CHAPTER XLI
A week was gone since Edmund might be supposed
in town, and Fanny had heard nothing of him.
There were three different conclusions to be drawn from
his silence, between which her mind was in fluctuation;
each of them at times being held the most probable.
Either his going had been again delayed, or he had yet
procured no opportunity of seeing Miss Crawford alone,
or he was too happy for letter-writing!
One morning, about this time, Fanny having now been nearly
four weeks from Mansfield, a point which she never failed
to think over and calculate every day, as she and Susan
were preparing to remove, as usual, upstairs, they were
stopped by the knock of a visitor, whom they felt they could
not avoid, from Rebecca's alertness in going to the door,
a duty which always interested her beyond any other.
It was a gentleman's voice; it was a voice that Fanny
was just turning pale about, when Mr. Crawford walked
into the room.
Good sense, like hers, will always act when really
called upon; and she found that she had been able to name
him to her mother, and recall her remembrance of the name,
as that of "William's friend," though she could not
previously have believed herself capable of uttering a
syllable at such a moment. The consciousness of his being
known there only as William's friend was some support.
Having introduced him, however, and being all reseated,
the terrors that occurred of what this visit might lead
to were overpowering, and she fancied herself on the point
of fainting away.
While trying to keep herself alive, their visitor, who had
at first approached her with as animated a countenance
as ever, was wisely and kindly keeping his eyes away,
and giving her time to recover, while he devoted himself
entirely to her mother, addressing her, and attending to
her with the utmost politeness and propriety, at the same
time with a degree of friendliness, of interest at least,
which was making his manner perfect.
Mrs. Price's manners were also at their best. Warmed by
the sight of such a friend to her son, and regulated
by the wish of appearing to advantage before him, she was
overflowing with gratitude--artless, maternal gratitude--
which could not be unpleasing. Mr. Price was out,
which she regretted very much. Fanny was just recovered
enough to feel that _she_ could not regret it; for to her
many other sources of uneasiness was added the severe
one of shame for the home in which he found her.
She might scold herself for the weakness, but there was
no scolding it away. She was ashamed, and she would have
been yet more ashamed of her father than of all the rest.
They talked of William, a subject on which Mrs. Price
could never tire; and Mr. Crawford was as warm in his
commendation as even her heart could wish. She felt
that she had never seen so agreeable a man in her life;
and was only astonished to find that, so great and so
agreeable as he was, he should be come down to Portsmouth
neither on a visit to the port-admiral, nor the commissioner,
nor yet with the intention of going over to the island,
nor of seeing the dockyard. Nothing of all that she
had been used to think of as the proof of importance,
or the employment of wealth, had brought him to Portsmouth.
He had reached it late the night before, was come for a
day or two, was staying at the Crown, had accidentally
met with a navy officer or two of his acquaintance since
his arrival, but had no object of that kind in coming.
By the time he had given all this information, it was not
unreasonable to suppose that Fanny might be looked at
and spoken to; and she was tolerably able to bear his eye,
and hear that he had spent half an hour with his sister
the evening before his leaving London; that she had sent
her best and kindest love, but had had no time for writing;
that he thought himself lucky in seeing Mary for even half
an hour, having spent scarcely twenty-four hours in London,
after his return from Norfolk, before he set off again;
that her cousin Edmund was in town, had been in town,
he understood, a few days; that he had not seen him himself,
but that he was well, had left them all well at Mansfield,
and was to dine, as yesterday, with the Frasers.
Fanny listened collectedly, even to the last-mentioned
circumstance; nay, it seemed a relief to her worn
mind to be at any certainty; and the words, "then by
this time it is all settled," passed internally,
without more evidence of emotion than a faint blush
After talking a little more about Mansfield, a subject
in which her interest was most apparent, Crawford began
to hint at the expediency of an early walk. "It was a
lovely morning, and at that season of the year a fine morning
so often turned off, that it was wisest for everybody not
to delay their exercise"; and such hints producing nothing,
he soon proceeded to a positive recommendation to Mrs. Price
and her daughters to take their walk without loss of time.
Now they came to an understanding. Mrs. Price, it appeared,
scarcely ever stirred out of doors, except of a Sunday;
she owned she could seldom, with her large family,
find time for a walk. "Would she not, then, persuade her
daughters to take advantage of such weather, and allow
him the pleasure of attending them?" Mrs. Price was
greatly obliged and very complying. "Her daughters
were very much confined; Portsmouth was a sad place;
they did not often get out; and she knew they had some
errands in the town, which they would be very glad to do."
