Elizabeth suggested lightheartedly. “But that is easy for me to say; I do not have to stay in the same house with them. I must remember to rescue Georgiana when I can.”
“She will appreciate it; she is often quite overwhelmed by Miss Bingley. In fact, I may need to be rescued as well,” he teased.
“You, sir, are perfectly capable of handling Miss Bingley with no assistance from me,” she replied, surprised by how content she felt walking so closely to him.
“Just as well, since you intend to desert us to her mercies soon enough. When are you planning to leave for your travels?”
“My aunt and uncle will arrive Monday and we plan to depart the next day.”
“It seems you are quite fond of your aunt and uncle.”
“Yes, I enjoy their company a great deal.”
“I would like to meet them, if I may.”
She glanced up at him, wondering if he realized that her uncle was in trade—she could not recall mentioning it—and if he would be so anxious to meet them if he knew. “If you wish,” she said neutrally.
“I do not believe that you ever told me of your new destination. Do you know where you will go, apart from the wilds of the north?”
Elizabeth colored, knowing that it was impossible to avoid the question once it was asked directly. “My aunt and uncle are setting the itinerary, and I do not know the details. My aunt has mentioned the Peaks, Matlock and Dovedale, and I believe she also plans for us to see Blenheim and Chatsworth. We will also be spending some time in a town in which my aunt spent her younger days. I believe you may be familiar with it; it is called Lambton.”
That Darcy was startled by her response was clear, and she did not doubt that he realized that she had deliberately kept this information from him. “Yes, I know it well,” he said slowly, “it is not five miles from Pemberley.” His mind jumped ahead to further possibilities—
She stole a glance at him, trying to gauge his response, but his expression was distant. She felt a sudden urge to apologize, though what she had to regret in traveling so near his home was not clear, but she was troubled by his apparent withdrawal.
She was determined to wait until he broke the silence, but as it went on and on, and she grew more and more uncomfortable to be walking hand in hand with a man who seemed to have forgotten her existence. Finally, she said, “Mr. Darcy, you appear to be miles away.” She did not desire any further conflict, so to remove any possible sting from her words, she tightened her hand around his for a moment.
He came back to himself from his reveries of having her by his side at Pemberley, of awakening in the morning with his hand tangled in her hair, of kissing her sleeping lips until she returned to consciousness with a passion that matched his own. He turned to the real Elizabeth with a rueful smile. “You are absolutely correct, Miss Bennet; my mind was far away in Derbyshire. My apologies for neglecting you.”
“And was your mind’s visit to Derbyshire fruitful?” she asked, her eyes sparkling as she gazed at him, just as he had so often pictured.
Bending his arm, he brought her hand to his lips in a casual manner, and brushed a kiss across her knuckles. “That remains to be seen, my love,” he said.
“
He looked at her in startled dismay. “What is the matter?”
“What is the matter? Mr. Darcy, if I have in some way led you to believe that I am willing to accept this level of familiarity, I do apologize, as it was not my intention to mislead you,” she said vigorously, determined not to continue in the passive course she had set to date.
He released her hand immediately, his expression baffled and worried. “Miss Bennet, I deeply regret offending you in any way; it is my sole wish to please you, and I will certainly refrain from any behavior to which you object. I…” He tried desperately to think of further ways to apologize before he lost all the ground he had gained, and then, recognizing that honesty was his only hope, said more calmly, “I cannot say that I completely understand, but if you do not wish me to kiss your hand, you may depend on it that I shall not.”
She was quite surprised that he did not realize that his words were objectionable; in many ways it seemed more atypical of him to violate a social rule than to take liberties. “Mr. Darcy, my objection was to the overly familiar manner in which you referred to me,” she said tiredly.
Darcy, taken aback, immediately began to review the conversation in his mind, and then paled abruptly as he realized what he had said. “Miss Bennet, I apologize, indeed, I ought to grovel at your feet; you are quite correct to upbraid me. It was a complete slip of the tongue; my mind was elsewhere, and I did not realize at all what I was saying. I do know better than that, and I would certainly not have intentionally have embarrassed either of us in that manner, and…”
“That is quite an adequate amount of groveling,” Elizabeth interrupted with a smile, relieved by his obviously genuine embarrassment and regret. “I accept your apology, and shall not think on the matter again.”
Darcy kept his eyes fixed directly ahead of him. This was not going well at all; every effort he made seemed to lead to disaster. It would be a miracle if she was still willing to speak to him at the end of the day. Perhaps he should revert to his safer, old patterns and hold his tongue as much as possible to avoid making a fool of himself again—but no, she would think him uncivil in that case. He certainly needed to control his fantasies of her.
Elizabeth, seeing his struggle, decided to take mercy on him. “Mr. Darcy,” she said with laughter in his voice, “I fear that you are once again honing your skills at leaping to conclusions, and I must insist that you cease at once, and instead acknowledge that I am far too reasonable and pleasant a person to possibly dream up the sort of horrors you are capable of imagining.”
His lips twitched. “Are you laughing at me, Miss Bennet?”
“I would be sorely distressed if I could find no source of humor in you, sir,” she replied lightly. “And we are approaching our destination, and I hope we can remain friends long enough to climb the hill, so that we may save our breath for our exertions.”
Darcy tried to match her light-hearted tones with fair success, and they were able to proceed in accord with one another as they tackled the ascent of the hill. Darcy took full advantage of the roughness of the path to have the pleasure of helping Elizabeth past obstacles, and by the time they reached the summit, his good humor was restored.
Darcy invited her to sit on a flat stone that afforded a view of the countryside. She pointed out various towns and holdings as they sat side by side, Darcy taking pleasure in holding Elizabeth’s hand between his own and caressing it lightly from time to time. Elizabeth, feeling a combination of a warm contentment and an agitated excitement induced by his closeness and the remarkable sensations he seemed able to produce through his lightest touch of her hand, said, “Tell me something about yourself, something that I do not know.”
“What shall I tell you about?”
“Whatever you like. Perhaps you could tell me about growing up at Pemberley.”
He laughed. “Not Pemberley, please, or I will start having ideas you will object to again.”
Puzzled, she said, “Because of Pemberley?”
“I have an excellent imagination, Miss Bennet, and I recommend we change the subject immediately.”
Still mystified, she said, “As you wish. What shall it be, then? Tell me about going to university. Is that a safer topic?”
“Let me see, what can I tell you? I studied at Cambridge, and there were good times and bad. I missed home and my family intensely at first, since it was my first time away since I had attended the first year at Harrow, about which the less said, the better. After that I had tutors at home, since my mother, once she became ill, was reluctant to have me so far away, and I supported her in that for my own selfish reasons. Once I became accustomed to being at Cambridge, though, my studies were fascinating for the most part, and I could think of
