Студопедия — Jane Austen 18 страница
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Jane Austen 18 страница






of analogy will authorise me to assert that ours are the most tender.

Man is more robust than woman, but he is not longer lived;

which exactly explains my view of the nature of their attachments.

Nay, it would be too hard upon you, if it were otherwise.

You have difficulties, and privations, and dangers enough to struggle with.

You are always labouring and toiling, exposed to every risk and hardship.

Your home, country, friends, all quitted. Neither time, nor health,

nor life, to be called your own. It would be hard, indeed"

(with a faltering voice), "if woman`s feelings were to be

added to all this."

 

"We shall never agree upon this question," Captain Harville

was beginning to say, when a slight noise called their attention

to Captain Wentworth`s hitherto perfectly quiet division of the room.

It was nothing more than that his pen had fallen down; but Anne was

startled at finding him nearer than she had supposed, and half inclined

to suspect that the pen had only fallen because he had been

occupied by them, striving to catch sounds, which yet she did not think

he could have caught.

 

"Have you finished your letter?" said Captain Harville.

 

"Not quite, a few lines more. I shall have done in five minutes."

 

"There is no hurry on my side. I am only ready whenever you are.

I am in very good anchorage here," (smiling at Anne,) "well supplied,

and want for nothing. No hurry for a signal at all. Well, Miss Elliot,"

(lowering his voice,) "as I was saying we shall never agree,

I suppose, upon this point. No man and woman, would, probably.

But let me observe that all histories are against you--all stories,

prose and verse. If I had such a memory as Benwick, I could bring you

fifty quotations in a moment on my side the argument, and I do not think

I ever opened a book in my life which had not something to say

upon woman`s inconstancy. Songs and proverbs, all talk

of woman`s fickleness. But perhaps you will say, these were all

written by men."

 

"Perhaps I shall. Yes, yes, if you please, no reference to examples

in books. Men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story.

Education has been theirs in so much higher a degree; the pen has

been in their hands. I will not allow books to prove anything."

 

"But how shall we prove anything?"

 

"We never shall. We never can expect to prove any thing upon such a point.

It is a difference of opinion which does not admit of proof.

We each begin, probably, with a little bias towards our own sex;

and upon that bias build every circumstance in favour of it

which has occurred within our own circle; many of which circumstances

(perhaps those very cases which strike us the most) may be precisely such

as cannot be brought forward without betraying a confidence,

or in some respect saying what should not be said."

 

"Ah!" cried Captain Harville, in a tone of strong feeling,

"if I could but make you comprehend what a man suffers when he takes

a last look at his wife and children, and watches the boat

that he has sent them off in, as long as it is in sight,

and then turns away and says, `God knows whether we ever meet again!`

And then, if I could convey to you the glow of his soul when he does

see them again; when, coming back after a twelvemonth`s absence,

perhaps, and obliged to put into another port, he calculates how soon

it be possible to get them there, pretending to deceive himself,

and saying, `They cannot be here till such a day,` but all the while

hoping for them twelve hours sooner, and seeing them arrive at last,

as if Heaven had given them wings, by many hours sooner still!

If I could explain to you all this, and all that a man can bear and do,

and glories to do, for the sake of these treasures of his existence!

I speak, you know, only of such men as have hearts!" pressing his own

with emotion.

 

"Oh!" cried Anne eagerly, "I hope I do justice to all that is felt by you,

and by those who resemble you. God forbid that I should undervalue

the warm and faithful feelings of any of my fellow-creatures!

I should deserve utter contempt if I dared to suppose that true attachment

and constancy were known only by woman. No, I believe you capable

of everything great and good in your married lives. I believe you equal

to every important exertion, and to every domestic forbearance,

so long as--if I may be allowed the expression--so long as you have

an object. I mean while the woman you love lives, and lives for you.

All the privilege I claim for my own sex (it is not a very enviable one;

you need not covet it), is that of loving longest, when existence

or when hope is gone."

 

She could not immediately have uttered another sentence; her heart

was too full, her breath too much oppressed.

 

"You are a good soul," cried Captain Harville, putting his hand

on her arm, quite affectionately. "There is no quarreling with you.

And when I think of Benwick, my tongue is tied."

