Jane Austen 11 страница

to complain, however. Mr Elliot was better to look at than most men,

and he had no objection to being seen with him anywhere."

 

Mr Elliot, and his friends in Marlborough Buildings, were talked of

the whole evening. "Colonel Wallis had been so impatient to be

introduced to them! and Mr Elliot so anxious that he should!"

and there was a Mrs Wallis, at present known only to them by description,

as she was in daily expectation of her confinement; but Mr Elliot

spoke of her as "a most charming woman, quite worthy of being known

in Camden Place," and as soon as she recovered they were to be acquainted.

Sir Walter thought much of Mrs Wallis; she was said to be

an excessively pretty woman, beautiful. "He longed to see her.

He hoped she might make some amends for the many very plain faces

he was continually passing in the streets. The worst of Bath was

the number of its plain women. He did not mean to say that there were

no pretty women, but the number of the plain was out of all proportion.

He had frequently observed, as he walked, that one handsome face

would be followed by thirty, or five-and-thirty frights; and once,

as he had stood in a shop on Bond Street, he had counted

eighty-seven women go by, one after another, without there being

a tolerable face among them. It had been a frosty morning,

to be sure, a sharp frost, which hardly one woman in a thousand

could stand the test of. But still, there certainly were

a dreadful multitude of ugly women in Bath; and as for the men!

they were infinitely worse. Such scarecrows as the streets were full of!

It was evident how little the women were used to the sight of anything

tolerable, by the effect which a man of decent appearance produced.

He had never walked anywhere arm-in-arm with Colonel Wallis

(who was a fine military figure, though sandy-haired) without observing

that every woman`s eye was upon him; every woman`s eye was sure to be

upon Colonel Wallis." Modest Sir Walter! He was not allowed

to escape, however. His daughter and Mrs Clay united in hinting

that Colonel Wallis`s companion might have as good a figure

as Colonel Wallis, and certainly was not sandy-haired.

 

"How is Mary looking?" said Sir Walter, in the height of his good humour.

"The last time I saw her she had a red nose, but I hope that may not

happen every day."

 

"Oh! no, that must have been quite accidental. In general she has been

in very good health and very good looks since Michaelmas."

 

"If I thought it would not tempt her to go out in sharp winds,

and grow coarse, I would send her a new hat and pelisse."

 

Anne was considering whether she should venture to suggest that a gown,

or a cap, would not be liable to any such misuse, when a knock at the door

suspended everything. "A knock at the door! and so late!

It was ten o`clock. Could it be Mr Elliot? They knew he was to dine

in Lansdown Crescent. It was possible that he might stop in his way home

to ask them how they did. They could think of no one else.

Mrs Clay decidedly thought it Mr Elliot`s knock." Mrs Clay was right.

With all the state which a butler and foot-boy could give,

Mr Elliot was ushered into the room.

 

It was the same, the very same man, with no difference but of dress.

Anne drew a little back, while the others received his compliments,

and her sister his apologies for calling at so unusual an hour,

but "he could not be so near without wishing to know that neither she

nor her friend had taken cold the day before," &c. &c; which was

all as politely done, and as politely taken, as possible, but her part

must follow then. Sir Walter talked of his youngest daughter;

"Mr Elliot must give him leave to present him to his youngest daughter"

(there was no occasion for remembering Mary); and Anne, smiling and

blushing, very becomingly shewed to Mr Elliot the pretty features

which he had by no means forgotten, and instantly saw, with amusement

at his little start of surprise, that he had not been at all aware

of who she was. He looked completely astonished, but not more astonished

than pleased; his eyes brightened! and with the most perfect alacrity

he welcomed the relationship, alluded to the past, and entreated

to be received as an acquaintance already. He was quite as good-looking

as he had appeared at Lyme, his countenance improved by speaking,

and his manners were so exactly what they ought to be, so polished,

so easy, so particularly agreeable, that she could compare them

in excellence to only one person`s manners. They were not the same,

but they were, perhaps, equally good.

 

He sat down with them, and improved their conversation very much.

There could be no doubt of his being a sensible man. Ten minutes

were enough to certify that. His tone, his expressions,

his choice of subject, his knowing where to stop; it was all

the operation of a sensible, discerning mind. As soon as he could,

he began to talk to her of Lyme, wanting to compare opinions

respecting the place, but especially wanting to speak of the circumstance

of their happening to be guests in the same inn at the same time;

to give his own route, understand something of hers, and regret that

he should have lost such an opportunity of paying his respects to her.

