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"A very considerate husband."

"I have promised not to count his shirts while he is trying to tell me about his day."

Elizabeth reached up and held her hand for a moment. Jane bent to kiss her cheek, then finished the last pin. Neither hurried.

Their mother arrived when the allotted time was over, already distressed by the plainness of the gown and the insufficiency of the morning. She held a small length of lace between both hands.

"I wore this," she said. "At my wedding. I thought perhaps—though of course you wish everything very simple."

Elizabeth had been ready with a joke about excessive embellishment. She put it aside.

"Will you fasten it for me?"

Mrs. Bennet's objections became instructions. Jane must stand closer; the light was wrong; Elizabeth must hold still unless she wished to be pricked on her wedding morning. Her hands were competent, despite all she said of her nerves. Elizabeth watched them smooth the lace and was ashamed of how seldom she had noticed that competence.

"There," her mother said. "It is not too much."

"It is exactly enough."

Mrs. Bennet began to cry. Jane passed her a handkerchief. They had allowed time for that too.

* * *

Darcy — Downstairs

Darcy had paced from the window to the door so often that Bingley moved a small table out of his way.

"Thank you," Darcy said on the next circuit.

"I should prefer you intact for the ceremony."

Mr. Bennet had put down his book. He watched Darcy complete another circuit, then moved his own feet out of the way.

"She can still change her mind," Darcy said.

"Yes."

The answer appeared to steady him more than reassurance would have done. He stopped beside the mantelpiece. "So can I."

"Do you wish to?"

"No."

"Then when she arrives, you may both say so. The clergyman has brought a book for that purpose."

Bingley laughed, and Darcy at last smiled. He adjusted a vase which had been disturbed when the table moved, then left it slightly crooked. There would be no time to perfect everything. He found he was willing to begin anyway.

* * *

Elizabeth — The Ceremony

The drawing room at Longbourn held the wedding party and Lady Catherine's flowers. The flowers had arrived in greater numbers than the guests, but by careful arrangement no human being had yet been obliged to stand in the passage.

The special license lay ready for the clergyman, who had already confirmed the arrangements with Mr. Bennet. Charlotte sat near Jane. Georgiana had come from town the evening before; she had greeted Elizabeth shyly and then, with visible courage, asked to be called her sister. Anne had come with her mother and had left her spaniel book in the carriage, a sacrifice which she did not permit to pass entirely unnoticed. Lydia and Wickham were still away; a letter from Lydia, full of advice about bonnets, rested upstairs beside Elizabeth's gloves.

Darcy turned when Elizabeth entered. She saw the change in him before anyone spoke: his attention leaving the window, the clergyman, the waiting company, and coming wholly to her. He did not look as though she had fulfilled a prediction. He looked glad she had arrived.

She took her place beside him. The lace at her sleeve brushed his coat.