"Mr Darcy."

"You look well."

"And yourself," nodded Elizabeth.

"Your family -- they are all well?" Mr Darcy paused, as Elizabeth was transported back in time to another such stilted conversation with him. Mr Darcy obviously misconstrued her expression. "I mean, considering."

"They are all well, Mr Darcy." Elizabeth looked to the door they were standing outside of, "Well, I only presume Thomas is well."

"I saw him only yesterday, he appears quite well."

It seemed natural, not by design at all, that they both at that moment turned to walk towards the park. Elizabeth could not imagine calling on her son at this time. To sit in their little crowded drawing room -- if they had such a room -- with Mr Darcy and their sons looking on at them. Not to mention her nephew, who if he was anything like his mother or his father, Elizabeth could not think he would help the situation.

"You came to London to see your son, Mrs Davis?"

"Yes, there are some things we must speak of."

"If you are referring to the reason neither of our sons is currently attending Oxford, I can assure you that while I cannot find their actions laudable, I do not think it constitutes general ill-behaviour. Indeed if I could see that the prank, could have, and perhaps should have been laughed off, then -- "Mr Darcy paused and Elizabeth saw that he was smiling. It was a rare sight.

"If you can find such behaviour amusing, then I suppose the world should too" countered Elizabeth, "But does Mrs Darcy find her son's wilfulness so entertaining?"

"My wife is no longer with us; she has not been for some time."

Elizabeth started, she had not known that and Mr Darcy's curious wording made her pause -- "I did not know I apologise."

"Do not make yourself upset, Mrs Davis, it was a blessing."

"A blessing?" If Mrs Darcy was indeed dead, Elizabeth did not know what to make of the fact Mr Darcy might be pleased over the matter. She had hoped for his happiness, not that he would be begging for release!

"I meant for her, she was ill for some time and to be no longer in pain...was a release Fitzwilliam does not remember a great deal and I am glad that he does not; it was difficult but it was time."

No wonder Mr Darcy's letter to her on Henry's death had been so sincere. He had experienced it all first hand.

"I still am sorry for your loss," Elizabeth was sincerely sorry for him. If his son barely remembered his mother, then Mr Darcy must have had a lonely life -- unless -- "you never remarried?"

"At first it seemed disrespectful to Amelia's memory, and then it seemed unfair to Fitzwilliam to disrupt his life when he was still a child -- and then --" Darcy lifted a hand in a shrugging gesture, "Excuses perhaps."

"I do not think you need to make excuses not for something -- not to me at least." Elizabeth shook her head. "It was a great impertinence."

Mr Darcy hid a small upward turning of his mouth, "It is not surprising that such questions should be on your mind, if anything it is I who should be asking how you are coping?"

"As best I can. I know I wrote something to you in response to your letter, but I cannot remember what. That time is a blur to me, but I hope I did your letter justice."

Mr Darcy just nodded, "I did not expect any response. I just wished to offer you my condolences."

"Ah but you forget, yours is a particular talent. And talents should not go unrewarded." Elizabeth ducked her head and bit her tongue; it seemed all too easy, and to remember what she had liked -- loved -- about this man, to fall back into her teasing of him. She had missed that. Not just with him, but with Henry also. She missed her equal. Teasing her children was not the same.

"Are you unwell?"

Elizabeth straightened her head, "No, I just. I do not wish to be ..."

"I think we are both old enough to find no comfort in hiding behind society's niceties -- and we are alone."

"It is good to see you. I did come to London to see my son, but I wished to see my sister. I have some notion -- perhaps foolish -- that if I mend that relationship somehow the ..."

"Past twenty years will not have happened?"

Elizabeth rolled her eyes at herself. "I said foolish notion. But Yorkshire is not the wilderness; I should not have drifted away from my family -- I never knew -- I never congratulated you on your marriage!"

Elizabeth did not say that someone could have written to her of it, but was it so unlikely? There was only one person who would have been thoughtless enough in those early days to write to her of Mr Darcy: her mother. But other concerns usurped her mind, more local and domestic matters than the fate of a man who had merely been a proud disagreeable lump in the landscape of Meryton for a short time was not in her mind. Mrs Bennet had spent more time searching out information about Mr Bingley; and that had ceased when she had read the notice in one of the London papers announcing Mr Bingley's engagement.

"It is not surprising ... "

"It is not the wilderness, we receive the London papers."

"Mrs Davis, I only meant to say it is not surprising that you were caught up in your new family."

Trying to begin her new family, thought Elizabeth, frowning as she thought of her anxieties at being unable to conceive in the early days of her marriage. Reading of the Darcys', marriage and then the prompt delivery of an heir could not have helped matters. Not that it would have been specific to the Darcys' any such situation would have depressed Elizabeth's spirits.

"I hoped for your happiness, when I said God Bless. Although perhaps I am presuming that you remember ... "

"No, you are not presuming. I remember. I wish that time at Pemberley that I had said something to you... It would not have been proper of course, but how mortified I felt at what I had said to you when I read ... "

"I wish you had not felt that way. I could not see it at the time, and not perfectly for a very long time afterwards, your leaving so suddenly from Pemberley where I had thought -- " Mr Darcy broke off and flicked his cane through some leaves before continuing, "Your reproofs benefited me immensely. I had not acted in a gentleman like manner."

"I did not know then ... "

"I do not think any action, past or present, excuses me from what I said to you -- or rather the manner in which I acted towards you. My life would have been very different. You improved me. I could not have been the husband I was without you. I regret that I caused nothing but damage in yours."

Elizabeth let out a deep breath she did not know that she had been holding in, with it came a volley of words that she had been holding onto for years, the unspoken tension between them was to be broken and Elizabeth could only hope the outcome would be positive; "I could not wait. No, it was not even that. I was hurt, blinded by my pride and my prejudice. Isolated by my jealousy. Henry was my salve. I could not continue being unhappy and focusing on my family. I needed to be happy."

"I would not begrudge you that. I would never begrudge you that." Elizabeth wished to believe him, but something about his tone,made her think he had had to convince himself, and perhaps he had not entirely done so. "As I said, I meant my closing of my letter. Although, how bitter I must have appeared to you, I hoped my actions at Pemberley would erase it, but if you still have that letter! I hope you have burned it."

"I have not. It was a lesson to me, and a reminder to myself that I should not be bitter ... "

"That answers my question!"

"No, I merely meant as a lesson in how to be open when it must cause great pain. I do not think I learnt it particularly well with my son at least. Children -- they take all your thoughts and your attention. It must have been doubly hard without your wife."

"I suspect we would have had very different view on what values we should raise our son with."

"Henry and I disagreed many a time. Particularly when Thomas was younger and Henry thought he should be allowed to fall off his own horses in life -- " Elizabeth had barely run that sentence through her brain before it had escaped her mouth. With a gasp she brought her hand to her mouth and tried to blink back her tears. "I beg you will excuse me, I must see my son."

If Mr Darcy was taken aback at her sudden change in demeanour, Elizabeth did not see it, turning away. The footsteps behind her told her that he was following her, she hoped out of a gentlemanly desire to ensure she made it safely to the door, despite her not being an innocent in need of protection, and not out of a desire to engage her in any more conversation.

Elizabeth reached to grasp the knocker, but was forestalled, "Allow me, Mrs Davis."

"Thank you," said Elizabeth, trying to sound gracious.

"I will not intrude on your time with your son."

This time she was sincere in her gratitude, and she watched him as he retreated across the road. He was as tall as ever. That was unlikely to change and he still had a dignified mien, but he was more open now. She wondered if that was what he had learnt from his wife. Or rather, what he had learnt from losing his wife. She wondered whether he had loved her. And which her she meant.

Something churned inside her that she could be thinking about such things, when Henry was barely cold in the ground. Almost eighteen months was nothing compared to the lifetime they had had together. She had thought she was over this. She was over this; it was nothing more than seeing a man she had loved, that she had great hopes for, again. Now they had met, they could go on as indifferent acquaintances. Or even friends. Their experiences, the ones they had had together twenty years ago, the ones they had shared through Wickham, and the ones they had shared separately such as the loss of a spouse, had merely made them able to be honest with each other.

The door opened and an elderly retainer peered at her; it took two rather loud conversations in order for her to be ushered into her son's rooms. The retainer announced her and then shuffled out.

But he had announced her to a rather startled boy who was most definitely not her son. She suddenly froze when she thought this must be Mr Darcy's son. Except she saw nothing of him and that seemed wrong to her.

"Ma'am! Er -- Aunt!"

Elizabeth laughed both at her nephew's confusion and her own. Although his confusion seemed to stem from the fact that the room was in some disorder, Maximilien tried to surreptitiously push some of the mess upon the floor under the armchair he had been lazing in before had jumped to his feet.

"My son?"

"He is not home, ma'am -- Aunt. Do...sit down."

Elizabeth looked at the sofa, which was covered in newspapers, a riding crop and quite possibly an old scone. She then looked back at her nephew who was eying the sofa with some trepidation. Elizabeth bent and swept everything to the floor with her reticule before taking a seat. "I presume my sister has chosen never to visit you here?"

Maximilien laughed, "It was a mutual decision that it was best she did not."

"Different items but Kitty was just as --" Elizabeth searched for the right word -- "disordered at your age." Except she did not know that; the young man in front of her was of age, give or take a couple of months. When Kitty had come of age she had been a mother several times over and Elizabeth had not known her.

"She has not changed so much." Maximilien paused, "I wished to say, that I am very sorry that I led Thomas into... "

Elizabeth put up her hand, "I am proud to say my son is his own man."

"Indeed, but I am at least two years older ... "

"And age brings wisdom."

"My father says with age comes stupidity." That was said with a smirk.

Elizabeth was not surprised that was one of Lord Ashbourne's flippancies. Except like the man, it was not entirely a joke. One became entrenched, unmoveable, blind, cautious.

Maximilien was a handsome boy, with an open face, he spoke of his parents with irreverence, but not, Elizabeth thought, without respect. She could see why Thomas liked his cousin so. She had worried that he might have been blinded by wealth and consequence; she had a habit of making such assumptions, it was a habit she should really try and break. But her nephew seemed to have no airs and graces. He did not even appear to have the sort of proper pride that Charlotte Collins had often spoken of.

Of course she was basing this on first impressions, and those had been faulty enough in the past, but she hoped that she was not incorrect on this occasion.

"That sounds like the Viscount. I cannot imagine he considers that it applies to him."

Maximilien snorted, "Of course not, ma'am -- Aunt."

"I do not think I like Ma'am Aunt. Aunt Lizzy would do quite as well."

Her nephew did not have long to dwell on his embarrassing gaucheness; he seemed too much his father's son, unused to being socially awkward as they were distracted by her son's entrance.

"Mama!"

If it was possible, her son was even taller than when she had last seen him. She clung to him for only a moment, conscious of an audience and not wishing to embarrass him. "Am I forgiven?" It was a warmer welcome than his letters had given her hope for.

