A Continued Affection

Part 12

"You have not yet called at our house, Mary! I think it quite remiss of you!"

Sally Egerton was teasing, but Mary Bennet turned wide brown eyes on first her and then Georgiana, her brow creasing in consternation.

"No!" Sally continued, struggling to restrain her laughter. "Do not list off excuses! I think it a personal affront to us all that we should meet you here and not have entertained you first at home. My brother is quite desolated..." She met Georgiana's eyes and winked, and at last, Georgiana relented, clearing her throat and capturing Mary's attention.

"I think, Miss Mary, that your friend is teasing you."

"She is?" The ghost of a smile flitted across Mary's face, and her shoulders heaved in a sigh of relief. "She is. Yes, but you are very right, Sally, we ought to have called on you first, and I should like to have, only -"

She paused, glancing out of the corner of her eyes at her two younger sisters, who had cornered Caroline Bingley and were peppering her with questions about her dress, her jewellery, and myriad other queries that were designed, Georgiana suspected, to unsettle, rather than compliment, their friend.

"I know," Sally sighed, expansively. "We younger sisters cannot always have what we want! I am quite envious of you, Georgiana, for you have but one brother and he dotes on you."

Georgiana stiffened, looking back to her friends.

"Oh, I am not sure about that...!"

"He does!" Sally insisted. "I have witnessed it. You do not think he hosts this dinner for his own enjoyment? No, it is for you - so that you may be introduced to all the delightful people who have found their way to London from Hertfordshire." Her eyes sparkled with fun. "Are you not suitably delighted by us?"

Georgiana laughed, at that moment thoroughly delighted to have made not one but two new friends in as many minutes. She thought it would be impossible not to like Sally Egerton, who was entirely guileless and agreeable. Mary, she could not claim to know at all, having only met her a moment or two earlier, but she could not help but be intrigued by the cleverness that she suspected lurked behind those dark eyes.

"You are musical, I believe, Miss Mary?"

Mary blushed, meeting Georgiana's gaze.

"Who told you that?" She glared at Sally, who merely dimpled at her.

"My brother praised your talents to me only this morning," Georgiana confessed. That was true: she had quizzed Darcy over the breakfast table, demanding to know pertinent details of all those he had invited so that I might temper my conversation to topics that would interest them, she had claimed, but also because curiosity plagued her and she wished to have it satisfied. He had spoken fleetingly of the Egertons, confessing he knew them himself but a little. The Bennets he waxed a little more freely, although she knew her brother well enough to discern his true opinions of the sisters. Jane, he admired for her beauty and her dainty manners, confessing to Georgiana that he supposed Charles Bingley was already three-quarters in love with her and remarking, with a groan, that there would likely be a wedding before the month was out. Elizabeth came next, although he shared little but that she had expressed a love of books. Mary was held up as the sister of all five that Georgiana would likely wish to befriend: for whilst she was quiet she was clever and musical. He had skirted the final two and now, seeing Kitty and Lydia Bennet in person, Georgiana could well understand why.

"Your brother?" Mary frowned, and there was some strange spark in her eye that Georgiana had not seen before. "He spoke to you...about me?"

"About all of you," Georgiana admitted, detailing their conversation and fearing, mid-explanation that Mary read some insult in her words. "He was very complimentary," she hurried out. "And praised your accomplishments. I do hope you might play for us this evening."

"Of course she will!" Sally declared. "You play so well, Mary, you know Sidney will be sorely disappointed not to hear you again." She shot her friend a sly look that did not go unnoticed by Georgiana, who saw the way Mary's cheeks paled, then reddened, as she stammered out an awkward attempt to change the subject.

Well! Georgiana thought, deducing the secret and thinking it a charming one. Mary Bennet and Mr Egerton! What a sweet pair they would make! She made it her mission, then and there, to facilitate the match, sensing that Sally would be only too happy to make her friend Mary Bennet her sister Mary Egerton, and contriving that matchmaking was the very sort of distraction she should like to undertake during her time in London.

"I am pleased that, in this, at least, my brother was right," Georgiana continued, as Mary consented, at last, to play something if Georgiana truly wished her to. "What of your sisters? I can see, without the need of your telling me, that Mr Bingley is quite lost to the pretty fair sister, so I deduce she must be Jane?"

Mary nodded, glancing anxiously to the corner where Darcy stood, in conversation with an older couple who were not, Georgiana thought, Mary's parents but her aunt and uncle. The Gardiners. They were not alone, though, for there was another sister: with the same dark hair and eyes as Mary, although her features were a little sharper, more defined. She spoke more easily, too, her face as animated as her words as she jumped from topic to topic, blithely encouraging her companions to join her in speaking freely. Georgiana was surprised. She did not lately recall seeing her brother so engaged, certainly not amongst people who were near-strangers.

"Is that Elizabeth, speaking to my brother?"

"Yes," Mary said, wrenching her gaze away with apparent effort. "And my aunt and uncle, Mr and Mrs Gardiner."

"They certainly seem a happy group," Sally remarked, with a blithe smile. "It is strange, I did not think Mr Darcy and Miss Elizabeth to be particularly fond of one another in Hertfordshire. Certainly, they never seemed to share more than a word or two, and yet here in London they chatter away like old friends. How peculiar! I suppose change is in the air..."