Mr. Darcy came to Grosvenor Street expecting no more singularity than to find his friend at home.

Instead, he was shown into the Hurst drawing room to discover, not Bingley, but Miss Bingley at the pianoforte, Mrs. Hurst upon a sofa near the fire, and a morning so carefully composed that accident had plainly been forbidden the house.

The room was handsome and warm, with every comfort arranged to be noticed without seeming to ask for notice. A bright coal fire answered in the pier-glasses, and the half-drawn blind softened the winter light until even January appeared to have been received on Miss Bingley’s terms.

The instrument stood open with music already arranged upon the stand; a chair had been placed near enough to invite admiration and far enough to make retreat discourteous.

Miss Bingley rose from the music-stool at his entrance, all smiles and easy welcome.

“Mr. Darcy! You are exact to the moment. We were but this instant speaking of you.”

Darcy bowed. “Your servant. I understood Bingley was with you.”

Her hand, which had been turning a page she could already play from memory, rested for the smallest moment too long upon the paper.

“My brother was most unfortunately called away. A tiresome engagement, of which he had not the least warning till within the half hour. He was quite vexed to be detained.”

“Quite vexed,” Mrs. Hurst said.

Darcy looked from one to the other. Bingley, if vexed, would commonly have contrived to say so for himself. “Indeed.”

“But you must not punish us for his absence,” said Miss Bingley, recovering all her brightness. “You are come in the happiest possible time. I have just prevailed on Louisa to hear a new Italian air, and you know how partial you have always been to music.”

Darcy took the chair appointed him, because there was no avoiding it without rudeness, and sat down with the uncomfortable sense of filling an empty place. A little proper conversation followed on the weather and morning engagements; all perfectly civil, and all intolerably managed.

“You are very grave today, Mr. Darcy. I hope Pemberley brings you no disquiet.”

“None of consequence.”

“Then London must answer for it, which is less handsome in me to hear, as I am one of its present representatives. You shall be restored by music whether you consent to it or not.”

Miss Bingley began. She sang very well; he knew it at once, and knew also that the morning had been arranged to make him say so. When she ended the first page and turned toward him, smiling for praise, he found himself in no better humor.

“You are severe, Mr. Darcy. I do not believe you have heard three notes.”

“I heard enough to know the performance excellent.”

“Only excellent? That is starvation from you.”

“Caroline, you must not angle for compliments before noon,” Mrs. Hurst said.

“Louisa would reduce any woman to humility. My brother, at least, would have insisted on another song.”

“Then it is unfortunate he is not here,” Darcy said.

Before Miss Bingley could improve upon that misfortune, the door opened.

“Miss Bennet.”

If Miss Bingley had desired interruption least at that moment, it was difficult to blame her taste; but her surprise, though prettily managed, was not perfect.

Darcy rose at once.

Jane Bennet entered with the quick, slight pause of a person who had expected one room and found another. She had not looked for him. The discovery showed itself only in that first instant, for she recovered immediately; but he saw it, and saw as well that she was thinner than at Netherfield, and paler, though still so entirely mistress of herself that many a less attentive observer might have chosen to call her merely composed.

“Miss Bennet!” Miss Bingley cried. “What an unexpected pleasure. Had I but known you were coming this way!”

Miss Bennet curtsied. “I fear I come without sufficient ceremony. I was in the neighborhood and wished to inquire after your health.”

“You are very obliging. Pray sit down. We are quite by ourselves — only my sister, Mr. Darcy, and I. My brother is unfortunately from home.”

Mrs. Hurst added, “He was called away in haste.”

Miss Bennet received it with calm civility. “I am sorry to have missed him.”

Nothing could be more proper. To Darcy’s ear, nothing was less empty.

He moved a chair nearer the fire. Miss Bennet thanked him and sat. Miss Bingley resumed her place, not at the instrument now, but at the tea-table.

“Tea, Miss Bennet?”

“You are very good.”

“Sugar?”

“None, I thank you.”

“You must take care of yourself. It is a severe morning for ladies who will venture abroad.”

“I am very well, I thank you.”

“And your aunt keeps you entirely to herself, I think. We have seen so very little of you.”

“My aunt is all kindness.”

“Mrs. Gardiner does everything handsomely, I am sure,” Mrs. Hurst said.

“Oh, perfectly,” Miss Bingley said. “Gracechurch Street must be very cheerful.”

“Very cheerful indeed.”

It was the kind of observation by which Miss Bingley expressed her opinion of a part of town without the vulgarity of naming it. Miss Bennet appeared determined to hear none of it.

Miss Bingley set the cup before her.

Mrs. Hurst tried another subject. “Have you been much abroad in town, Miss Bennet? There is such a crowd everywhere now.”

“Not much.”

“We have thought of the opera twice this week and gone neither time,” Miss Bingley said. “One is so persecuted by engagements. Do not you find London fatiguing?”

“Not at present.”

“Mr. Darcy never allows that one may complain of society. Do you, Mr. Darcy?”