"There is nothing to forgive."

Elizabeth squeezed his hands.

"If you would excuse me -- "

"Oh no, Max, we cannot turn you out! I shall take Mama to a hotel. There is nothing to offer in the way of luncheon here. "

"Do not lie, Thomas!"

"Max." Thomas sounded reproving, "I hardly think that is an appropriate luncheon for my mother."

"You will be giving Mrs Davis the impression that I find it suitable."

Elizabeth had assumed they were talking of ale, or some other liquid substitute for food and foolishness. Now she was not so sure.

Her nephew had not finished, "Darcy does not find it ... "

"I think my mother is fully recognisant of the fact none of us approve!" said Thomas.

"I wish I knew what it was you did not approve of!"

"Our cook can only cook one thing," said Thomas. "And that is -- "

"Burnt." Finished Maximilien for him.

Elizabeth blinked, "Burnt what?"

"Just Burnt." Maximilien sounded rueful.

"Thomas I accept your invitation for luncheon, but you must let me -- "

"No, it will be my treat. You have come all this way, because I was so " Thomas lowered his voice, "rude to you. I beg you would forgive me."

Elizabeth curled her arm into her son's and smiled up at him. She was happy to have him restored to her in such good spirits. "Then you will not mind me offering a suggestion to avoid the burnt?"

"The club?" said Maximilien.

She had a thought: had they put Thomas up for London clubs? Thomas was not born to the world of London clubs and gambling! But she pushed down her maternal worries, determined not to let them spoil the moment. "No, home."

"Mama."

"If you came home ... "

"Apart from that time you burnt my birthday cake."

"Thomas, you were ten and that was hardly my fault."

Thomas grinned at her and Elizabeth squeezed his arm in mock annoyance.

Elizabeth knew her son better than to presume his manner and mood meant he had abandoned his searching into her past. She had just needed some fortification, not just for this, but to balance the shock at seeing Mr Darcy and their conversation.

She put her knife and fork down, "You asked me some questions in a letter, which I was not prepared to answer then but I am now."

Thomas looked up at her, fork half way to his mouth.

"Finish eating at least," said Elizabeth exasperatedly. Men and their food. There had been a moment in her marriage that she had thought that perhaps Henry would morph into Mr Hurst. Luckily, however, Henry could put food into a little compartment of his life and enjoyment. Lucky for him, because Henry would have not liked being married to Mrs Hurst.

Thomas hurriedly shoved his plate aside. "I do not wish to intrude ... "

"Thomas," Elizabeth tried not to sound irritated.

"I know I have pried and I cannot say I -- " Thomas shrugged his shoulders, "Perhaps I should not ask questions and you should just tell me what you will."

"It does no credit to me."

"Have you called someone tolerable, I suppose?"

Elizabeth blinked. He knew of that? "I thought you said you would let me speak."

"Sorry, Mama."

"After my sister eloped, or should I say ran away since no marriage was ever announced, my father sent Kitty away. I thought it was because he wanted her to improve herself, so that she would not make the same mistakes as her sister. I thought it was unnecessary that with some care and guidance, that if I was a better sister -- but she was to go away. It became apparent to me that once that was done, my father thought he had absolved himself of his duty, or his failings over Lydia. All his proper feelings passed away, more quickly than they should. I had thought I had known his faults, I thought he spoke only depreciatingly of his lack of ability to be ashamed for long."

Indeed Elizabeth herself had told her father not to be so severe upon himself; her heart had gone out to him on her return to Longbourn, what he must have suffered and to not hear a word of sense spoken about him, what with Jane so consumed with looking after their mother. She had thought she was trying to shoulder his burden, not remove it completely.

"Kitty wished to go to London for the little season; it was only mere months since Lydia's elopement. We had never met the family. But my father saw nothing wrong with his actions or hers."

"But if she was unhappy at school -- " Elizabeth squeezed her son's hand. It had taken Thomas a little while to settle into school himself. He had hated being away from his home.

"She had better come home to us; all I saw was her escaping. Then Lord Ashbourne. I did not think she loved him. I thought the worst and you will let me beg off telling you what I said to her when she returned to Longbourn for the wedding. It was hardly sisterly. You understand now that it was ill-conceived words spoken between sisters that forced a wedge between us? Well a further wedge from childhood, favouritism and the thoughtlessness of Lydia."

Thomas nodded, then he opened his mouth before closing it again.

"You may ask me something if you choose."

"You were jealous?"

"Of Kitty? Yes. She seemed to suffer no ill effects. Lydia -- nothing. I thought it meant she did not feel, did not think, as she should have."

"You were not jealous because of ... "

"Whom she was to marry?" Elizabeth laughed. "No, I did not know your uncle from a sack of potatoes. I foresaw unhappiness for him and her when he discovered his wife had deceived him, but no, I never wished I was marrying him."

"I meant someone else."

Elizabeth gave a wry smile, her son was not stupid. "Let us say I was jealous that my hopes were dashed, when I had been a good dutiful daughter. Not perfect. If I had been perfect I might have been long married before Lydia's foolishness."

"How did you know Mr Darcy, if you did not know Lord Ashbourne?"

"Netherfield. It was let one Michaelmas, to a Mr Bingley, a great friend of Mr Darcy's. He, Darcy, and Mr Bingley's sisters came to the neighbourhood and caused a great stir. Not as much as the militia, but there were more of the soldiers to go around than there were single London gentlemen."

"So Mr Darcy introduced your sister to my uncle when she was in town?"

That was an idea that had never struck Elizabeth before. She had assumed that it was mere coincidence that Kitty had met and married the cousin of Mr Darcy. In her darkest moments she had thought of course there must only be a finite number of rich handsome men that Kitty and her school friend could have set their caps at, that of course some of them must be related to Mr Darcy. But, of course, Kitty had already known one of them. She had never thought of that

He wasn't even sure why he was attending. Societal duty was only one part of it; an adverse reaction to being cooped up in his townhouse was perhaps another part of it.

Darcy had been sure that he would conquer this deep feeling of regret. That his actions, his misapplication of his parents' maxims, led him to acting in a manner that befitted no one. To insult a woman under the guise of love... that was a move worthy of a Wickham, not a Darcy.

At first Darcy thought that Elizabeth was so misguided and stubborn that she deserved nothing in the way of an explanation, but he could hardly sleep with the knowledge that she was alive in the world and thinking ill of him. So he had written her that letter. He wondered now whether what he had thought of as an objective account of all her accusations, was actually a rather bitter statement of a man disappointed.

A chance to rectify that came at Pemberley. He had not expected her, and he rather thought that surprise showed upon his person when he had literally run into her in the grounds. He had been determined to show her that he was not the ogre she thought him; at Pemberley, at his home, he was comfortable. He knew that was where everyone said he was at his best, apart from Bingley who thought him awful anywhere when he had nothing to do.

He'd gone to the inn, to see her, to speak to her...to declare himself once again -- no, Darcy did not know precisely what it was that had caused him to race to Lambton all a twitter. The maid had bobbed nervously and said that the Gardiners had left that morning.

They had left abruptly, and he had waited for some explanation, more than a single line note left by Mr Gardiner citing not much at all.

His feelings had overwhelmed him, and he disliked himself immensely when he allowed that to happen and perhaps he had let Miss Bingley prey too much upon him. He'd thought immediately that they had some illness in the family that called them away so hastily, but Miss Bingley had said that surely that would be mentioned in the note. After all it was natural that an illness to someone Elizabeth loved dearly would call her away from what he had thought she had been finding a revelatory trip. But it was naturally something that could be revealed in a note.

What could not be revealed in a note? Urgent business? Mr Gardiner was a successful businessman and he had already been told by that man that his business had prevented them from going to the Lakes. No, urgent business in town was a reason needing no secrecy.

No notice in the paper declared mourning, and no letter came for him at Pemberley. He had assumed that once whatever crisis was over within the Gardiner or Bennet family, that a letter of thanks for his hospitality would be swift. Neither Elizabeth nor her surprisingly fashionable London relations would be remiss in that duty. But it never came. Of course it was possible that there was no notice in any paper that Darcy was likely to see, and that Longbourn was shut up in mourning. Grief would put a hold on any happy feeling, and Darcy understood and respected that. If it was Mr Bennet, Elizabeth would be devastated, and Darcy could not intrude upon that.

But these thoughts were precisely the reason he had come back to London. Once his guests had departed and the business that took him back to Pemberley had been exhausted all he had been left with were his thoughts, and Georgiana's queries.

He had not confessed to Bingley his part in separating him from Jane Bennet. It seemed cruel to do so when all it appeared that it to serve was the easing of his own conscience. Elizabeth had given him no hopes, and he could hardly expect Jane to give Bingley any. Jane Bennet might be an angel, but Darcy had never thought her a fool, to be able to give herself to a man who had once abandoned her so cruelly? It was unlikely. Sending Bingley back into Hertfordshire with false hope, merely to satisfy his own curiosity and heartache? Darcy could not do it.

Indeed, Darcy thought, he had no grounds to think that Elizabeth even believed his letter to her at Hunsford. Of course, at the time he had thought her manner towards him as greatly changed as his manner towards her. But he had once been completely in error regarding her feelings; there was nothing to say that he had not once again deluded himself regarding her feelings.

Mrs Reynolds had commented, quite innocently, to him that Miss Bennet and her aunt had seemed quite interested in Mr Wickham's portrait. It was a possibility that their visit to Pemberley was merely to see what had been denied to that poor man by his wicked self. He could not believe that Elizabeth would be so blind, his letter so full of facts and the permission to apply to the Colonel. She would at least have to think -- but he could not know.

Even without Bingley there was nothing, but his pride stopping him from visiting Longbourn, and therein was the rub. Darcy was not sure he could make such a public spectacle of himself. For Mr Darcy to turn up in the neighbourhood, staying in a public inn, only, it seemed, to visit Longbourn? He knew village gossip and he knew what would be suspected: the truth, for once.

Without any encouragement? He found he baulked at it. If only he could discover what had sent them away in such a rush! (If it was not he who had done so). Once again he cursed his inability to perform well to strangers. If he had he might have someone in the neighbourhood that he could, with propriety, write to, to discover if all was well at Longbourn.

Darcy turned his head to watch, dispassionately, the set forming in front of him and frowned when he caught a glimpse of someone.

He found himself moving down the set, as he had once done at Netherfield, to keep her in sight. It took him a little time to be convinced that it was her; she looked different, the dress he supposed.

Her presence at a London Ball put paid to the notion that Longbourn was deep in mourning. He might think the youngest Bennet sisters foolish and wanton but not to that extent. Although she was not dancing, merely standing with a group of giggling girls.

"The Miss Muffets?"

Darcy turned to regard his cousin. "I beg your pardon?"

"You have been staring at the Miss Muffets for the past twenty minutes; it will be remarked upon."

