She agreed to this by look rather than word and I could tell by her silence that her spirits were low. My heart felt for her.

‘I know you have something on your mind,’ I said gently.

‘Am I to hear of it from everybody but Fanny herself?’

She sounded dejected. ‘If you hear of it from everybody, cousin, there can be nothing for me to tell.’

‘Not of facts, perhaps; but of feelings, Fanny. No one but you can tell me them. I do not mean to press you. If it is not what you wish yourself, I have done,’ I said, adding only, by way of encouragement, ‘I had thought it might be a relief.’

‘I am afraid we think too differently for me to find any relief in talking of what I feel,’ she said quietly.

‘Do you suppose that we think differently?’ I asked in surprise. ‘I dare say, that on a comparison of our opinions, they would be found as much alike as they had been used to be. I consider Crawford’s proposals as most advantageous and desirable, if you could return his affection. I consider it as most natural that all your family should wish you could return it; but that, as you cannot, you have done exactly as you ought in refusing him. Can there be any disagreement between us here?’

‘Oh no!’ she cried in relief. ‘But I thought you blamed me! I thought you were against me. This is such a comfort!’

I pulled her arm further through mine and was relieved and reassured to feel her lean on me.

‘How could you possibly suppose me against you?’ I asked her softly.

‘My uncle thought me wrong, and I knew he had been talking to you.’

‘As far as you have gone, Fanny, I think you perfectly right. Can it admit of a question? It is disgraceful to us if it does. If you did not love Crawford, nothing could have justified your accepting him.’

She gave a sigh, and as I heard all her worries rushing out of her I was glad I had brought her such comfort. How unhappy she must have been, thinking we were all against her. But once she was more comfortable I felt I must show her the advantages of Crawford’s offer, for I did not want her to grow old regretting the chance she had thrown away in her youth. Crawford was offering her love and affection; her own establishment; and all the joys of a rich and varied life.

‘Crawford’s is no common attachment,’ I said gently, as we walked on together, feeling the sun on our faces and crunching the frost beneath our feet. ‘He perseveres with the hope of creating that regard which had not been created before. This, we know, must be a work of time. But let him succeed at last, Fanny,’ I said, for I felt sure she only needed a little encouragement to welcome his attentions, and that, as Mrs. Crawford, she would be a happy woman. I was astonished when she burst out, ‘Oh! never, never, never! he never will succeed with me.’

‘Never, Fanny?’ I asked, surprised into adding, ‘This is not like yourself, your rational self.’

‘I mean, that I think I never shall,’ she said, controlling her passion. ‘As far as the future can be answered for; I think I never shall return his regard.’

I could not understand why she was so set against him, of leaving the home of her uncle for one of her own — and then all was made clear to me. Fanny’s tender nature had given her a strong attachment to early things, and made her dislike the thought of change or separation. One of the things I had thought of as being in Crawford’s favor was in fact against him, for in gaining a home of her own, she would have to leave behind the home she knew. I wished again that he had taken things more slowly, attaching her to him before speaking of marriage, so that she would have been prepared for his declarations and even wanting them; and, wanting them, she would have been able to face the thought of leaving the securities and pleasures of childhood with composure.

‘I must hope that time, proving him (as I firmly believe it will ) to deserve you by his steady affection, will give him his reward,’ I said.

But she did not enter into my hopes. Quite the reverse. ‘We are so totally unlike,’ she said, ‘we are so very, very different in all our inclinations and ways, that I consider it as quite impossible we should ever be tolerably happy together, even if I could like him. There never were two people more dissimilar. We have not one taste in common. We should be miserable.’

This was bleak indeed. So bleak that I felt fancy was at work, rather than reason.

‘You have both warm hearts and benevolent feelings,’ I pointed out. ‘And, Fanny, who that heard him read, and saw you listen to Shakespeare the other night, will think you unfitted as companions? There is a decided difference in your tempers, I allow. He is lively, you are serious; but so much the better: his spirits will support yours.’

