Elizabeth entered the library, seeking some peace and quiet after a thoroughly hectic morning, only to find a small, slender figure standing in the centre of it, her hands over her eyes. With the air of a displaced fairy, she proclaimed,

"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men."

Elizabeth could not keep herself from laughing at this pronouncement and the child whirled to face her in astonishment, dropping her hands. She cheerfully greeted her, "Good morning, Miss Darcy."

"Oh! I didn't know anyone was there," she said, the fairy-quality fading somewhat. Despite her rare beauty, she was only a little girl. "I have been trying to remember my verse and I keep forgetting."

Elizabeth smiled in amusement as Anne shut her eyes again. "Surely you could try and remember with your eyes open?"

"Oh, no," the girl said earnestly, "because there is a Bible in here, and I know I would just have to go and look, and then I would feel dreadful and I'd forget again. I promised my aunt, you see, that I would remember before I came back for Christmas, and I must not disappoint her. Papa says I must always keep my promises, and so I should never make a promise I do not think I can keep."

"Your papa sounds very wise," Elizabeth agreed gravely, kneeling down to look at the child directly.

"But I thought I could remember it, I did! And I did remember it, you heard me!"

"So I did. And it is a proper compliment to your aunt, that you went to all this effort to remember your verse. I am an aunt myself, you see."

Anne clasped her hands. "Do any of your nieces memorise verses for you?"

"Not one of them." Elizabeth laughed. "Still, you should probably be with the other children. What if you had gotten lost?"

"Oh, I never get lost. And I should have told my papa where I was, but I didn't think he would let me go, and I don't like Caroline."

"That was very naughty of you. Your papa is doubtless worried sick about you."

"Oh no!" She covered her mouth with her free hand. "He will not get sick? My mama got sick when I was a baby and died, I do not want anything to happen to papa. You see, he is the best man in the world and I love him more than anything, I could not bear it if something bad happened to him."

Elizabeth smiled reassuringly. "It is only a turn of phrase, it means that he would be upset because he didn't know where you gone or what had happened to you."

"Oh, well, I shall tell him next time," said the little girl, tossing her head. Elizabeth smiled once more. "Do you belong to the house? I have not seen you before, but we don't come here very often, they usually come to us, because Mr Bingley is my god-father."

"Mrs Bingley is my sister," Elizabeth said quietly. "I am come to stay with her for a time." She thought of her father, dead these four months, and blinked rapidly, pressing her fingers against her black skirts.

"I am sorry you are sad," the child said unexpectedly, and Elizabeth stared down in astonishment. The little girl's icy blue eyes were of a shade particularly unsuited to warmth, and yet there was no doubting it; without warning, Elizabeth was thrust back seven years, to the inn at Lambton, and another pair of blue eyes were gazing at her with the utmost compassion.

She caught her breath. "Thank you," Elizabeth said softly. "I am not so sad anymore, now that I have my sister."

"I wish I had a brother or sister," Anne replied, looking up at her wistfully. "Lady Elliot is dreadful to Mr Bingley, but papa and Aunt Georgiana still write to each other all the time."

"Perhaps you shall, someday," Elizabeth offered half-heartedly.

"Not unless papa marries again," the small Darcy before her said, and Elizabeth flinched slightly. "I do not think he shall. I heard my aunt say he would not, because he only married mamma because she needed a husband to protect her from something, I don't know what, and he was lonely and they liked each other, and there was no-one else like that and he could not be with the one he really wanted. So he shan't marry. But I have some cousins who are very nice, and Aunt Georgiana misses Pemberley a great deal so she visits quite a lot, and because she does not want to leave papa all alone, although he's not alone because he has me. And Stephen, he's Aunt Georgiana's son, he is more like a brother than a cousin really, because he is more like papa than my uncle Westhampton and likes him better too, and he spends so much time at Pemberley because he is unhappy at Aincourt and he loves papa so very much, and me too, of course." She took a deep breath. "Are you an angel, Miss Bennet?"

