”
“No, read it yourself,” cried Catherine, whose second thoughts were
clearer.
“No, read it yourself,” cried Catherine, whose second thoughts were
clearer.
Austen - Northanger Abbey
At that instant a door
underneath was hastily opened; someone seemed with swift steps to ascend
the stairs, by the head of which she had yet to pass before she could
gain the gallery. She had no power to move. With a feeling of terror
not very definable, she fixed her eyes on the staircase, and in a few
moments it gave Henry to her view. “Mr. Tilney! ” she exclaimed in a
voice of more than common astonishment. He looked astonished too. “Good
God! ” she continued, not attending to his address. “How came you here?
How came you up that staircase? ”
“How came I up that staircase! ” he replied, greatly surprised. “Because
it is my nearest way from the stable-yard to my own chamber; and why
should I not come up it? ”
Catherine recollected herself, blushed deeply, and could say no more. He
seemed to be looking in her countenance for that explanation which her
lips did not afford. She moved on towards the gallery. “And may I not,
in my turn,” said he, as he pushed back the folding doors, “ask how you
came here? This passage is at least as extraordinary a road from the
breakfast-parlour to your apartment, as that staircase can be from the
stables to mine. ”
“I have been,” said Catherine, looking down, “to see your mother’s
room. ”
“My mother’s room! Is there anything extraordinary to be seen there? ”
“No, nothing at all. I thought you did not mean to come back till
tomorrow. ”
“I did not expect to be able to return sooner, when I went away; but
three hours ago I had the pleasure of finding nothing to detain me. You
look pale. I am afraid I alarmed you by running so fast up those stairs.
Perhaps you did not know--you were not aware of their leading from the
offices in common use? ”
“No, I was not. You have had a very fine day for your ride. ”
“Very; and does Eleanor leave you to find your way into all the rooms in
the house by yourself? ”
“Oh! No; she showed me over the greatest part on Saturday--and we were
coming here to these rooms--but only”--dropping her voice--“your father
was with us. ”
“And that prevented you,” said Henry, earnestly regarding her. “Have you
looked into all the rooms in that passage? ”
“No, I only wanted to see--Is not it very late? I must go and dress. ”
“It is only a quarter past four” showing his watch--“and you are not now
in Bath. No theatre, no rooms to prepare for. Half an hour at Northanger
must be enough. ”
She could not contradict it, and therefore suffered herself to be
detained, though her dread of further questions made her, for the first
time in their acquaintance, wish to leave him. They walked slowly up the
gallery. “Have you had any letter from Bath since I saw you? ”
“No, and I am very much surprised. Isabella promised so faithfully to
write directly. ”
“Promised so faithfully! A faithful promise! That puzzles me. I have
heard of a faithful performance. But a faithful promise--the fidelity
of promising! It is a power little worth knowing, however, since it can
deceive and pain you. My mother’s room is very commodious, is it not?
Large and cheerful-looking, and the dressing-closets so well disposed!
It always strikes me as the most comfortable apartment in the house, and
I rather wonder that Eleanor should not take it for her own. She sent
you to look at it, I suppose? ”
“No. ”
“It has been your own doing entirely? ” Catherine said nothing. After a
short silence, during which he had closely observed her, he added, “As
there is nothing in the room in itself to raise curiosity, this must
have proceeded from a sentiment of respect for my mother’s character,
as described by Eleanor, which does honour to her memory. The world, I
believe, never saw a better woman. But it is not often that virtue can
boast an interest such as this. The domestic, unpretending merits of a
person never known do not often create that kind of fervent, venerating
tenderness which would prompt a visit like yours. Eleanor, I suppose,
has talked of her a great deal? ”
“Yes, a great deal. That is--no, not much, but what she did say was very
interesting. Her dying so suddenly” (slowly, and with hesitation it
was spoken), “and you--none of you being at home--and your father, I
thought--perhaps had not been very fond of her. ”
“And from these circumstances,” he replied (his quick eye
fixed on hers), “you infer perhaps the probability of some
negligence--some”--(involuntarily she shook her head)--“or it may be--of
something still less pardonable. ” She raised her eyes towards him
more fully than she had ever done before. “My mother’s illness,” he
continued, “the seizure which ended in her death, was sudden. The malady
itself, one from which she had often suffered, a bilious fever--its
cause therefore constitutional. On the third day, in short, as soon as
she could be prevailed on, a physician attended her, a very respectable
man, and one in whom she had always placed great confidence. Upon his
opinion of her danger, two others were called in the next day, and
remained in almost constant attendance for four and twenty hours. On the
fifth day she died. During the progress of her disorder, Frederick and I
(we were both at home) saw her repeatedly; and from our own observation
can bear witness to her having received every possible attention
which could spring from the affection of those about her, or which her
situation in life could command. Poor Eleanor was absent, and at such a
distance as to return only to see her mother in her coffin. ”
“But your father,” said Catherine, “was he afflicted? ”
“For a time, greatly so. You have erred in supposing him not attached
to her. He loved her, I am persuaded, as well as it was possible for him
to--we have not all, you know, the same tenderness of disposition--and
I will not pretend to say that while she lived, she might not often have
had much to bear, but though his temper injured her, his judgment never
did. His value of her was sincere; and, if not permanently, he was truly
afflicted by her death. ”
“I am very glad of it,” said Catherine; “it would have been very
shocking! ”
“If I understand you rightly, you had formed a surmise of such horror as
I have hardly words to--Dear Miss Morland, consider the dreadful nature
of the suspicions you have entertained. What have you been judging from?
Remember the country and the age in which we live. Remember that we are
English, that we are Christians. Consult your own understanding, your
own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing
around you. Does our education prepare us for such atrocities? Do our
laws connive at them? Could they be perpetrated without being known, in
a country like this, where social and literary intercourse is on such a
footing, where every man is surrounded by a neighbourhood of voluntary
spies, and where roads and newspapers lay everything open? Dearest Miss
Morland, what ideas have you been admitting? ”
They had reached the end of the gallery, and with tears of shame she ran
off to her own room.
CHAPTER 25
The visions of romance were over. Catherine was completely awakened.
