Free Into Kent by Stanley Michael Hurd

were just curious about the goings-on.”
    She gave them another glance, then said complacently, “I am the more pleased by your leisure and curiosity in that I am most particularly in need of two strong men to run to the fishmonger’s; I had thought to send some footmen, but as you are here…” Edmund snatched Darcy by the lapels and pulled him away at a run. As they scrambled up the stairs, Darcy demanded, “But Edmund, does she not need our help?”
    As they gained the landing, Colonel Fitzwilliam slowed down and assured him, “Not at all, Darcy; you may believe me: that was just the warning shot across the bow. What she wanted was for us to be elsewhere—we are safe enough, now, I think, but now that we have brought ourselves to her attention, rather than trust to luck I shall go ahead and be elsewhere, entirely; I shall wander over to Knightsbridge, to see if there is any news.” Colonel Fitzwilliam was attached to the First Dragoons, and their barracks was no more than a five-minute ride. He went up stairs to change, and Darcy returned to his library, cautiously and securely closing the door behind him.
    Later that afternoon, perhaps two hours before dinner, Darcy finished his work in the library and wandered out past the front drawing-room; he saw that the Colonel had returned from the barracks and was staring out the window onto the Square with a preoccupied air and a cup of tea in his hand. “You are back!” Darcy cried. “Anything left in the teapot?” Colonel Fitzwilliam turned to face him: “Of course, Darcy,” he replied. “Shall I ring?”
    “No; I had rather not bring myself to my aunt’s attention by taking away one of her minions,” Darcy said with a grin. “Besides,” said he, “I believe I can manage to pour a cup of tea in my own home without injury, or loss of dignity.” He proceeded to demonstrate, and the two men sat down by the fire.
    “Do not let my mother catch you performing servant’s duties,” the Colonel warned.
    Darcy smiled at him and took a sip. “I have not seen her above stairs all day; I believe we are safe enough. Well, Edmund, I really have not had a chance to catch up with you since last summer; how are you?”
    Colonel Fitzwilliam blew out a breath. “Well enough, Darcy,” he replied. “I am very glad to be here; Georgiana is looking better, I believe.”
    “Yes; I, too, see some improvement—I have hopes the worst is past. I do wish we could find the means of overcoming her reticence, though; she has no concept of her own worth and accomplishment.”
    Colonel Fitzwilliam nodded. “So true. Why is it that those of least ability so often enjoy the greatest assurance?” he mused. Looking at his cousin, he went on: “But Darcy, you were not much different from your sister at that age; when we were at Eton, I swear you some times went a week without speaking to any one.”
    “I was not being shy, Edmund—only uninspired. If I said nothing it was because I could think of nothing worth saying.”
    “That hardly matters to most people; they are perfectly happy to prattle away about nothing to each other.”
    Darcy shrugged his indifference to such.
    “There!” his cousin laughed. “Bingley would have used two dozen words to say that others’ ways were not his own.”
    ”Making me more efficient in my speech than my friend,” Darcy scoffed. “Need I point out that this is not a profound revelation? But, if you are right, and there is a similarity of mind between Georgiana and myself, then I have failed to see it in that light; to me it has always seemed she was merely timid, and too hard upon herself.”
    “That, she certainly is,” the Colonel agreed. “But as she is easy with us, I do not see it as an essential aspect of her character; only that she has too little appreciation of her strengths, relative to others her age.”
    “We must hope so,” Darcy said. “I keep trying. But what of you, Edmund? You look well; how do things fare in His