Page 143 of Colour My World
Elizabeth’s laughter joined his, lighter, like wind ripplingthrough autumn leaves. The tension that had wound so tightly between them had finally snapped.
Darcy shook his head, the corner of his mouth still curved, eyes brighter than she had ever seen them. “May we walk?”
Elizabeth let out a final breath of amusement, then inclined her head. “Yes, please.” She took his offered arm.
The path was still damp beneath their feet. The mist was reluctant to leave, clinging to the hills and curling at the edges of their boots. The scent of rain-soaked earth and crushed grass filled the air. For a long moment, they said nothing.
Elizabeth glanced up at him, her expression unreadable. Then, “May I ask you something absurd?”
“You may ask me anything.”
She tilted her head. “At breakfast that morning, at Longbourn, you scarcely said a word.”
“I remember.”
“You stared at your plate as though it might offer salvation. I used to wonder if you feared Mrs Ecclestone would devour you whole.”
“Only figuratively.”
She smiled. “I always meant to ask what were you looking at?”
Darcy hesitated, then answered without flourish. “Staffordshire. Blue. Vine pattern. One leaf bore seven points instead of five. The glaze was uneven. A hairline crack along the rim.”
Elizabeth blinked. Then, laughed freely, fully. “You memorised the china?”
“It was the safest object on the table.”
Her laughter lit the air. He let himself join it, a lower sound, warmer, real.
“I thought you were judging us,” she said.
“I was judging the potter’s consistency.”
She looked up at him again, eyes dancing. “And what was yourverdict?”
“A respectable piece. Uneven in places, yet serviceable.”
“How appropriate.” She slipped her arm more securely through his. They descended the path towards Longbourn. Neither spoke. But the silence had changed. It was no longer heavy with uncertainty, no longer a battleground of words unsaid. It was comfortable, expectant.
Then, he said, “My mother believed in certainty.”
Elizabeth turned towards him. “As in fate?”
“Yes.” He hesitated. “In knowing one’s course before one could understand it.”
“And what did she believe of yours?”
Darcy’s lips parted, but it took him a moment to answer. “She foresaw you.” He smiled at her. “When I was still a boy. Before I had any notion of what such things could mean.”
“Me?”
“Not by name. But she told me I would know the one meant for me when I looked at her and saw the world in colour.”
Elizabeth’s grip on his arm tightened.Had she felt it, too?
“And did you?”
“At the assembly. The moment I saw you.”