Henry’s address, short as it had been, had more thoroughly opened her
eyes to the extravagance of her late fancies than all their several
disappointments had done. Most grievously was she humbled. Most bitterly
did she cry. It was not only with herself that she was sunk--but with
Henry. Her folly, which now seemed even criminal, was all exposed to
him, and he must despise her forever. The liberty which her imagination
had dared to take with the character of his father--could he ever
forgive it? The absurdity of her curiosity and her fears--could they
ever be forgotten? She hated herself more than she could express. He
had--she thought he had, once or twice before this fatal morning, shown
something like affection for her. But now--in short, she made herself as
miserable as possible for about half an hour, went down when the
clock struck five, with a broken heart, and could scarcely give an
intelligible answer to Eleanor’s inquiry if she was well. The formidable
Henry soon followed her into the room, and the only difference in his
behaviour to her was that he paid her rather more attention than usual.
Catherine had never wanted comfort more, and he looked as if he was
aware of it.
The evening wore away with no abatement of this soothing politeness; and
her spirits were gradually raised to a modest tranquillity. She did not
learn either to forget or defend the past; but she learned to hope that
it would never transpire farther, and that it might not cost her Henry’s
entire regard. Her thoughts being still chiefly fixed on what she had
with such causeless terror felt and done, nothing could shortly be
clearer than that it had been all a voluntary, self-created delusion,
each trifling circumstance receiving importance from an imagination
resolved on alarm, and everything forced to bend to one purpose by
a mind which, before she entered the abbey, had been craving to be
frightened. She remembered with what feelings she had prepared for a
knowledge of Northanger. She saw that the infatuation had been created,
the mischief settled, long before her quitting Bath, and it seemed as if
the whole might be traced to the influence of that sort of reading which
she had there indulged.
Charming as were all Mrs. Radcliffe’s works, and charming even as were
the works of all her imitators, it was not in them perhaps that human
nature, at least in the Midland counties of England, was to be looked
for. Of the Alps and Pyrenees, with their pine forests and their vices,
they might give a faithful delineation; and Italy, Switzerland, and
the south of France might be as fruitful in horrors as they were there
represented. Catherine dared not doubt beyond her own country, and even
of that, if hard pressed, would have yielded the northern and western
extremities. But in the central part of England there was surely some
security for the existence even of a wife not beloved, in the laws of
the land, and the manners of the age. Murder was not tolerated, servants
were not slaves, and neither poison nor sleeping potions to be procured,
like rhubarb, from every druggist. Among the Alps and Pyrenees, perhaps,
there were no mixed characters. There, such as were not as spotless as
an angel might have the dispositions of a fiend. But in England it was
not so; among the English, she believed, in their hearts and habits,
there was a general though unequal mixture of good and bad. Upon this
conviction, she would not be surprised if even in Henry and Eleanor
Tilney, some slight imperfection might hereafter appear; and upon this
conviction she need not fear to acknowledge some actual specks in
the character of their father, who, though cleared from the grossly
injurious suspicions which she must ever blush to have entertained, she
did believe, upon serious consideration, to be not perfectly amiable.
Her mind made up on these several points, and her resolution formed, of
always judging and acting in future with the greatest good sense, she
had nothing to do but to forgive herself and be happier than ever; and
the lenient hand of time did much for her by insensible gradations in
the course of another day. Henry’s astonishing generosity and nobleness
of conduct, in never alluding in the slightest way to what had passed,
was of the greatest assistance to her; and sooner than she could have
supposed it possible in the beginning of her distress, her spirits
became absolutely comfortable, and capable, as heretofore, of continual
improvement by anything he said. There were still some subjects, indeed,
under which she believed they must always tremble--the mention of a
chest or a cabinet, for instance--and she did not love the sight of
japan in any shape: but even she could allow that an occasional memento
of past folly, however painful, might not be without use.
The anxieties of common life began soon to succeed to the alarms of
romance. Her desire of hearing from Isabella grew every day greater.
She was quite impatient to know how the Bath world went on, and how the
rooms were attended; and especially was she anxious to be assured of
Isabella’s having matched some fine netting-cotton, on which she had
left her intent; and of her continuing on the best terms with James. Her
only dependence for information of any kind was on Isabella. James had
protested against writing to her till his return to Oxford; and Mrs.
Allen had given her no hopes of a letter till she had got back to
Fullerton. But Isabella had promised and promised again; and when she
promised a thing, she was so scrupulous in performing it! This made it
so particularly strange!
For nine successive mornings, Catherine wondered over the repetition
of a disappointment, which each morning became more severe: but, on
the tenth, when she entered the breakfast-room, her first object was a
letter, held out by Henry’s willing hand. She thanked him as heartily
as if he had written it himself. “‘Tis only from James, however,” as she
looked at the direction. She opened it; it was from Oxford; and to this
purpose:
“Dear Catherine,
“Though, God knows, with little inclination for writing, I think it my
duty to tell you that everything is at an end between Miss Thorpe and
me. I left her and Bath yesterday, never to see either again. I shall
not enter into particulars--they would only pain you more. You will soon
hear enough from another quarter to know where lies the blame; and I
hope will acquit your brother of everything but the folly of too easily
thinking his affection returned. Thank God! I am undeceived in time!
But it is a heavy blow! After my father’s consent had been so kindly
given--but no more of this. She has made me miserable forever! Let me
soon hear from you, dear Catherine; you are my only friend; your love
I do build upon. I wish your visit at Northanger may be over before
Captain Tilney makes his engagement known, or you will be uncomfortably
circumstanced. Poor Thorpe is in town: I dread the sight of him; his
honest heart would feel so much. I have written to him and my father.
Her duplicity hurts me more than all; till the very last, if I reasoned
with her, she declared herself as much attached to me as ever, and
laughed at my fears. I am ashamed to think how long I bore with it;
but if ever man had reason to believe himself loved, I was that man. I
cannot understand even now what she would be at, for there could be no
need of my being played off to make her secure of Tilney. We parted
at last by mutual consent--happy for me had we never met! I can never
expect to know such another woman! Dearest Catherine, beware how you
give your heart.
“Believe me,” &c.