She gave him a short account of her party and business at Lyme.

His regret increased as he listened. He had spent his whole

solitary evening in the room adjoining theirs; had heard voices,

mirth continually; thought they must be a most delightful set of people,

longed to be with them, but certainly without the smallest suspicion

of his possessing the shadow of a right to introduce himself.

If he had but asked who the party were! The name of Musgrove would

have told him enough. "Well, it would serve to cure him of

an absurd practice of never asking a question at an inn,

which he had adopted, when quite a young man, on the principal

of its being very ungenteel to be curious.

 

"The notions of a young man of one or two and twenty," said he,

"as to what is necessary in manners to make him quite the thing,

are more absurd, I believe, than those of any other set of beings

in the world. The folly of the means they often employ

is only to be equalled by the folly of what they have in view."

 

But he must not be addressing his reflections to Anne alone:

he knew it; he was soon diffused again among the others,

and it was only at intervals that he could return to Lyme.

 

His enquiries, however, produced at length an account of the scene

she had been engaged in there, soon after his leaving the place.

Having alluded to "an accident," he must hear the whole.

When he questioned, Sir Walter and Elizabeth began to question also,

but the difference in their manner of doing it could not be unfelt.

She could only compare Mr Elliot to Lady Russell, in the wish

of really comprehending what had passed, and in the degree of concern

for what she must have suffered in witnessing it.

 

He staid an hour with them. The elegant little clock on the mantel-

piece had struck "eleven with its silver sounds," and the watchman

was beginning to be heard at a distance telling the same tale,

before Mr Elliot or any of them seemed to feel that he had been there long.

 

Anne could not have supposed it possible that her first evening in

Camden Place could have passed so well!

 

Chapter 16

 

 

There was one point which Anne, on returning to her family,

would have been more thankful to ascertain even than Mr Elliot`s

being in love with Elizabeth, which was, her father`s not being

in love with Mrs Clay; and she was very far from easy about it,

when she had been at home a few hours. On going down to breakfast

the next morning, she found there had just been a decent pretence

on the lady`s side of meaning to leave them. She could imagine Mrs Clay

to have said, that "now Miss Anne was come, she could not suppose herself

at all wanted;" for Elizabeth was replying in a sort of whisper,

"That must not be any reason, indeed. I assure you I feel it none.

She is nothing to me, compared with you;" and she was in full time

to hear her father say, "My dear madam, this must not be. As yet,

you have seen nothing of Bath. You have been here only to be useful.

You must not run away from us now. You must stay to be acquainted

with Mrs Wallis, the beautiful Mrs Wallis. To your fine mind,

I well know the sight of beauty is a real gratification."

 

He spoke and looked so much in earnest, that Anne was not surprised

to see Mrs Clay stealing a glance at Elizabeth and herself.

Her countenance, perhaps, might express some watchfulness;

but the praise of the fine mind did not appear to excite a thought

in her sister. The lady could not but yield to such joint entreaties,

and promise to stay.

 

In the course of the same morning, Anne and her father chancing to be

alone together, he began to compliment her on her improved looks;

he thought her "less thin in her person, in her cheeks; her skin,

her complexion, greatly improved; clearer, fresher. Had she been

using any thing in particular?" "No, nothing." "Merely Gowland,"

he supposed. "No, nothing at all." "Ha! he was surprised at that;"

and added, "certainly you cannot do better than to continue as you are;

you cannot be better than well; or I should recommend Gowland,

the constant use of Gowland, during the spring months. Mrs Clay has been

using it at my recommendation, and you see what it has done for her.

You see how it has carried away her freckles."

 

If Elizabeth could but have heard this! Such personal praise

might have struck her, especially as it did not appear to Anne

that the freckles were at all lessened. But everything must

take its chance. The evil of a marriage would be much diminished,

if Elizabeth were also to marry. As for herself, she might always

command a home with Lady Russell.

 

Lady Russell`s composed mind and polite manners were put to some trial

on this point, in her intercourse in Camden Place. The sight of Mrs Clay

in such favour, and of Anne so overlooked, was a perpetual provocation

to her there; and vexed her as much when she was away, as a person in Bath

who drinks the water, gets all the new publications, and has

a very large acquaintance, has time to be vexed.