A laugh bubbled up in Elizabeth's throat. "Certainly not, why do you ask?"

Anne shrugged, glancing longingly at the family Bible. "Mr Bingley says Mrs Bingley is one, and if she is an angel, and you are her sister, shouldn't you be an angel too?"

"He only means," said Elizabeth, smiling, "that she is like an angel."

"Well, she looks like one," Anne said matter-of-factly. "Like papa."

"I beg your pardon?"

"I think papa is like an angel too. Don't you think?"

"I -- "

She was saved by Darcy himself, who entered at that moment, and cast a stern look at his daughter. "Anne," he began, then caught sight of Elizabeth, his face lighting up. "Miss Bennet! I -- I did not know you were here. In here, I mean -- of course I knew you were here, at Baildon."

Anne giggled. "You are very silly, papa. But I memorised my verse for Aunt Georgiana, Miss Bennet heard me. Didn't you, Miss Bennet?"

"I did," Elizabeth agreed, smiling first at Anne and then at Darcy. "Good morning, Mr Darcy."

"Oh, good morning," he said, rather wryly. "I hope your sister is . . . better?"

Lydia had woken early from a nightmare, her screams alerting all nearby to her distress. How Darcy had discovered it was anyone's guess, as his chambers were quite on the opposite side of the house. "Yes, I believe so," she said tiredly. "As much as she can be, I suppose."

"Is Mrs Wickham really your sister, Miss Bennet?"

Elizabeth and Darcy both turned to Anne, looking at her small uptilted face, wide, fearless blue eyes, and Elizabeth felt a vague unsettled guilt. Two children -- one wild, resentful, and rather stupid, the other prim, happy, and clever -- they could not be more different, although they were near to the same age. Surely she ought to resent little Anne Darcy, for having everything -- every happiness, worldly or otherwise, that a girl could desire, for having everything that her poor niece lacked? Yet she did not. She could not even convince herself to care for Betsey, for her own namesake, Lydia Elizabeth, beyond the call of duty and family, not anything to what she felt for this delightful little girl who would never know what it was to fear her own father -- who thought him like an angel --

"Yes," Elizabeth said, her voice choked a little. "Yes, she is."

"And Mrs Bingley's?"

"Yes."

Anne frowned, clearly puzzling over this revelation. Thankfully, Darcy intervened once more. "Anne, you should not be here, you were told to stay with the others in the nursery."

"But papa, Caroline is there, and she is dreadful!"

"I daresay you and Jenny can manage her, Anne," Darcy replied dryly; "if anything serious occurs, send a servant."

Anne wrinkled her nose, but obediently dropped a curtsey with an impudent, "Yes, sir," before whirling away.

"Are you well, Miss Bennet? You looked distressed a moment ago." He looked at her intently, and Elizabeth raised her chin.

"How can one not be distressed?" She softened her voice slightly. "It is only a matter of time, sir, before Lydia shall have to return. Mr Wickham may do whatever he likes to her, and to those children. Whatever we do, it is -- oh, it will only make it that much worse, when he reclaims them."

"When?" Darcy raised his eyebrows. "From what your sister has told me, Mr Wickham is more than half out of his mind. Even if he realises their absence, he is hardly likely to care. He gains nothing from their presence, that he cannot just as easily find elsewhere. If he does sober enough to come here, your brother and I shall simply have to explain that it is in his best interests to let her alone. But I do not think he shall. He is, I understand, in very ill health." The faint smile accompanying this spoke volumes.

Elizabeth stared, her mind spinning. "But -- then, what is to be done? They cannot stay here interminably -- even Lydia would not ask such a thing of Jane and Bingley, would she?"

"I hardly know," Darcy said uneasily. "The matter is still unresolved. Has not Mrs Bingley spoken to you of it?"

Elizabeth's lips tightened. "No, she has not. There is a great deal, it seems, that Mrs Bingley does not speak to me about." Then she recalled her situation, and penitently added, "I should not have said that. I'm sorry."

