Page 64 of Eavesdroppers Never Hear
She ignored him to the extent she could with a knife at her throat. “This reminds me of Antonia. Do you remember her, Lydia?”
She saw her sister scrunch her face in confusion, then finally say, “I understand.”
“Understand what?” Wickham said, waving the knife around threateningly.
Darcy saw the knife move away from her throat and thought the distraction was for the good, so he threw his two pence in. “I must admit to some curiosity myself, Lydia,” he said, hardly noticing he had omitted the ‘miss.’
At that moment, things happenedquickly…very-very quickly.
“Now Lydia!”Elizabeth yelled, and her sister let out a scream that would wake the dead from three counties away. It was enough to make Darcy jump at least two feet and sent chills down his spine, especially since it occurred a foot from his head.
Wickham startled alarmingly at the scream, which made the knife move away from Elizabeth’s head even more and pointedslightly away from her. She had been watching and waiting for exactly that scenario. Like a snake striking, Elizabeth, careful to avoid the point, reached down with her head and bit his thumb hard enough to draw blood; and simultaneously stomped on the instep of his foot as hard as she could. She was wearing dancing slippers which were not nearly as efficacious as walking boots for stomping, but in a contest between heel and instep, the heel emerged the victor every time. Such a direct hit was bound to hurt like the devil—boots or no.
Wickham dropped the knife and started screaming like a banshee to go along with Lydia.
A couple seconds later, when the knife fell to the ground, Elizabeth shot across the ten yards separating the groups, turned around to face the threat, and ended up ploughingher back into Darcy’s chest at a dead run.
Darcy wrapped his arms around and held her tightly, just as he heard, “Darcy, what the devil is going on?” from the hedge behind him.
In a flash, Elizabeth saw red streak across the gap between them, and no more than a blink later, she found Colonel Fitzwilliam standing over Wickham, laying on the ground with a sword at his throat.
The tableau froze for several seconds, nobody quite believing that such a foolhardy plan had worked.
Elizabeth finally said, “Well done, Lydia.”
Lydia still sounded on the verge of crying. “Do not praise me for helping fix a problem I created.”
“Enough of that… you did well… better than well,” Darcy said softly.
The colonel spoke gently, feeling that a valuable lesson had been learnt cheaply. “We will discuss propriety and safety n some detail later, young lady, but you did what you had to do when you had to.Accept the victory!”
There was still no word from Wickham, much to Elizabeth’s delight.
Fitzwilliam said, “I daresay I missed most of this drama. I only came in at the end, so may I enquire of something that puzzles me exceedingly?”
“Of course,” Elizabeth replied.
“I saw you bite his thumb, and I saw you stomp his foot… all well done, by the way…”
“Thank you,” she replied.
She was certainly distracted, but with her racing pulse returning to something akin to normal, she was mostly preoccupied by the feeling of Darcy’s arms around her chest and his fingers tightly interlaced with hers. It felt… it felt… well, wonderful seemed such a weak word, but it was the best she could produce on short notice. The feeling was extraordinary.
Unaware of her preoccupation (or more likely engaging his soldier’s instinct for self-preservation), he continued, “…how the devil…” then he looked slightly embarrassed until Lydia giggled softly.
He continued, “…I mean, how did you knock him out. He is dead to the world.”
Elizabeth sighed, looked down at Darcy’s hands, and gave them a squeeze. She thought about separating herself to restore some semblance of propriety, but they were facing a hardened criminal (though, unconscious on the ground at the moment), so she reckoned she could disregard the normal rules. Not only that, shequite likedthe sensation and was loath to give it up.
She finally sighed. “If I tell you, will you promise no consequences?”
“That I cannot do,” Darcy said softly, then chuckled when she stiffened in his arms, assuming he would pay later. He continued quickly, “I can promise noretribution, buta rewardis a consequence,and if someone helped you, they will mostcertainlybe rewarded handsomely.”
She laughed at his joke and was nowhere near as annoyed as she might have been with his little prevarication. “Simon, you may come out. I suppose you have Jenny with you.”
“Yes ma’am,” Simon said, and stepped out.
“How?” Darcy and the colonel asked at the same time.
