Page 3 of Transforming Mr. Darcy
Elizabeth smiled, imagining the fun she should have had sharpening her wit on Mr. Darcy. Instead, she would have to defend him. She felt rather determined to do it, too. Despite her anger and yes, disappointment at his remarks, she had been on the receiving end of Mildread’s irritation herself in the past. As a result, Elizabeth pitied the man rather than despising him. He deserved a set-down, but he truly had no idea the power or capricious nature of the enemy he had made. His remarkshadbeen unkind. Still, it would cause all sorts of difficulties were his hair to suddenly grow six feet in length, or he were to shrink to half his size, or he developed large, pointed ears.
Oh, how she hadhatedthose ears.
Elizabeth shuddered. She had learned her lessons quickly. But then, she couldseeMildread and knew what was happening. Mr. Darcy was not a Bennet, so he could not. And he did not strike her as the sort of man who indulged his fancy with tales of magical beings. Almost everything about him was sombre, from his dark clothing to his sceptical gaze. This was not a man prone to whimsy.
This all presumed, of course, that Mr. Darcy would remain at Netherfield despite his clear dislike for the area and its inhabitants. If he knew what was good for him, Mr. Darcy would quit Netherfield House at once.
Unfortunately, Elizabeth did not credit the man with that much sense.
There wassomething the matter with his mattress. Darcy stretched and rolled on his side to avoid the hard spot in the centre of the bed, but it seemed to shift with him. He flopped back, tossing his arms out wide. No, there it was again. He shoved a hand beneath his back to feel for whatever it was that was paining him.
He rolled to the other side. Still there. He sat up in the bed and pushed himself to his feet before flipping the mattress up. He felt along the bottom of the bedding, on the frame, but could find nothing. He lowered it and felt along the top. No hard spot.
Something small and light hit the floor. Had it not been so quiet, he would not have heard it. Darcy bent to pick it up. It was the shape of a small stone but weighed almost nothing. He rolled it between his thumb and finger. It rather had the size, shape, and feel of a dried pea. Where had such a thing come from? They were nowhere near the kitchens. He placed it on the small table near the bed.
He lay back in bed again but there was no relief. His back ached, almost exactly in the centre of his spine. “Damnation,” he muttered, reaching around to rub at the soreness. “I will never get any sleep on this ridiculous bed.” He dragged the coverlet and a quilt with him and sat in a chair close to the fire. Though it was still uncomfortable attempting to slumber sitting up, it was better than the bed. Darcy sighed. It was nearly dawn. He would simply have to make do.
He remembered the pea the next morning, but it was no longer on the table.
After several days with very little sleep, Darcy could feel the servants’ stares and predict their whispers. He had changed rooms every morning in search of a decent mattress, and he knew full well what he would have thought about a guest who did the same. Miss Bingley’s assurances were growing thin, and she began to act as though he was making a joke at her expense.
Cartwright, his valet, had even offered his own bed, saying that he knew it was very fine and quite restful. It was a sign of his desperation for rest that he did not quibble over taking Cartwright’s bed before agreeing. Yet the moment Darcy reclined, there was that spot again. If it were not for the dark bruise Cartwright could see on his back when he helped Darcy dress in the mornings, they might both believe that Darcy was imagining the entire thing. At least Cartwright could stem the tide of the servants’ gossip by relaying that bit of information. As much as Darcy detested being an object of anyone’s conversation, in this case, he understood the necessity.
“Sir?” Cartwright asked in the morning. “It is rather small, but might this be the problem?” He held out a pea. “The maid found it when she made the bed.”
It was the same pea as before. Darcy said nothing, simply took the pea and placed it on the bed table. Before he left the room, he glanced back. The little pea was still there.
When he returned for the evening, it had vanished.
It took several cups of coffee each afternoon for him to make his way through the engagements Bingley had agreed to attend, but he was determined to assist his friend. Bingley was quite taken with the eldest Bennet daughter, though Darcy suspected it would come to nothing as it had several times before. In the end, he was not certain how muchhe had assisted Bingley, who spoke and danced and played cards almost exclusively with Miss Bennet.