Darcy had not thought it was that long, he had been thinking. "I was merely looking in that direction, deep in thought."

Ash looked unconvinced. "Then I beg you, when lost in thought find a blank wall to gaze upon, if you do not wish to raise expectations."

Darcy could not but think of Sir William Lucas and Meryton's expectations regarding Bingley.

"Unless you wish to be married and find this the easiest way to arrange it?" Lord Upton, one of his cousin's closest companions, joined Darcy's other side. Darcy was used to this sort of pincer movement. They had used it since boyhood to tease him.

"If you do wish to be married, Darcy, please do not go about it in this silly fashion; as my cousin, you do me no credit."

"I was merely lost in reverie. You may disown me if you like, but I was not aware your standing was so tenuous that any action of mine could topple it." Occasionally Darcy was able to get his own back.

Ash laughed. "I think only of you."

"I had not thought that the Miss Muffets would be acceptable to you, Darcy." Lord Upton remarked.

"You have thought upon this, Miles? I had thought no woman was acceptable to Darcy. There is always some fault he finds."

"I had thought they were not gently bred enough for Darcy's taste. Not of his sphere." mimicked Lord Upton.

"You sound like my Aunt,' complained Ash. "But the Bingleys made their fortune in trade; Darcy is hardly a hypocrite."

"Yet Darcy is unlikely to marry Bingley. Or his sister. Therein lies the difference."

It was at that moment that Darcy made his decision. He handed his glass to a surprised Ash and strode across the room to the group of girls that included the Miss Muffets.

Mrs Muffet, and another lady Darcy was sure he should know the name of, were clearly the chaperones of this little party, and those worthy women would hardly be expected to ignore an eligible bachelor making his way towards them. It was not improper pride to think himself an eligible bachelor; it was merely fact.

"Mr Darcy," Mrs Muffet curtseyed and the rest of the group followed. Darcy returned it with a bow.

"Mrs Muffet."

The conversation seemed briefly at an end, after all Darcy only had remembered her and her daughters' names when Ash had mentioned them. He had been introduced, he was introduced to all the young ladies in London it seemed sometimes, but he had not spoken two words to the party after that, or singled them out for any attention.

"It is good to see you back in London, sir. I believe, all young ladies rejoice when any young man comes back to town. After all, there seems to be such a dearth of dance partners."

Darcy had to silently applaud Mrs Muffet; she was far more subtle than Mrs Bennet. Though he was still afraid he would disappoint her. The young ladies were still a little drawn away from them, some whispering and giggling.

"I have come, ma'am, to claim an acquaintance with one of your charges. Miss Bennet." Darcy bowed again, this time in the direction of Catherine Bennet.

Miss Bennet had been watching him, somewhat apprehensively he thought, since he had accosted their little group, but she curtseyed; "Mr Darcy."

"I had not known -- " Mrs Muffet looked confused. "They really should not be out, sir. I ... "

Darcy was momentarily surprised. Miss Catherine had never appeared to him to be not out. It was a source of amusement for Miss Bingley and a source of contempt for his aunt that all five sisters should be out at once. Why in London was Miss Catherine suddenly not to be out? He decided it had more to do with Mrs Muffet wishing him to pay attention to the eldest Miss Muffet, a shy plain girl of one and twenty celebrating her third, or was it fourth, season.

"If you are not engaged, Miss Bennet, for the next dance?"

Miss Bennet hesitated for a moment, but it seemed an internal hesitation, not one based on the whispering of her friend or the half spoken indicts from her chaperones. He was, for once pleased in those negative traits he had observed in her and her sisters, now that it served his purpose.

"Mr Darcy," she gave him her hand.

He was wondering, as he led her into the set, whether that was all she could say. He had not heard her speak a great deal when he was in Hertfordshire;it was all her youngest sister's chatter, or the middle child's horrific playing of the pianoforte. If she was mute, she could hardly tell him what he wanted to know.

"Your family are all well, I trust?" The dance moved apart for a moment, so Darcy was afraid he would miss her answer, but she answered him when they were joined again.

"Yes, sir."

Darcy was at once relieved and worried. Relieved that no ill had befallen the family but worried that it meant that he had truly been the reason that Elizabeth and her family had left Lambton.

His next question was on the tip of his tongue, but he was interrupted.

"I hope your family is well, Mr Darcy."

"They are very well, thank you."

"Your Aunt?"

Why did Catherine Bennet wish to ask after his Aunt's health? She could only mean Lady Catherine. Perhaps there was some interest in hearing about other Catherines. "She is in health."

The dance separated, but before it did Darcy was almost sure he caught a look of distaste upon Miss Bennet's face. It had disappeared when the dance brought them together. "I am glad to hear it. She seems very liberal with her advice, it would be a pity if she was to cease doing so."

"I beg your pardon?"

"My cousin, Mr Collins, visited Longbourn recently; Lady Catherine was so good to remember us."

She probably managed to offend the entire household, thought Darcy ruefully. If his relations were appalling the ladies of Longbourn, one member of that family might remember his own comments about her relations and think him hypocritical. A charge he could hardly deny. Although any of his aunt's maxims being filtered through Mr Collins would surely be even further distorted.

What confused him was that Miss Bennet seemed touched by these concerns. Her previous concerns had seemed to revolve around soldiers and bonnets, not what other people thought of them, unless those other people were handsome young men.

"And are all your sisters in town, Miss Bennet?"

"No, sir."

"You are visiting your friends?"

She did not need to answer him verbally for him to see the patent reproof in her eyes.

Darcy was glad that no one here would know that he was about to borrow Bingley's line of questioning, which had all the subtlety of a runaway horse. "All your sisters remain at Longbourn?"

"No, sir."

She was either shyer than he had given her credit for, or she disliked him, or she had no intellect. Based upon previous assumptions, it was most likely the last.

"Which sisters?" he asked.

Once again Darcy reminded himself that making assumptions about Bennet sisters was a perilous activity. Looking at her face, he had a sudden feeling that she knew why he asked.

"My sister Elizabeth is visiting friends in the North."

He was now no longer uncertain.

"So, not a Miss Muffet." Ash joined him at the refreshment table.

Darcy was pouring lemonade. He was not so rude as to abandon Miss Bennet the minute they had left the dance floor. He had no desire to remain in her company although, she had not disgraced him in any way. But he would no longer leave any young lady open to comment because of his treatment of her. If his encounters with her sister had taught him anything, was that his actions -- his pride and selfish distain for the feelings of others -- did him no credit most of the time.

The table was overloaded and Darcy found no space for the glass he had poured for Miss Bennet, so he handed it to his cousin.

"Thank you, such a good cousin that you are."

"That is for Miss Bennet."

‘Miss Bennet. Is this the Miss Bennet?"

Darcy shot the Viscount a look; it was pointless to even ask where Ash had heard of the Miss Bennets, or that there was possibly a the Miss Bennet. The Colonel and his brother were close.

"No." Denying anything more to his cousin would only give his cousin more facts to put together, and if there was something the Viscount was good at doing it was puzzles. Darcy merely put his hand out for the glass, now that he had his own.

"You might spill it, Darce, after you."

This could only lead to disaster.

"Miss Bennet, might I introduce my cousin, Lord Ashbourne."

Miss Bennet nodded and accepted the proffered glass of lemonade from him. When Darcy turned to claim the other from his cousin, Ash looked at him blankly, "Have you forgotten your own lemonade?"

Darcy tried to keep his face equally blank, "It is quite all right I can do without lemonade."

"May I ask how you know my cousin, Miss Bennet?"

"His friend, Mr Bingley, had leased a house near ours."

This new restrained Bennet sister made Darcy wonder how much was new and how much was his own coloured interpretations of the past.

"If you are recovered from your generosity to my cousin (you need not tell me what an appalling dancer he is) would you do me the honour?"

Ash was rarely rejected and it was not one of those occasions. Darcy accepted that it his lot to dispose of the glasses of lemonade.

It gave him once again an excuse not to be dancing.

He had not learnt a great deal, except that no one was unwell, and that it would be pointless going to Meryton if Elizabeth was not there.

"Mr Darcy."

Darcy turned to see Mrs Muffet.

"Mrs Muffet."

"Can I ask you how you know Miss Bennet?"

Darcy stiffened, except he knew no matter how he felt it was not an impertinent question. He explained his recent stay in Hertfordshire.

"Then you will understand my concern," replied Mrs Muffet.

"You have nothing to be concerned over."

"My young charge, fresh from the schoolroom, indeed not even emancipated from there, was allowed to appear here at my dear friend's ball, after I succumbed, I hope not in error, to the begging of my daughter to allow them both to attend. I am not in the habit of allowing schoolgirls to dance. I had thought perhaps you were some family friend. But I have been misled by you it seems; I had not thought you the type."

Darcy could not help but glare at the lady to his right. That she should imply that ...

"And now Miss Bennet is dancing with -- " Mrs Muffet did not have to elaborate on the Viscount's reputation. Mrs Muffet clearly held him responsible for introducing her impressionable young charge to a man who could only break her heart.

But Darcy was not concerned with Miss Bennet's heart. Was the younger Miss Muffet a school friend of Miss Bennet's? Why was Miss Bennet at school?

What had occurred to make the Longbourn household, so free of governesses and masters, suddenly turn to a formalised system of education where the out were no longer out?

She wished to have private conversation with Kitty; they had many things to talk about, but she was not sure she wanted to launch straight into conversations that had been put off for many years. It also raised less suspicion this way for Emily and Henrietta, who would wonder why they could not meet their aunt. Here Elizabeth could send the girls off to look at trinkets.

Really the only obstacle Elizabeth could think of was that Kitty might not wish to step foot in such an unfashionable place, but Elizabeth could hardly wish her daughters to suffer the indignity of falling in love with something they could not afford to purchase.

Elizabeth need not have worried; it turned out that Elizabeth had inadvertently picked one of Kitty's favourite shopping haunts.

"You do not prefer somewhere where..." Elizabeth looked at the bolts of cloth in front of her. It was some sort of paradox those who could buy expensive cloth would have a dress able to be worn for years, and those who could only afford the cheap would find they had to continually replace, often leading to a higher cost than if they had bought the expensive cloth to start with. Of course the fashionable never wore their dresses for years.

"Oh no!" replied Kitty. "I must have something to source my creations." Kitty wrinkled her nose at a particularly offensive patterned muslin. "It was decided quite early on it was better to buy here ... "

"Unless you have improved over the years?"

Kitty laughed, "Decidedly not."

This led to a happy conversation regarding a gown that a fourteen year old Kitty had fashioned from one of Mrs Bennet's best dresses.

Kitty had brought her youngest daughter Bella, and the three cousins were happily pulling through ribbons. It brought back happy memories for Elizabeth. She'd spent many a day in Meryton with Jane, or with Kitty and Lydia. Although with the latter two, there was less giggling and more attempts to separate the two when they both found they were tugging on the same ribbon.