She hesitated, and then said reluctantly, ‘I cannot approve his character. I have not thought well of him from the time of the play. I then saw him behaving so improperly by poor Mr. Rushworth, not seeming to care how he exposed or hurt him, and paying attentions to my cousin Maria, which — in short, at the time of the play, I received an impression which will never be got over.’

I protested at this, but she said, ‘As a bystander, perhaps I saw more than you did; and I do think that Mr. Rushworth was sometimes very jealous. And before the play, I am much mistaken if Julia did not think Mr. Crawford was paying her attentions. ’

‘To be sure, the play did none of us credit, but Fanny, you have lived so retired that you have made too much of Crawford’s lively nature, and my sisters’ desire to be admired. To condemn the behavior of that time is right and just; but to let it destroy your future happiness is folly. He will make you happy, Fanny; I know he will make you happy, and you will make him happy,’ I reassured her.

She looked tired. I did not want to press her further, so I turned the conversation to other things, talking of my time with the Owens.

‘You spent your time pleasantly there?’ asked Fanny, reviving once the subject of Crawford was dropped. ‘The Miss Owens — you liked them, did not you?’

‘Yes, very well. Pleasant, good-humored, unaffected girls. But I am spoilt, Fanny, for common female society. Good-humored, unaffected girls will not do for a man who has been used to sensible women. They are two distinct orders of being. You and Miss Crawford have made me too nice,’ I told her.

She smiled, but it was a tired smile, and I felt she had had enough conversation. So, with the kind authority of a privileged guardian, I led her back into the house.


Saturday 14 January

I spoke to my father after breakfast and told him that I thought we should make no further attempts to persuade Fanny, but that everything should be left to Crawford’s addresses and the passage of time.

‘She must become used to the idea of his being in love with her, and then a return of affection might not be very distant.’

‘It shall be as you say, but I only hope that she might persuade herself into receiving his addresses properly, before his inclination for paying them is over.’

‘He will prove himself steadfast, I am sure,’ I said.

‘I hope so,’ was my father’s only reply.

I was not a little curious to see how Fanny would receive Crawford this evening, and in the event their encounter promised well. He came and sat with us some time, and I saw a softening of Fanny’s face, and a tenderness in her expression that led me to believe all would finally be well.

‘It is a pity your brother has to go to town tomorrow,’ I said to Mary. She followed my eyes towards Fanny and her brother.

‘Yes, it is, but he has promised to escort me to my friend’s house and, having once delayed my visit, I cannot delay it again. And who knows? Absence might prove to be his friend. When she is no longer receiving his attentions, Fanny might come to miss them and welcome their return.’

I thought it only too likely.

‘And tomorrow you are leaving, too,’ I said to her.

‘Yes, I am. You will not begrudge me a stay in town? Mrs. Fraser has been my intimate friend for years.’

‘I could never begrudge you anything. I have already been more fortunate than I dared hope, for you were still here when I returned after Christmas when I was expecting to find you gone.’

‘I should have gone, by rights, but when it came to it I found I could not leave the neighborhood whilst Henry was trying to fix Fanny. It would not have been fair to take him away at such a time.’

But something in her eye and voice told me that that was not her only reason for delaying her departure.

‘I thought I would not see you again.’

‘Did you?’ she asked with a smile.

‘I did. I thought you were lost to me. But now I hope we may meet often. I will be going to town myself before long. will I see you there?’

‘I rely upon it. You must come and visit me at Mrs. Fraser’s.’

‘You may be certain of it.’

There was time for no more. The evening was drawing to an end. Crawford was taking his leave of Fanny, who seemed sorry to see him go, and I took Mary’s hand and bent over it.

‘Until then,’ I said.


Tuesday 17 January

‘Well, Edmund,’ said my father, as we sat over the port, ‘and do you think Fanny misses Crawford now that he has gone?’

‘I hardly think three or four days’ absence enough to produce such a feeling.’

‘And yet she has been used to attention, to being singled out in the most flattering way. It is strange that she should not miss it. The attentions of her aunts can hardly compensate for the company of an intelligent young man.’

What puzzled me more was that Fanny did not seem to regret Miss Crawford, for Mary had been her friend and companion for far longer than Crawford had been her acknowledged lover.