CHAPTER XXXIX

The Miss Dashwoods had now been rather more than two months in town,

and Marianne's impatience to be gone increased every day. She sighed

for the air, the liberty, the quiet of the country; and fancied that

if any place could give her ease, Barton must do it. Elinor was hardly

less anxious than herself for their removal, and only so much less

bent on its being effected immediately, as that she was conscious of

the difficulties of so long a journey, which Marianne could not be

brought to acknowledge. She began, however, seriously to turn her

thoughts towards its accomplishment, and had already mentioned their

wishes to their kind hostess, who resisted them with all the eloquence

of her good-will, when a plan was suggested, which, though detaining

them from home yet a few weeks longer, appeared to Elinor altogether

much more eligible than any other. The Palmers were to remove to

Cleveland about the end of March, for the Easter holidays; and Mrs.

Jennings, with both her friends, received a very warm invitation from

Charlotte to go with them. This would not, in itself, have been

sufficient for the delicacy of Miss Dashwood;--but it was enforced

with so much real politeness by Mr. Palmer himself, as, joined to the

very great amendment of his manners towards them since her sister had

been known to be unhappy, induced her to accept it with pleasure.

When she told Marianne what she had done, however, her first reply was

not very auspicious.

"Cleveland!"--she cried, with great agitation. "No, I cannot go to

Cleveland."--

"You forget," said Elinor gently, "that its situation is not--that it

is not in the neighbourhood of--"

"But it is in Somersetshire. I cannot go into Somersetshire. There,

where I looked forward to going;--no, Elinor, you cannot expect me to

go there."

Elinor would not argue upon the propriety of overcoming such

feelings;--she only endeavoured to counteract them by working on

others;--represented it, therefore, as a measure which would fix the

time of her returning to that dear mother, whom she so much wished to

see, in a more eligible, more comfortable manner, than any other plan

could do, and perhaps without any greater delay. From Cleveland, which

was within a few miles of Bristol, the distance to Barton was not

beyond one day, though a long day's journey; and their mother's

servant might easily come there to attend them down; and as there

could be no occasion of their staying above a week at Cleveland, they

might now be at home in little more than three weeks' time. As

Marianne's affection for her mother was sincere, it must triumph with

little difficulty, over the imaginary evils she had started.

Mrs. Jennings was so far from being weary of her guest, that she

pressed them very earnestly to return with her again from Cleveland.

Elinor was grateful for the attention, but it could not alter her

design; and their mother's concurrence being readily gained, every

thing relative to their return was arranged as far as it could

be;--and Marianne found some relief in drawing up a statement of the

hours that were yet to divide her from Barton.

"Ah! Colonel, I do not know what you and I shall do without the Miss

Dashwoods;"--was Mrs. Jennings's address to him when he first called

on her, after their leaving her was settled--"for they are quite

resolved upon going home from the Palmers;--and how forlorn we shall

be, when I come back!--Lord! we shall sit and gape at one another as

dull as two cats."

Perhaps Mrs. Jennings was in hopes, by this vigorous sketch of their

future ennui, to provoke him to make that offer, which might give

himself an escape from it; and if so, she had soon afterwards good

reason to think her object gained; for, on Elinor's moving to the

window to take more expeditiously the dimensions of a print, which she

was going to copy for her friend, he followed her to it with a look of

particular meaning, and conversed with her there for several minutes.

The effect of his discourse on the lady too, could not escape her

observation, for though she was too honorable to listen, and had even

changed her seat, on purpose that she might _not_ hear, to one close

by the piano forte on which Marianne was playing, she could not keep

herself from seeing that Elinor changed colour, attended with

agitation, and was too intent on what he said to pursue her

employment. Still farther in confirmation of her hopes, in the

interval of Marianne's turning from one lesson to another, some words

of the Colonel's inevitably reached her ear, in which he seemed to be

apologising for the badness of his house. This set the matter beyond a

doubt. She wondered, indeed, at his thinking it necessary to do so;

but supposed it to be the proper etiquette. What Elinor said in reply

she could not distinguish, but judged from the motion of her lips,

that she did not think _that_ any material objection;--and Mrs.

Jennings commended her in her heart for being so honest. They then

talked on for a few minutes longer without her catching a syllable,

when another lucky stop in Marianne's performance brought her these

words in the Colonel's calm voice,--

"I am afraid it cannot take place very soon."

Astonished and shocked at so unlover-like a speech, she was almost

ready to cry out, "Lord! what should hinder it?"--but checking her

desire, confined herself to this silent ejaculation.

"This is very strange!--sure he need not wait to be older."

