“Very handsome,” answers poor Elizabeth briefly.
One example of the praise thus freely bestowed strikes Elizabeth as of all others the most extraordinary. “I have never had a cross word from him in his life, and I have known him ever since he was four years old,” declares the old servant. And yet, if there was one fault more than another which Elizabeth Bennet had been accustomed to ascribe unhesitatingly to the lordly bear, Darcy, it was a bad temper; but, according to this credible witness, the bear abroad must be a lamb at home.
As Elizabeth digests the reflections aroused by this evidence, and looks at a full-length portrait of the master of the house, in which the face wears such a smile as she had noticed sometimes on the lips of the living man when he looked at her, she feels a deeper sentiment of gratitude than she has yet experienced for the love which had been so strong, though there was little of the courtier in the lover.
The little party are consigned to the gardener, who is conducting them across the lawn to the river. Elizabeth has turned back to look again. Her uncle and aunt have stopped also, and are conjecturing the date of the house, when its owner comes suddenly forward from the road leading to the stables.
The two so much interested are within twenty yards of each other, and cannot avoid an encounter. Their eyes meet; both grow crimson. He absolutely starts, and for a moment seems immovable with surprise, but shortly recovering himself, advances and speaks to Elizabeth with perfect civility, if not perfect composure.
Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner recognise Mr. Darcy from his resemblance to his picture and from the exclamation of the gardener. They stand a little aloof, while the new comer and their niece exchange greetings.
In the meantime Elizabeth is reduced to a state of extreme confusion and discomfort. She scarcely dares lift her eyes to her quondam lover’s face. She cannot forget, and she knows he must recall with equal vividness, the circumstances under which they parted at Hunsford.
She is keenly alive to the impropriety, the indelicacy of his finding her at Pemberley. Why did she come? or why has he thus returned a day before he was expected? How strange her being there must appear to him! In what a disgraceful light may it not strike so vain a man! For Elizabeth still holds forlornly to the last rag of the mental and moral habiliments in which she clothed him. She clings to the conviction of his high opinion of himself and his deserts. But, in spite of herself, amidst all the jumble of sensations which his appearance has excited, none is more distinct or strikes her more forcibly, than the realisation that he is heaping coals of fire on her head, by behaving to the girl who had rejected him—well-nigh with contumely—with the greatest, most sedulous courtesy that a true gentleman could show on such a trying occasion. More than that, there is a complete alteration in his whole tone, which she cannot fail to observe, that might have been perceptible even to a stranger. He has overcome his old aversion to the small polite forms and genialities of social intercourse, along with his old stiffness and coldness. He puts himself to the trouble of inquiring for the very relations he stigmatised, as well as for herself. He asks when she has left home, and how long she means to stay in Derbyshire. He is interested in her answers. He is animated and agreeable, in the middle of his evident agitation, for the first time since she has known him. His words only fail him when his last idea deserts him, and, after standing a moment silent, he recollects himself, and takes his leave.
Elizabeth is full of astonishment in her distress, and all the time she walks about the grounds, mechanically responding to their praises on the part of her companions, and hearing the gardener triumphantly announce that the park is ten miles round, she is puzzling out the riddle, asking herself what Mr. Darcy thinks of her; whether she is still dear to him, in defiance of everything? She cannot tell, not even from her own heart, if he has felt most pain or pleasure in seeing her again; but certainly he has not been at ease.
While the visitors are still wandering about, Elizabeth is again surprised by seeing Darcy at a little distance coming towards them. For a moment she thinks he will strike into another path, but when a turn of the road shows him still advancing, and preparing to greet them with all his newly-acquired cordiality, she determines to emulate him, and gets out the words “delightful,” “charming,” when it strikes her that praise of Pemberley from her may be misconstrued, and she colours and is silent.