Catherine had not read three lines before her sudden change of
countenance, and short exclamations of sorrowing wonder, declared her to
be receiving unpleasant news; and Henry, earnestly watching her through
the whole letter, saw plainly that it ended no better than it began. He
was prevented, however, from even looking his surprise by his father’s
entrance. They went to breakfast directly; but Catherine could hardly
eat anything. Tears filled her eyes, and even ran down her cheeks as she
sat. The letter was one moment in her hand, then in her lap, and then in
her pocket; and she looked as if she knew not what she did. The general,
between his cocoa and his newspaper, had luckily no leisure for noticing
her; but to the other two her distress was equally visible. As soon
as she dared leave the table she hurried away to her own room; but the
housemaids were busy in it, and she was obliged to come down again.
She turned into the drawing-room for privacy, but Henry and Eleanor had
likewise retreated thither, and were at that moment deep in consultation
about her. She drew back, trying to beg their pardon, but was, with
gentle violence, forced to return; and the others withdrew, after
Eleanor had affectionately expressed a wish of being of use or comfort
to her.
After half an hour’s free indulgence of grief and reflection, Catherine
felt equal to encountering her friends; but whether she should make
her distress known to them was another consideration. Perhaps, if
particularly questioned, she might just give an idea--just distantly
hint at it--but not more. To expose a friend, such a friend as Isabella
had been to her--and then their own brother so closely concerned in it!
She believed she must waive the subject altogether. Henry and Eleanor
were by themselves in the breakfast-room; and each, as she entered it,
looked at her anxiously. Catherine took her place at the table, and,
after a short silence, Eleanor said, “No bad news from Fullerton, I
hope? Mr. and Mrs. Morland--your brothers and sisters--I hope they are
none of them ill? ”
“No, I thank you” (sighing as she spoke); “they are all very well. My
letter was from my brother at Oxford. ”
Nothing further was said for a few minutes; and then speaking through
her tears, she added, “I do not think I shall ever wish for a letter
again! ”
“I am sorry,” said Henry, closing the book he had just opened; “if I
had suspected the letter of containing anything unwelcome, I should have
given it with very different feelings. ”
“It contained something worse than anybody could suppose! Poor James is
so unhappy! You will soon know why. ”
“To have so kind-hearted, so affectionate a sister,” replied Henry
warmly, “must be a comfort to him under any distress. ”
“I have one favour to beg,” said Catherine, shortly afterwards, in an
agitated manner, “that, if your brother should be coming here, you will
give me notice of it, that I may go away. ”
“Our brother! Frederick! ”
“Yes; I am sure I should be very sorry to leave you so soon, but
something has happened that would make it very dreadful for me to be in
the same house with Captain Tilney. ”
Eleanor’s work was suspended while she gazed with increasing
astonishment; but Henry began to suspect the truth, and something, in
which Miss Thorpe’s name was included, passed his lips.
“How quick you are! ” cried Catherine: “you have guessed it, I declare!
And yet, when we talked about it in Bath, you little thought of its
ending so. Isabella--no wonder now I have not heard from her--Isabella
has deserted my brother, and is to marry yours! Could you have believed
there had been such inconstancy and fickleness, and everything that is
bad in the world? ”
“I hope, so far as concerns my brother, you are misinformed. I hope
he has not had any material share in bringing on Mr. Morland’s
disappointment. His marrying Miss Thorpe is not probable. I think you
must be deceived so far. I am very sorry for Mr. Morland--sorry that
anyone you love should be unhappy; but my surprise would be greater at
Frederick’s marrying her than at any other part of the story. ”
“It is very true, however; you shall read James’s letter yourself.
Stay--There is one part--” recollecting with a blush the last line.
“Will you take the trouble of reading to us the passages which concern
my brother?
”
“No, read it yourself,” cried Catherine, whose second thoughts were
clearer. “I do not know what I was thinking of” (blushing again that she
had blushed before); “James only means to give me good advice. ”
He gladly received the letter, and, having read it through, with close
attention, returned it saying, “Well, if it is to be so, I can only
say that I am sorry for it. Frederick will not be the first man who has
chosen a wife with less sense than his family expected. I do not envy
his situation, either as a lover or a son. ”
Miss Tilney, at Catherine’s invitation, now read the letter likewise,
and, having expressed also her concern and surprise, began to inquire
into Miss Thorpe’s connections and fortune.
“Her mother is a very good sort of woman,” was Catherine’s answer.
“What was her father? ”
“A lawyer, I believe. They live at Putney. ”
“Are they a wealthy family? ”
“No, not very. I do not believe Isabella has any fortune at all: but
that will not signify in your family. Your father is so very liberal!
He told me the other day that he only valued money as it allowed him to
promote the happiness of his children. ” The brother and sister looked
at each other. “But,” said Eleanor, after a short pause, “would it be to
promote his happiness, to enable him to marry such a girl? She must be
an unprincipled one, or she could not have used your brother so. And how
strange an infatuation on Frederick’s side! A girl who, before his eyes,
is violating an engagement voluntarily entered into with another man! Is
not it inconceivable, Henry? Frederick too, who always wore his heart so
proudly! Who found no woman good enough to be loved! ”
“That is the most unpromising circumstance, the strongest presumption
against him. When I think of his past declarations, I give him up.
Moreover, I have too good an opinion of Miss Thorpe’s prudence to
suppose that she would part with one gentleman before the other
was secured. It is all over with Frederick indeed! He is a deceased
man--defunct in understanding. Prepare for your sister-in-law, Eleanor,
and such a sister-in-law as you must delight in! Open, candid, artless,
guileless, with affections strong but simple, forming no pretensions,
and knowing no disguise. ”
“Such a sister-in-law, Henry, I should delight in,” said Eleanor with a
smile.