 

Their attention was called towards the others. Mrs Croft was taking leave.

 

"Here, Frederick, you and I part company, I believe," said she.

"I am going home, and you have an engagement with your friend.

To-night we may have the pleasure of all meeting again at your party,"

(turning to Anne.) "We had your sister`s card yesterday,

and I understood Frederick had a card too, though I did not see it;

and you are disengaged, Frederick, are you not, as well as ourselves?"

 

Captain Wentworth was folding up a letter in great haste, and either

could not or would not answer fully.

 

"Yes," said he, "very true; here we separate, but Harville and I

shall soon be after you; that is, Harville, if you are ready,

I am in half a minute. I know you will not be sorry to be off.

I shall be at your service in half a minute."

 

Mrs Croft left them, and Captain Wentworth, having sealed his letter

with great rapidity, was indeed ready, and had even a hurried,

agitated air, which shewed impatience to be gone. Anne know not how

to understand it. She had the kindest "Good morning, God bless you!"

from Captain Harville, but from him not a word, nor a look!

He had passed out of the room without a look!

 

She had only time, however, to move closer to the table where

he had been writing, when footsteps were heard returning;

the door opened, it was himself. He begged their pardon,

but he had forgotten his gloves, and instantly crossing the room

to the writing table, he drew out a letter from under the scattered paper,

placed it before Anne with eyes of glowing entreaty fixed on her

for a time, and hastily collecting his gloves, was again out of the room,

almost before Mrs Musgrove was aware of his being in it:

the work of an instant!

 

The revolution which one instant had made in Anne, was almost

beyond expression. The letter, with a direction hardly legible,

to "Miss A. E.--," was evidently the one which he had been folding

so hastily. While supposed to be writing only to Captain Benwick,

he had been also addressing her! On the contents of that letter

depended all which this world could do for her. Anything was possible,

anything might be defied rather than suspense. Mrs Musgrove had

little arrangements of her own at her own table; to their protection

she must trust, and sinking into the chair which he had occupied,

succeeding to the very spot where he had leaned and written,

her eyes devoured the following words:

 

 

"I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means

as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony,

half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings

are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart

even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years

and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman,

that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you.

Unjust I may have been, weak and resentful I have been,

but never inconstant. You alone have brought me to Bath.

For you alone, I think and plan. Have you not seen this?

Can you fail to have understood my wishes? I had not waited even

these ten days, could I have read your feelings, as I think you must have

penetrated mine. I can hardly write. I am every instant hearing

something which overpowers me. You sink your voice, but I can

distinguish the tones of that voice when they would be lost on others.

Too good, too excellent creature! You do us justice, indeed.

You do believe that there is true attachment and constancy among men.

Believe it to be most fervent, most undeviating, in F. W.

 

"I must go, uncertain of my fate; but I shall return hither,

or follow your party, as soon as possible. A word, a look,

will be enough to decide whether I enter your father`s house

this evening or never."

 

 

Such a letter was not to be soon recovered from. Half and hour`s solitude

and reflection might have tranquillized her; but the ten minutes only

which now passed before she was interrupted, with all the restraints

of her situation, could do nothing towards tranquillity. Every moment

rather brought fresh agitation. It was overpowering happiness.

And before she was beyond the first stage of full sensation,

Charles, Mary, and Henrietta all came in.

 

The absolute necessity of seeming like herself produced then

an immediate struggle; but after a while she could do no more.

She began not to understand a word they said, and was obliged

to plead indisposition and excuse herself. They could then see

that she looked very ill, were shocked and concerned, and would not

stir without her for the world. This was dreadful. Would they only

have gone away, and left her in the quiet possession of that room

it would have been her cure; but to have them all standing or

waiting around her was distracting, and in desperation,

she said she would go home.

 

"By all means, my dear," cried Mrs Musgrove, "go home directly,

and take care of yourself, that you may be fit for the evening.

I wish Sarah was here to doctor you, but I am no doctor myself.

Charles, ring and order a chair. She must not walk."