This delay on the Colonel's side, however, did not seem to offend or

mortify his fair companion in the least, for on their breaking up the

conference soon afterwards, and moving different ways, Mrs. Jennings

very plainly heard Elinor say, and with a voice which showed her to

feel what she said--

"I shall always think myself very much obliged to you."

Mrs. Jennings was delighted with her gratitude, and only wondered that

after hearing such a sentence, the Colonel should be able to take

leave of them, as he immediately did, with the utmost sang-froid, and

go away without making her any reply!--She had not thought her old

friend could have made so indifferent a suitor.

What had really passed between them was to this effect.

"I have heard," said he, with great compassion, "of the injustice your

friend Mr. Ferrars has suffered from his family; for if I understand

the matter right, he has been entirely cast off by them for

persevering in his engagement with a very deserving young woman. Have

I been rightly informed?--Is it so?--"

Elinor told him that it was.

"The cruelty, the impolitic cruelty,"--he replied, with great

feeling,--"of dividing, or attempting to divide, two young people

long attached to each other, is terrible. Mrs. Ferrars does not know

what she may be doing--what she may drive her son to. I have seen Mr.

Ferrars two or three times in Harley Street, and am much pleased with

him. He is not a young man with whom one can be intimately acquainted

in a short time, but I have seen enough of him to wish him well for

his own sake, and as a friend of yours, I wish it still more. I

understand that he intends to take orders. Will you be so good as to

tell him that the living of Delaford, now just vacant, as I am

informed by this day's post, is his, if he think it worth his

acceptance--but _that_, perhaps, so unfortunately circumstanced as he

is now, it may be nonsense to appear to doubt; I only wish it were

more valuable. It is a rectory, but a small one; the late incumbent, I

believe, did not make more than 200 L per annum, and though it is

certainly capable of improvement, I fear, not to such an amount as to

afford him a very comfortable income. Such as it is, however, my

pleasure in presenting him to it, will be very great. Pray assure him

of it."

Elinor's astonishment at this commission could hardly have been

greater, had the Colonel been really making her an offer of his hand.

The preferment, which only two days before she had considered as

hopeless for Edward, was already provided to enable him to marry;--and

_she_, of all people in the world, was fixed on to bestow it!--Her

emotion was such as Mrs. Jennings had attributed to a very different

cause;--but whatever minor feelings less pure, less pleasing, might

have a share in that emotion, her esteem for the general benevolence,

and her gratitude for the particular friendship, which together

prompted Colonel Brandon to this act, were strongly felt, and warmly

expressed. She thanked him for it with all her heart, spoke of

Edward's principles and disposition with that praise which she knew

them to deserve; and promised to undertake the commission with

pleasure, if it were really his wish to put off so agreeable an office

to another. But at the same time, she could not help thinking that no

one could so well perform it as himself. It was an office in short,

from which, unwilling to give Edward the pain of receiving an

obligation from _her_, she would have been very glad to be spared

herself; but Colonel Brandon, on motives of equal delicacy, declining

it likewise, still seemed so desirous of its being given through her

means, that she would not on any account make farther opposition.

Edward, she believed, was still in town, and fortunately she had heard

his address from Miss Steele. She could undertake therefore to inform

him of it, in the course of the day. After this had been settled,

Colonel Brandon began to talk of his own advantage in securing so

respectable and agreeable a neighbour, and _then_ it was that he

mentioned with regret, that the house was small and indifferent; an

evil which Elinor, as Mrs. Jennings had supposed her to do, made very

light of, at least as far as regarded its size.

"The smallness of the house," said she, "I cannot imagine any

inconvenience to them, for it will be in proportion to their family

and income."

By which the Colonel was surprised to find that _she_ was considering

Mr. Ferrars's marriage as the certain consequence of the presentation;

for he did not suppose it possible that Delaford living could supply

such an income, as anybody in his style of life would venture to

settle on, and he said so.

"This little rectory _can_ do no more than make Mr. Ferrars

comfortable as a bachelor; it cannot enable him to marry. I am sorry

to say that my patronage ends with this; and my interest is hardly

more extensive. If, however, by an unforeseen chance it should be in

my power to serve him farther, I must think very differently of him

from what I now do, if I am not as ready to be useful to him then as I

sincerely wish I could be at present. What I am now doing indeed,

seems nothing at all, since it can advance him so little towards what

must be his principal, his only object of happiness. His marriage must

still be a distant good;--at least, I am afraid it cannot take place

very soon."

Such was the sentence which, when misunderstood, so justly offended

the delicate feelings of Mrs. Jennings; but after this narration of

what really passed between Colonel Brandon and Elinor, while they

stood at the window, the gratitude expressed by the latter on their

parting, may perhaps appear in general, not less reasonably excited,

nor less properly worded than if it had arisen from an offer of

marriage.