We parted reluctantly, and I returned to my brother’s house. I could not rest, however. I longed for Edward’s company, so that I would have someone to talk to, but he had been called away to visit one of his elderly parishioners, and was not likely to return all night. The evening dragged on interminably, but tomorrow, everything will be different.

Wednesday 10 September

I cannot believe it. My heart is heavy as I write. Not long ago, Anne accepted my hand, her father gave his consent and we were the two happiest people alive. Yesterday evening, Anne told Lady Russell the news, and this morning Anne told me the marriage could not go ahead.

How can life change so suddenly? It does not seem real. Nothing has seemed real since I met her by the river this morning. The air was warm, the birds were in full voice—a perfect morning, with no hint of the thunderbolt that was about to smite me.

Then Anne appeared. I noticed at once that her step was slow, but I thought she was tired, or that she had not seen me. As she drew closer, however, I could see that her shoulders were bowed.

She looked up and saw me. Her expression was hesitant, and her step faltered.

‘What is it?’ I asked her, covering the last few yards between us in two strides. ‘What is wrong?’

‘Nothing, only ... I have to speak to you.’

Then she said something I had never expected to hear: that she had reconsidered; that we were too young; that long engagements were never a good thing; that it would be unfair of her to burden me with an engagement when I still had my way to make in the world; that we must be grateful we had told no one of our engagement, for there would be no embarrassment in breaking it; and that it would be best if we forgot it had ever taken place.

I was dumbfounded. But I soon came about. Her objections were easy to do away with, and I reassured her that we were not too young, and that our engagement would not be a long one, for I would soon have enough for us to marry on.

‘And then, Anne, our adventures will begin.’

She shook her head sadly.

‘Ah, I see. You have changed your mind about going to sea,’ I said, thinking this was what lay behind it. Although I was sorry, I was not downhearted. ‘You have never been aboard ship, and, now that it comes to it, you are frightened,’ I said gently, taking her hands. ‘The thought of it is too much for you. I understand. But fear not. If you do not feel you can leave your home and family, your friends and neighbours, and above all, dry land, then I will not hold you to it. But that is no reason to break our engagement.’

She drew her hands from mine and said, ‘No, Frederick, I cannot.’

‘Cannot? Why not?’ I asked, seeking to understand.

‘Everyone around me is counselling me against it—’

‘So that is it. They have bullied you into submission,’ I said.

‘No, they have not bullied me,’ she said.

But, despite her loyalty to her family, it was clear that that was what had happened.

‘I knew how it would be,’ I said. ‘Your father was condescending when I spoke to him yesterday, and he has told you I am not good enough for you, and you, Anne, my dear, gentle Anne, do not have the courage to stand up to him.’ I was conscious of feeling disappointment as I said it, for I had thought she was stronger than that, but I quickly rallied. ‘Take my strength, for I have strength enough for two.’

‘It is not just my father,’ she said in distress. ‘Lady Russell thinks it would be a mistake, too. The anxieties of your profession, the inevitable delays. I am only nineteen—’

‘That did not trouble you yesterday.’

‘No. But I have seen so little of life ... I must be guided by those who have seen more, and listen when they tell me it is impossible.’

‘Impossible? To buy ourselves a snug little cottage as soon as I have captured another ship, and then, when I have enough prize money to buy something better, the estate we have talked about?’

‘Lady Russell says it will never be. She says you will have other calls on your purse at this time of life.’

‘I assure you I have a far greater knowledge of the calls on my purse than Lady Russell can have.’

‘And you will be worrying about me whilst you are away. Lady Russell says—’

‘Lady Russell!’ I exclaimed impatiently. ‘Always Lady Russell! Have you no heart and no mind of your own?’

She broke away from me, taking two steps back.

‘She was my mother’s best friend, and I am used to relying on her judgement, and she has always guided me well.’

I reassured her; she was resolute. I argued; she was firm. Back and forth we went, neither one of us giving ground.

