Chapter 43: Much Ado About Mid-Century Modern
Elizabeth, along with her aunt and uncle, makes the drive to Mr. Darcy's estate the next day. His manor is situated handsomely in the middle of the woods, and Elizabeth notes that, oh, shit, somebody actually put some thought into this place to make sure that the stateliness of the house didn't interfere with the natural beauty of the grounds it sat on.
Yep, it looks like a pretty nice place to live, all right.
Then they go into the house, where the housekeeper shows them around the place, because that's a thing you could just do back then I guess. Just go tour someone's house while they're out. Sort of like how you can take a tour of Buckingham Palace, I suppose. Or the White House.
Anyway, Elizabeth finds that of course every angle of the grounds looks incredible from every window, and every room is tastefully adorned with practical, high-quality Scandinavian furniture, rather than the overly ostentatious decor she'd seen at Lady Catherine's.
She realizes, damn, I could have been living here by now, and I'd be having my aunt and uncle over as guests at the moment instead. Except then she remembers, oh, my uncle doesn't own land, so he'd never be allowed to visit. Even though he's here right now. So like... are they trespassing, or what?
Elizabeth is still worried about running into Mr. Darcy here, but the housekeeper confirms that he is definitely not supposed to come back home until tomorrow when he's bringing over a bunch of friends. It's a bit of a close shave, but ultimately no big deal. She'll be long-gone by then.
As they continue touring the house and looking at various portraits, it becomes clear to the housekeeper that Elizabeth has actually met Mr. Darcy before, and the woman becomes much more talkative, prompted further by Uncle Bennet's curiosity. He asks if Darcy is often home this time of year, but the housekeeper replies he isn't around as often as she would like. Although she also implies that he'd stay home more often if he'd just settle down with somebody already, but states she has no idea who the hell would even be good enough for the man.
In fact, the housekeeper goes on to share many more fine words about Mr. Darcy, about how she'd known him since he was four and he was always a good-natured person, and how she's extremely fortunate to work for him, and any of his servants and renters will say he's really just a stand-up guy. Which, like, is high praise when you figure how many people in the world bitch about their bosses and landlords; and this thought occurs to Elizabeth, too, as she gazes at a portrait of the man. And she has some feelings.
Then they go outside so the gardener can give them a tour of the grounds. And that's when they run into Mr. Darcy.
It happens so suddenly—and they're so close to each other—that it's impossible for Elizabeth not to be instantly recognized. Mr. Darcy is clearly taken aback by her presence as well, but still decides to approach and make small talk. His manner toward her is perfectly civil, and he even politely asks how her family is doing. But this entire thing is still awkward as hell; she knows the fact that she's here on his lawn right now is completely preposterous, and he's caught so off-guard that he keeps asking her the same questions before finally being at a loss for anything to talk about.
Darcy then excuses himself, leaving the Bennets to continue their tour; but all Elizabeth can think about is how dumb she was to even come here and how bizarre it must look to him, and like, if they had just been ten minutes faster then the whole stupid encounter wouldn't have happened at all and she wouldn't be feeling like an idiot right now.
Some time later, though, Mr. Darcy comes back out to meet with them, and her aunt asks Elizabeth if she's going to make introductions. Here she's like, aha, Mr. Darcy thinks I'm hanging around with upper-class folks; as soon as I tell him they're just peasants, he's going to make an excuse to leave, just watch.
Not only does Mr. Darcy not do that, he actually finds common ground with Uncle Bennet on fishing; and soon he's inviting her uncle to come by any time to fish in his streams, here are the good spots for trout, and by the way do you need me to fetch you a rod? So Elizabeth can't even claim that small victory, nor can she understand why he's being so chill about everything.
Eventually she finds herself side-by-side with Darcy as the group continues on with their walk. She tells him, okay, for the record, everybody I asked said you weren't going to be here today, so I want some credit for that. In turn, he admits that he came home a day early to make sure everything was in order since the Bingleys would be joining him tomorrow.
He also says, hey, since you're in town anyway, my sister will be coming home tomorrow too, and she kind of wants to meet you.
Elizabeth is particularly encouraged by this, because this means that A) he must have been talking her up pretty good, and B) he's not actually all that mad at her if he's inviting her back.
But despite having more time to themselves as they outpace her aunt and uncle, they still don't know what the hell else they can possibly say to each other after what happened, so they linger in awkward silence for a while before the Bennets finally depart.
On the way back to their lodging, Aunt and Uncle Bennet remark to Elizabeth, wow, Mr. Darcy actually seems super cool, we expected something different based on how you and Mr. Wickham described him. This forces Elizabeth to admit that, eeh, actually, I have it on good authority that Mr. Wickham is kind of an ass.
Even though the housekeeper straight-up said as much when they were looking at a portrait of Wickham earlier, so I don't know why this is such a revelation now.