"Oh this is hideous!"

Elizabeth looked up to find Kitty holding a green and yellow vase. It was ghastly. "Are you in need of a vase?"

"I thought I might send one to Jane."

Elizabeth nodded; she had been looking through combs to see if any appealed to her. It was Jane's birthday and she always liked to buy something special for Jane.

Not only because Jane was quite her favourite sister, but to make up for the time when Jane was not.

"This one?" said Kitty.

"Not that one!" said Elizabeth, although Jane would pretend to like such a vase, and even put it on display!

"You should not simply nod then," smiled Kitty, replacing the vase.

"These mother of pearl combs are very pretty," said Elizabeth, pointing them out to her sister.

"It would be a very practical present, " reproved Kitty.

"Jane would approve," responded Elizabeth.

"You would know," was all Kitty responded.

"Kitty..."

"Yes?"

"I know you are close to Jane." Indeed Jane and Kitty had grown closer as Elizabeth had distanced herself from Jane, and torn up at Kitty. "You would know as well as me."

"Ah but ... "

"No buts; the first twenty years of my life I may have had Jane to myself, but we have shared her longer."

"Indeed, it was very hard for her, you know, Lizzy. It was very hard for us all. Lydia, and then you."

"I am sorry."

Kitty looked at Elizabeth, and Elizabeth could sense her calculation -- "I sense there is a but...."

Elizabeth shook her head, "No buts. I was angry. I thought everyone in the world mad but me!"

"You did not have to prolong your visit ... Indeed it was though you never returned to Longbourn after my marriage."

Elizabeth had returned physically to her home, but she knew what Kitty meant. Elizabeth had never been there in spirit.

"I could not trust myself not to speak." Elizabeth would never have exposed Jane to Mrs Bennet's ire, but it was the height of difficulty to sit there and watch and listen to their mother lament over Mr Bingley's continued absence when she knew the truth.

"It was Jane's decision."

"A faulty one," said Elizabeth heatedly before quickly turning her head away and composing herself. She turned back to her sister, "No, I cannot even say that now. She is happy. Perhaps she would have been happier but ... "

"You can hardly make that judgement, Lizzy. You judged Darcy harshly for thinking himself capable of judging what would make his friend happy, you cannot judge Jane's for her."

"I thought you had influenced her."

"Jane might be malleable but where she makes a decision she is firm. I tried to persuade her; we were allies, you and I, but we did not know it."

Elizabeth snorted. "I am ashamed to think of how I thought about the world, how I spoke to you. Heartily ashamed."

"You were angry. And then you could not think of the past and what might have been -- otherwise you would have ended up in Bedlam."

"You mean if I had only practiced what I preached and been patient? After all Mr Bingley came back for Jane."

"At his friend's behest," said Kitty, "and I think the stunning blow that Jane dealt Bingley might have caused that friend some concern."

Elizabeth had thought that at the time; why would Mr Darcy come to see her family if Jane, who Elizabeth had assured Mr Darcy was deeply in love with Mr Bingley, had acted so contrary to that advice? He could have easily thought her a liar, a terrible judge of character, or any number of things. If one sister could marry a Viscount perhaps they all thought themselves above mere ‘misters'.

That had fuelled her anger towards Jane but it had only been a small spark of it, the spark that she worked hard to remove, because it was selfish and petty. The bulk of her reaction had been based on the frustration that Jane was destroying her future.

Not only was it prudent to marry Mr Bingley, it was (Elizabeth judged) Jane's heart's deepest wish. Elizabeth had seen the way that Jane had mourned Mr Bingley's loss and her pain at Miss Bingley's rejection of her. That did not come from superficial feelings! Yet Elizabeth could still remember standing in the still room, upon her return to Longbourn for Kitty's wedding and hearing her sister tell her the news. Elizabeth had been venting her feelings regarding the wedding and Jane had just serenely sighed at her.

"I think, Lizzy, you are too quick to judge."

"Too quick to judge! I cannot see how I could be! I cannot judge Kitty's desire to flee school and this family, if she feels so abused, but in this manner? A manner that is likely to end in ruin and more scandal?"

"Lizzy, she truly loves him."

"Jane, I know it is your nature to see the best in people but there is a difference between the love of a title, of a house...and of a person. Only think of Mr Collins. He did not love any of us, he loved the Miss Bennets of Longbourn, indeed he did not even love them; he loved the duty he would be fulfilling if he married a Miss Bennet of Longbourn."

"Kitty is hardly Mr Collins."

"She is a foolish silly girl who has captured the fleeting attention of a man of consequence and thinks her life will be balls and parties."

"I cannot think Lord Ashbourne that foolish ... "

"All men are foolish. Look at our father. Look at our parents' marriage!" Elizabeth accidentally decapitated a flower in her wild gestures. Jane giggled at her.

"Are you sure you are not jealous, Lizzy?"

"I am not jealous of Kitty. Except, perhaps that she does deserve to be married. I don't think of me -- I think of you, Jane." That had been a lie. Elizabeth had thought just as much of herself as she had of Jane, but she had told herself so often of her selflessness that she had begun to believe it.

"Of me?"

"Mr Bingley. How unfair -- "

"Oh Lizzy. If you have been worrying about me, please do not."

"How can I not? Of course Mama has great plans of other rich men now that Kitty shall be nobility but the scandal of Lydia will out and the taint of fortune hunting -- not that your Mr Bingley would think of that ... "

"Lizzy!" Jane cut in sharply. "I have seen Mr Bingley."

"Mama -- " Elizabeth had thought if Mr Bingley had been in the neighbourhood then she would have heard about it -- ten times daily at least -- from Mrs Bennet.

"She does not know. I met him quite by accident before he reached the door." Jane put down her gardening shears. "I refused him, Lizzy."

"What?" Elizabeth did not think she had heard her sister correctly.

"He told me he loved me, and I told him I could not marry him."

"Because of Lydia?"

"No, Lizzy. A little."

"If he did not care -- " After all Mr Bingley must have known of Lydia at this point, surely he must? "Or you could have told ... "

"Lizzy! When Lydia ran off with Mr Wickham she acted without thought and without reliance on her own guidance. Her note said as much, it was his idea and she thought it a grand adventure! You said yourself that she was weak-willed, craven and fickle."

"No, Lydia was not to be relied upon, unless it was to ruin us all," said Elizabeth. "I do not understand why this affects how you loved Mr Bingley."

"Mr Bingley left Netherfield because Mr Darcy told him that I did not love him. Mr Darcy told Mr Bingley he was mistaken. Mr Bingley comes to me."

Elizabeth frowned, "I do not follow?"

‘Where was Mr Bingley's heart in all this? Why was he so easily able to be ordered around by his friend? Did he not trust in himself? How could I trust in that love? "

Elizabeth had had no response. It seemed Mr Bingley had come to be honest to Jane and had been condemned in the process.

"Do you see Lizzy? Our marriage, any of our marriages, would face more obstacles than a mere disapproving friend."

"But love..."

"It is not just about that, Lizzy, and if some friend chose to tell him to no longer love his wife?"

Elizabeth shook her head. Of course now she could wonder at how she, Elizabeth Bennet, had been so blinded by love. If she had blinded by the calf loves of your youth and disregarded any notions of prudence she might have ended up married long before she had even met Mr Darcy. She had always prided herself on being able to understand prudence in marriage.

There was always a limit to practicality. Charlotte Collins' marriage was evidence of that fact. The idea of having to order one's life to minimise the contact one had with ones husband? That was the height of folly.

But that was not what Jane had done. Elizabeth still wondered if Jane was trying to protect herself by sheltering herself from really feeling; really experiencing a true marriage.

"What do you think of this vase? I think it vastly improved on that green one."

The vase Kitty held was blue with yellow flowers and was pretty. It didn't have the willow pattern that was so popular, so there could be some hope that Jane did not have one identical.

"It is very pretty, but would it travel?"

"Oh that is not my problem! That is Ash's!"

Elizabeth laughed.

Kitty smiled, "Did not Henry convince you that his way was the only successful way?"

"Yes, even though his way invariably failed."

"But it provides much amusement to watch! Although a broken vase would do Jane no good. These are very novel, they would not break on the journey!" Kitty appeared to be examining embroidered fabric flowers.

"Useful if your guests are blind!"

"I think if I had blind guests I would just tell them there were flowers, not put fabric ones in their place."

"Very true, but perhaps they would smell the absence of flowers?"

Something struck Elizabeth about the trivial nature of their discussion, and how comfortable it felt. Even when they were discussing a period of great pain in their family and between the sisters it was absent of hurt. It seemed like a burden had been lifted from her shoulders. Of course they would have to discuss it, they could not avoid the matter completely, but it was not the crux of their relationship. They might not have been ‘sisters' in the true meaning of the word before but they felt like ones now. It was under the umbrella of this feeling that Elizabeth felt safe blurting out something.

"I saw Mr Darcy."

"You have seen Mr Darcy?" Kitty looked quite comical, frozen in place, fake flowers in one hand, vase held aloft in the other.

"Yes we had a quite pleasant conversation."

"Pleasant?"

"You are surprised."

"I had not thought pleasant characterised the majority of your previous interactions."

"Kitty, if you had not noticed, there is little point holding onto childish notions! Indeed I think you learnt that lesson before me! We are both grown with children, if we could not meet and be pleasant and open, I would think there was something vastly wrong with both of us!"

"So you found him radically altered?"

"No! Altered perhaps but not radically so. Naturally altered."

"But you said he was open! Is that a natural alteration of a man who lost his wife early, is a confirmed bachelor and has a demanding son?"

Elizabeth paused not knowing what to say before her sister continued.

"Or is he just determined to be open around you?"

"I think, you, with your better acquaintance, would know better."

‘I think it matters not how much time has passed. If a man's pride has been hurt, he will be determined to prove himself. And if a young lady's pride has been hurt, and her ability to judge a good character made a mockery of, then she too will be determined to prove herself.'

"What do you mean, Kitty?"

"I think you were both trying far too hard. You were outdoing each other with your laissez-faire approach to each other."

"I cannot believe you find fault with us being pleasant with each other!"

"I do not find fault, I just wonder what happens when you are both yourselves once more."

Elizabeth opened her mouth to tell her sister that there was far more to her and Mr Darcy's relationship than Kitty could surely know, but that was the point. She did not know how much Kitty had heard, and how true those mutterings were. If they had been filtered through Lord Ashbourne... Elizabeth did not think her brother-in-law would alter the truth, but anything he knew was automatically filtered through his own perceptions.

"Has Mr Darcy spoken to you of our dealings?"

"I know he proposed to you, that you refused him -- on the grounds of Jane and Mr Wickham. I know he explained himself to you. I know hearing of Jane's rejection of Bingley... You know Bingley quite blamed Darcy. Quite rightly I think, although he should, and did, blame himself equally. Anyway Bingley's rejection threw Darcy and then....you hurt him deeply with your marriage."

