CHAPTER XLVII.

Mrs. Dashwood did not hear unmoved the vindication of her former

favourite. She rejoiced in his being cleared from some part of his

imputed guilt;—she was sorry for him;—she wished him happy. But the

feelings of the past could not be recalled.—Nothing could restore him

with a faith unbroken—a character unblemished, to Marianne. Nothing

could do away the knowledge of what the latter had suffered through his

means, nor remove the guilt of his conduct towards Eliza. Nothing could

replace him, therefore, in her former esteem, nor injure the interests

of Colonel Brandon.

Had Mrs. Dashwood, like her daughter, heard Willoughby’s story from

himself—had she witnessed his distress, and been under the influence of

his countenance and his manner, it is probable that her compassion

would have been greater. But it was neither in Elinor’s power, nor in

her wish, to rouse such feelings in another, by her retailed

explanation, as had at first been called forth in herself. Reflection

had given calmness to her judgment, and sobered her own opinion of

Willoughby’s deserts;—she wished, therefore, to declare only the simple

truth, and lay open such facts as were really due to his character,

without any embellishment of tenderness to lead the fancy astray.

In the evening, when they were all three together, Marianne began

voluntarily to speak of him again;—but that it was not without an

effort, the restless, unquiet thoughtfulness in which she had been for

some time previously sitting—her rising colour, as she spoke,—and her

unsteady voice, plainly showed.

“I wish to assure you both,” said she, “that I see every thing—as you

can desire me to do.”

Mrs. Dashwood would have interrupted her instantly with soothing

tenderness, had not Elinor, who really wished to hear her sister’s

unbiased opinion, by an eager sign, engaged her silence. Marianne

slowly continued,—

“It is a great relief to me—what Elinor told me this morning—I have now

heard exactly what I wished to hear.”—For some moments her voice was

lost; but recovering herself, she added, and with greater calmness than

before—“I am now perfectly satisfied, I wish for no change. I never

could have been happy with him, after knowing, as sooner or later I

must have known, all this.—I should have had no confidence, no esteem.

Nothing could have done it away to my feelings.”

“I know it—I know it,” cried her mother. “Happy with a man of libertine

practices!—With one who so injured the peace of the dearest of our

friends, and the best of men!—No—my Marianne has not a heart to be made

happy with such a man!—Her conscience, her sensitive conscience, would

have felt all that the conscience of her husband ought to have felt.”

Marianne sighed, and repeated, “I wish for no change.”

“You consider the matter,” said Elinor, “exactly as a good mind and a

sound understanding must consider it; and I dare say you perceive, as

well as myself, not only in this, but in many other circumstances,

reason enough to be convinced that your marriage must have involved you

in many certain troubles and disappointments, in which you would have

been poorly supported by an affection, on his side, much less certain.

Had you married, you must have been always poor. His expensiveness is

acknowledged even by himself, and his whole conduct declares that

self-denial is a word hardly understood by him. His demands and your

inexperience together, on a small, very small income, must have brought

on distresses which would not be the _less_ grievous to you, from

having been entirely unknown and unthought of before. _Your_ sense of

honour and honesty would have led you, I know, when aware of your

situation, to attempt all the economy that would appear to you

possible: and, perhaps, as long as your frugality retrenched only on

your own comfort, you might have been suffered to practice it, but

beyond that—and how little could the utmost of your single management

do to stop the ruin which had begun before your marriage? Beyond

_that_, had you endeavoured, however reasonably, to abridge _his_

enjoyments, is it not to be feared, that instead of prevailing on

feelings so selfish to consent to it, you would have lessened your own

influence on his heart, and made him regret the connection which had

involved him in such difficulties?”

Marianne’s lips quivered, and she repeated the word “Selfish?” in a

tone that implied—“do you really think him selfish?”