“But perhaps,” observed Catherine, “though she has behaved so ill by our
family, she may behave better by yours. Now she has really got the man
she likes, she may be constant. ”
“Indeed I am afraid she will,” replied Henry; “I am afraid she will
be very constant, unless a baronet should come in her way; that is
Frederick’s only chance. I will get the Bath paper, and look over the
arrivals. ”
“You think it is all for ambition, then? And, upon my word, there are
some things that seem very like it. I cannot forget that, when she first
knew what my father would do for them, she seemed quite disappointed
that it was not more. I never was so deceived in anyone’s character in
my life before. ”
“Among all the great variety that you have known and studied. ”
“My own disappointment and loss in her is very great; but, as for poor
James, I suppose he will hardly ever recover it. ”
“Your brother is certainly very much to be pitied at present; but we
must not, in our concern for his sufferings, undervalue yours. You feel,
I suppose, that in losing Isabella, you lose half yourself: you feel a
void in your heart which nothing else can occupy. Society is becoming
irksome; and as for the amusements in which you were wont to share at
Bath, the very idea of them without her is abhorrent. You would not,
for instance, now go to a ball for the world. You feel that you have no
longer any friend to whom you can speak with unreserve, on whose regard
you can place dependence, or whose counsel, in any difficulty, you could
rely on. You feel all this? ”
“No,” said Catherine, after a few moments’ reflection, “I do not--ought
I? To say the truth, though I am hurt and grieved, that I cannot still
love her, that I am never to hear from her, perhaps never to see her
again, I do not feel so very, very much afflicted as one would have
thought. ”
“You feel, as you always do, what is most to the credit of human nature.
Such feelings ought to be investigated, that they may know themselves. ”
Catherine, by some chance or other, found her spirits so very much
relieved by this conversation that she could not regret her being led
on, though so unaccountably, to mention the circumstance which had
produced it.
CHAPTER 26
From this time, the subject was frequently canvassed by the three young
people; and Catherine found, with some surprise, that her two young
friends were perfectly agreed in considering Isabella’s want of
consequence and fortune as likely to throw great difficulties in the way
of her marrying their brother. Their persuasion that the general would,
upon this ground alone, independent of the objection that might be
raised against her character, oppose the connection, turned her feelings
moreover with some alarm towards herself. She was as insignificant,
and perhaps as portionless, as Isabella; and if the heir of the Tilney
property had not grandeur and wealth enough in himself, at what point
of interest were the demands of his younger brother to rest? The very
painful reflections to which this thought led could only be dispersed by
a dependence on the effect of that particular partiality, which, as she
was given to understand by his words as well as his actions, she had
from the first been so fortunate as to excite in the general; and by a
recollection of some most generous and disinterested sentiments on the
subject of money, which she had more than once heard him utter, and
which tempted her to think his disposition in such matters misunderstood
by his children.
They were so fully convinced, however, that their brother would not
have the courage to apply in person for his father’s consent, and so
repeatedly assured her that he had never in his life been less likely to
come to Northanger than at the present time, that she suffered her mind
to be at ease as to the necessity of any sudden removal of her own. But
as it was not to be supposed that Captain Tilney, whenever he made his
application, would give his father any just idea of Isabella’s conduct,
it occurred to her as highly expedient that Henry should lay the whole
business before him as it really was, enabling the general by that means
to form a cool and impartial opinion, and prepare his objections on
a fairer ground than inequality of situations. She proposed it to him
accordingly; but he did not catch at the measure so eagerly as she had
expected. “No,” said he, “my father’s hands need not be strengthened,
and Frederick’s confession of folly need not be forestalled. He must
tell his own story. ”
“But he will tell only half of it. ”
“A quarter would be enough. ”
A day or two passed away and brought no tidings of Captain Tilney. His
brother and sister knew not what to think. Sometimes it appeared to
them as if his silence would be the natural result of the suspected
engagement, and at others that it was wholly incompatible with it.
The general, meanwhile, though offended every morning by Frederick’s
remissness in writing, was free from any real anxiety about him, and had
no more pressing solicitude than that of making Miss Morland’s time at
Northanger pass pleasantly. He often expressed his uneasiness on this
head, feared the sameness of every day’s society and employments would
disgust her with the place, wished the Lady Frasers had been in the
country, talked every now and then of having a large party to dinner,
and once or twice began even to calculate the number of young dancing
people in the neighbourhood. But then it was such a dead time of year,
no wild-fowl, no game, and the Lady Frasers were not in the country.
And it all ended, at last, in his telling Henry one morning that when he
next went to Woodston, they would take him by surprise there some day
or other, and eat their mutton with him. Henry was greatly honoured and
very happy, and Catherine was quite delighted with the scheme. “And when
do you think, sir, I may look forward to this pleasure? I must be at
Woodston on Monday to attend the parish meeting, and shall probably be
obliged to stay two or three days. ”
“Well, well, we will take our chance some one of those days. There is
no need to fix. You are not to put yourself at all out of your way.
Whatever you may happen to have in the house will be enough. I think I
can answer for the young ladies making allowance for a bachelor’s table.
Let me see; Monday will be a busy day with you, we will not come on
Monday; and Tuesday will be a busy one with me. I expect my surveyor
from Brockham with his report in the morning; and afterwards I cannot in
decency fail attending the club. I really could not face my acquaintance
if I stayed away now; for, as I am known to be in the country, it would
be taken exceedingly amiss; and it is a rule with me, Miss Morland,
never to give offence to any of my neighbours, if a small sacrifice of
time and attention can prevent it. They are a set of very worthy men.
They have half a buck from Northanger twice a year; and I dine with them
whenever I can. Tuesday, therefore, we may say is out of the question.
But on Wednesday, I think, Henry, you may expect us; and we shall be
with you early, that we may have time to look about us. Two hours and
three quarters will carry us to Woodston, I suppose; we shall be in the
carriage by ten; so, about a quarter before one on Wednesday, you may
look for us. ”
A ball itself could not have been more welcome to Catherine than
this little excursion, so strong was her desire to be acquainted with
Woodston; and her heart was still bounding with joy when Henry, about an
hour afterwards, came booted and greatcoated into the room where she
and Eleanor were sitting, and said, “I am come, young ladies, in a
very moralizing strain, to observe that our pleasures in this world
are always to be paid for, and that we often purchase them at a great
disadvantage, giving ready-monied actual happiness for a draft on the
future, that may not be honoured. Witness myself, at this present hour.
Because I am to hope for the satisfaction of seeing you at Woodston on
Wednesday, which bad weather, or twenty other causes, may prevent, I
must go away directly, two days before I intended it. ”
“Go away! ” said Catherine, with a very long face. “And why? ”
“Why! How can you ask the question? Because no time is to be lost in
frightening my old housekeeper out of her wits, because I must go and
prepare a dinner for you, to be sure. ”
“Oh! Not seriously! ”
“Aye, and sadly too--for I had much rather stay. ”
“But how can you think of such a thing, after what the general said?