Elizabeth looked at the ground and then around to make sure none of their daughters were in close proximity.

"I do not think badly of you for marrying a good man, who you knew loved you, who knew about Lydia and did not care. I know you loved Henry deeply. You and Darcy seemed ships passing in the night -- albeit ships determined to lob cannonballs into each other without realising it!"

Elizabeth liked that analogy. So much miscommunication and misunderstanding and mistiming.

"Courtship was not meant to be so difficult. Not after Lydia, I suppose I had little patience and fight in me."

"Not with me living up to my reputation and Jane apparently casting hers aside and Papa!"

"At least we were both happy," said Elizabeth.

"Yes. Although I would have much rather you as Mrs Darcy than...I should not speak ill of the dead.'

"You did not like Mrs Darcy?"

"She was hard to like. She looked down upon me. I was not well-born enough, I was not witty enough. I think Darcy thought he was doing as he ought when he married her, some corrupted notion of duty, but also of your influence since I believe he did care deeply for her."

Mr Darcy had told her that she had improved him, thought Elizabeth had that been what he meant? Marrying a lady he did care for, but one that was suitable? Or not having such a strict requirement?

"You think she reinforced all of his bad qualities?"

"Some of them," Kitty was playing with a fringe, "not all. I think the danger comes from being alone and brooding and trying to raise a son, when you are rudderless." Kitty laughed. "I think Ash would roll his eyes at all my attempts to make you and Darcy ships."

"Boats."

"Are they? Is there a difference?" Kitty furrowed her brow.

"Is what a difference, Mama? Of what do you talk?" Miss Bella approached them, almost invisible behind an array of ribbons.

"Boats," said Kitty with a sly smile, "or is it ships?"

He hoped he had looked unremarkable when he had met Elizabeth so unexpectedly on the doorstep of their sons' shared lodgings. He was conscious of no sense of awkwardness between them. But he wondered whether that had been merely the fact that he had been determined that there should be none. Darcy had learnt a great deal through his life, some lessons served to him by his parents, his family, his son, his wife, and a great one from Elizabeth.

Before Elizabeth, if Darcy had thought of marriage his thoughts would have immediately turned to the example of his parents, or of his aunts and uncles. Strong dynastic marriages. Happy unions (on the most part) of people from the same world, with an equal expectation of themselves and each other.

Until Netherfield. There in Meryton he had felt a stirring of a mixture of emotions when he had been bewitched by a woman for the first time. Really bewitched. He had never thought of caring deeply for the young lady. It had never entered his mind. Of course he had never thought of entering a marriage with someone he did not like, but there was a difference between true and lasting friendship and what he had felt for Elizabeth.

The feeling was far similar to what he had felt for certain young ladies in his youth. But then he had not contemplated marriage. Then the idea of combining the feeling with marriage had never even been an option. He was exceedingly glad it had not! No one could ever convince him there was no such thing as ineligibility in a woman! There was a difference between base feelings, and the type of feeling that was for one's partner in life. Elizabeth had opened his eyes to that.

Perhaps he had been too bitter when he married Amelia. Her cutting humour spoke to his (what he now saw as) bitterness. She knew what she wanted and was forthright in seeking what she wanted. That was refreshing to Darcy, who never liked simpering females, nor had he once liked the type of woman who was too direct, but his attitude on that subject had done almost a revolution. Amelia's obvious interest in him attracted Darcy. She had no reason to fake that attraction.

She wasn't wealthy but her dowry was reasonable and her family respectable. Yet it was mainly her other attractions -- her wit, her personality -- that held the attention of other men. It was those attentions that let Darcy know that she had chosen him the man.

The only wish he'd ever made of Amelia was that she had lived to help him raise their son. He knew that their opinions would have differed. They were at variance on so many subjects in life that it was to be expected. But there was no doubt they would have loved their son equally, in all senses of that word.

Darcy assumed that since he'd raised Georgiana from when she was a little girl, he was in a far better situation, with mountains of experience, than any of his cousins, for all Richard was also Georgiana's guardian. He'd found however that when it came to a son, who he was responsible for since the moment he drew his first breath, things were completely new. Darcy did not know if he was making the same mistakes that his parents did. He tried to instil pride without prejudice. Self worth but not at the expense of others.

Some days Darcy wondered whether he was just making different mistakes.

Darcy finished with his cravat and reached for his coat. The action somehow reminded him of a day many years ago at Pemberley, reaching for a coat before almost running to Lambton. He shook his head. It was possible that he would see Elizabeth today, unlike that day. It seemed strange to him that suddenly after years of their closely intertwined family never colliding completely, that they were now crashing together. Their sons had met at Oxford. No, even before that, Darcy had reached out when Mr Davies had tragically been killed. Elizabeth had reached out to her sister, and Kitty to her. Ash had strode in determined to throw people together.

Perhaps he should be wondering at the fact they had never met before this. Although maybe it was not so curious. Henry Davis was not a man of substantial means. Seasons in London would have been out of the question. Even if visiting was possible, three children would focus all of Elizabeth's attentions; their needs would be put above hers. Darcy himself had no reason to visit Longbourn, a natural visiting place for Elizabeth.

For the first years he had always subtlety inquired whether Elizabeth, or indeed Jane, would be part of any party formed by Kitty and Ash. He'd learnt to stop asking since the answer was always a curt no. Darcy did not know whether it had been a compliment to him. But Ash's reaction to his questioning to recently at Pemberley made it obvious that Ash had not cared for his sensibility, and Darcy never really thought that was the reason; it was Kitty's feelings that Ash solely cared for.

It only confirmed something Darcy had begun to think over the years: If Kitty's sisters were not invited, or refused invitations, then it was a disagreement subsisting wholly between the sisters, not he who was the reason for the absence. He wished he could say, for the sake of his own character, that it had not taken him years to come to this conclusion.

Darcy did hear of Kitty's family. Neither Kitty nor Ash guarded their conversation around him, and for that he was glad. He was unsure how he would have felt if he had been treated like a blushing girl just released from the schoolroom, unable to hear even the most mild unpleasantness.

He had wondered whether Elizabeth had been told anything of him. Elizabeth's demeanour in the park, and not knowing of Amelia's death, had answered that question so decidedly!

That felt so strange to him: did he want her to be needing, nay, wanting details of his life? When she had chosen to marry another? He had not known Henry Davis but he would not wish an unfaithful wife, even in thought alone, on anyone. He also did not want to think so ill of Elizabeth. If she could marry without love, she would have accepted his proposal. Or Mr Collins'.

Or did it unsettle him more to consider the possibility she did not care to hear of him, that she was now so uninterested in him and his family?

In reality Darcy knew that the rupture in her family was no doubt the real reason that she had heard so little of his life. The communication lines had been broken, and even those that had been resurrected were unlikely to mention him.

Darcy pulled his jacket closed with a hard tug; he disliked thinking in this maudlin manner. It was a pointless exercise. It reminded him of his uncertainty before and after he had seen Kitty across that ballroom floor. It reminded him of anxiously awaiting Bingley's return from unknowingly being the advance guard, and then that empty feeling when Bingley had been unceremoniously turned away.

That was why he had eventually married Amelia -- no uncertainty.

The house felt empty; there was no need to employ a veritable army of servants. In the early days of their marriage they had not needed one either, it was only when Fitzwilliam had been born and Amelia had fallen ill that the house overflowed. Darcy found he did not miss the bustle. He knew Georgiana thought him lonely, but he strangely was not. He had his family and he had his friends, more of them than he probably deserved.

He wished that he and Bingley could have remained friends, but he knew that was impossible. Bingley blamed him for Jane's rejection, for which Darcy did take responsibility. If he had not interfered Bingley would never have left Jane's side. Where Elizabeth was concerned Darcy had only himself to blame. His hesitation, his damnable pride, his actions -- all seemed to result in destroying something that could have been.

Although if it was so fragile, would it have been worth it? The same argument had only served to anger Bingley beyond belief. Sometimes Darcy thought he still saw the port stain on the wall in his study. It was an argument that Darcy had had with himself in his darkest moments, when all hope of Elizabeth seemed gone and his cousin seemed determined to tie him to a life he was trying to forget.

Darcy knew that that night Ash had announced his engagement he'd spoken intemperately. He'd known it for years, and yet he only apologised for it recently. It had been worse than the ramblings of a drunken man. He'd insulted his cousin and he'd insulted his cousin's wife.

More than anything he'd insulted himself. Gone against his new resolutions!

He'd not meant to, but Darcy had found himself speaking in such a disgusting and vile manner. More than that, he'd found himself breaking the confidence Bingley had entrusted with him. Bingley who had come to him after a chance meeting with Sir William Lucas in town; the catalyst for Darcy to confess to Bingley and to urge him to return to Jane Bennet. He'd stood there and instead of toasting his cousin's happiness, Darcy had found the story of Lydia Bennet spilling out of his lips.

Darcy could still see his cousin's face and he did not think he would ever forget his words.

"You should be damn glad that you are telling me something I already know, because if you ever try with your bitterness or your pride -- do not tell me you meant only kindness, or that you think only of my welfare -- to destroy my happiness, I promise you it will be the last thing you ever do."

He seemed to have a habit of attempting to destroy friendships with his own actions. He just did not understand how his cousin could ignore his birthright, ignore everything society told him was expected of him. Ignore it all! It was not just ignoring it all, he managed to do that and behave admirably and win his chosen bride.

If Darcy had done the latter he would have married Elizabeth long before Lydia had had the chance to disgrace the family. If he had set aside his expectations, lifted his blinkers and seen the world.

He knew that reality was not a fantasy. It could have been.

Darcy found himself on the landing facing his painting; evidence that he was not a perfect person.

He'd always, for instance, written drafts of letters. Those of business he kept as a record of what he'd said: an important detail when organising prices and sales. Personal letters he usually ended up burning when he knew that the letter had been received. There was one draft of a personal nature that was particularly scratched and lined, but he kept it.

Amelia had found it. Darcy did not suppose she was snooping. She was his wife; she could have no jealousy of any other woman and Amelia was not the type of woman to be jealous for no reason.

But she'd questioned him. Wanting to know all.

He should have wanted to share everything with her, and in a way he did, he wanted to see the sympathy in her eyes, hear her perhaps condemn Elizabeth. He received neither.

Instead Amelia had congratulated him on his escape, understandable as he could have never married her if he'd married Elizabeth. She'd been of the opinion that a family so sullied and full of inconstant sisters and loud mothers would never have done for Darcy.

Her complete certainty that it had been an ill-fated flirtation had angered him. It had, to him, ridiculed and diminished his feelings and his sorrow.

Some of Amelia's reaction had to have come from her shared antipathy with Kitty. His mother-in-law described her daughter once to their son as ‘all angles'. Fitzwilliam had only been five; the analogy had been lost on him. It had not been lost on Darcy. Where Amelia had been angles, Kitty was all curves. It was expected they would clash. But over the years, if they had had the time, Darcy was sure they would have become great friends.