‘It will be to your ruin. I cannot marry you,’ she said. ‘I could not forgive myself if I stood in your way, and prevented you from advancing as your deserve. With a fiancée, you would be cautious. You would lack the reckless spirit a man needs to advance. You would not achieve your ambitions, held back by me.’

I could not believe what I was hearing. I refused to take it in, but as last I could argue with her no longer.

‘You cannot mean to break faith with me?’ I asked her, my courage faltering. ‘Say it is not so?’

’Frederick ...’

‘I thought you loved me.’

The words were wrung out of me.

‘I do,’ she declared passionately. ‘I love you, but—’

‘But not enough,’ I said.

I could not keep the grief out of my voice.

‘It is not that.’

‘It is exactly that. You do not love me enough to go against family and friends, to follow your heart wherever it leads, even if it leads to the ends of the earth.’

‘Frederick—’

‘Enough,’ I said, hurt as I had never been before, not even when I had been injured in battle. ‘You have made your feelings clear. You cannot marry me. Very well. I will not hold you to your promise. I will have no unwilling bride. Our engagement is at an end.’

I made her a bow and then I hastened away, for I could not bear it, to have happiness so close, and yet so far.

I left Elliot land, and walked back towards the village.

I was just turning into the lane when fate threw in my way the one person I did not wish to see, the very woman who had caused all my misery: Lady Russell.

She coloured when she saw me, and faltered, as well she might.

I was in no mood to mince my words.

‘Ay, madam, well might you look so,’ I said. ‘You have done me a terrible disservice. You have taken from me the woman I love, and caused a great deal of unhappiness where there was nothing but happiness before. It is a bad day’s work.’

‘I have done nothing but give good counsel to Anne,’ she replied, collecting herself. ‘She has no mother, and it is up to me to guide her. Had I any scruples about the part I have played, I would have lost them when you spoke to me just now. I am not accustomed to being addressed in such a manner. You are a hotheaded young man, Commander Wentworth, with nothing to offer Anne but a long engagement followed by a lifetime of uncertainty and loneliness. I want something better for her. I want her to have the comforts she is accustomed to, and the company of a husband who does not spend half his life at sea.’

‘I could soon have given her the comforts she needs. We are at war! There are plenty of opportunities for a resolute young man to make his fortune, for never was there a better friend to a penniless young captain of ability and ambition than Napoleon Bonaparte. I mean to rise in the world, and I would have taken Anne with me.’

‘A baronet’s daughter does not need a sailor to lift her,’ she remarked in a superior tone.

‘With my prize money I could have given her a better home than the one she has now. In a few years’ time—’

‘—you are likely to be as poor as you are now, for you spend your money as quickly as you win it.’

‘With a wife to support, I would have changed my ways. I would not have wanted to spend my money rashly, for I would have had someone else to spend it on. I would have had a reason to invest in the funds, and watch my capital grow.’

‘So says every young man, until he is married, but then it is a different story. He finds the pleasures of youth hard to abandon, and the call of his friends too strong, and his wife is left to manage on whatever her husband chooses to give her.’

‘And what this husband would have chosen to give her would have been his hand and his heart.’ I saw a smile of derision on her lips. ‘So, you would rather see Anne married to a man she does not love, than allow her to follow her heart?’

‘Love! Young people always talk about love, but nine times out of ten it is nothing but a passing fancy. Anne is young. She will soon find someone else, and you will fall in love again the next time you are ashore.’

‘You presume too much,’ I said. ‘You cannot know my feelings. You have no right to say that they will change, or that I am so fickle. I love Anne.’

‘And are you the only one involved in matrimony? Is it enough for you to love her? Pray, consider, she must also love you.’

‘And so she does.’

‘But not enough to marry you.’

‘No,’ I said, bitterly. ‘You talk of men’s fickleness, but it is women’s fickleness that is to blame, here, today: Anne’s for not loving me enough to follow her feelings, and yours for persuading her to abandon me, in the hope of a better marriage in the future, to a man she will not care for. It is the curse of the Elliots, and all about them, to care more about money and status than affection and true worth.’