When he so particularly desired you not to give yourself any trouble,
because anything would do. ”
Henry only smiled. “I am sure it is quite unnecessary upon your sister’s
account and mine. You must know it to be so; and the general made such
a point of your providing nothing extraordinary: besides, if he had not
said half so much as he did, he has always such an excellent dinner
at home, that sitting down to a middling one for one day could not
signify. ”
“I wish I could reason like you, for his sake and my own. Good-bye. As
tomorrow is Sunday, Eleanor, I shall not return. ”
He went; and, it being at any time a much simpler operation to Catherine
to doubt her own judgment than Henry’s, she was very soon obliged to
give him credit for being right, however disagreeable to her his going.
But the inexplicability of the general’s conduct dwelt much on her
thoughts. That he was very particular in his eating, she had, by her own
unassisted observation, already discovered; but why he should say
one thing so positively, and mean another all the while, was most
unaccountable! How were people, at that rate, to be understood? Who but
Henry could have been aware of what his father was at?
From Saturday to Wednesday, however, they were now to be without Henry.
This was the sad finale of every reflection: and Captain Tilney’s letter
would certainly come in his absence; and Wednesday she was very sure
would be wet. The past, present, and future were all equally in gloom.
Her brother so unhappy, and her loss in Isabella so great; and Eleanor’s
spirits always affected by Henry’s absence! What was there to interest
or amuse her? She was tired of the woods and the shrubberies--always so
smooth and so dry; and the abbey in itself was no more to her now than
any other house. The painful remembrance of the folly it had helped
to nourish and perfect was the only emotion which could spring from a
consideration of the building. What a revolution in her ideas! She, who
had so longed to be in an abbey! Now, there was nothing so charming
to her imagination as the unpretending comfort of a well-connected
parsonage, something like Fullerton, but better: Fullerton had its
faults, but Woodston probably had none. If Wednesday should ever come!
It did come, and exactly when it might be reasonably looked for. It
came--it was fine--and Catherine trod on air. By ten o’clock, the chaise
and four conveyed the trio from the abbey; and, after an agreeable drive
of almost twenty miles, they entered Woodston, a large and populous
village, in a situation not unpleasant. Catherine was ashamed to say
how pretty she thought it, as the general seemed to think an apology
necessary for the flatness of the country, and the size of the village;
but in her heart she preferred it to any place she had ever been at,
and looked with great admiration at every neat house above the rank of
a cottage, and at all the little chandler’s shops which they passed. At
the further end of the village, and tolerably disengaged from the rest
of it, stood the parsonage, a new-built substantial stone house, with
its semicircular sweep and green gates; and, as they drove up to the
door, Henry, with the friends of his solitude, a large Newfoundland
puppy and two or three terriers, was ready to receive and make much of
them.
Catherine’s mind was too full, as she entered the house, for her either
to observe or to say a great deal; and, till called on by the general
for her opinion of it, she had very little idea of the room in which she
was sitting. Upon looking round it then, she perceived in a moment that
it was the most comfortable room in the world; but she was too guarded
to say so, and the coldness of her praise disappointed him.
“We are not calling it a good house,” said he. “We are not comparing
it with Fullerton and Northanger--we are considering it as a mere
parsonage, small and confined, we allow, but decent, perhaps, and
habitable; and altogether not inferior to the generality; or, in other
words, I believe there are few country parsonages in England half so
good. It may admit of improvement, however. Far be it from me to say
otherwise; and anything in reason--a bow thrown out, perhaps--though,
between ourselves, if there is one thing more than another my aversion,
it is a patched-on bow. ”
Catherine did not hear enough of this speech to understand or be pained
by it; and other subjects being studiously brought forward and supported
by Henry, at the same time that a tray full of refreshments was
introduced by his servant, the general was shortly restored to his
complacency, and Catherine to all her usual ease of spirits.
The room in question was of a commodious, well-proportioned size, and
handsomely fitted up as a dining-parlour; and on their quitting it to
walk round the grounds, she was shown, first into a smaller apartment,
belonging peculiarly to the master of the house, and made unusually tidy
on the occasion; and afterwards into what was to be the drawing-room,
with the appearance of which, though unfurnished, Catherine was
delighted enough even to satisfy the general. It was a prettily shaped
room, the windows reaching to the ground, and the view from them
pleasant, though only over green meadows; and she expressed her
admiration at the moment with all the honest simplicity with which she
felt it. “Oh! Why do not you fit up this room, Mr. Tilney? What a pity
not to have it fitted up! It is the prettiest room I ever saw; it is the
prettiest room in the world! ”
“I trust,” said the general, with a most satisfied smile, “that it will
very speedily be furnished: it waits only for a lady’s taste! ”
“Well, if it was my house, I should never sit anywhere else. Oh! What a
sweet little cottage there is among the trees--apple trees, too! It is
the prettiest cottage! ”
“You like it--you approve it as an object--it is enough. Henry, remember
that Robinson is spoken to about it. The cottage remains. ”
Such a compliment recalled all Catherine’s consciousness, and silenced
her directly; and, though pointedly applied to by the general for her
choice of the prevailing colour of the paper and hangings, nothing like
an opinion on the subject could be drawn from her. The influence of
fresh objects and fresh air, however, was of great use in dissipating
these embarrassing associations; and, having reached the ornamental part
of the premises, consisting of a walk round two sides of a meadow, on
which Henry’s genius had begun to act about half a year ago, she was
sufficiently recovered to think it prettier than any pleasure-ground she
had ever been in before, though there was not a shrub in it higher than
the green bench in the corner.
A saunter into other meadows, and through part of the village, with a
visit to the stables to examine some improvements, and a charming game
of play with a litter of puppies just able to roll about, brought them
to four o’clock, when Catherine scarcely thought it could be three. At
four they were to dine, and at six to set off on their return. Never had
any day passed so quickly!
She could not but observe that the abundance of the dinner did not seem
to create the smallest astonishment in the general; nay, that he was
even looking at the side-table for cold meat which was not there. His
son and daughter’s observations were of a different kind. They had
seldom seen him eat so heartily at any table but his own, and never
before known him so little disconcerted by the melted butter’s being
oiled.
At six o’clock, the general having taken his coffee, the carriage again
received them; and so gratifying had been the tenor of his conduct
throughout the whole visit, so well assured was her mind on the subject
of his expectations, that, could she have felt equally confident of the
wishes of his son, Catherine would have quitted Woodston with little
anxiety as to the How or the When she might return to it.