“The whole of his behaviour,” replied Elinor, “from the beginning to

the end of the affair, has been grounded on selfishness. It was

selfishness which first made him sport with your affections; which

afterwards, when his own were engaged, made him delay the confession of

it, and which finally carried him from Barton. His own enjoyment, or

his own ease, was, in every particular, his ruling principle.”

“It is very true. _My_ happiness never was his object.”

“At present,” continued Elinor, “he regrets what he has done. And why

does he regret it?—Because he finds it has not answered towards

himself. It has not made him happy. His circumstances are now

unembarrassed—he suffers from no evil of that kind; and he thinks only

that he has married a woman of a less amiable temper than yourself. But

does it follow that had he married you, he would have been happy?—The

inconveniences would have been different. He would then have suffered

under the pecuniary distresses which, because they are removed, he now

reckons as nothing. He would have had a wife of whose temper he could

make no complaint, but he would have been always necessitous—always

poor; and probably would soon have learned to rank the innumerable

comforts of a clear estate and good income as of far more importance,

even to domestic happiness, than the mere temper of a wife.”

“I have not a doubt of it,” said Marianne; “and I have nothing to

regret—nothing but my own folly.”

“Rather say your mother’s imprudence, my child,” said Mrs. Dashwood;

“_she_ must be answerable.”

Marianne would not let her proceed;—and Elinor, satisfied that each

felt their own error, wished to avoid any survey of the past that might

weaken her sister’s spirits; she, therefore, pursuing the first

subject, immediately continued,

“_One_ observation may, I think, be fairly drawn from the whole of the

story—that all Willoughby’s difficulties have arisen from the first

offence against virtue, in his behaviour to Eliza Williams. That crime

has been the origin of every lesser one, and of all his present

discontents.”

Marianne assented most feelingly to the remark; and her mother was led

by it to an enumeration of Colonel Brandon’s injuries and merits, warm

as friendship and design could unitedly dictate. Her daughter did not

look, however, as if much of it were heard by her.

Elinor, according to her expectation, saw on the two or three following

days, that Marianne did not continue to gain strength as she had done;

but while her resolution was unsubdued, and she still tried to appear

cheerful and easy, her sister could safely trust to the effect of time

upon her health.

Margaret returned, and the family were again all restored to each

other, again quietly settled at the cottage; and if not pursuing their

usual studies with quite so much vigour as when they first came to

Barton, at least planning a vigorous prosecution of them in future.

Elinor grew impatient for some tidings of Edward. She had heard nothing

of him since her leaving London, nothing new of his plans, nothing

certain even of his present abode. Some letters had passed between her

and her brother, in consequence of Marianne’s illness; and in the first

of John’s, there had been this sentence:—“We know nothing of our

unfortunate Edward, and can make no enquiries on so prohibited a

subject, but conclude him to be still at Oxford;” which was all the

intelligence of Edward afforded her by the correspondence, for his name

was not even mentioned in any of the succeeding letters. She was not

doomed, however, to be long in ignorance of his measures.

Their man-servant had been sent one morning to Exeter on business; and

when, as he waited at table, he had satisfied the inquiries of his

mistress as to the event of his errand, this was his voluntary

communication,—

“I suppose you know, ma’am, that Mr. Ferrars is married.”

Marianne gave a violent start, fixed her eyes upon Elinor, saw her

turning pale, and fell back in her chair in hysterics. Mrs. Dashwood,

whose eyes, as she answered the servant’s inquiry, had intuitively

taken the same direction, was shocked to perceive by Elinor’s

countenance how much she really suffered, and a moment afterwards,

alike distressed by Marianne’s situation, knew not on which child to

bestow her principal attention.

The servant, who saw only that Miss Marianne was taken ill, had sense

enough to call one of the maids, who, with Mrs. Dashwood’s assistance,

supported her into the other room. By that time, Marianne was rather

better, and her mother leaving her to the care of Margaret and the

maid, returned to Elinor, who, though still much disordered, had so far

recovered the use of her reason and voice as to be just beginning an

inquiry of Thomas, as to the source of his intelligence. Mrs. Dashwood

immediately took all that trouble on herself; and Elinor had the

benefit of the information without the exertion of seeking it.