He had wished to fulfil at least one of Bingley’s requests. His friend had taken him to task for saying what he had about Miss Elizabeth at the assembly. Though Darcy stood by his original opinion of the woman, it had been impolitic to state it. He hoped to apologise and perhaps observe her more closely.
He had made the attempt, but it always took him a moment to gather his thoughts, and Miss Elizabeth had simply rushed into any conversational pause with her rapid, endless chatter. Darcy could not help but note that she was only that way with him. He made her nervous, and that made him nervous. She could not fancy herself in love with him after so short an acquaintance, could she? It was surely only the anxiety produced by being in company with a gentleman from a position in society so superior to her own. Yes, that must be it.
After the third such meeting, where he had heard more than he could bear about the seasons in Meryton, the novel her youngest sisters were reading, and the charms of Oakham Mount, wherever that was, he simply gave up and returned to another sleepless night at Netherfield. Each morning he placed the pea on the table. Each night it was gone. Until he felt it in the middle of his back.
The seventh room on the seventh night was the charm. With a happy moan, Darcy sank into the soft bed and slept deeply through the night. The following day, Cartwright told everyone that his master had taken ill from the injury to his back but was now on the mend. This explanation was accepted without much additional comment, for which Darcy was grateful. He was not pleased that he had disrupted Bingley’s household in such a way, but his friend, as always, would hear nothing about it.
“You have had a difficult time this past week,” Bingley said warmly. “I am sorry for it.”
Leave it to Bingley to offer apologies for something that had nothing to do with him. He truly was a good friend.
Darcy hoped that the rest of his stay would be an improvement. He had been too distracted by fatigue to relay his concerns about the Bennets to his friend, but now he wondered whether he should. If hehadbeen ill, perhaps he had not given Miss Elizabeth a fair chance. It would explain a great deal. As he recalled Miss Elizabeth’s strange and overly loquacious behaviour, he shivered and then flinched at the sharp pain near his spine. His back was not entirely healed, but the sleep had been restorative, and his mind felt a great deal clearer. Yes, he would rest first and wait to determine whether he ought toadvise Bingley to return to London.
Elizabeth kept runninginto Mr. Darcy. Why must the man follow Mr. Bingley into society when he had not the inclination for it? The first time she allowed him an opportunity to speak with her he had made a terrible hash of it. Every time he opened his mouth, the poor fellow insulted someone. It might even be amusing were it not for Mildread’s ire.
“I wish to apologise for having offended you, Miss Elizabeth,” Mr. Darcy had said in his serious way, “but I could not have known you would be listening.”
Elizabeth waited, but apparently that was the entirety of his message.
“As it happens, I was not listening,” she had replied. “Unfortunately, others were.” She mimicked Mildread by lifting a single brow. “I am sure it was not improved in the retelling.”
He winced.Good.It was not truly an apology when he was at the same time reproving her. Insulting man.
Mildread had been unimpressed with his show of repentance, and Elizabeth was afraid to allow the man to speak thereafter for fear he would set the fairy off again. Mildread had sulked for an entire day following the assembly, and a sulking fairy godmother was a trial not even Mamma’s nerves could surpass. Elizabeth wondered why Mildread remained with the Bennets at all when humans seemed to irritate her so.
Long ago, there had been fairy godmothers enough for any young lady who needed one and not only for finding husbands. But over time, Mildread told her, humans had become less grateful for magical assistance, greedier and more demanding. Most fairies had simply given up and gone away. But the Bennet family had managed to earn the loyalty and dedication of both Priscilla and Mildread. Elizabeth was not sure why that was, exactly. Whether the Bennet women had been unusually appreciative (she was not) or simply needed the help more than most (she did not), even they only had two fairy godmothers left, which meant that the girls had to share. Priscilla had appeared for Jane around her eighteenth birthday, and Mildread about the same age for Elizabeth. Mary was already eighteen, but because both fairies were spoken for, she would not have a fairy godmother of her own until either Jane or Elizabeth married. The Bennet sisters had always shared things—their clothing, jewellery, a maid—and this was no different. When there were five daughters, one learned to make do.