 

But the chair would never do. Worse than all! To lose the possibility

of speaking two words to Captain Wentworth in the course of her quiet,

solitary progress up the town (and she felt almost certain of meeting him)

could not be borne. The chair was earnestly protested against,

and Mrs Musgrove, who thought only of one sort of illness,

having assured herself with some anxiety, that there had been no fall

in the case; that Anne had not at any time lately slipped down,

and got a blow on her head; that she was perfectly convinced of having

had no fall; could part with her cheerfully, and depend on

finding her better at night.

 

Anxious to omit no possible precaution, Anne struggled, and said--

 

"I am afraid, ma`am, that it is not perfectly understood.

Pray be so good as to mention to the other gentlemen that we hope

to see your whole party this evening. I am afraid there had been

some mistake; and I wish you particularly to assure Captain Harville

and Captain Wentworth, that we hope to see them both."

 

"Oh! my dear, it is quite understood, I give you my word.

Captain Harville has no thought but of going."

 

"Do you think so? But I am afraid; and I should be so very sorry.

Will you promise me to mention it, when you see them again?

You will see them both this morning, I dare say. Do promise me."

 

"To be sure I will, if you wish it. Charles, if you see Captain Harville

anywhere, remember to give Miss Anne`s message. But indeed, my dear,

you need not be uneasy. Captain Harville holds himself quite engaged,

I`ll answer for it; and Captain Wentworth the same, I dare say."

 

Anne could do no more; but her heart prophesied some mischance

to damp the perfection of her felicity. It could not be very lasting,

however. Even if he did not come to Camden Place himself,

it would be in her power to send an intelligible sentence

by Captain Harville. Another momentary vexation occurred.

Charles, in his real concern and good nature, would go home with her;

there was no preventing him. This was almost cruel. But she could not

be long ungrateful; he was sacrificing an engagement at a gunsmith`s,

to be of use to her; and she set off with him, with no feeling

but gratitude apparent.

 

They were on Union Street, when a quicker step behind, a something

of familiar sound, gave her two moments` preparation for the sight

of Captain Wentworth. He joined them; but, as if irresolute

whether to join or to pass on, said nothing, only looked.

Anne could command herself enough to receive that look,

and not repulsively. The cheeks which had been pale now glowed,

and the movements which had hesitated were decided. He walked by her side.

Presently, struck by a sudden thought, Charles said--

 

"Captain Wentworth, which way are you going? Only to Gay Street,

or farther up the town?"

 

"I hardly know," replied Captain Wentworth, surprised.

 

"Are you going as high as Belmont? Are you going near Camden Place?

Because, if you are, I shall have no scruple in asking you

to take my place, and give Anne your arm to her father`s door.

She is rather done for this morning, and must not go so far without help,

and I ought to be at that fellow`s in the Market Place.

He promised me the sight of a capital gun he is just going to send off;

said he would keep it unpacked to the last possible moment,

that I might see it; and if I do not turn back now, I have no chance.

By his description, a good deal like the second size double-barrel of mine,

which you shot with one day round Winthrop."

 

There could not be an objection. There could be only the most

proper alacrity, a most obliging compliance for public view;

and smiles reined in and spirits dancing in private rapture.

In half a minute Charles was at the bottom of Union Street again,

and the other two proceeding together: and soon words enough had passed

between them to decide their direction towards the comparatively quiet

and retired gravel walk, where the power of conversation would make

the present hour a blessing indeed, and prepare it for all

the immortality which the happiest recollections of their own future lives

could bestow. There they exchanged again those feelings

and those promises which had once before seemed to secure everything,

but which had been followed by so many, many years of division

and estrangement. There they returned again into the past,

more exquisitely happy, perhaps, in their re-union, than when

it had been first projected; more tender, more tried, more fixed

in a knowledge of each other`s character, truth, and attachment;

more equal to act, more justified in acting. And there, as they slowly

paced the gradual ascent, heedless of every group around them,

seeing neither sauntering politicians, bustling housekeepers,

flirting girls, nor nursery-maids and children, they could indulge in

those retrospections and acknowledgements, and especially in

those explanations of what had directly preceded the present moment,

which were so poignant and so ceaseless in interest. All the little

variations of the last week were gone through; and of yesterday

and today there could scarcely be an end.