Darcy reached out and straightened the frame slightly. He'd still been angry with Amelia when she'd pressed and pressed him to paint something for her.

Another face he'd always remember: Amelia's when she'd praised him, as only a wife could, then the change in her expression when he'd told her what it was of. It had been like a slap to the face. He'd attempted to make some excuse that Kitty had reminded him of something, but Amelia had not been fooled.

The painting he was sure had been destined for burning but Amelia had hung it right where it still stayed to this day.

She'd just looked at him and never spoke of it again. He did not know what she meant by it, and he never had the courage to ask her. Had she wanted it there to forever punish him for what he'd done to her, and what he'd lost? Or had she wanted to show him she understood that Elizabeth had been part of his life, and had meant something to him. That she understood she'd hurt him by belittling how he'd felt.

Darcy shook off those musings and found himself in the breakfast room with no remembrance of leaving the landing and arriving there.

The newspaper was neatly folded by his plate like it always was; he was glad of the distraction.

He opened the paper and perused it. Calm suddenly reigned as it always did when Darcy felt in control. It was as though the dust had settled and left in its wake was clarity, in his household and in his life.

He flicked one of the pages; of course there was never any good news! There never was and the advertisements were all for frivolities. Pointless items that never did what they advertised. Amelia had delighted in them. Darcy had indulged her by never commenting and sharing his opinion.

When Darcy lowered the newspaper to reach for some tea, his vision was filled with the petulant face of his son. Darcy brought the newspaper back up again. He waited some moments before letting the corner of the paper droop. No Fitzwilliam was still there and the look on his son's face did not inspire Darcy with confidence.

"You wished to speak to me?"

Fitzwilliam's mouth opened and then closed again. "No, sir." And with that he was gone.

Strange child, thought Darcy.

A niggling voice, in the back of his head did point out that it was obvious that his son had wanted to speak to him. About something that was clearly troubling him. Or was something difficult to articulate. Darcy tried to dismiss it; if Fitzwilliam wished to speak to him he could, they had no secrets.

Well Fitzwilliam had no secrets from him.

Except he'd not mentioned Max's cousin Thomas Davis to him. Or their escapades that led to their suspension, or indeed the fact Max had been set upon by blaggards.

Darcy put down his newspaper and went in search of his son.

It was not surprising that his son was in his chambers. Darcy wondered why Fitzwilliam did just not stay here; he did not seem to spend a great deal of his time at his own lodgings.

But then he remembered what it was like to be such a young man and desirous of making his own way in the world. He could only hope that Fitzwilliam was not trying on the life that Wickham and so many of his contemporaries had embraced.

Neither of their personalities allowed them to have the free and easy relationship that Darcy observed between his cousins and their sons. Darcy had never had it with his father and it was not a regret he held. Darcy found he did not dislike being held in respect and esteem. More so now that he felt he was perhaps deserving of that respect and esteem. Darcy found himself unable to avoid being a strict parent. He wondered if that was the result of his character, or of the fact there was only one of him. Where there could be two sets of eyes focused upon a child, leniency was more acceptable.

He wondered also that whether where there were two parents there was a greater bond. A closeness. Darcy had perhaps drawn away from his son, from expressing his feelings properly to his son, because of a fear of swamping the boy.

Fitzwilliam was a child to be protected, not to be placed in the position of confidant and of having to bear his father's crosses.

He knew Fitzwilliam looked up to him; Ash had groaned often enough that if he heard one more ‘my father' from the little one's lips he would not be accountable for his actions. It made Darcy more determined to act correctly, to lead by example.

"Did you wish to speak to me, Fitzwilliam?"

His son shrugged his shoulders, not turning to look at his father.

"You are not normally this rude, I think," said Darcy.

This usually would have resulted in an apology from his son, but there was no response. Darcy wondered if this was part of his son becoming far more a man than he ever had been before.

Of course, both Ash and Richard had informed him that this day would arrive. Darcy thought they were both waiting for the day so they could decidedly smug, since Darcy had laughed at them both. He'd forgotten that his experience was in losing a father while still relatively young, the transition between son to equal had never occurred with his father.

Yet he could never have imagined his son behaving in any manner except politeness. To himself at least; he could not know how Fitzwilliam behaved in company where he was not present. More than likely with a degree of social awkwardness which might be mistaken for something else. Darcy would have wished away one of his less admirable traits that his son had inherited if he could, but since he himself had never grown out of it, he did not know how to cure it in his son.

"Fitzwilliam!"

It was then his son did turn towards him. "Father."

‘If you have something you wish to say to me, say it."

"You would not like it."

"I am accustomed to hearing things I do not like."

"Not from me."

Darcy inclined his head, "Not from you. But you are accustomed to hearing things you do not like from me."

A twisted smile formed on Fitzwilliam's face. He was no doubt thinking of the punishment Darcy had meted out on hearing of his prank. He had told Elizabeth that it should be laughed at and perhaps it should have been, but laughable or not, it was unbecoming behaviour. Darcy did not know what Elizabeth's response had been, but he knew even Ash had had a reaction, so Darcy did not feel so bad about his, in his opinion at least, trifling restrictions.

"You have made me look a fool."

Darcy could not prevent his eyebrows almost disappearing into his hairline. When he had offered to allow his son to speak to him as an equal he had not meant this!

"Davis asks you questions which I think are impertinent and unable to be answered by you, but you answer. Why did I never know that you knew Lady Ashbourne's family?"

"You never asked," said Darcy. It was an unfair response really.

"I have asked you about my mother, about everything..." Fitzwilliam did not add that Darcy had not been forthcoming. Darcy found himself unable to often open up about his feelings. Or explain himself particularly well.

"There is so little to say." Darcy checked himself, realising that he sounded so dismissive of his late wife. "I mean she was your mother and she loved you." Darcy knew his mother-in-law had told Fitzwilliam about his mother. A romantic view perhaps, but since he himself chose to think about his mother without fault Darcy could not deny his son the same view. After all it was cruelness enough that he had to live without his mother; it seemed vindictive to ensure that his son knew of Amelia's faults as well as her virtues.

"I do not disappoint you?"

"No."

"And Thomas Davis and his mother?"

Darcy smiled, "A young lady I knew long ago, and her son who apparently now seems to form an unholy alliance with you and your cousin. "

"That is all?"

"Now I feel I disappoint you."

"Of course not, father. I am glad we have had this conversation."

So when Darcy had asked Thomas to accompany him to Angelo's on St James Street, there could only be one answer.

It did mean that Thomas had to admit that his only experience with fencing had been play-acting with sticks.

"Oh that should not matter, we will hardly be serious," was Darcy's only response. Thomas was surprised at the other boy's affability. He was never consistent in his reactions, and Thomas just grew used to being surprised.

"I should not want to hinder your exercise."

"Well I shall inform you when you do so."

Thomas had clamped his lips around the obvious retort to when not if. After all, it was entirely probable that he would put in a poor showing. Perhaps that was why Darcy invited him. He could only look good against someone who had never held a sword before.

It was an unexpected courtesy that Darcy allowed him to observe some of the movements of the other fencers, and showed him the appropriate stances. Thomas did not think he could do too much harm, except to his pride; after all there were buttons on the end of swords.

The first time they had fenced together it had almost ended in disaster despite those precautions, but Thomas found himself a quick learner. Particularly since several times they had visited Angelo's Max had come with them. If Max was present then Darcy did not want to fence with him, even if he could be ensured a victory with Thomas.

This day he was sure that he would be fencing with some other gentlemen at the establishment as Max had joined them.

"We should introduce Thomas to the pugilistic sport!" said Max as they waited for several young men to spill out of Angelo's before they took the stairs.

For of course boxing and fencing went hand in hand at this establishment. Thomas had little interest in watching or participating in that sport, it was not new to him.

"I know how to box, Max," said Thomas.

"Who taught you?" said Darcy.

"My father." It had involved some considerable embarrassment, for Thomas, the first time he had managed to land a blow on his father. Although Henry seemed proud, Thomas now smiled at the memory

Max laughed. "So did mine."

Darcy only frowned.

"Don't sulk, Darcy. Can you imagine your father boxing?"

"I am sure he knows how," was Darcy's curt response. "He didn't teach me to fence either if that is your next question, Davis."

"I never -- " Thomas broke off, sensing it was pointless to defend himself.

"Oh but that would be encouraging bad habits!" laughed Max, "What if you wished to duel?"

"Don't be ridiculous, Max, nobody duels anymore." Darcy grabbed his sword and swished it through the air several times. Releasing some pent up frustration no doubt. After all Darcy always seemed to have pent up frustration, thought Thomas.

"And if they do, it's not with swords," added Thomas. It was not often that Darcy and he had the same opinion and rarer still that it was the opposite one to Max.

Darcy's lack of charity with his cousin might have been the reason that this day he practically demanded that Thomas fence with him. Thomas did not mind, he would not be so ruthlessly slaughtered today.

It did not take long for Thomas to get the upper hand which surprised him. He could only suppose something was distracting his opponent. Since he was winning, he should have realised that Darcy would use everything in his power to distract him; he just did not guess the source of that distraction.

"You know, of course, that your mother refused my father." Darcy's sword easily struck through to Thomas's shoulder. "A point to me."

Did the other boy mean that Mr Darcy senior had recently proposed to his mother? Thomas dismissed that immediately. He had to have meant before his father, and before Darcy's own mother. It was a possibility that Thomas himself had thought of and his mother had never really denied it, so he was unsure why he was so surprised now.

Of course he never thought that Darcy of all people would be thinking the same thing, and that he would be talking of it in a public forum.

How did he know for sure? It could not be that Mr Darcy spoke of his mother in such a fashion? It would be the height of incivility and Thomas would have to demand satisfaction, wouldn't he? Thomas was the defender of his mother's honour now that his father was gone.

"You have nothing to say, Davis?"

"No, except to say that if you speak of my mother slightingly again I will have to demand real satisfaction." Thomas raised his sword again.

"It is not slightingly. I have not insulted her by revealing the truth."

"If it is indeed the truth." Thomas managed to break through Darcy's defence. They disengaged.

"Oh it is. You see, my mother wrote me a letter."

"From the grave?" said Thomas disbelievingly. He knew it was a stupid thing to say the moment it slipped out of his mouth. Of course Mrs Darcy could not write from beyond the grave. Darcy must have meant a letter written before her death. He could believe that. Thomas knew his own father would have written him something, if he could have.

"Yes, from beyond the grave," Darcy struck his next blow with more force than before.

It seemed to Thomas that if Mrs Darcy was writing to her son about her husband's failed romantic exploits that she might have just had her priorities wrong. Surely a letter to a much beloved son should be filled with the advice and love she would not be around to deliver herself?

