Free Into Hertfordshire by Stanley Michael Hurd

about a quiet, happy, faithful love affair? No, we must have conflict to make a tale; but why so in real life?”
    “That, I cannot say; but it does most assuredly seem so to me,” Darcy said with an air of finality. They were nearly at the Hall. Darcy shook his head like a horse bothered by a fly. “I pray you, Bingley, let us leave off this discussion; I hear it all too often echoing back and forth in my mind: I am heartily tired of it, I can tell you. What say we drop these conies off with Nicholls and get some tea? It has gone a bit chilly.”
     

 
     
     
    Chapter Seven
     
     
    That next Saturday morning Mrs. Hurst and Miss Bingley were to be at home to the ladies of a number of the local families; the two eldest Miss Bennets were to be amongst the company. The attendance of the gentleman was not, strictly speaking, required, but neither of Bingley’s sisters were surprised when he arrived in the drawing-room, dressed very smartly indeed, a quarter-hour before the first guests were expected. But that Mr. Darcy should also appear was a source of surprise and comment. Even Bingley took notice, and his thoughts certainly were not centred on Darcy at that moment.
    “What! Has the leopard changed its spots?” said he to Darcy. “Have you become a member of Society at last, then? Let me caution you: a man of your advanced years must avoid these sudden shocks to the system, lest you be overset.” Bingley, being six years’ Darcy’s junior, enjoyed reminding him of that fact.
    Miss Bingley would not allow this slight to Mr. Darcy to go unchallenged. “Charles, what nonsense! Mr. Darcy knows very well what his duties are as master of Pemberley and our guest; he knows better than you, I dare say, how important it is to observe the conventional civilities in a country society.”
    Bingley defended himself with feeling, going even so far as to remind his sister of his seniority and of his incontestable right to banter with a friend. When she saw that Darcy was leaning towards her brother’s side of the affair, Miss Bingley abandoned her position and demurely accepted his as being proper and correct; as she did so, however, her eye was on Darcy. He noticed her careful observation of his reaction, and interpreted it correctly: she had divined by some means that her occasional lapses of correct behaviour grated on him, and she was assuming this guise of diffidence to curry his favour. His eyes hardened at her calculated dissemblance, but he said nothing.
    The argument between the two of them did serve to move the focus of conversation away from him, and that was just as well; the question of what had compelled him to come down was one he could not very well have answered. It certainly was not, he assured himself, that Miss Elizabeth Bennet was expected. With a train of logic worthy of Bingley at his finest, Darcy assured himself that he was safe from any serious interest in her direction, as her connections made any alliance unthinkable, and he was not one to dally with a lady to satisfy his own conceit. And surely, merely to be in her presence was insufficient reason to subject himself to an almost exclusively female society for hours on end. So, while entirely certain of the reasons that did not bring him to the drawing-room, he would have been hard pressed to explain the reasons that did .
    Nevertheless, he did subject himself to such society, and, to those who knew him well, he did so with the appearance of perfect composure—even enjoyment. The only ones in the room, however, who were sufficiently intimate with his ways to be able to observe this were Bingley and his sister Caroline. Bingley’s attention, of course, was completely consumed by Miss Bennet; Miss Bingley, on the other hand, was so given over to watching Darcy, that several of her new neighbours wondered at her distraction. Yet there was very little for her to see: he spoke but seldom, and never at length; nor did he appear to have a particular object