 

She had not mistaken him. Jealousy of Mr Elliot had been

the retarding weight, the doubt, the torment. That had begun to operate

in the very hour of first meeting her in Bath; that had returned,

after a short suspension, to ruin the concert; and that had influenced him

in everything he had said and done, or omitted to say and do,

in the last four-and-twenty hours. It had been gradually yielding

to the better hopes which her looks, or words, or actions

occasionally encouraged; it had been vanquished at last by

those sentiments and those tones which had reached him while she talked

with Captain Harville; and under the irresistible governance of which

he had seized a sheet of paper, and poured out his feelings.

 

Of what he had then written, nothing was to be retracted or qualified.

He persisted in having loved none but her. She had never been supplanted.

He never even believed himself to see her equal. Thus much indeed

he was obliged to acknowledge: that he had been constant unconsciously,

nay unintentionally; that he had meant to forget her, and believed it

to be done. He had imagined himself indifferent, when he had only

been angry; and he had been unjust to her merits, because he had been

a sufferer from them. Her character was now fixed on his mind

as perfection itself, maintaining the loveliest medium of fortitude

and gentleness; but he was obliged to acknowledge that only at Uppercross

had he learnt to do her justice, and only at Lyme had he begun

to understand himself. At Lyme, he had received lessons

of more than one sort. The passing admiration of Mr Elliot

had at least roused him, and the scenes on the Cobb and at

Captain Harville`s had fixed her superiority.

 

In his preceding attempts to attach himself to Louisa Musgrove

(the attempts of angry pride), he protested that he had for ever

felt it to be impossible; that he had not cared, could not care,

for Louisa; though till that day, till the leisure for reflection

which followed it, he had not understood the perfect excellence

of the mind with which Louisa`s could so ill bear a comparison,

or the perfect unrivalled hold it possessed over his own.

There, he had learnt to distinguish between the steadiness of principle

and the obstinacy of self-will, between the darings of heedlessness

and the resolution of a collected mind. There he had seen everything

to exalt in his estimation the woman he had lost; and there begun

to deplore the pride, the folly, the madness of resentment,

which had kept him from trying to regain her when thrown in his way.

 

From that period his penance had become severe. He had no sooner

been free from the horror and remorse attending the first few days

of Louisa`s accident, no sooner begun to feel himself alive again,

than he had begun to feel himself, though alive, not at liberty.

 

"I found," said he, "that I was considered by Harville an engaged man!

That neither Harville nor his wife entertained a doubt of our

mutual attachment. I was startled and shocked. To a degree,

I could contradict this instantly; but, when I began to reflect

that others might have felt the same--her own family, nay,

perhaps herself--I was no longer at my own disposal. I was hers in honour

if she wished it. I had been unguarded. I had not thought seriously

on this subject before. I had not considered that my excessive intimacy

must have its danger of ill consequence in many ways; and that I had

no right to be trying whether I could attach myself to either of the girls,

at the risk of raising even an unpleasant report, were there no other

ill effects. I had been grossly wrong, and must abide the consequences."

 

He found too late, in short, that he had entangled himself;

and that precisely as he became fully satisfied of his not caring

for Louisa at all, he must regard himself as bound to her,

if her sentiments for him were what the Harvilles supposed.

It determined him to leave Lyme, and await her complete recovery elsewhere.

He would gladly weaken, by any fair means, whatever feelings or

speculations concerning him might exist; and he went, therefore,

to his brother`s, meaning after a while to return to Kellynch,

and act as circumstances might require.

 

"I was six weeks with Edward," said he, "and saw him happy.

I could have no other pleasure. I deserved none. He enquired after you

very particularly; asked even if you were personally altered,

little suspecting that to my eye you could never alter."

 

Anne smiled, and let it pass. It was too pleasing a blunder

for a reproach. It is something for a woman to be assured,

in her eight-and-twentieth year, that she has not lost one charm

of earlier youth; but the value of such homage was inexpressibly increased

to Anne, by comparing it with former words, and feeling it to be

the result, not the cause of a revival of his warm attachment.

 

He had remained in Shropshire, lamenting the blindness of his own pride,

and the blunders of his own calculations, till at once released from Louisa

by the astonishing and felicitous intelligence of her engagement

with Benwick.

