An Unlikely Acquaintance

Part 5

Elizabeth had always been fond of dancing and this evening was no different. Colonel Fitzwilliam, for now she knew his name she rather fancied it suited him, was a skilled dancer, but it was his good humour which made the whole experience of dancing with him so enjoyable.

"You are quiet, Miss Bennet," he remarked, as they chanced to pass one another. "I trust I am not boring you?"

She could not see his face, hidden as it was behind a mask, but she could hear the smile he must have been wearing in his voice and obediently smiled back.

"I am concentrating!" she insisted, swallowing a laugh as she moved through a particularly complicated number of steps.

"Ah, then I shall not distract you," he replied, almost taunting her to make a mistake. Fortunately, she was easily adequate to the task and avoided both distraction and disaster, breathing a sigh of relief once they were on firmer ground again, both literally and figuratively. The dance allowed them to converse without fear of being overheard.

"You have not yet told me what brings you to Meryton, Colonel Fitzwilliam."

"I should have thought that was obvious," he said, lightly, although there was a touch of a grimace about his words. "I am here on the bidding of my masters."

"Oh?"

"For work, Miss Bennet." He sighed, and although his voice retained the lightness and ease of earlier she could not help but think he was not quite so jolly as before. "We military men must go wherever we are told."

Lizzy felt a flash of indignation that gave way to embarrassment. Of course he was here to work, had she not known that much? What man, given a choice, would leave his home for the anonymity of a barracks in a town he had never yet set foot in, at Christmas?

It is not Christmas any longer, she reminded herself, yet the rubric held. Poor Colonel Fitzwilliam was living a life of upheaval and here she was acting as if he had a choice in the matter.

"Sill, I suppose Meryton is a good deal preferable to certain postings."

"There, you are right, Miss Bennet." Colonel Fitzwilliam laughed and Lizzy smiled to hear the sound. "There are worse places I might be put to work. At least here I am afforded the privilege of dancing and meeting people."

"You must come to dine with us at Longbourn one evening, too," Lizzy put in, surprised at herself for being so forward with her invitation. She swallowed any embarrassment, albeit grateful that the colonel could not see her face, which she was quite sure must be a rosy shade of red beneath her mask. "Then you will know more people," she followed up, lamely.

"That is very kind of you, Miss Bennet. I should be delighted to accept, assuming the invitation was genuine and not a mere display of feminine compassion at my sorry plight!"

His eyes danced behind his mask and Lizzy realised he was teasing her, before laughing along with him.

"I suppose I ought not to spurn such an offer, whatever its cause," Colonel Fitzwilliam continued. "You rightly pointed out I know very few people here, particularly those I might one day consider friends." He sighed, and Lizzy was compelled to ask what was behind the sorrowful expression, for she fancied that, could she see his face fully and unobscured it would have fallen into a frown. "I had thought my cousin remained here in Hertfordshire, but it seems I arrive too late."

Lizzy's heart thudded noisily, painfully, in her chest, and her throat was dry as she forced out a question.

"Your cousin?"

"Aye. Perhaps you know him, he stayed here quite some months I believe." He chuckled underneath his breath. "I dare say he heard tell of my coming and that precipitated his swift departure. Mr Fitzwilliam Darcy, Miss Bennet. You see, we share a family name."

The floor seemed to tilt beneath Lizzy's feet and she stumbled, although the steps she was dancing were no longer complicated. Hurrying to steady herself and praying her partner had not noticed, she sought eager clarification.

"Mr Darcy is...is your cousin?"

"He is." Colonel Fitzwilliam was watching her carefully. "Am I to deduce, from your change in tone, that you are a little acquainted with him?"

One might say so! Lizzy wrestled her features into a smile, although her thoughts ran at once in five different directions, and it was a long moment before she could summon an answer.

"We are a little acquainted. At least, we were, before he and Mr Bingley left Hertfordshire. Their departure was, as you say, swift." She swallowed past a lump in her throat. "I do not suppose you know of any plans they have to return?"

"Alas, no." Colonel Fitzwilliam shrugged his broad shoulders. "I had hoped to see him here, for it has been some months since we were afforded time to spend together. Perhaps I will make it as far as London and reunite with him there if I am ever permitted to take a holiday from my responsibilities at the regiment."

Lizzy nodded, but she scarcely heard a word Colonel Fitzwilliam said. She was busily turning over his news in her mind, examining it from all angles and trying to make some type of sense from it. Colonel Fitzwilliam and Mr Darcy were cousins! No wonder, then, that she had mistaken one for the other when first she saw him. Now, knowing this, she fancied she could trace some vague likeness in their stance, the way they moved, although that must be where the similarity ended. She could never have foreseen dancing with Mr Darcy like this. Dancing, perhaps, but speaking so freely, laughing so often? Mr Darcy was no conversationalist. Not like his cousin.

She had so rejoiced to herself at the thought of being parted from the disagreeable Fitzwilliam Darcy that it seemed to her some strange twist of fate that she should now be dancing so happily with his cousin.

Must people be judged on their relations? she thought, recalling that she, too, possessed a cousin she was not at all like. How unhappy she would be to think that people saw any likeness of character between her and the odious Mr Collins! Nobody can help their family, she reminded herself, determined to put away all thoughts of Mr Darcy and appreciate Colonel Fitzwilliam only for who he was. It ought to have been easy. It was easy, except for the fact that Mr Darcy, whom she had been only too pleased to part ways with, continued to linger in her thoughts like a phantom, and she could not help but wonder whether, were they to see one another again, she might enjoy dancing with him almost as much as with his cousin.