And the consequence was, that Fanny, strange as it was--
strange, awkward, and distressing--found herself and Susan,
within ten minutes, walking towards the High Street
with Mr. Crawford.
It was soon pain upon pain, confusion upon confusion;
for they were hardly in the High Street before they met
her father, whose appearance was not the better from its
being Saturday. He stopt; and, ungentlemanlike as he looked,
Fanny was obliged to introduce him to Mr. Crawford.
She could not have a doubt of the manner in which
Mr. Crawford must be struck. He must be ashamed
and disgusted altogether. He must soon give her up,
and cease to have the smallest inclination for the match;
and yet, though she had been so much wanting his affection
to be cured, this was a sort of cure that would be almost
as bad as the complaint; and I believe there is scarcely
a young lady in the United Kingdoms who would not rather
put up with the misfortune of being sought by a clever,
agreeable man, than have him driven away by the vulgarity
of her nearest relations.
Mr. Crawford probably could not regard his future
father-in-law with any idea of taking him for a model
in dress; but (as Fanny instantly, and to her great
relief, discerned) her father was a very different man,
a very different Mr. Price in his behaviour to this most
highly respected stranger, from what he was in his own
family at home. His manners now, though not polished,
were more than passable: they were grateful, animated, manly;
his expressions were those of an attached father,
and a sensible man; his loud tones did very well in the
open air, and there was not a single oath to be heard.
Such was his instinctive compliment to the good manners
of Mr. Crawford; and, be the consequence what it might,
Fanny's immediate feelings were infinitely soothed.
The conclusion of the two gentlemen's civilities was an offer
of Mr. Price's to take Mr. Crawford into the dockyard,
which Mr. Crawford, desirous of accepting as a favour
what was intended as such, though he had seen the dockyard
again and again, and hoping to be so much the longer
with Fanny, was very gratefully disposed to avail himself of,
if the Miss Prices were not afraid of the fatigue;
and as it was somehow or other ascertained, or inferred,
or at least acted upon, that they were not at all afraid,
to the dockyard they were all to go; and but for
Mr. Crawford, Mr. Price would have turned thither directly,
without the smallest consideration for his daughters'
errands in the High Street. He took care, however, that they
should be allowed to go to the shops they came out expressly
to visit; and it did not delay them long, for Fanny could
so little bear to excite impatience, or be waited for,
that before the gentlemen, as they stood at the door,
could do more than begin upon the last naval regulations,
or settle the number of three-deckers now in commission,
their companions were ready to proceed.
They were then to set forward for the dockyard at once,
and the walk would have been conducted--according to
Mr. Crawford's opinion--in a singular manner,
had Mr. Price been allowed the entire regulation of it,
as the two girls, he found, would have been left
to follow, and keep up with them or not, as they could,
while they walked on together at their own hasty pace.
He was able to introduce some improvement occasionally,
though by no means to the extent he wished; he absolutely
would not walk away from them; and at any crossing
or any crowd, when Mr. Price was only calling out,
"Come, girls; come, Fan; come, Sue, take care of yourselves;
keep a sharp lookout!" he would give them his particular
attendance.
Once fairly in the dockyard, he began to reckon upon
some happy intercourse with Fanny, as they were very soon
joined by a brother lounger of Mr. Price's, who was come
to take his daily survey of how things went on, and who
must prove a far more worthy companion than himself;
and after a time the two officers seemed very well satisfied
going about together, and discussing matters of equal
and never-failing interest, while the young people sat down
upon some timbers in the yard, or found a seat on board
a vessel in the stocks which they all went to look at.
Fanny was most conveniently in want of rest. Crawford could
not have wished her more fatigued or more ready to sit down;
but he could have wished her sister away. A quick-looking
girl of Susan's age was the very worst third in the world:
totally different from Lady Bertram, all eyes and ears;
and there was no introducing the main point before her.
He must content himself with being only generally agreeable,
and letting Susan have her share of entertainment,
with the indulgence, now and then, of a look or hint
for the better-informed and conscious Fanny. Norfolk was
what he had mostly to talk of: there he had been some time,
and everything there was rising in importance from his
present schemes. Such a man could come from no place,
no society, without importing something to amuse;
his journeys and his acquaintance were all of use,
and Susan was entertained in a way quite new to her.
For Fanny, somewhat more was related than the accidental
agreeableness of the parties he had been in.
For her approbation, the particular reason of his going into
Norfolk at all, at this unusual time of year, was given.
It had been real business, relative to the renewal of a
lease in which the welfare of a large and--he believed--
industrious family was at stake. He had suspected his
agent of some underhand dealing; of meaning to bias him
against the deserving; and he had determined to go himself,
and thoroughly investigate the merits of the case.
