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“I beg your pardon.”

“No, you do not.”

“No,” he admitted. “Not entirely.”

She laughed again, more steadily. The sound eased something in his chest which had been held tight since he asked his question.

“I have thought of the things which happened when I was awake, too,” she said. “Your sitting upon that stool in Mrs. Bell’s cottage, for one.”

“Must that be remembered?”

“I intend to remember it for years.”

“I shall hope you also remember that the other chair was unsafe.”

“I remember all of it. I remember that you did not make Mrs. Bell uncomfortable about it. And the walk afterward, when Sir tried to carry half a tree home and expected us to accommodate him.”

Darcy smiled. Her eyes were bright now with something other than tears.

“You listened when I told you about Mr. Collins,” she continued. “You did not say I ought to have accepted him for the sake of Longbourn.”

“I could not have wished it.”

“And yesterday, when Jane wished to hear the end of her chapter before the tea was poured, you let Charles sit beside her and sent for a fresh pot when it had grown cold. You did not tell her that a cup of tea must take precedence over a book merely because it was already upon the table.”

“I have endured that inconvenience myself.”

“I thought you might have done.”

She moved her hands apart and rested them upon the chair’s arms.

“I like you, Mr. Darcy. I like talking to you, and laughing with you, and discovering that you have noticed something which I had supposed only I found amusing. I am not always pleased with you.”

“I had observed that.”

“But I should be very sorry if you ceased to come into a room because I was there.”

“There is very little danger of it.”

Elizabeth looked at him for a long moment.

“Elspeth was not there for any of those things.”

“No.”

“She did not know you.”

“No.”

The silence which followed was full of everything he wished to say and dared not hurry. Elizabeth stood. Darcy rose with her, remaining beside his chair until he knew whether she intended to leave.

Instead she came toward him.

“I should like to kiss you now,” she said.

He could scarcely make himself answer. “I should like that very much.”

Her smile trembled. She put one hand against his coat, rose upon her toes, and touched her mouth to his.