CHAPTER 27
The next morning brought the following very unexpected letter from
Isabella:
Bath, April
My dearest Catherine, I received your two kind letters with the greatest
delight, and have a thousand apologies to make for not answering them
sooner. I really am quite ashamed of my idleness; but in this horrid
place one can find time for nothing. I have had my pen in my hand to
begin a letter to you almost every day since you left Bath, but have
always been prevented by some silly trifler or other. Pray write to me
soon, and direct to my own home. Thank God, we leave this vile place
tomorrow. Since you went away, I have had no pleasure in it--the dust
is beyond anything; and everybody one cares for is gone. I believe if I
could see you I should not mind the rest, for you are dearer to me than
anybody can conceive. I am quite uneasy about your dear brother, not
having heard from him since he went to Oxford; and am fearful of some
misunderstanding. Your kind offices will set all right: he is the only
man I ever did or could love, and I trust you will convince him of it.
The spring fashions are partly down; and the hats the most frightful you
can imagine. I hope you spend your time pleasantly, but am afraid you
never think of me. I will not say all that I could of the family you are
with, because I would not be ungenerous, or set you against those you
esteem; but it is very difficult to know whom to trust, and young men
never know their minds two days together. I rejoice to say that the
young man whom, of all others, I particularly abhor, has left Bath. You
will know, from this description, I must mean Captain Tilney, who, as
you may remember, was amazingly disposed to follow and tease me, before
you went away. Afterwards he got worse, and became quite my shadow. Many
girls might have been taken in, for never were such attentions; but I
knew the fickle sex too well. He went away to his regiment two days ago,
and I trust I shall never be plagued with him again. He is the greatest
coxcomb I ever saw, and amazingly disagreeable. The last two days he was
always by the side of Charlotte Davis: I pitied his taste, but took no
notice of him. The last time we met was in Bath Street, and I turned
directly into a shop that he might not speak to me; I would not even
look at him. He went into the pump-room afterwards; but I would not have
followed him for all the world. Such a contrast between him and your
brother! Pray send me some news of the latter--I am quite unhappy about
him; he seemed so uncomfortable when he went away, with a cold, or
something that affected his spirits. I would write to him myself, but
have mislaid his direction; and, as I hinted above, am afraid he
took something in my conduct amiss. Pray explain everything to his
satisfaction; or, if he still harbours any doubt, a line from himself
to me, or a call at Putney when next in town, might set all to rights.
I have not been to the rooms this age, nor to the play, except going in
last night with the Hodges, for a frolic, at half price: they teased
me into it; and I was determined they should not say I shut myself up
because Tilney was gone. We happened to sit by the Mitchells, and they
pretended to be quite surprised to see me out. I knew their spite: at
one time they could not be civil to me, but now they are all friendship;
but I am not such a fool as to be taken in by them. You know I have a
pretty good spirit of my own. Anne Mitchell had tried to put on a
turban like mine, as I wore it the week before at the concert, but made
wretched work of it--it happened to become my odd face, I believe, at
least Tilney told me so at the time, and said every eye was upon me; but
he is the last man whose word I would take. I wear nothing but purple
now: I know I look hideous in it, but no matter--it is your dear
brother’s favourite colour. Lose no time, my dearest, sweetest
Catherine, in writing to him and to me, Who ever am, etc.
Such a strain of shallow artifice could not impose even upon Catherine.
Its inconsistencies, contradictions, and falsehood struck her from the
very first. She was ashamed of Isabella, and ashamed of having ever
loved her. Her professions of attachment were now as disgusting as her
excuses were empty, and her demands impudent. “Write to James on her
behalf! No, James should never hear Isabella’s name mentioned by her
again. ”
On Henry’s arrival from Woodston, she made known to him and Eleanor
their brother’s safety, congratulating them with sincerity on it, and
reading aloud the most material passages of her letter with strong
indignation. When she had finished it--“So much for Isabella,” she
cried, “and for all our intimacy! She must think me an idiot, or she
could not have written so; but perhaps this has served to make her
character better known to me than mine is to her. I see what she has
been about. She is a vain coquette, and her tricks have not answered.
underneath was hastily opened; someone seemed with swift steps to ascend
the stairs, by the head of which she had yet to pass before she could
gain the gallery. She had no power to move. With a feeling of terror
not very definable, she fixed her eyes on the staircase, and in a few
moments it gave Henry to her view. “Mr. Tilney! ” she exclaimed in a
voice of more than common astonishment. He looked astonished too. “Good
God! ” she continued, not attending to his address. “How came you here?
How came you up that staircase? ”
“How came I up that staircase! ” he replied, greatly surprised. “Because
it is my nearest way from the stable-yard to my own chamber; and why
should I not come up it? ”
Catherine recollected herself, blushed deeply, and could say no more. He
seemed to be looking in her countenance for that explanation which her
lips did not afford. She moved on towards the gallery. “And may I not,
in my turn,” said he, as he pushed back the folding doors, “ask how you
came here? This passage is at least as extraordinary a road from the
breakfast-parlour to your apartment, as that staircase can be from the
stables to mine. ”
“I have been,” said Catherine, looking down, “to see your mother’s
room. ”
“My mother’s room! Is there anything extraordinary to be seen there? ”
“No, nothing at all. I thought you did not mean to come back till
tomorrow. ”
“I did not expect to be able to return sooner, when I went away; but
three hours ago I had the pleasure of finding nothing to detain me. You
look pale. I am afraid I alarmed you by running so fast up those stairs.
Perhaps you did not know--you were not aware of their leading from the
offices in common use? ”
“No, I was not. You have had a very fine day for your ride. ”
“Very; and does Eleanor leave you to find your way into all the rooms in
the house by yourself? ”
“Oh! No; she showed me over the greatest part on Saturday--and we were
coming here to these rooms--but only”--dropping her voice--“your father
was with us. ”
“And that prevented you,” said Henry, earnestly regarding her. “Have you
looked into all the rooms in that passage? ”
“No, I only wanted to see--Is not it very late? I must go and dress. ”
“It is only a quarter past four” showing his watch--“and you are not now
in Bath. No theatre, no rooms to prepare for. Half an hour at Northanger
must be enough. ”
She could not contradict it, and therefore suffered herself to be
detained, though her dread of further questions made her, for the first
time in their acquaintance, wish to leave him. They walked slowly up the
gallery. “Have you had any letter from Bath since I saw you? ”
“No, and I am very much surprised. Isabella promised so faithfully to
write directly. ”
“Promised so faithfully! A faithful promise! That puzzles me. I have
heard of a faithful performance. But a faithful promise--the fidelity
of promising! It is a power little worth knowing, however, since it can
deceive and pain you. My mother’s room is very commodious, is it not?