"Why should it matter?" said Thomas, finding it difficult to fence and speak at the same time. It was just another piece to a puzzle that Thomas was sure he had the main picture already completed in. It was just a side piece that perhaps explained his mother's reaction to everything. A spurned or disappointed love and her sister marrying the cousin. He could imagine it as a plot of a lurid novel. It was still difficult however to imagine his mother as the heroine.

Thomas found his defence broken and Darcy grasped the hilt of Thomas's sword and forced it to Thomas' chest. The side of Darcy's own sword was pressed to Thomas' neck. Since they were so close, Darcy did not have to raise his voice above a whisper. "Because my father loved my mother and I denounce anyone who tries to deny it."

Darcy stepped back and bowed arrogantly before pushing back through the spectators who had gathered to watch the bout.

"What was that about?" Max looked troubled and concerned.

"I have no idea." It was only a partial lie.

"How do you like London, Thomas?" Mrs Gardiner smiled at him, handing him a cup of tea.

The last time he had seen Mrs Gardiner he must have been ten; she looked much the same as she had then and her kind eyes inviting confidences had not changed.

Although when he was ten those confidences were likely to be about the apple pie he had liberated from the kitchen, not family secrets.

Thomas had almost made up his mind how to respond when Henrietta saved him the effort.

"How could he not? When we are cabin'd, cribbed'd and confined to carriages and walking to prescribed places, and he has the key to the city."

"I know what you have been reading," murmured their mother, not looking up from her embroidery. She'd told him that if Mrs Gardiner was so generous to them, the least she could do was to help recover the chairs, Mrs Gardiner's eyesight not being what it once was.

"Emily recommended it to me," said Henrietta defiantly.

"And Aunt Mary recommended it to me," added Emily.

Thomas, meanwhile was wondering if he had the key to the city could he return it? All it seemed to bring him was information that he could do little with. He could not inform or question his mother on such a subject.

He did not so much as wonder whether it was true; it explained too much. Thomas found himself wondering what it was that Mr Darcy lacked and his father excelled in. Mr Darcy had position and wealth. Of course his son was possibly proof there was a prickly character underneath the calm exterior and that was the kindest thing that Thomas could find to say about Darcy the Junior.

If his mother had not rejected him due to his character, perhaps she did it to spare him the taint of her sister? Although it did not seem to be an insurmountable object to any of his uncles. And the image of his mother sacrificing her great love had too many unpleasant implications for his parents' relationship so Thomas rejected it wholeheartedly. His parents had loved one another!

The other alternatives were that Darcy had it mixed up, or that his mother had been the one rejected when Mr Darcy had discovered the shameful behaviour of Aunt Lydia.

"Thomas?" Mrs Gardiner looked at Thomas's undrunk tea.

Thomas apologised for his distraction and crinkled his face up when he realised the tea was now cold. Mrs Gardiner looked conspiratorial as she turned herself away from his mother and she leant in towards him.

"How do you find your cousin?"

"Max? I like him very much indeed." Thomas thought if she was trying to keep their conversation private she could hardly have chosen a worse subject; one of the girls would surely hear the name and be immediately interested.

Mrs Gardiner sat back, pleased. "I am glad. I always thought you would make good companions. If...well I should not speak of that."

Thomas smiled, "Probably not, but I know of the disagreement between my mother and my aunt, but better late than never?"

"For more than one thing," added Mrs Gardiner.

Thomas looked at the door and was tempted to knock. But what would he say? He didn't think that anything he could say to the younger Darcy would placate him. Thomas didn't know if he even wanted to placate him. After all, as much as Darcy was convinced his father was blameless, Thomas was almost as convinced his mother was blameless, although perhaps not totally. He'd learnt enough of the world to know that in a disagreement between two people, there was rarely a situation where one was totally innocent and one was the villain.

Thomas was still staring lost in thought when he realised that someone had come to lean against the wall.

"I've always found that coming between two people, intent on some sort of relationship, in this case apparently enemies, is never a good idea." Max paused, "But I was never one for good ideas."

Max wouldn't know how much Thomas suddenly believed in that thought.

"Thomas?"

Thomas turned away and leant on the door, "I don't think this is my argument."

Max looked like he would have responded but Thomas suddenly fell backwards and almost flattened Darcy.

"Why are you loitering outside my door?" said Darcy, once he'd managed to disentangle and straighten himself.

"If you did not take so long to get ready we would not have to loiter," said Thomas, earning a laugh from Max and a glare from Darcy.

They were attending an engagement at Ashbourne House. Max had complained in the Hackney that it was doubtless to be a tediously formal evening. Thomas didn't know if Max knew or suspected the reasons for the formality: the gathering of people who had a lot to say to one another but not much impetus, as far as Thomas could see, to do so.

It wasn't until after dinner that Thomas thought Max had, for once, got it wrong. Gossip of the political and the familiar nature took up most of dinner. Although Thomas was sure his mother would never have described it as gossip. Since she had often lectured the children, and their father sometimes, on the base nature of gossip and how it ruined lives.

It wasn't so formal that everyone was forced to only make polite conversation with the person next to them. Chatter flew up and down and across the table. But after dinner, everyone broke off into little groups.

Lady Carling took up her position at the piano. A tall and graceful woman, although she had seemed less inclined to partake in the conversation around the table. She seemed more at home behind the piano. Two more different people than Mr Darcy and his sister Thomas could not readily bring to mind. Of course one was fair and one was dark, but Mr Darcy had a commanding presence and somehow you seemed to be able to guess his thoughts, Lady Carling was inscrutable, fading into the background.

At least that was how it seemed to him. Although Thomas was realising he was not perhaps the most observant person, or the best judge of character.

He could see similarities for instance between his Aunt Kitty and his mother, where she apparently saw none. Part of her explanation for the rift had been differing personalities. He could see less in common between his Aunt Jane and his mother. His Aunt Jane had the same introspective character as his Aunt Mary. But Aunt Jane did have the Bennet searching eyes.

His contemplation of Lady Carling meant he did not notice being joined by Max.

"I think perhaps it is time we removed ourselves to the billiards room."

"My father always told me being bored was a weakness of character." Thomas responded cheekily.

"It is not to cure boredom but prevent that..."

Thomas looked where Max was looking. Darcy. Of course.

Darcy was glowering. It seemed to Thomas that this particular brand of glowering was about to accompany an outburst. Thomas turned further to look over his shoulder, this time at what Darcy was glaring at.

He was glaring at his father, and Thomas's mother.

They were sitting on a sofa, intent on conversation. It was nothing extraordinary as far as Thomas could see. But they did not look displeased with each other, which made Thomas' theory that Mr Darcy had rejected his mother for such a superficial reason rather less likely.

His mother would never forgive that sin. Thomas was almost sure of that at least.

Or perhaps at the time she had not thought it superficial? It only seemed that way because of the happy marriages all of the sisters had made.

"Do you not think so?"

Thomas was aware that for the ...well thousandth, perhaps...time in as many days he had been oblivious to a conversation going on about him.

"I beg your pardon?"

Henrietta, who had as far as he was concerned appeared out of nowhere, looked impatiently at him. "Do you not think we should be dancing?"

Thomas could not think of anything worse. He would after all be surely forced to dance with his sister. He caught up his wineglass to give him an excuse, but his sister apparently had other ideas.

"I think Mr Fitzwilliam would like to dance?" Henrietta sat down and smiled at her cousin.

Thomas tried not to spit up his wine at the look on Max's face.

Henrietta did not need a real answer from either of the boys. Instead she swept Miss Fitzwilliam up in her wake to beg Lady Carling to play something they could dance with.

"Please remember that you refused billiards!" said Max in an anguished whisper.

"Every gentleman should make it his duty to like dancing." Thomas had not seen his uncle approach. Lord Ashbourne leant over and lowered his voice, "particularly my son."

Max muttered something unrepeatable under his breath.

"Ask the lovely lady to dance, Maximilien," was his father's only response.

It appeared that Lady Carling chose an older style dance to begin. The brave couples stood facing each other. Thomas had managed to avoid being bullied into dancing, so too it seemed had Darcy.

His mother and Mr Darcy were still sitting, watching the set forming and the music starting, when Mr Darcy said something to her causing her to smile and laugh. Then they were joining the set.

The look of outrage on Darcy's face would have amused Thomas under any other circumstance. But he could not have the boy create a scene.

Thomas put his wineglass down and tried to nonchalantly cross the room to strongarm Darcy out of the room without anyone else being the wiser.

This was what they had danced to that time at Netherfield. When she was determined to hate him, yet found herself in a set with him almost against her will, and he was determined to find fault with her while still falling in love with her against his better nature. Neither of them had known then what the other had been thinking, or the war taking place within.

"Shall we have some conversation?"

Elizabeth smiled, "I think, perhaps, now I am older and wiser that I no longer need conversation during dancing. Dancing is food enough for me."

Darcy nodded. "It is a pity, nevertheless. We may never have the opportunity again to form opinions of one another."

He was, as far as Elizabeth could tell, attempting to be bold and teasing. It was obvious however that he had little practice in the endeavour. It was a rusty attempt but it could not help but make Elizabeth smile. Both because he was trying, and because it reminded her, in a nice way, of their former conversations.

"I think if we did not have an opinion by now then we would be very poor sorts of creatures."

"Yet so much has changed. Should we, in all good conscience, allow these opinions to stagnate? Those opinions that might have been formed unnecessarily and not from all the facts?"

"Opinions I find are rarely reflective of fact, Mr Darcy."

Elizabeth was reminded of Kitty's conversation with her. The fact that she and Darcy were in essence being false with one another. Trying to out do each other in being civil. More than civil. Even attempting to impress one another. She'd dismissed it as ridiculous but now she wondered if once again she'd underestimated her sister. This interaction with Darcy felt as if both of them were skating on thin ice.

Henry had taken her skating numerous times, and never once had the ice cracked but sometimes she had looked down and fancied she could see right through the ice, like it was not actually there. The same feeling as she was experiencing now had flooded through her. Interestingly, the thought of Henry only brought a slight tremor to her mind, not like the moment in the park when it had overcome her and prevented her continuing her conversation with Mr Darcy any longer.

She was suddenly aware that the face had brought them back together and Darcy was looking at her expectantly yet she had not heard a word of what he had said.

"I find that my mind has wandered, Mr Darcy. Of what were we talking?"

"Nothing of import." But Elizabeth saw a shadow cross his eyes and Elizabeth felt their dance ended as troublingly as their first had done.

"Where has Thomas disappeared to?" said Mrs Gardiner as Elizabeth sat down on the sofa. Elizabeth scanned the room. Max appeared to be still in the clutches of Henrietta, but of the other young man of the party she could see nothing.

"Mr Darcy's son has disappeared too. I suspect they have found something more entertaining to do than sitting discussing pleasantries with us."

"He is a very handsome man, not quite as handsome has his father was; his sullen expression spoils his visage."

