Set in Stone, Chapter 3.

Dr. Darcy’s consulting room was on the first floor, in the east wing Elizabeth had not yet fully explored. She was summoned there or rather, her father mentioned at luncheon that Dr. Darcy would appreciate a word with her at two o’clock if she felt well enough, in a tone that suggested feeling well enough was not actually optional.

She arrived at two to find the door open and Dr. Darcy standing beside a desk that was occupied almost entirely by papers arranged in stacks of alarming precision. He looked up as she entered, then immediately away, directing his attention somewhere past her left shoulder.

“Miss Bennet. Please, sit.”

There were two chairs. She took the one that was not behind the desk. He remained standing for a moment longer than was comfortable, as though he had forgotten the ordinary rhythm of these things, then sat and consulted a notebook that lay open in front of him.

“I wanted to review a few details,” he said. “Your father has provided some background, but there are gaps I hope you can help me fill.”

“I shall do my best,” Elizabeth said. “Though I confess my memory of recent weeks is not what I would wish it to be.”

“Yes,” he said. “That is not uncommon with this sort of condition.”

“And what sort of condition is it?”

He looked up, not quite at her face, but near enough that she could not determine precisely where his gaze was landing. Then he returned to the notebook. “A periodic nervous disorder,” he said. “Somnambulism, primarily, with associated memory disruption following episodes. Your father wrote to me after you had a particularly concerning incident at home.”

“I do not remember it.”

“No,” he said. “You would not.”

She waited for him to elaborate. He did not. Instead he asked her a series of questions. When had she first noticed the fatigue? Were there preceding symptoms? Had she experienced unusual dreams or waking disturbances? She answered as well as she could, which was not well at all. It was rather like being asked to describe a room one had only glimpsed through a doorway while walking past.

“You are finding the medication tolerable, I hope,” he said.

She thought of the bitter draught she had been given that morning, and the morning before that, poured from an amber bottle whose label she had not thought to examine closely. “It is not pleasant,” she said. “But I understand it is meant to be helpful.”

“It is helpful,” he said. “The formulation is my own. Rutinum compositum. A compound preparation, primarily rue, with several other components to moderate the more difficult side effects.”

“Rutinum compositum,” Elizabeth repeated. “That is quite a name for a tincture.”

“It is a precise name for a specific preparation.”

“It is a grandiose name,” she said. “Do all medicines require Latin to be efficacious, or only yours?”

Something that was almost amusement crossed his face, though it did not reach his eyes, which were still fixed on a point safely past her. “The nomenclature is standard practice in pharmaceutical research. If you prefer, I can call it ‘the bitter draught Miss Bennet dislikes.’“

“I think I prefer the Latin after all,” Elizabeth said. “At least it sounds as though it ought to work.”

He made a note in his book. She could not tell whether he was recording her answer or simply occupying himself with something other than looking at her. His manner was odd—not unkind, precisely, but remote in a way that suggested either extreme professionalism or extreme discomfort. She could not determine which, and found she minded not being able to determine it.

“Your father mentioned that you have three sisters,” he said, turning to a fresh page. “All younger, I believe.”

“Four sisters,” Elizabeth corrected. “Jane is older and recently married. The younger three are here with us: Mary, Kitty, and Lydia. You have met them, I think.”

“Yes,” he said. “At breakfast.”

“And yesterday, apparently, though I do not recall that breakfast at all.”

He glanced up again, the same brief, displaced look, and she noticed for the first time that his face, which she had initially taken for severe, was really only tired. He had the look of a man who was not sleeping well and had not been sleeping well for some time.

And the side-whiskers. She had thought them merely unfashionable at breakfast, but now, seeing them in better light and at closer range, she revised her assessment. They were meant to make him look older, more authoritative. It was the sort of facial hair a senior physician in late middle age might cultivate to signal his decades of experience. On Dr. Darcy, who could not be much past thirty, they signaled only that he had miscalculated rather badly what such embellishments actually accomplished.

“Is something amusing?” he asked.

She realized she had been staring. “Not at all.”

“You were smiling.”