Large and cheerful-looking, and the dressing-closets so well disposed!
It always strikes me as the most comfortable apartment in the house, and
I rather wonder that Eleanor should not take it for her own. She sent
you to look at it, I suppose? ”
“No. ”
“It has been your own doing entirely? ” Catherine said nothing. After a
short silence, during which he had closely observed her, he added, “As
there is nothing in the room in itself to raise curiosity, this must
have proceeded from a sentiment of respect for my mother’s character,
as described by Eleanor, which does honour to her memory. The world, I
believe, never saw a better woman. But it is not often that virtue can
boast an interest such as this. The domestic, unpretending merits of a
person never known do not often create that kind of fervent, venerating
tenderness which would prompt a visit like yours. Eleanor, I suppose,
has talked of her a great deal? ”
“Yes, a great deal. That is--no, not much, but what she did say was very
interesting. Her dying so suddenly” (slowly, and with hesitation it
was spoken), “and you--none of you being at home--and your father, I
thought--perhaps had not been very fond of her. ”
“And from these circumstances,” he replied (his quick eye
fixed on hers), “you infer perhaps the probability of some
negligence--some”--(involuntarily she shook her head)--“or it may be--of
something still less pardonable. ” She raised her eyes towards him
more fully than she had ever done before. “My mother’s illness,” he
continued, “the seizure which ended in her death, was sudden. The malady
itself, one from which she had often suffered, a bilious fever--its
cause therefore constitutional. On the third day, in short, as soon as
she could be prevailed on, a physician attended her, a very respectable
man, and one in whom she had always placed great confidence. Upon his
opinion of her danger, two others were called in the next day, and
remained in almost constant attendance for four and twenty hours. On the
fifth day she died. During the progress of her disorder, Frederick and I
(we were both at home) saw her repeatedly; and from our own observation
can bear witness to her having received every possible attention
which could spring from the affection of those about her, or which her
situation in life could command. Poor Eleanor was absent, and at such a
distance as to return only to see her mother in her coffin. ”
“But your father,” said Catherine, “was he afflicted? ”
“For a time, greatly so. You have erred in supposing him not attached
to her. He loved her, I am persuaded, as well as it was possible for him
to--we have not all, you know, the same tenderness of disposition--and
I will not pretend to say that while she lived, she might not often have
had much to bear, but though his temper injured her, his judgment never
did. His value of her was sincere; and, if not permanently, he was truly
afflicted by her death. ”
“I am very glad of it,” said Catherine; “it would have been very
shocking! ”
“If I understand you rightly, you had formed a surmise of such horror as
I have hardly words to--Dear Miss Morland, consider the dreadful nature
of the suspicions you have entertained. What have you been judging from?
Remember the country and the age in which we live. Remember that we are
English, that we are Christians. Consult your own understanding, your
own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing
around you. Does our education prepare us for such atrocities? Do our
laws connive at them? Could they be perpetrated without being known, in
a country like this, where social and literary intercourse is on such a
footing, where every man is surrounded by a neighbourhood of voluntary
spies, and where roads and newspapers lay everything open? Dearest Miss
Morland, what ideas have you been admitting? ”
They had reached the end of the gallery, and with tears of shame she ran
off to her own room.
CHAPTER 25
The visions of romance were over. Catherine was completely awakened.
Henry’s address, short as it had been, had more thoroughly opened her
eyes to the extravagance of her late fancies than all their several
disappointments had done. Most grievously was she humbled. Most bitterly
did she cry. It was not only with herself that she was sunk--but with
Henry. Her folly, which now seemed even criminal, was all exposed to
him, and he must despise her forever. The liberty which her imagination
had dared to take with the character of his father--could he ever
forgive it? The absurdity of her curiosity and her fears--could they
ever be forgotten? She hated herself more than she could express. He
had--she thought he had, once or twice before this fatal morning, shown
something like affection for her. But now--in short, she made herself as
miserable as possible for about half an hour, went down when the
clock struck five, with a broken heart, and could scarcely give an
intelligible answer to Eleanor’s inquiry if she was well. The formidable
Henry soon followed her into the room, and the only difference in his
behaviour to her was that he paid her rather more attention than usual.
Catherine had never wanted comfort more, and he looked as if he was
aware of it.
The evening wore away with no abatement of this soothing politeness; and
her spirits were gradually raised to a modest tranquillity. She did not
learn either to forget or defend the past; but she learned to hope that
it would never transpire farther, and that it might not cost her Henry’s
entire regard. Her thoughts being still chiefly fixed on what she had
with such causeless terror felt and done, nothing could shortly be
clearer than that it had been all a voluntary, self-created delusion,
each trifling circumstance receiving importance from an imagination
resolved on alarm, and everything forced to bend to one purpose by
a mind which, before she entered the abbey, had been craving to be
frightened. She remembered with what feelings she had prepared for a
knowledge of Northanger. She saw that the infatuation had been created,
the mischief settled, long before her quitting Bath, and it seemed as if
the whole might be traced to the influence of that sort of reading which
she had there indulged.