"Aunt!" said Elizabeth, only half putting on her scandalised whisper."

"You do not think so?"

"I can hardly be expected to pass judgement of that nature on a child barely a year older than my own son!"

"Lizzy, you have eyes!"

Elizabeth was grateful for the reprieve that her sister's breathless appearance gave. Where she and Darcy had retired, the others had continued with a lively hop. The look that Kitty had thrown her husband and he her, had both warmed and chilled Elizabeth's heart. She was happy for them and sad for herself, and sorry that she could have not seen the success her sister's marriage was.

Her aunt however would not be distracted from her current thinking.

"Kitty, do you not think Young Mr Darcy is only a facsimile of his father? I think he loses something. Lizzy cannot give me an opinion."

"I have not thought often of the Little One in such terms, but no one should stand in the shadow of his father."

"But he cannot help but do so in looks."

"Does this mean, Lizzy, you do not have an opinion on the father either?" Kitty directed the question towards her. Elizabeth saw the glint in her sister's eyes but Kitty did not torment her for very long. "No, he is not as well looking as his father. But Darcy might very well have grown into his looks. And handsome is as handsome does, so perhaps good looks are not the sole recommendation of anyone!"

"He appears to not have his father's temperament either,' said Mrs Gardiner.

"Or too much of it," said Kitty lightly.

Elizabeth felt the urge to defend the boy. "Only a moment ago you thought one should not compare! I daresay, Fitzwilliam is his own man. And a good man."

The glint had returned to Kitty's eyes, even though Elizabeth did not understand what the reasoning behind it was. Elizabeth returned the look with a strong look of her own.

"Of course, Lizzy. But you have not seen how cosseted he was by his grandmother. And Lady Catherine de Bourgh took an inordinate amount of interest in him before she passed. I shall not speak ill of the dead. Nor shall I make comment on the arrangement; Mr Darcy needed female influence and your sister and his wife were not always available. But the effect on an impressionable child?" Mrs Gardiner did not continue her thought, she did not need to.

Elizabeth had met Anne de Bough, so Elizabeth could imagine the effect Lady Catherine could have had, but Darcy would be on guard for such things. Although a small voice in the back of her mind said if he did not see the effect himself he could not do anything about it.

That blindness could be genuine or it could be wilful. In the case of her own father, who refused to see what Lydia could become, even what she had become. Then refused to see what Kitty would become if he treated her like a common criminal.

"Let us talk of better things." With that, Kitty deftly cut off the conversation.

"Do you think this bonnet is suitable?" Elizabeth looked up from her embroidery.

"For what, Henrietta?"

"Riding in the park," Henrietta guessed Elizabeth's next question or objection, "with Max. There cannot be anything improper if my cousin and one of his footmen are with me."

"No, nothing improper," She did trust Max. But if she had not, then she trusted in his parents. "That bonnet however will make it very difficult to see. I am sure you brought your riding bonnet. In fact I am sure you brought all your bonnets from home!"

Henrietta frowned, "If I added a veil to it, it would look far more dashing. How clever you are Mama.' She darted upstairs before Elizabeth could question how a veil on the riding bonnet could solve her objection to Henrietta's first choice on the grounds of visibility.

"Do not worry, Mama, she is only like this because she had finally got a flirt. She told me herself," said Emily from the floor.

"A flirt."

"Yes, a beau. Our cousin, Max." Emily added in case Elizabeth had not quite made that connection. "It was the comment we made about how things would end in a novel that did it, I suspect."

Elizabeth stared. She could think of nothing worse. Of course if they truly loved one another....except they couldn't! ‘and Henrietta has told you this herself?"

"Yes. She doesn't let me see what she is writing to Beth. So I think it must be little else, but the subject of her flirting."

Beth was Jane's eldest daughter. She was by rights in the middle of Emily and Henrietta in age, so she was alternatively claimed by them both as boon companions. The last time she'd seen Beth, Elizabeth had thought that it was inevitable that she would become closer to Henrietta as they both approached that age that age where bonnets trumped trees. Henrietta writing secretly alarmed her, but she had to remind herself that Beth wasn't Kitty and Henrietta was not Lydia. Neither were Jane or herself, her parents.

If this was some boy from the village Elizabeth would have had no problem with speaking to him directly. Expressing her concern that her daughter was too young, that he was too young, that their temperaments might not suit -- all her concerns that she did not feel she could say to her own nephew! It reminded her once again what she had missed out on, and what Kitty had missed out upon.

So Elizabeth had merely exchanged commonplace conversation with Max when he had come to collect Henrietta. Max looked impeccable and without being asked reassured Elizabeth that the horse was quite old and staid, that a footman would be with them the whole time, and that he would endeavour to have her home promptly. He was the perfect gentleman and Elizabeth felt badly that she had the feelings that were simmering within her.

Even as it became a daily occurrence these feelings did not subside. Even when she went to take a walk in the park with the girls she would find Henrietta detaching herself from them, in favour of her cousin's society, this time often Clara's.

"You look troubled, Mrs Davis?"

Elizabeth had not noticed Mr Darcy so she found herself jumping a little.

His arm steadied hers. "I did not mean to startle you."

"No, I was deep in thought."

"Pleasant, I hope."

Elizabeth wondered for a moment if she should make up some pleasantry, some book or dress that she had been mediating on, but the truth seemed easiest. He had acquaintance with Max and as a man might know how best to proceed.

"I fear that a tendre has developed between my daughter and her cousin. Max." She clarified.

Darcy looked up sharply at the little group of young people walking ahead of them. "This displeases you?"

"I am not sure. It disturbs me. I have not spoken to my daughter. I know her, speaking of it might make it real for her, instead of a mere fancy. But I do not know -- if Henry had been alive it would be his role to speak to the young men."

"Indeed. But I do not think Max would take it amiss or be offended if you spoke to him. He does not have that part of his father's temperament."

Elizabeth smiled. She had thought of speaking to Ash but the idea alarmed her; similarly Kitty might be offended. They had too much history of misunderstandings surrounding ‘love' between them.

"You know him better than I. Would you -- I would not wish to impose -- " Elizabeth was not even quite sure what she was asking.

"There would be no imposition, I assure you. But am I - do I have the right to interfere?"

Bingley. Elizabeth had wondered when his spectre would be introduced between them.

"I think in this case it is hardly an interference. A request for clarification on behalf of a mother."

Darcy nodded curtly.

"I had not asked you, how does Mr Bingley?"

"Very well, as far as I know. Our friendship is not what it once was."

"I am sorry to hear that. Do believe me that I never meant to be the cause of ... "

"I assure you. You have not the least amount of blame attached to yourself."

‘"If I had not assured you that Jane... "

"You believed your sister in love because I have no doubt that she was so. But love is...sometimes not enough and sometimes it can die. Your sister's feelings are entirely her own and uncontrollable by you. I always knew that, Elizabeth."

"I hope at least Mr Bingley is happy."

"I believe he is. Bingley was never one to love in half measures and he always found it very easy to hand his heart over. A talent to be admired, I feel."

"And pitied. To be so changeable." Said Elizabeth, keenly aware that perhaps they were not just talking of Bingley and Jane any longer.

"I will speak to Max for you. But I do not think you have anything to fear, no matter what his answers are."

"I am glad to have you reassure me. I notice you don't point out my foolishness."

"I think that it is the foolishness attendant to any parent. I would hardly point out my own follies!"

Thomas looked down upon her, taking a moment out from his pacing. "Why did you not ask me to speak to Max?"

Elizabeth had no answer to that. She had not even thought of her son, which she was now realising was a mistake. She had thought so much on how to avoid offending people, she had not thought she could offend him instead!

"Surely it is what my father should have done. Do I not stand in his place?"

"Of course, Thomas, but you cannot expect to be your father. Especially not to me! You are my little boy."

Thomas left that slide, although Elizabeth could tell he wished to respond to that last sentence with every fibre of his being.

"Not to mention I know Max! I could have told you what was afoot! You did not need to even approach him -- and Darcy made such a scene ... "

Elizabeth blinked. A scene was the last thing she would associate with Mr Darcy. Although if he had spoken to Maximilien formally, requesting an audience and so forth then she could imagine that it would look much like a set piece upon the stage.

"Of course he is just being polite! Flirt with Henrietta! The last thing on his mind! Henrietta knows that! I expect she doesn't mind how she comes by the company of a grandson of an earl! As long as he gives her consequence, it doesn't matter that he would rather be elsewhere!"

Elizabeth felt she was doing a great deal of blinking at her son. He was not often in a passion, but this had apparently broken through his normally calm exterior. In fact he had seemed somewhat preoccupied since the informal dance Kitty had held. She herself had been distracted with the girls that she was now only retrospectively noticing it. She would address the problem with him directly but it seemed best to first resolve the pressing issue in front of them.

"Then why would he spend so much time with her? No young man is that polite! Should be that polite."

"She does not spend all that time -- She spends time with Clara also!" Thomas looked at her as if she was the most unobservant parent in the world, which Elizabeth was beginning to feel. Of course Henrietta had spent time with Clara, she had seen them herself many times, even when she had asked Darcy to question Max. But until this moment she had only thought of Clara as Max's sister, as a way of Henrietta becoming closer to Max. She had not thought of Clara in her own right, which was silly; of course the older and fashionable Clara would be an object of attraction to Henrietta! Fashion was still apparently just as important as men and Elizabeth was relieved. She had put too much stock in what Henrietta had said to Emily as well. Now she felt foolish, more foolish than any parent should feel!

Not to mention she had asked Mr Darcy to interrogate her nephew! Particularly when in the process she had forgotten her son.

She had always thought she had broken away from her fault of judging too harshly on first impressions. It seemed she was always to be doomed to that blindness.

More than that, to ask Mr Darcy had been forward and presumptuous! He was not part of her family; she should not have felt as at ease as she had done in asking him -- no, it came too close to feelings that she had not truly acknowledged to herself to feel comfortable.

"Very well," said Elizabeth, hoping she sounded duly chastened because she was about to start her interrogation. "But it cannot just be this that has you in a passion."

"A passion?"

"Striding about, hands waving. You look like your father did when something in the newspaper disagreed with him."

Thomas' hands dropped to his side immediately. "I was just upset you did not come to me, Mama." Thomas came to sit beside her and he took her hands. "I am your son. I am supposed to protect you and the girls. I cannot do that if I do not know -- " Thomas broke off. "I cannot protect you if you will not let me."

"And that is all you have flown into this passion over?"

Thomas frowned and looked away and then he looked back at her.

"No, there is nothing."

Elizabeth kissed his forehead, half disbelieving him, but not knowing what else to say to make him confess. "I'm sorry. I will include you more. But you must understand that Mr Darcy ..."

It was Thomas's turn to prevent her from speaking, squeezing her hands. "I just wish for you to be happy, Mama."

Elizabeth was touched. But why had he stopped her talking and why did it feel like a warning?