第121章[第2页/共6页]

“Very much.”

She held out her hand;he kissed it with affectionate gallantry, though he hardly knew how to look,and they entered the house.

“Yes;he introduced us to his sister.”

“I have heard from authority, which I thought as good, that it was left you conditionally only,and at the will of the present patron.”

The contents of this letter threw Elizabeth into a flutter of spirits,in which it was difficult to determine whether pleasure or pain bore the greatest share.The vague and unsettled suspicions which uncertainty had produced of what Mr. Darcy might have been doing to forward her sister's match, which she had feared to encourage as an exertion of goodness too great to be probable, and at the same time dreaded to be just, from the pain of obligation, were proved beyond their greatest extent to be true!He had followed them purposely to town,he had taken on himself all the trouble and mortification attendant on such a research;in which supplication had been necessary to a woman whom he must abominate and despise,and where he was reduced to meet,frequently meet,reason with,persuade,and finally