“I do not recollect prescribing it.”

“You abandon me, then.”

“I was never enlisted.”

Miss Bennet answered everything with perfect gentleness. She neither hurried nor lingered, neither claimed intimacy nor accepted distance. Darcy had often thought her sweetness perhaps too yielding for a world that rewarded stronger colors. He began, against his own ease, to see that he had mistaken quiet for weakness.

“I hope the tea is to your liking, Miss Bennet,” Miss Bingley said.

Jane lifted the cup. “Very much, I thank you.”

“You are easily satisfied.”

“I have no wish to be difficult.”

Mrs. Hurst smiled and stirred her own cup. “Caroline prefers gratitude with a little more ceremony.”

“Then I shall endeavor to improve,” Miss Bennet said.

A slight silence followed. Miss Bennet sat opposite Darcy, her cup held carefully between both hands, her face governed with too much care to be easy. Miss Bingley, perceiving the silence, turned again to the pianoforte.

“Mr. Darcy, you must insist on another song. Miss Bennet, you know he is the severest of critics.”

Miss Bennet set down her cup. She turned, not to Miss Bingley, but to Darcy.

“Mr. Darcy, have you seen Mr. Bingley lately?”

There are moments when a room alters so completely that the furniture itself seems to have changed allegiance. Darcy, who had thought the morning merely inconvenient, discovered in that instant that he had not yet understood its seriousness.

“I have,” he said, and because the answer was so plainly insufficient, added after the smallest pause, “I saw him yesterday.”

Miss Bennet inclined her head. Her voice, when she spoke again, was steady enough to shame every artifice in the room. “Then please do give him my regards. I enjoyed his company very much.”

No emphasis was needed. No woman less scrupulously correct could have said less; no woman more sincere could have said more.

Darcy looked at her and understood at once what he ought to have known before. She had cared; he had taken reserve for indifference, and modesty for want of feeling. The error, because it was his own judgment that had made it, struck hard. He had not saved Bingley from an imprudent attachment; he had only helped prolong the quiet mortification of a woman too modest to accuse him of it.

“I shall not fail to deliver your message, Miss Bennet.”

Miss Bingley laughed lightly, and far too soon. “My brother is always delighted to be remembered by his Hertfordshire friends.”

Miss Bennet turned to her with unaltered sweetness. “He is very obliging.”

Darcy no longer doubted that Miss Bingley had understood Miss Bennet perfectly.

She had borne her part so steadily that when the first visible cost of it came, it seemed almost a reproach. Her color, never high, ebbed further, and for an instant her composure showed itself for what it was: effort. She rose.

“I have stayed too long already. Pray do not let me interrupt your morning any more.”

“You are not interrupting us in the least,” Miss Bingley cried. “Though I am quite shocked that you should think of venturing out again so soon. Will your carriage be called? Or have you a hackney waiting?”

“My maid, Fran, is below. I dismissed the coach when I arrived.”

Miss Bingley stood. She smiled as a hostess must when she could not possibly desire what she was saying.

Darcy had a full half-minute in which to remain where he was and let the business conclude itself. It would have been the safer course. It would also have had the advantage, so often mistaken for wisdom, of postponing difficulty. He had postponed enough.

“My carriage is at the door,” he said. “If you will permit me, Miss Bennet, it shall set you down wherever you wish.”

Miss Bingley turned to him. Surprise, in a woman so practiced in arrangement, was never entirely unguarded.

“Mr. Darcy, you are too obliging. There can be no occasion to give yourself such trouble. Miss Bennet is not, I believe, at the far end of the town.”

“The morning is severe,” he replied. “My carriage is already there.”

Mrs. Hurst said, “Indeed, Miss Bennet, you must allow such a convenience.”

Miss Bennet paused only the fraction necessary for propriety. To refuse would have required more notice than acceptance. “You are very kind, sir.”

Darcy bowed. “Pray allow me.”

Mrs. Hurst murmured, “Very attentive, Mr. Darcy,” and rang for the servant.

“You must let us know that you have not taken cold, Miss Bennet,” Miss Bingley said.

“You are very good,” Miss Bennet replied. “I am sure I shall do very well.”

“With Mr. Darcy’s carriage, one may hope so.”

Miss Bennet thanked her again, and those who remained busied themselves in not observing her departure.

In the hall, the air was colder than in the drawing room, and the business of departure plainer. Fran had come up from below and stood ready; a footman held open the door. Outside, the street shone damp and gray, the horses breathing steam into the winter light. Darcy offered Miss Bennet his arm to the carriage. She accepted it as she had accepted all else that morning — quietly, properly, and without surrendering more feeling than the moment required. He handed her in. Fran followed. Behind them came Miss Bingley’s voice, still perfectly pitched.

“You are all attention, Mr. Darcy.”

He turned only enough to bow. Then he stepped in after Miss Bennet, and the carriage door closed upon the sight of Miss Bingley in the doorway, her smile intact and the morning’s music untouched behind her.