s shrill voice.
Elizabeth could not yet distinguish her words, but she did not need to. Those high, urgent notes could belong to no other. No doubt she had just received news of the new occupant at Netherfield Park. It would be a long evening indeed if her mother had made such a discovery.
And if the new arrivals proved to be bachelors? There would be no end to her mother’s raptures. Not that Elizabeth could wholly blame her. Any woman with five daughters must, inevitably, concern herself with securing them respectable husbands. As much as she had hesitated to say so to Charlotte, there came a point when a woman without a prospect might indeed find herself looking at the dreaded shelf.
Not that she or her sisters were yet in danger of such a fate—none of them had yet passed one-and-twenty.
She took a steadying breath as she neared the door, bracing herself for whatever storm brewed within—only for the door to spring open and Thomas, the family’s ward, to run out. Without preamble, he seized her wrist and pulled her away.
“And pray, where do you think we are going?” she protested, though she did not resist as he hurried her across the courtyard.
“Trust that I am doing you a kindness, Lizzy. You do not wish to go inside just now. Your mother is in fine form.”
“I heard her voice as I approached, so I already suspected as much. Is it about the new neighbours?”
“Indeed, it is.”
They made their way across the yard to the stables, passing the groom and a stable hand, both of whom cast them curious glances but said nothing. It was hardly unusual for Thomas to be found here, after all. He pulled open the door, and the familiar scent of hay and horse met Elizabeth’s senses. Only then did Thomas finally release her wrist, waving her inside before shutting the door firmly behind them.
“You will thank me later,” he said. “Your mother has already repeated the same speech twice—once for Jane, once for Kitty. She is now on her third repetition, as Mary and Lydia have just returned from Meryton. I daresay she will not wish to repeat herself a fourth time for you.”
“And what, pray, is all this excitement about? I saw a procession of carriages arrive earlier. I trust they are all younggentlemen in desperate need of wives?” she teased, dropping onto a bale of hay. The horses nickered nearby.
Thomas sat beside her and leaned back, letting his legs dangle from the haystack as he had done since childhood.
Elizabeth smiled, suddenly reminded of a day almost fifteen years past, when six-year-old Thomas had first come to live with them. She had just celebrated her fifth birthday when he arrived, and though she had been too young to fully comprehend his circumstances, she had been delighted, nonetheless. It had been her fondest wish to have a brother.
Her mother, newly delivered of Lydia, had been most put out by her continued failure to produce a son, and Elizabeth had taken it upon herself to remedy the matter, praying earnestly every Sunday in church and each night before bed that a brother might miraculously appear. And in a way, one had.
Of course, Thomas Bennet—though he bore the family name—was no true brother. They shared the last name due to his mother, Bessy Bennet, her father’s unfortunate cousin.
“What are you smiling about?” he asked, perplexed.
“Nothing—nothing to do with our present predicament. Only that I recall the first time I saw you sitting on a bale of hay just like this.”
“The day I arrived.” He nodded. “I remember it well. I was terrified. I had no notion who these Bennets were, nor why I was to live among them. I felt as though I had been in that carriage for days and days, though upon further reflection, Brighton is but a day and a half away. At the time, it seemed an eternity.”
“I know it. And I remember how quiet you were at dinner—so unlike the Thomas I know and cherish now,” she said, giggling.
“Yes, well, your mother had prepared some dreadful dish—the memory of which I have done my best to suppress.”
“It was haggis.”
“Did you not hear me? I do my best to suppress such a memory. But if you insist on torturing me with this memory, I shall indulge you. Haggis. Dreadful. She made it because she had been informed that my branch of the family had settled in Scotland and thus presumed, I would appreciate it. I did not.”
“No, and nor had you ever even been to Scotland,” Elizabeth remembered. The aunt and uncle who had taken him in after his mother’s death had moved to Scotland and deposited Thomas with another relative in Brighton from where he’d joined them. Though Mrs Bennet had never been one for paying attention to detail.
“Quite right. I thought she was exceedingly displeased with me for not eating it. That is why I came out here to hide—I thought she would be cross with me.”
“She was not. Only disappointed. But you could not have known. You had yet to become acquainted with the delight that is my mother.”
“Indeed, not yet.” He smiled wryly. “I did, however, become acquainted with you that evening. I remember looking up to find you lurking in the shadows, watching me as though you expected me to steal a horse.”
She laughed aloud. “I did not! I merely wished to marvel at you, for I was convinced that my prayers had summoned you.”