 

"Here," said he, "ended the worst of my state; for now I could at least

put myself in the way of happiness; I could exert myself;

I could do something. But to be waiting so long in inaction,

and waiting only for evil, had been dreadful. Within the first

five minutes I said, `I will be at Bath on Wednesday,` and I was.

Was it unpardonable to think it worth my while to come? and to arrive

with some degree of hope? You were single. It was possible that

you might retain the feelings of the past, as I did; and one encouragement

happened to be mine. I could never doubt that you would be loved and

sought by others, but I knew to a certainty that you had refused one man,

at least, of better pretensions than myself; and I could not help

often saying, `Was this for me?`"

 

Their first meeting in Milsom Street afforded much to be said,

but the concert still more. That evening seemed to be made up

of exquisite moments. The moment of her stepping forward

in the Octagon Room to speak to him: the moment of Mr Elliot`s appearing

and tearing her away, and one or two subsequent moments,

marked by returning hope or increasing despondency, were dwelt on

with energy.

 

"To see you," cried he, "in the midst of those who could not be

my well-wishers; to see your cousin close by you, conversing and smiling,

and feel all the horrible eligibilities and proprieties of the match!

To consider it as the certain wish of every being who could hope

to influence you! Even if your own feelings were reluctant or indifferent,

to consider what powerful supports would be his! Was it not enough

to make the fool of me which I appeared? How could I look on

without agony? Was not the very sight of the friend who sat behind you,

was not the recollection of what had been, the knowledge of her influence,

the indelible, immoveable impression of what persuasion had once done--

was it not all against me?"

 

"You should have distinguished," replied Anne. "You should not have

suspected me now; the case is so different, and my age is so different.

If I was wrong in yielding to persuasion once, remember that

it was to persuasion exerted on the side of safety, not of risk.

When I yielded, I thought it was to duty, but no duty could be called

in aid here. In marrying a man indifferent to me, all risk

would have been incurred, and all duty violated."

 

"Perhaps I ought to have reasoned thus," he replied, "but I could not.

I could not derive benefit from the late knowledge I had acquired

of your character. I could not bring it into play; it was overwhelmed,

buried, lost in those earlier feelings which I had been smarting under

year after year. I could think of you only as one who had yielded,

who had given me up, who had been influenced by any one rather than by me.

I saw you with the very person who had guided you in that year of misery.

I had no reason to believe her of less authority now. The force of habit

was to be added."

 

"I should have thought," said Anne, "that my manner to yourself

might have spared you much or all of this."

 

"No, no! your manner might be only the ease which your engagement

to another man would give. I left you in this belief; and yet,

I was determined to see you again. My spirits rallied with the morning,

and I felt that I had still a motive for remaining here."

 

At last Anne was at home again, and happier than any one in that house

could have conceived. All the surprise and suspense, and every other

painful part of the morning dissipated by this conversation,

she re-entered the house so happy as to be obliged to find an alloy

in some momentary apprehensions of its being impossible to last.

An interval of meditation, serious and grateful, was the best corrective

of everything dangerous in such high-wrought felicity; and she went

to her room, and grew steadfast and fearless in the thankfulness

of her enjoyment.

 

The evening came, the drawing-rooms were lighted up, the company assembled.

It was but a card party, it was but a mixture of those who had

never met before, and those who met too often; a commonplace business,

too numerous for intimacy, too small for variety; but Anne had never found

an evening shorter. Glowing and lovely in sensibility and happiness,

and more generally admired than she thought about or cared for,

she had cheerful or forbearing feelings for every creature around her.

Mr Elliot was there; she avoided, but she could pity him.

The Wallises, she had amusement in understanding them. Lady Dalrymple

and Miss Carteret--they would soon be innoxious cousins to her.

She cared not for Mrs Clay, and had nothing to blush for in

the public manners of her father and sister. With the Musgroves,

there was the happy chat of perfect ease; with Captain Harville,

the kind-hearted intercourse of brother and sister; with Lady Russell,

attempts at conversation, which a delicious consciousness cut short;

with Admiral and Mrs Croft, everything of peculiar cordiality and

fervent interest, which the same consciousness sought to conceal;

and with Captain Wentworth, some moments of communications







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