 

As Mr Elliot became known to her, she grew more charitable,

or more indifferent, towards the others. His manners were

an immediate recommendation; and on conversing with him she found

the solid so fully supporting the superficial, that she was at first,

as she told Anne, almost ready to exclaim, "Can this be Mr Elliot?"

and could not seriously picture to herself a more agreeable

or estimable man. Everything united in him; good understanding,

correct opinions, knowledge of the world, and a warm heart.

He had strong feelings of family attachment and family honour,

without pride or weakness; he lived with the liberality of a man of fortune,

without display; he judged for himself in everything essential,

without defying public opinion in any point of worldly decorum.

He was steady, observant, moderate, candid; never run away with by spirits

or by selfishness, which fancied itself strong feeling; and yet,

with a sensibility to what was amiable and lovely, and a value

for all the felicities of domestic life, which characters of

fancied enthusiasm and violent agitation seldom really possess.

She was sure that he had not been happy in marriage. Colonel Wallis

said it, and Lady Russell saw it; but it had been no unhappiness

to sour his mind, nor (she began pretty soon to suspect) to prevent his

thinking of a second choice. Her satisfaction in Mr Elliot

outweighed all the plague of Mrs Clay.

 

It was now some years since Anne had begun to learn that she

and her excellent friend could sometimes think differently;

and it did not surprise her, therefore, that Lady Russell

should see nothing suspicious or inconsistent, nothing to require

more motives than appeared, in Mr Elliot`s great desire of a reconciliation.

In Lady Russell`s view, it was perfectly natural that Mr Elliot,

at a mature time of life, should feel it a most desirable object,

and what would very generally recommend him among all sensible people,

to be on good terms with the head of his family; the simplest process

in the world of time upon a head naturally clear, and only erring

in the heyday of youth. Anne presumed, however, still to smile about it,

and at last to mention "Elizabeth." Lady Russell listened, and looked,

and made only this cautious reply:--"Elizabeth! very well;

time will explain."

 

It was a reference to the future, which Anne, after a little observation,

felt she must submit to. She could determine nothing at present.

In that house Elizabeth must be first; and she was in the habit

of such general observance as "Miss Elliot," that any particularity

of attention seemed almost impossible. Mr Elliot, too,

it must be remembered, had not been a widower seven months.

A little delay on his side might be very excusable. In fact,

Anne could never see the crape round his hat, without fearing that

she was the inexcusable one, in attributing to him such imaginations;

for though his marriage had not been very happy, still it had existed

so many years that she could not comprehend a very rapid recovery

from the awful impression of its being dissolved.

 

However it might end, he was without any question their

pleasantest acquaintance in Bath: she saw nobody equal to him;

and it was a great indulgence now and then to talk to him about Lyme,

which he seemed to have as lively a wish to see again, and to see more of,

as herself. They went through the particulars of their first meeting

a great many times. He gave her to understand that he had

looked at her with some earnestness. She knew it well;

and she remembered another person`s look also.

 

They did not always think alike. His value for rank and connexion

she perceived was greater than hers. It was not merely complaisance,

it must be a liking to the cause, which made him enter warmly

into her father and sister`s solicitudes on a subject which

she thought unworthy to excite them. The Bath paper one morning

announced the arrival of the Dowager Viscountess Dalrymple,

and her daughter, the Honourable Miss Carteret; and all the comfort

of No.--, Camden Place, was swept away for many days; for the Dalrymples

(in Anne`s opinion, most unfortunately) were cousins of the Elliots;

and the agony was how to introduce themselves properly.

 

Anne had never seen her father and sister before in contact with nobility,

and she must acknowledge herself disappointed. She had hoped

better things from their high ideas of their own situation in life,

and was reduced to form a wish which she had never foreseen;

a wish that they had more pride; for "our cousins Lady Dalrymple

and Miss Carteret;" "our cousins, the Dalrymples," sounded in her ears

all day long.

 

Sir Walter had once been in company with the late viscount,

but had never seen any of the rest of the family; and the difficulties

of the case arose from there having been a suspension of all intercourse

by letters of ceremony, ever since the death of that said late viscount,

when, in consequence of a dangerous illness of Sir Walter`s

at the same time, there had been an unlucky omission at Kellynch.