He had gone, had done even more good than he had foreseen,
had been useful to more than his first plan had comprehended,
and was now able to congratulate himself upon it, and to
feel that in performing a duty, he had secured agreeable
recollections for his own mind. He had introduced himself
to some tenants whom he had never seen before; he had begun
making acquaintance with cottages whose very existence,
though on his own estate, had been hitherto unknown to him.
This was aimed, and well aimed, at Fanny. It was pleasing
to hear him speak so properly; here he had been acting
as he ought to do. To be the friend of the poor and
the oppressed! Nothing could be more grateful to her;
and she was on the point of giving him an approving look,
when it was all frightened off by his adding a something
too pointed of his hoping soon to have an assistant,
a friend, a guide in every plan of utility or charity
for Everingham: a somebody that would make Everingham
and all about it a dearer object than it had ever been
yet.
She turned away, and wished he would not say such things.
She was willing to allow he might have more good
qualities than she had been wont to suppose. She began
to feel the possibility of his turning out well at last;
but he was and must ever be completely unsuited to her,
and ought not to think of her.
He perceived that enough had been said of Everingham,
and that it would be as well to talk of something else,
and turned to Mansfield. He could not have chosen better;
that was a topic to bring back her attention and her looks
almost instantly. It was a real indulgence to her to hear
or to speak of Mansfield. Now so long divided from
everybody who knew the place, she felt it quite the voice
of a friend when he mentioned it, and led the way to her
fond exclamations in praise of its beauties and comforts,
and by his honourable tribute to its inhabitants allowed
her to gratify her own heart in the warmest eulogium,
in speaking of her uncle as all that was clever and good,
and her aunt as having the sweetest of all sweet tempers.
He had a great attachment to Mansfield himself; he said so;
he looked forward with the hope of spending much, very much,
of his time there; always there, or in the neighbourhood.
He particularly built upon a very happy summer and
autumn there this year; he felt that it would be so:
he depended upon it; a summer and autumn infinitely superior
to the last. As animated, as diversified, as social,
but with circumstances of superiority undescribable.
"Mansfield, Sotherton, Thornton Lacey," he continued;
"what a society will be comprised in those houses!
And at Michaelmas, perhaps, a fourth may be added:
some small hunting-box in the vicinity of everything so dear;
for as to any partnership in Thornton Lacey, as Edmund
Bertram once good-humouredly proposed, I hope I foresee
two objections: two fair, excellent, irresistible objections
to that plan."
Fanny was doubly silenced here; though when the moment
was passed, could regret that she had not forced herself into
the acknowledged comprehension of one half of his meaning,
and encouraged him to say something more of his sister
and Edmund. It was a subject which she must learn to speak of,
and the weakness that shrunk from it would soon be quite
unpardonable.
When Mr. Price and his friend had seen all that they wished,
or had time for, the others were ready to return;
and in the course of their walk back, Mr. Crawford contrived
a minute's privacy for telling Fanny that his only
business in Portsmouth was to see her; that he was come
down for a couple of days on her account, and hers only,
and because he could not endure a longer total separation.
She was sorry, really sorry; and yet in spite of this and the
two or three other things which she wished he had not said,
she thought him altogether improved since she had seen him;
he was much more gentle, obliging, and attentive to other
people's feelings than he had ever been at Mansfield;
she had never seen him so agreeable--so _near_ being agreeable;
his behaviour to her father could not offend, and there
was something particularly kind and proper in the notice
he took of Susan. He was decidedly improved. She wished
the next day over, she wished he had come only for one day;
but it was not so very bad as she would have expected:
the pleasure of talking of Mansfield was so very great!
Before they parted, she had to thank him for another pleasure,
and one of no trivial kind. Her father asked him to do
them the honour of taking his mutton with them, and Fanny
had time for only one thrill of horror, before he declared
himself prevented by a prior engagement. He was engaged
to dinner already both for that day and the next; he had met
with some acquaintance at the Crown who would not be denied;
he should have the honour, however, of waiting on them
again on the morrow, etc., and so they parted--Fanny in
a state of actual felicity from escaping so horrible an evil!
To have had him join their family dinner-party, and see
all their deficiencies, would have been dreadful!
Rebecca's cookery and Rebecca's waiting, and Betsey's
eating at table without restraint, and pulling everything
about as she chose, were what Fanny herself was not yet
enough inured to for her often to make a tolerable meal.
_She_ was nice only from natural delicacy, but _he_ had been
brought up in a school of luxury and epicurism.