Sally O'Rourke - The Man Who Loved Jane Austen

Darcy thought about that for a long moment. “That could turn out to be an advantage,” he said, “when I try to explain to you about the letter.”

She cast a questioning glance his way but he kept walking, so she said nothing and waited for him to go on.

“What I meant was that it may be helpful that you work with your imagination,” he continued. “Because I’m absolutely positive that what I’m about to tell you would be automatically rejected by anyone without a receptive mind.”

“About why you said Jane’s letter was meant for you?” she asked.

Darcy nodded. “I’ve never discussed the reasons for my interest in Jane Austen with anyone.”

Eliza wasn’t quite sure if another response was expected from her. So when Darcy did not say anything further for several more seconds she nudged him. “Well, I’m all ears,” she said.

“Perhaps, but it’s difficult to know where to begin, considering the fact that you obviously already think I’m deranged,” he responded, looking grave.

“I’m so sorry about what I said to you before!” she apologized, determined not to provoke him again, at least not until she had heard him out. “I have such a big mouth,” she added. “I’m afraid tact has never been one of my virtues.”

Darcy raised a hand to preclude any further admissions of guilt on her part. “Please don’t apologize,” he said. “In fact, there was a long period of time when I wondered myself whether I was merely delusional, or if…”

He left the thought hanging as the enormous black stallion he had been riding earlier extended its head over the fence and whinnied for his attention. Stepping off the road, Darcy walked over to the enclosure, patted the animal’s nose and fished in his pocket for a handful of something. Eliza came over and leaned on the rails beside him and watched the horse gratefully nuzzling the treat from his open palm.

“Before I begin my story,” Darcy said, turning to look at her, “you should probably know that my family has been breeding champion hunters and jumpers on this same land for generations.”

Deprived of Darcy’s full attention, the black horse fixed a jealous eye on Eliza, then tossed its noble head impatiently in an obvious plea for more of whatever the treat had been.

“I saw the plaque on your gates,” Eliza said, keeping a wary eye on the magnificent animal, which still frightened her, mostly because of its size. “The idea that it’s been in your family since—is it 1789?—is amazing.”

Darcy nodded. “We’ve always been proud of our heritage. And we’ve been buying and selling horses across the Atlantic since the late 1800s,” he told her. “So my visit to England three years ago began as an ordinary business trip.” He hesitated for a moment. “It wasn’t really ordinary, I suppose. You see I had gone to England specifically to attend a breeder’s auction at which a particular horse was to be sold. A champion among champions.” He rubbed the velvety nose of the big black stallion again. “Lord Nelson, meet Eliza Knight.”

Darcy looked over at her and smiled. She couldn’t help but return the smile.

Turning back to the horse, he hesitated, wondering just how much to tell her. The memory of the auction excited his senses but the exhilarating images dimmed as Darcy also remembered the cloying closeness of Faith Harrington that long-ago afternoon. She had been hanging on his arm all day, the sweet smell of too much champagne on her breath as she screamed encouragement into his ear every time the blue lighted numbers on the electronic auction board went up and up…

Over Darcy’s objections, Harv had insisted his sister accompany them to England. Darcy, however, had been concerned that a trip abroard with him would simply fuel the tabloid reports of their impending engagement; reports, which seemed to be more and more frequent. He often wondered, in spite of her declaration of innocence, if Faith wasn’t the source of the reports. She often allowed her fantasies to get the better of her and he didn’t want to add to them. But, as was often the case with Harv, he had acquiesed and so she had joined them.

Shaking off the unpleasant thoughts he said, “I wanted that horse very badly.” Darcy resumed his narrative, suddenly remembering that Eliza was still there, “primarily to improve the bloodlines of my stable.” He shook his head ruefully. “The only question was whether or not I could really afford him.”

There had been an Arab princeling in a box opposite Darcy’s, the third or fourth son of the royal house of some oil-rich Gulf dynasty. With no appreciable chance of ever attaining his country’s throne, and with unlimited money to spend, the handsome young prince had become a notorious international playboy and womanizer, and a renowned horseman as well. That particular afternoon, surrounded by a bevy of pale English film actresses and his huge retinue of bulky bodyguards and simpering retainers in well-cut suits, the flamboyant prince had been Darcy’s only serious competitor for the black horse.

The bid had escalated well past the million-pound mark—Darcy’s absolute upper limit—when, thankfully, the youthful potentate had suddenly lost interest in the proceedings and dropped out.

“In the end,” Darcy told Eliza without elaborating, “I won the bid and the horse was mine, but for far more than I had planned on spending. I immediately had Lord Nelson transported down to a friend’s country place in Hampshire, about fifty miles out of London, to be stabled there until I could arrange to have him flown back to the States.

“That night,” Darcy continued, “my friends rather unwisely decided that a victory celebration was in order. I’m afraid there was a great deal of drinking and general carousing…”

His voice trailed off again as he prudently edited his story, leaving out the details of the drunken evening that had ensued in the echoing drawing room of the vast Edwardian manor house his friends the Cliftons had rented for the summer. Also leaving out the fact that the evening had ended very late as he tottered up the stairs, with Faith still hanging on his arm.

Throughout his halting preamble Eliza had been closely watching Darcy, certain from his long pauses and hesitant delivery that he was modifying the story for her benefit as he went, but uncertain what any of it had to do with Jane Austen, or her letters.

Now he caught her quizzical expression and flushed with embarrassment.

“Well, I suppose you’re wondering what all of this rambling about a horse auction and a country house has to do with the Jane Austen letters?” he asked, as though he’d been reading her mind.

Eliza grinned and pointed her chin westward. “The sun will be going down in a few hours,” she noted.

The small joke seemed to relax Darcy slightly. “I’m sorry,” he said, “I warned you that I’d never discussed this with anyone before. I had no idea it was going to be so difficult.”

“I get the impression that you’re trying to be selective in what you’re telling me,” Eliza replied, trying to put him more at ease. “Maybe if you just told me everything that happened and left out all the long, reflective pauses.”

Darcy nodded. “You’re right,” he said. “It’s just that some of what took place is a bit personal in nature.”

Eliza solemnly raised her right hand. “I promise not to tell another soul,” she said.

“Okay,” he agreed. “The only point of the story so far is that three years ago I went to England to buy a very expensive horse and ended up with him at a friend’s country place in Hampshire.”

Eliza nodded. “Fair enough.”

“One more thing I should explain before I go ahead,” he said. “Some of what I’m about to tell you—things I didn’t know as they were happening—was related to me afterwards…” Darcy hesitated, choosing his words carefully, “…by someone else who was there.”