No letter of condolence had been sent to Ireland. The neglect

had been visited on the head of the sinner; for when poor Lady Elliot

died herself, no letter of condolence was received at Kellynch,

and, consequently, there was but too much reason to apprehend

that the Dalrymples considered the relationship as closed.

How to have this anxious business set to rights, and be admitted

as cousins again, was the question: and it was a question which,

in a more rational manner, neither Lady Russell nor Mr Elliot

thought unimportant. "Family connexions were always worth preserving,

good company always worth seeking; Lady Dalrymple had taken a house,

for three months, in Laura Place, and would be living in style.

She had been at Bath the year before, and Lady Russell had heard her

spoken of as a charming woman. It was very desirable that

the connexion should be renewed, if it could be done, without any

compromise of propriety on the side of the Elliots."

 

Sir Walter, however, would choose his own means, and at last wrote

a very fine letter of ample explanation, regret, and entreaty,

to his right honourable cousin. Neither Lady Russell nor Mr Elliot

could admire the letter; but it did all that was wanted,

in bringing three lines of scrawl from the Dowager Viscountess.

"She was very much honoured, and should be happy in their acquaintance."

The toils of the business were over, the sweets began. They visited

in Laura Place, they had the cards of Dowager Viscountess Dalrymple,

and the Honourable Miss Carteret, to be arranged wherever they might

be most visible: and "Our cousins in Laura Place,"--"Our cousin,

Lady Dalrymple and Miss Carteret," were talked of to everybody.

 

Anne was ashamed. Had Lady Dalrymple and her daughter even been

very agreeable, she would still have been ashamed of the agitation

they created, but they were nothing. There was no superiority of manner,

accomplishment, or understanding. Lady Dalrymple had acquired

the name of "a charming woman," because she had a smile and a civil answer

for everybody. Miss Carteret, with still less to say, was so plain

and so awkward, that she would never have been tolerated in Camden Place

but for her birth.

 

Lady Russell confessed she had expected something better; but yet

"it was an acquaintance worth having;" and when Anne ventured to speak

her opinion of them to Mr Elliot, he agreed to their being nothing

in themselves, but still maintained that, as a family connexion,

as good company, as those who would collect good company around them,

they had their value. Anne smiled and said,

 

"My idea of good company, Mr Elliot, is the company of clever,

well-informed people, who have a great deal of conversation;

that is what I call good company."

 

"You are mistaken," said he gently, "that is not good company;

that is the best. Good company requires only birth, education,

and manners, and with regard to education is not very nice.

Birth and good manners are essential; but a little learning is

by no means a dangerous thing in good company; on the contrary,

it will do very well. My cousin Anne shakes her head.

She is not satisfied. She is fastidious. My dear cousin"

(sitting down by her), "you have a better right to be fastidious

than almost any other woman I know; but will it answer?

Will it make you happy? Will it not be wiser to accept the society

of those good ladies in Laura Place, and enjoy all the advantages

of the connexion as far as possible? You may depend upon it,

that they will move in the first set in Bath this winter,

and as rank is rank, your being known to be related to them

will have its use in fixing your family (our family let me say)

in that degree of consideration which we must all wish for."

 

"Yes," sighed Anne, "we shall, indeed, be known to be related to them!"

then recollecting herself, and not wishing to be answered, she added,

"I certainly do think there has been by far too much trouble taken

to procure the acquaintance. I suppose" (smiling) "I have more pride

than any of you; but I confess it does vex me, that we should be

so solicitous to have the relationship acknowledged, which we may

be very sure is a matter of perfect indifference to them."

 

"Pardon me, dear cousin, you are unjust in your own claims.

In London, perhaps, in your present quiet style of living,

it might be as you say: but in Bath; Sir Walter Elliot and his family

will always be worth knowing: always acceptable as acquaintance."

 

"Well," said Anne, "I certainly am proud, too proud to enjoy a welcome

which depends so entirely upon place."

 

"I love your indignation," said he; "it is very natural.

But here you are in Bath, and the object is to be established here

with all the credit and dignity which ought to belong to Sir Walter Elliot.

