Page 1 of The Blackmail of Mr. Darcy
Prologue
Caroline Bingley smiled widely.
Thiswas the kind of information she had been waiting for. She felt quite sure that she could utilise her discovery to reach the object of her longing, the goal towards which she had assiduously worked for several years now.
When her brother first befriended Mr. Darcy, three years before, Caroline had been transfixed by his handsome face, his perfect manners, his intelligence, and most especially his body: his height, his obvious strength, his athleticism. Mr. Darcy was the ideal to which other men could only aspire.
The truth was, Caroline was very tall for a woman. She was not prone to corpulence, but neither was she ethereal or willowy. She had once heard a man say that she was “too brawny by half,” and she had felt devastated by the critique. She had always despised looking down upon her dance partners and would-be suitors, but ever since the “brawny” insult, she felt especially worried about being too big and too strong to be appealing. She had become single-minded about the search for a very tall, well-built man.
Mr. Darcy was that man.
Caroline had set out to win his regard using normal methods. She knew she was handsome, but she put a lot of time and effort into excellent grooming, fashionable clothing, and flattering hair styles. She had a splendid dowry and a superior education, and she made sure to subtly inform him of these. She used flattery in an attempt to gain his interest, and she took careful note of his food preferences so that, whenever she acted as her brother’s hostess, she could order meals featuring his favourites. She even worked to befriend his dreadfully boring sister.
Nothing had worked. Not only had Mr. Darcy not asked for her hand in marriage, he did not even seek her out. Caroline was certainly notdesperate;she was not, as her brother had once shouted, infatuated with a delusion. However, she knew that she would have to change her tactics. Normal methods were ineffective…. The question had been, what other options were there?
The answer now seemed to have just fallen into her lap!
Caroline Bingley had heard the old proverb,Eavesdroppers hear no good of themselves, but she had often found eavesdropping to be advantageous. And this time….
This time, the information she had gleaned would enable her to force the issue. Soon, shewouldfind herself side-by-side with Mr. Darcy. Soon, shewouldbe the dainty one, the feminine figure protected by his oh-so-masculine person. Soon, shewouldbe Mrs. Darcy.
Chapter 1
Elizabeth
Elizabeth Bennet had done as much repair as she could to her appearance. She had thoroughly wiped the mud off her half-boots with a handful of grass. It had been impossible to clean all the mud off the skirt of her walking dress and the petticoat beneath, but she had removed all that she could by scrubbing it with sand and a sprinkle of water from the nearby stream. Then, of course, she had scrubbed her hands as well. They felt chilled and stiff as she pulled her gloves back on. She flexed her fingers several times to restore their feeling.
The morning had been very breezy, so it had been difficult to completely tame her hair, but she had taken off her bonnet, re-pinned the errant curls that had blown out of her original hairstyle, and put her bonnet on again, tying the bow carefully.
She breathed in deeply, slowly releasing the air through her nose. She felt ready for anything.
Except, maybe, Miss Bingley.
Elizabeth knocked on the door of the manor at Netherfield Park. The butler, Stanford, opened it and recognised her immediately. Still, she complied with polite formalities, saying, “Miss Elizabeth Bennet, here to see my ailing sister, MissBennet. If Miss Bingley is at home, I would like to apply to her for permission to visit my sister and see how she fares.”
She gave Stanford credit for not looking pointedly at her mud-stained skirts. He promptly showed her into Netherfield’s entry and then, at the door to the morning room, he announced, “Miss Elizabeth Bennet.”
Caroline Bingley’s strident voice had been complaining that the morning’s preparation of eggs were not as she had ordered, but when Stanford announced Elizabeth, Miss Bingley stopped talking, and Elizabeth heard the susurration of fabric as several people stood up. She sighed just a bit at the realisation that she was likely to have all the Netherfield residents witness her muddy incursion.
She raised her chin fractionally and entered the room. As she had expected, Mr. and Mrs. Hurst, Mr. and Miss Bingley, and Mr. Darcy were scattered around the room, their cups and saucers and plates of food near to hand. The men stood, although Mr. Hurst seemed to do so quite reluctantly.
Miss Bingley, acting as hostess of her brother’s home, crossed the room to offer her hand and lightly squeeze Elizabeth’s. All the men bowed; Elizabeth curtseyed. Then the real fun ensued.
“Miss Eliza!” Miss Bingley said in her most condescending manner. “How remarkable it is to see you here, so early in the morning.”
It was, of course, too early for polite calling hours. She kept her eyes locked onto Miss Bingley, who was busy looking down her nose at Elizabeth. Actually, Miss Bingley was almost a foot taller than Elizabeth, so “looking down” was mandatory. Still, her facial expression and her voice gave the proper context: she believed the Bennets to be decidedly beneath the Bingleys.
Lifting her chin up just the tiniest bit more, Elizabeth replied, “I have come to see my sister, hoping to help nurse her back to health.”
Miss Bingley raised her eyebrows, deliberately swept her gaze down to the evidence of mud, and asked, “Did you… walk?”
“As you see.”
“It must be three miles from Longbourn to Netherfield!”
“It is actually closer to two and a half, because I crossed the fallow fields.”
Miss Bingley made no reply to that, but Elizabeth felt that she could see the words “Hence all the mud!” forming in her brain.
