The Tracker's Secret: Sunderverse (Mate Tracker Book 2) by Ingrid Seymour (rm book recommendations TXT) 📕

never heard anything more ridiculous in all my life,’

said Louisa.

‘Or vulgar,’ said Caroline.‘And the youngest girl! Begging for a ball. I cannot believe you encouraged her,

Charles.’

‘But I like giving balls,’ protested Bingley.

‘You should not have rewarded her impertinence,’ said

Louisa.

‘No, indeed. You will only make her worse. Though

how she could become any worse I do not know. Kitty

was dreadful enough, but the youngest girl – what was

her name?’

‘Lydia,’ supplied Louisa.

‘Lydia! Of course, that was it! To be so forward. You

would not like your sister to be so forward, I am persuaded, Mr Darcy.’

‘No, I would not,’ I said, ill pleased.

To compare Georgiana to such a girl was beyond anything I could tolerate.

‘And yet they are the same age,’ went on Caroline. ‘It

is incredible how two girls can be so different, the one so

elegant and refined, and the other so brash and noisy.’

‘It is their upbringing,’ said Louisa. ‘With such a low

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mother, how could Lydia be anything but vulgar?’

‘Those poor girls,’ said Caroline, shaking her head.

‘They are all touched with the same vulgarity, I fear.’

‘Not Miss Bennet!’ protested Bingley. ‘You said yourself she was a sweet girl.’

‘And so she is. Perhaps you are right. Perhaps she has

escaped the taint of mixing with such people. But Elizabeth Bennet is inclined to be pert, even though she does

have fine eyes,’ said Caroline, turning her gaze towards

me.

I had been about to dismiss Elizabeth from my

thoughts, but I changed my mind. I will not do so to

please Miss Bingley, however satirical she may be.

In the evening, Elizabeth joined us in the drawingroom. I took care to say no more than a brief, ‘Good

evening’, and then I took up a pen and began writing to

Georgiana. Elizabeth, I noticed, took up some needlework at the far side of the room.

I had hardly begun my letter, however, when Caroline

began to compliment me on the evenness of my handwriting and the length of my letter. I did my best to

ignore her, but she was not to be dissuaded and continued to praise me at every turn. Flattery is all very well,

but a man may tire of it as soon as curses. I said nothing,

however, as I did not wish to offend Bingley.

‘How delighted Miss Darcy will be to receive such a

letter!’ Caroline said.

I ignored her.

‘You write uncommonly fast.’

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I was unwise enough to retaliate with, ‘You are mistaken. I write rather slowly.’

‘Pray tell your sister that I long to see her.’

‘I have already told her so once, by your desire.’

‘How can you contrive to write so even?’ she asked.

I swallowed my frustration and resumed my silence. A

wet evening in the country is one of the worst evils I

know, especially in restricted company, and if I replied I

feared I would be rude.

‘Tell your sister I am delighted to hear of her improvement on the harp…’

Pray, whose letter is it? I nearly retorted, but stopped

myself just in time.

‘. . . and pray let her know that I am quite in raptures

with her beautiful little design for a table, and I think it

infinitely superior to Miss Grantley’s.’

‘Will you give me leave to defer your raptures till I write

again? At present I have not room to do them justice.’

I saw Elizabeth smile at this, and bury her head in her

needlework. She smiles readily, and I am beginning to

find it infectious. I was almost tempted to smile myself.

Caroline, however, was not to be quelled.

‘Do you always write such charming long letters to

her, Mr Darcy?’

‘They are generally long,’ I replied, not being able to

avoid answering her question. ‘But whether always

charming, it is not for me to determine.’

‘It is a rule with me, that a person who can write a

long letter, with ease, cannot write ill,’ she said.

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‘That will not do for a compliment to Darcy,’ broke in

Bingley,‘because he does not write with ease. He studies

too much for words of four syllables. Do you not,

Darcy?’

‘My style of writing is very different from yours,’ I

agreed.

‘My ideas flow so rapidly that I have not time to

express them, by which means my letters sometimes

convey no ideas at all to my correspondents,’ said Bingley.

‘Your humility must disarm reproof,’ said Elizabeth,

laying her needlework aside.

‘Nothing is more deceitful than the appearance of

humility,’ I said, laughing at Bingley’s comments, but

underneath I was conscious of a slight irritation that she

was praising him.‘It is often only carelessness of opinion,

and sometimes an indirect boast.’

‘And which of the two do you call my little recent

piece of modesty?’ asked Bingley.

‘The indirect boast,’ I said with a smile.‘The power of

doing anything with quickness is always much prized by

the possessor, and often without any attention to the

imperfection of performance. When you told Mrs Bennet this morning that if you ever resolved on quitting

Netherfield you should be gone in five minutes, you

meant it to be a sort of compliment to yourself, but I am

by no means convinced. If, as you were mounting your

horse, a friend were to say, “Bingley, you had better stay

till next week,” you would probably do it.’

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‘You have only proved by this that Mr Bingley did not

do justice to his own disposition.You have shown him off

now much more than he did himself,’ said Elizabeth with

a laugh.

‘I am exceedingly gratified by your converting what

my friend says into a compliment on the sweetness of my

temper,’ said Bingley merrily.

I smiled, but I was not so gratified, though why this

should be I do not know. I am sure I like Bingley very

well, and I am always pleased when other people value

him, too.

‘But Darcy would think the better of me, if under

such a circumstance I were to give a flat denial, and ride

off as fast