“Who told you that Mr. Ferrars was married, Thomas?”

“I see Mr. Ferrars myself, ma’am, this morning in Exeter, and his lady

too, Miss Steele as was. They was stopping in a chaise at the door of

the New London Inn, as I went there with a message from Sally at the

Park to her brother, who is one of the post-boys. I happened to look up

as I went by the chaise, and so I see directly it was the youngest Miss

Steele; so I took off my hat, and she knew me and called to me, and

inquired after you, ma’am, and the young ladies, especially Miss

Marianne, and bid me I should give her compliments and Mr. Ferrars’s,

their best compliments and service, and how sorry they was they had not

time to come on and see you, but they was in a great hurry to go

forwards, for they was going further down for a little while, but

howsever, when they come back, they’d make sure to come and see you.”

“But did she tell you she was married, Thomas?”

“Yes, ma’am. She smiled, and said how she had changed her name since

she was in these parts. She was always a very affable and free-spoken

young lady, and very civil behaved. So, I made free to wish her joy.”

“Was Mr. Ferrars in the carriage with her?”

“Yes, ma’am, I just see him leaning back in it, but he did not look

up;—he never was a gentleman much for talking.”

Elinor’s heart could easily account for his not putting himself

forward; and Mrs. Dashwood probably found the same explanation.

“Was there no one else in the carriage?”

“No, ma’am, only they two.”

“Do you know where they came from?”

“They come straight from town, as Miss Lucy—Mrs. Ferrars told me.”

“And are they going farther westward?”

“Yes, ma’am—but not to bide long. They will soon be back again, and

then they’d be sure and call here.”

Mrs. Dashwood now looked at her daughter; but Elinor knew better than

to expect them. She recognised the whole of Lucy in the message, and

was very confident that Edward would never come near them. She observed

in a low voice, to her mother, that they were probably going down to

Mr. Pratt’s, near Plymouth.

Thomas’s intelligence seemed over. Elinor looked as if she wished to

hear more.

“Did you see them off, before you came away?”

“No, ma’am—the horses were just coming out, but I could not bide any

longer; I was afraid of being late.”

“Did Mrs. Ferrars look well?”

“Yes, ma’am, she said how she was very well; and to my mind she was

always a very handsome young lady—and she seemed vastly contented.”

Mrs. Dashwood could think of no other question, and Thomas and the

tablecloth, now alike needless, were soon afterwards dismissed.

Marianne had already sent to say, that she should eat nothing more.

Mrs. Dashwood’s and Elinor’s appetites were equally lost, and Margaret

might think herself very well off, that with so much uneasiness as both

her sisters had lately experienced, so much reason as they had often

had to be careless of their meals, she had never been obliged to go

without her dinner before.

When the dessert and the wine were arranged, and Mrs. Dashwood and

Elinor were left by themselves, they remained long together in a

similarity of thoughtfulness and silence. Mrs. Dashwood feared to

hazard any remark, and ventured not to offer consolation. She now found

that she had erred in relying on Elinor’s representation of herself;

and justly concluded that every thing had been expressly softened at

the time, to spare her from an increase of unhappiness, suffering as

she then had suffered for Marianne. She found that she had been misled

by the careful, the considerate attention of her daughter, to think the

attachment, which once she had so well understood, much slighter in

reality, than she had been wont to believe, or than it was now proved

to be. She feared that under this persuasion she had been unjust,

inattentive, nay, almost unkind, to her Elinor;—that Marianne’s

affliction, because more acknowledged, more immediately before her, had

too much engrossed her tenderness, and led her away to forget that in

Elinor she might have a daughter suffering almost as much, certainly

with less self-provocation, and greater fortitude.