certainly admired her, and his situation in life was most eligible; but,

to counterbalance these advantages, Mr. Darcy had considerable patronage

in the church, and his cousin could have none at all.{228}

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“On looking up.”


CHAPTER XXXIII.

MORE than once did Elizabeth, in her ramble within the park,

unexpectedly meet Mr. Darcy. She felt all the perverseness of the

mischance that should bring him where no one else was brought; and, to

prevent its ever happening again, took care to inform him, at first,

that it was a favourite haunt of hers. How it could occur a second time,

therefore, was very odd! Yet it did, and even the third. It seemed like

wilful ill-nature, or a voluntary penance; for on these occasions it was

not merely a few formal inquiries and an awkward pause and then away,

but he actually thought it necessary to turn back and walk with her. He

never said a great deal, nor did she give herself the trouble of talking

or of listening much; but it struck her in the course of their{229} third

rencounter that he was asking some odd unconnected questions—about her

pleasure in being at Hunsford, her love of solitary walks, and her

opinion of Mr. and Mrs. Collins’s happiness; and that in speaking of

Rosings, and her not perfectly understanding the house, he seemed to

expect that whenever she came into Kent again she would be staying

there too. His words seemed to imply it. Could he have Colonel

Fitzwilliam in his thoughts? She supposed, if he meant anything, he must

mean an allusion to what might arise in that quarter. It distressed her

a little, and she was quite glad to find herself at the gate in the

pales opposite the Parsonage.
She was engaged one day, as she walked, in re-perusing Jane’s last

letter, and dwelling on some passages which proved that Jane had not

written in spirits, when, instead of being again surprised by Mr. Darcy,