He turned to look at her. “Oh, no, I didn’t mean it in that way.”
“Didn’t you?” said Caroline.
“I must say, accomplishments have not been required in my house,” said Jane. “No one would callmeaccomplished.”
“I haven’t meant to be severe on your entire sex, Miss Bennet,” said Mr. Darcy, feeling the need to backtrack entirely. Why was he always saying these sorts of things? “What I was trying to say is that, erm, the way that society demands women be accomplished is actually making it so that no one is accomplished. And, why, really must a woman be accomplished, in the end? What is the purpose of it? In my estimation, I’d rather have a woman who was well-read than one who could cover a screen.”
Jane blushed again. “I cannot cover a screen, not well, I don’t think. So, there we are.”
“Miss Bennet,” said Caroline coldly, “is one of those women who seek to recommend themselves by feigning modesty.”
Jane blushed fiercely, ducking down her chin. “I think I must have done something to anger Miss Bingley, and I likely should know what it was, but I beg of her—”
“Oh, I apologize,” said Miss Bingley, sighing heavily. “It isn’t you, Miss Bennet.” She glared at Mr. Darcy.
He hadn’t been unkind to her during this exchange, sohow was it she was laying the blame at his feet? He resolved not to speak to Caroline atallafter this. He must avoid her entirely.
CHAPTER FOUR
BEING REASONABLY SUREthat Miss Elizabeth would be asleep, Mr. Darcy looked in on her later on that night, just before he retired for bed. He chastised himself for doing so. If anyone saw him, it wouldn’t look good, he didn’t think, going into a maiden’s room (even one so ill) just before bed, very late at night.
So, he made sure that no one would see him.
And no one did.
Well, no one, that is, except the maiden herself, who was not at all asleep. She was sitting up in bed with a book of Shakespearean comedies, and he started at the sight of her.
“Miss Bennet!” he said. “I must have taken a wrong turn.”
“Oh?” she said. “Well, I found myself a bit confused in the house, I must say, and it is a relief to know that you, who have been staying here for weeks, still find it confusing, too.” She gave him a little smirk, to let him know that she didn’t believe for a moment that he’d gotten turned around.
“I must go.”
“You should, likely, yes,” she said airily. “Why, you may catch my illness, and then we shall be felled by it, a houseful of people with coughs and fevers, and everyone will be ever so cross, and it will be all my own fault. You mustn’t come near me, really, but I must say, I am dreadfully bored, Mr. Darcy. And you, whatever I may say about you, are notboring.”
He went still, then, looking her over.
She coughed, and then groaned. “Oh, dear. Apologies, sir, you must not mind me. I am feverish and saying things I shall regret later, undoubtedly.”
“What do you say about me?” he said.
“Me?” She touched her chest. “Who says that I say anything about you?”
“You did. Just then. You said, ‘whatever I may say about’ me, that I wasn’t boring.”
“Oh, yes, but that was just a turn of phrase,” she said with a shrug.
He raised his eyebrows.
She lifted the book. “He has nothing in this house that was published before 1743, I don’t think. Except Wordsworth, that is. We mustn’t forget Wordsworth.”
He moved closer. “Bingley is not one for, er, books, not in general.”
“He’s a man of action, yes. Not contemplation,” she said. “But he is earnest, is he not? That earnestness, it’s rather affecting, rather…”
“You like him, then?”
She sighed, looking up at Mr. Darcy. “Why, of course, sir.”