You talk of being proud; I am called proud, I know, and I shall not wish

to believe myself otherwise; for our pride, if investigated,

would have the same object, I have no doubt, though the kind may seem

a little different. In one point, I am sure, my dear cousin,"

(he continued, speaking lower, though there was no one else in the room)

"in one point, I am sure, we must feel alike. We must feel that

every addition to your father`s society, among his equals or superiors,

may be of use in diverting his thoughts from those who are beneath him."

 

He looked, as he spoke, to the seat which Mrs Clay had been

lately occupying: a sufficient explanation of what he particularly meant;

and though Anne could not believe in their having the same sort of pride,

she was pleased with him for not liking Mrs Clay; and her conscience

admitted that his wishing to promote her father`s getting

great acquaintance was more than excusable in the view of defeating her.

 

Chapter 17

 

 

While Sir Walter and Elizabeth were assiduously pushing their

good fortune in Laura Place, Anne was renewing an acquaintance

of a very different description.

 

She had called on her former governess, and had heard from her

of there being an old school-fellow in Bath, who had the two strong claims

on her attention of past kindness and present suffering. Miss Hamilton,

now Mrs Smith, had shewn her kindness in one of those periods of her life

when it had been most valuable. Anne had gone unhappy to school,

grieving for the loss of a mother whom she had dearly loved,

feeling her separation from home, and suffering as a girl of fourteen,

of strong sensibility and not high spirits, must suffer at such a time;

and Miss Hamilton, three years older than herself, but still from the want

of near relations and a settled home, remaining another year at school,

had been useful and good to her in a way which had considerably lessened

her misery, and could never be remembered with indifference.

 

Miss Hamilton had left school, had married not long afterwards,

was said to have married a man of fortune, and this was all

that Anne had known of her, till now that their governess`s account

brought her situation forward in a more decided but very different form.

 

She was a widow and poor. Her husband had been extravagant;

and at his death, about two years before, had left his affairs

dreadfully involved. She had had difficulties of every sort

to contend with, and in addition to these distresses had been afflicted

with a severe rheumatic fever, which, finally settling in her legs,

had made her for the present a cripple. She had come to Bath

on that account, and was now in lodgings near the hot baths,

living in a very humble way, unable even to afford herself

the comfort of a servant, and of course almost excluded from society.

 

Their mutual friend answered for the satisfaction which a visit

from Miss Elliot would give Mrs Smith, and Anne therefore

lost no time in going. She mentioned nothing of what she had heard,

or what she intended, at home. It would excite no proper interest there.

She only consulted Lady Russell, who entered thoroughly into her sentiments,

and was most happy to convey her as near to Mrs Smith`s lodgings

in Westgate Buildings, as Anne chose to be taken.

 

The visit was paid, their acquaintance re-established, their interest

in each other more than re-kindled. The first ten minutes

had its awkwardness and its emotion. Twelve years were gone

since they had parted, and each presented a somewhat different person

from what the other had imagined. Twelve years had changed Anne

from the blooming, silent, unformed girl of fifteen, to the elegant

little woman of seven-and-twenty, with every beauty except bloom,

and with manners as consciously right as they were invariably gentle;

and twelve years had transformed the fine-looking, well-grown Miss Hamilton,

in all the glow of health and confidence of superiority, into a poor,

infirm, helpless widow, receiving the visit of her former protegee

as a favour; but all that was uncomfortable in the meeting had soon

passed away, and left only the interesting charm of remembering

former partialities and talking over old times.

 

Anne found in Mrs Smith the good sense and agreeable manners which

she had almost ventured to depend on, and a disposition to converse

and be cheerful beyond her expectation. Neither the dissipations

of the past--and she had lived very much in the world--nor the restrictions

of the present, neither sickness nor sorrow seemed to have

closed her heart or ruined her spirits.

 

In the course of a second visit she talked with great openness,

and Anne`s astonishment increased. She could scarcely imagine

a more cheerless situation in itself than Mrs Smith`s. She had been

very fond of her husband: she had buried him. She had been

used to affluence: it was gone. She had no child to connect her

with life and happiness again, no relations to assist in the arrangement

of perplexed affairs, no health to make all the rest supportable.

Her accommodations were limited to a noisy parlour, and a dark bedroom

behind, with no possibility of moving from one to the other without

assistance, which there was only one servant in the house to afford,

and she never quitted the house but to be conveyed into the warm bath.

Yet, in spite of all this, Anne had reason to believe that she had