“Was I? I had not noticed.” This was a lie. She had noticed. She decided it was not worth pursuing and changed the subject before he could. “How long do you anticipate I shall need to continue the Rutinum compositum?”

“That depends on your progress,” he said. “The compound is suppressive rather than curative. It reduces the frequency and severity of episodes, but it does not eliminate the underlying condition. I am working on a more permanent solution, but the research is not yet complete.”

“How reassuring.”

“I did not say it to reassure you,” he said. “I said it because it is accurate.”

She could not decide whether she disliked him. He was difficult to read, guarded in a way that might be professional necessity or personal coldness, and he had still not looked at her directly for more than a second at a time since she had entered the room. It ought to have been a relief, after her dimly remembered weeks of strangers peering at her with the concerned intensity people reserved for invalids, but instead it was faintly irritating. She had the sense of being assessed without being seen, catalogued without being acknowledged, and she found she did not care for it.

“Is there anything else you require from me?” she asked.

“Not at present,” he said. “I shall want to see you again in a few days to assess how you are tolerating the medication. In the meantime, if you experience any unusual symptoms—dizziness, visual disturbances, anything that concerns you—please inform me immediately.”

“And if I experience the urge to sleepwalk?”

“You will not,” he said. “That is what the medication is for.”

He said it with such flat certainty that she almost believed him. Almost.

She stood, and he stood as well, in a belated mirror of courtesy that again seemed slightly off in its timing. She had the impression of a man who was performing the ordinary social gestures from memory rather than instinct.

“Thank you, Dr. Darcy,” she said.

“Miss Bennet.”

He inclined his head. She left the room and did not look back, though she had the distinct sense as she walked down the corridor that he had not moved from where he stood, and that he had not yet returned his attention to his notebook.

She found her father in the library, which was where he had been most often since their arrival. He had claimed a chair near the window and surrounded himself with books in a fortification that suggested he did not wish to be dislodged.

“Well?” he said, looking up as she entered. “How did you find our host?”

“Odd,” Elizabeth said.

“Mm. Yes. I had noticed that.”

“Does he ever look at anyone directly?”

“Not if he can help it,” Mr. Bennet said. “I assumed it was a professional affectation. Physicians are taught to cultivate a certain manner, I believe, to inspire confidence in patients who might otherwise suspect them of incompetence. Though I grant you the side-whiskers suggest he has not entirely mastered the art.”

“They are extraordinary,” Elizabeth said. “Do you suppose anyone has told him?”

“I suspect,” Mr. Bennet said, “that Dr. Darcy is not a man who invites commentary on his personal grooming choices.”

Elizabeth sat in the chair opposite and considered this. “He said you wrote to him about an incident at home.”

Her father’s expression did not change, but there was a small pause before he answered. “I did.”

“I do not remember it.”

“No,” he said. “I did not think you would.”

“Will you tell me what happened?”

“You were walking in your sleep,” Mr. Bennet said. “You came downstairs in the night and could not be woken. Your mother tried to rouse you and—” He stopped. “It frightened her a great deal. It frightened all of us. I thought it best to seek advice from someone who specialized in such things.”

“And Dr. Darcy specializes in somnambulism?”

“In disorders of the nervous system,” her father said. “He studied in Vienna and has a particular interest in cases that are—difficult to classify. Mr. Bingley knew of him. Jane made the introduction.”

This was the first Elizabeth had heard of Jane’s involvement. Yet another thing she did not yet understand and could not bring herself to ask about directly. “And you trust him?”

“I trust him to know more about your condition than I do,” Mr. Bennet said. “Whether that is the same as trusting him generally, I have not yet determined. He is severe, he is odd, and he has a great many mirrors in his house for reasons he has not explained. But he has treated other patients with similar symptoms, and they have improved under his care, and at present I am willing to overlook a multitude of personal eccentricities in exchange for that.”

“Even the side-whiskers?”

“Even those,” Mr. Bennet said. “Though I admit they test my tolerance.”

Elizabeth smiled despite herself. Her father returned to his book, and she sat for a moment longer in the quiet of the library, looking out at the garden and the distant line of the village, and thinking about mirrors and grandiose Latin names and a man who would not meet her eyes.