India--A Pride and Prejudice Variation: Elizabeth Abroad, #1 by Sophia Grey

Author:Sophia Grey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Blue Flowers Press

Chapter 9

Mr. Bennet had already moved away through the crowd, and she could see him speaking to a gentleman with a broad smile and a beard that was a shockingly bright shade of red and a rotund gentleman with well-oiled hair and an ivory-topped walking stick.

Elizabeth took a breath and tried to focus on what was happening in the room. She took a glass of punch and wandered the room. Conversation was varied and did not revolve solely around trading and commerce, which was a welcome change from what had filled her mind for the past week.

An officer in familiar regimental colors asked her to dance, and though Elizabeth could not remember his name as soon as he had said it, she did her best to hide that fact. It was a sharp departure from the assemblies in Meryton where she would never forget the name of any of her dance partners. She was too distracted. The colors, the candles, the excitement and conversation in the room, and the stress that she had been under had turned her mind into a maelstrom of confusion. Thankfully, the officer at her side did not seem to notice.

Her partner was certainly handsome, and he was very gracious when it came to her mild discomfort with the unfamiliar steps, but she was too embarrassed to ask for his name again and declined his invitation for a second dance as punishment for her own misstep.

She danced twice more, and found, to her surprise that she was enjoying herself a great deal. The lemon and fruit ices she sampled between dances were unlike anything she had tasted in Hertfordshire, and she knew that she would have to describe them in minute detail to Jane thought she did not trust her memory with the exquisitely sharp flavors and unique aroma of each one. Mango. Lemon. Lime. Orange… each one unique and delicate. India was truly a wondrous place, and to think that it had been tamed by England— it was too marvelous for words.

Elizabeth had kept an eye upon her father as well, and she was pleased to see him contentedly seated at a card table at the side of the room. The gentleman with the bright red whiskers had been replaced with a slender man with a military air about him, and a young blond gentleman in possession of an amiable face and a relaxed demeanor.

If her father had intended to meet Mr. Darcy and Mr. Bingley tonight, he had not informed her of his plans. It was clear from what the woman with the orange feathers had said that the news of her father’s acquisition of Bennet Trading had not gone unnoticed among the other merchants.

As the musicians played yet another piece with which she was unfamiliar, Elizabeth took another glass of punch and positioned herself at the edge of the dance floor so that she might take a moment to observe the movements of the dancers and, perhaps, be more inclined to attempt the steps herself.

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