Darcy hesitated, and said, apparently apropos of nothing, "I do not visit Baildon as often as I ought, fond as I am of the Bingleys and their children. Somehow, after living so long at Pemberley, it seems rather confining." At her startled look, he added, "I am used to being alone. Being with so many people in so small a space . . ." He shrugged, looked around a little, and sat down, gazing at her expectantly. "What would you like to know?"

Elizabeth felt more obtuse than any man as she stood there, staring at him. "I -- beg your pardon?"

"Well, Mrs Wickham is your sister as well. Mrs Bingley must be very preoccupied, surely she would have told you all otherwise."

She could scarcely conceal her sceptical expression, and Darcy dropped his eyes. "In any case, you should know, and I am under no obligation to keep any of it a secret. Bingley is arranging for your mother to live in Meryton, near Mrs Phillips and Mrs Witherspoon. I, erm, have offered Mrs Wickham and her children a home."

"Not at Pemberley!" Her voice rose shrilly on the last, and Darcy very obviously bit back a smile. "I beg your pardon, but -- surely, you would not have her at your home -- any longer."

"No, I think not. There is, however, some property in Ireland, which should be perfectly convenient for, er, all concerned."

"Ireland," she repeated. "Ireland!"

"We thought it better that she not be, er, too near. Even if Wickham looks for her, he is unlikely to consider -- well, I daresay it is the best option."

"It cannot be inexpensive, to send her, and maintain her -- and the children -- "

"Oh, it is nothing of consequence really," he assured her. She rather suspected that Darcy's definition of nothing of consequence was not at all similar to her own, nor any other normal person's.

"Thank you, then."

With a distant look, he said, "You are welcome." Elizabeth sighed. She had never met anyone worse at accepting gratitude. Although, perhaps it was only from her. He loves me, she informed herself sternly. And who knows what insanity is going through his mind each time he gets that pinched, cold look. It must be dreadful.

"And I?" she inquired helpfully, trying to think of a way to redirect the conversation to more fertile grounds. He looked at her blankly. "In what manner am I to be disposed of?"

"You will stay here, of course." Hastily, he added, "At least, that is Mrs Bingley's wish. And Bingley's, naturally."

Elizabeth hesitated, then lifted her head to look him directly in the eye and said, "And is it yours also, Mr Darcy?"

He flushed, but after swallowing once, he replied steadily, "Yes, it is -- at least, so long as I also am here."

"How long do you intend that to be?" Her blood was singing in her ears.

"I must return to Pemberley for Christmas, I have already invited Georgiana and her family."

"Six weeks, then?" She felt her cheeks burning.

"Yes, but . . . I have also invited the Bingleys. You, naturally, are also included in that invitation, and I would be . . . more than pleased, if you were able to accompany them."

At seven-and-twenty, with four marriage proposals under her belt, Elizabeth Bennet had never been properly courted. Her flirtatious relations with Colonel Fitzwilliam, Wickham, and John Lucas hardly qualified, as none of those men intended marriage; the three other suitors did, but were in themselves perfectly inadequate; Darcy remained in a category by himself, but the peculiar vicissitudes of their relationship hardly constituted a courtship.

I think I shall enjoy this, she thought, wondering if she would need a fan every time they occupied the same room. Elizabeth gave him a look that Jane would certainly not approve of, and said demurely, "I would be honoured, Mr Darcy . . . is Pemberley as lovely in the winter as in the summer?"

Darcy hesitated only a moment. "Far lovelier, Miss Bennet."

---

Hwa-Shih: Aren't we all? Well, it depends upon how you define togetherness. :D Have you migrated from HG?

Jenna: Glad you enjoyed it.

elen: Glad you liked it, and the meeting with Anne -- the scene this entire story has been working towards. I think there was a collective sigh of "finally!" once I was able to post that! You're welcome. Well, he may not tell her in words for awhile. Yes, I would . . . if the dearth gets too much, you can try SoC! There's plenty of mush there.

maddie: Yes, ma'am. :-) Here they are. (And thank you, I hope you continue to enjoy it.)