Chapter Two

So here Mr. Darcy found himself dancing with Bingley's newest infatuation. And in his normal course of affairs Mr. Darcy would have completely avoided her as he wished he could read a book to read in the ballroom.

Especially of late.

The revelations about his mother's character that his uncle and aunt had pushed upon him in the sequel to Georgiana's near elopement with Wickham had… left Darcy with an unfamiliar uncertainty about himself, his family, and how he ought to think about those who he had always been inclined to think of with the greatest respect.

These last months Darcy had generally been in an ill mood, which he hoped to cure by endeavoring to hide this mood from Bingley, in hopes that Bingley's sunniness would make him glow a little.

What he had not expected to do, was to find himself dancing with a particularly pretty girl, who had a remarkable smile, a remarkable laugh, and even more remarkable eyes.

That Bingley had an interest in Miss Bennet allowed Mr. Darcy to relax.

His friend Bingley had prior claim, and Miss Bennet had been flirting with Mr. Bingley, while he did not think she was flirting with him, though she did still speak in a high spirited and teasing manner.

Not that anything a woman said or did in the open meant anything about their character, if there was one thing the revelations of the past half year had taught Darcy, it was that women could not be trusted.

As the master of a great estate he was the natural quarry of the unworthy women who crowded ballrooms. Of course Bingley was also Miss Bennet's natural quarry and he was likely an easier target than Darcy. Darcy wondered if she would quickly switch from the attention she had paid Bingley to him as the buck with the bigger antlers, or if she would prefer the surer seeming attention from Bingley.

Though, Darcy had seen enough of Bingley's falling into and out of his infatuations to know that his current attention to Miss Bennet was no guarantee of his future attention to her.

"I could tell," she said as they waited for the dance to start, "that my father likes you. So I shall refrain from teasing you mercilessly for only dancing with members of your own party."

This, Darcy thought, was a rather flirtatious sally on her part.

"I thank you, madam, for that," Darcy replied with his own carefully reserved smile. "But as you may see, I am dancing with a lady outside of my own party."

Miss Bennet laughed. "Nay, nay, I refuse that. Bingley foisted me upon you. He spent half our most recent dance in complaint about how you stood apart in that stupid manner" — Elizabeth's merry tinkling laugh and imitation of Bingley's voice took any sting that might be in those words away — "and how you had much better dance. He made me promise to do my best to convince you to dance with me — by the by, Mr. Bingley really is a fine and handsome gentleman, and a caring and concerned friend, and you may now tell him when you asked that I praised him to you, and that I said that his height is quite as much to my taste as yours —"

"I have always found it quite ridiculous that everyone insists on treating my height as almost a matter almost of character." Darcy replied slightly annoyed.

His mind followed the now well worn tracks that it always meandered down when talking to a pretty woman, whether married or not — what did she really want? And he now always suspected, despite knowing this to be unfair, that every word a woman spoke was oriented either towards gaining a lustful or a mercenary end.

"I know what is said about me," Darcy went on, his ill mood coming out once again now that he was speaking to a woman who he was attracted to much more than most women. "Mr. Bingley often says that he does not think he would pay me half so much deference if I were shorter than he. Not a whit of truth. Height is not entirely ephemeral, a good family background makes it more likely, and a wholesome childhood does yet more to encourage a full good growth, but I am respected by those who know me for my knowledge, my generosity, my capabilities as a landlord, and, I hope, the kindness I show towards those who are my friends."

The woman grinned at him very broadly, and with a mischievous and slightly mocking twinkle to her eye.

"You do not agree, Miss Bennet."

"Oh, no, I entirely agree that matters of character are of greater importance. Even in a handsome gentleman, I would rather he be of good character than tall, but ah…" Miss Bennet glanced up the line, and noted Mr. Bingley dancing with a girl whose features were barely tolerable and whose name Darcy neither knew, nor cared very much to know, "but when I told him that it made no difference to me nor any sensible woman, I lied."

There was such an expression of mischievous guilt on Miss Bennet's face that Darcy could not help himself. He smiled back at her and nearly laughed.

But he shook his head, getting rid of the undesired momentary good mood. "That is exactly the sort of small deception I expect from a flattering woman — though I am not sure if it me who you flatter dishonestly, by pretending to like my height more than you truly do, or Bingley in pretending an appreciation for his person you do not feel."

"Shocking, shocking!" Miss Bennet laughed. "You are an unusual man."

"Deception is my abhorrence, and I have learned of late that few other are of my mind about it."

"What a cynic. But social untruths are not deception. The deeper truth is that I like your friend Bingley, both his appearance and his friendliness. And so I was expressing the real truth of my sentiments with what I said. Truly though, if I were so tall as you, and a man, I do not believe I would not make a pretence of not being dreadfully impressed with myself solely because I was tall."

"I have many other matters towards which I prefer to base my pride on." His family name yet was one he could pride himself upon, he believed, but not his connection to either his sister, or his mother.

"And you are unwilling to disguise such pride." Miss Bennet laughed.

Darcy could tell that he had not offended her, but that he did amuse her. She had a mobile smile and friendly eyes, and he knew that against his better instincts, especially since Bingley liked her, he wanted to keep her smiling and laughing with him.

It was a strange emotion to take him, which he did not remember experiencing since he was a callow youth at his first balls, stumbling over his words with girls who smiled widely and falsely at him.

"Tell me now, did you like my Papa in turn? He can be a quite strange man, especially if he likes you."

"I confess to having had no notion what to say when I found a book pushed into my hands, with the promise that I needed it."

"You ought to have quoted Shakespeare."

"But for mine own part, it was Greek to me?"

Miss Bennet grinned.

This was why he found Miss Bennet more interesting than the average Miss at a country ball. Her father struck him as an interesting person, and so he wondered about her. "It is quite strange for a lady to learn the ancient languages."

"Have I interfered with your fun, by playing in the hallowed grounds of learning in which women ought not meddle — there is a dark secret about the ancients which I have learned from a close study of their texts. Do you wish to hear it?"

"I am all ears."

Miss Bennet lowered her voice, and mischievously glanced from side to side as if checking for eavesdroppers. "The ancients, in Rome and Greece: They taught their women Greek and Latin."

"I… yes…" Darcy looked at her quizzically. And then he grinned, and then he started laughing. She had a delightfully mischievous expression.

AN: So here it is, one last little bit of the story, and this is as much as I can publish here while the book is still in KU. I'll start posting the rest of the book here in about a year and a half. Hope you all liked the teaser.