Charming as were all Mrs. Radcliffe’s works, and charming even as were
the works of all her imitators, it was not in them perhaps that human
nature, at least in the Midland counties of England, was to be looked
for. Of the Alps and Pyrenees, with their pine forests and their vices,
they might give a faithful delineation; and Italy, Switzerland, and
the south of France might be as fruitful in horrors as they were there
represented. Catherine dared not doubt beyond her own country, and even
of that, if hard pressed, would have yielded the northern and western
extremities. But in the central part of England there was surely some
security for the existence even of a wife not beloved, in the laws of
the land, and the manners of the age. Murder was not tolerated, servants
were not slaves, and neither poison nor sleeping potions to be procured,
like rhubarb, from every druggist. Among the Alps and Pyrenees, perhaps,
there were no mixed characters. There, such as were not as spotless as
an angel might have the dispositions of a fiend. But in England it was
not so; among the English, she believed, in their hearts and habits,
there was a general though unequal mixture of good and bad. Upon this
conviction, she would not be surprised if even in Henry and Eleanor
Tilney, some slight imperfection might hereafter appear; and upon this
conviction she need not fear to acknowledge some actual specks in
the character of their father, who, though cleared from the grossly
injurious suspicions which she must ever blush to have entertained, she
did believe, upon serious consideration, to be not perfectly amiable.
Her mind made up on these several points, and her resolution formed, of
always judging and acting in future with the greatest good sense, she
had nothing to do but to forgive herself and be happier than ever; and
the lenient hand of time did much for her by insensible gradations in
the course of another day. Henry’s astonishing generosity and nobleness
of conduct, in never alluding in the slightest way to what had passed,
was of the greatest assistance to her; and sooner than she could have
supposed it possible in the beginning of her distress, her spirits
became absolutely comfortable, and capable, as heretofore, of continual
improvement by anything he said. There were still some subjects, indeed,
under which she believed they must always tremble--the mention of a
chest or a cabinet, for instance--and she did not love the sight of
japan in any shape: but even she could allow that an occasional memento
of past folly, however painful, might not be without use.
The anxieties of common life began soon to succeed to the alarms of
romance. Her desire of hearing from Isabella grew every day greater.
She was quite impatient to know how the Bath world went on, and how the
rooms were attended; and especially was she anxious to be assured of
Isabella’s having matched some fine netting-cotton, on which she had
left her intent; and of her continuing on the best terms with James. Her
only dependence for information of any kind was on Isabella. James had
protested against writing to her till his return to Oxford; and Mrs.
Allen had given her no hopes of a letter till she had got back to
Fullerton. But Isabella had promised and promised again; and when she
promised a thing, she was so scrupulous in performing it! This made it
so particularly strange!
For nine successive mornings, Catherine wondered over the repetition
of a disappointment, which each morning became more severe: but, on
the tenth, when she entered the breakfast-room, her first object was a
letter, held out by Henry’s willing hand. She thanked him as heartily
as if he had written it himself. “‘Tis only from James, however,” as she
looked at the direction. She opened it; it was from Oxford; and to this
purpose:
“Dear Catherine,
“Though, God knows, with little inclination for writing, I think it my
duty to tell you that everything is at an end between Miss Thorpe and
me. I left her and Bath yesterday, never to see either again. I shall
not enter into particulars--they would only pain you more. You will soon
hear enough from another quarter to know where lies the blame; and I
hope will acquit your brother of everything but the folly of too easily
thinking his affection returned. Thank God! I am undeceived in time!
But it is a heavy blow! After my father’s consent had been so kindly
given--but no more of this. She has made me miserable forever! Let me
soon hear from you, dear Catherine; you are my only friend; your love
I do build upon. I wish your visit at Northanger may be over before
Captain Tilney makes his engagement known, or you will be uncomfortably
circumstanced. Poor Thorpe is in town: I dread the sight of him; his
honest heart would feel so much. I have written to him and my father.
Her duplicity hurts me more than all; till the very last, if I reasoned
with her, she declared herself as much attached to me as ever, and
laughed at my fears. I am ashamed to think how long I bore with it;
but if ever man had reason to believe himself loved, I was that man. I
cannot understand even now what she would be at, for there could be no
need of my being played off to make her secure of Tilney. We parted
at last by mutual consent--happy for me had we never met! I can never
expect to know such another woman! Dearest Catherine, beware how you
give your heart.
“Believe me,” &c.
Catherine had not read three lines before her sudden change of
countenance, and short exclamations of sorrowing wonder, declared her to
be receiving unpleasant news; and Henry, earnestly watching her through
the whole letter, saw plainly that it ended no better than it began. He
was prevented, however, from even looking his surprise by his father’s
entrance. They went to breakfast directly; but Catherine could hardly
eat anything. Tears filled her eyes, and even ran down her cheeks as she
sat. The letter was one moment in her hand, then in her lap, and then in
her pocket; and she looked as if she knew not what she did. The general,
between his cocoa and his newspaper, had luckily no leisure for noticing
her; but to the other two her distress was equally visible. As soon
as she dared leave the table she hurried away to her own room; but the
housemaids were busy in it, and she was obliged to come down again.
She turned into the drawing-room for privacy, but Henry and Eleanor had
likewise retreated thither, and were at that moment deep in consultation
about her. She drew back, trying to beg their pardon, but was, with
gentle violence, forced to return; and the others withdrew, after
Eleanor had affectionately expressed a wish of being of use or comfort
to her.
After half an hour’s free indulgence of grief and reflection, Catherine
felt equal to encountering her friends; but whether she should make
her distress known to them was another consideration. Perhaps, if
particularly questioned, she might just give an idea--just distantly
hint at it--but not more. To expose a friend, such a friend as Isabella
had been to her--and then their own brother so closely concerned in it!
She believed she must waive the subject altogether. Henry and Eleanor
were by themselves in the breakfast-room; and each, as she entered it,
looked at her anxiously. Catherine took her place at the table, and,
after a short silence, Eleanor said, “No bad news from Fullerton, I
hope? Mr. and Mrs. Morland--your brothers and sisters--I hope they are
none of them ill? ”
“No, I thank you” (sighing as she spoke); “they are all very well. My
letter was from my brother at Oxford. ”
Nothing further was said for a few minutes; and then speaking through
her tears, she added, “I do not think I shall ever wish for a letter
again! ”
“I am sorry,” said Henry, closing the book he had just opened; “if I
had suspected the letter of containing anything unwelcome, I should have
given it with very different feelings. ”
“It contained something worse than anybody could suppose! Poor James is
so unhappy! You will soon know why. ”
“To have so kind-hearted, so affectionate a sister,” replied Henry
warmly, “must be a comfort to him under any distress. ”
“I have one favour to beg,” said Catherine, shortly afterwards, in an
agitated manner, “that, if your brother should be coming here, you will
give me notice of it, that I may go away. ”
“Our brother! Frederick! ”
“Yes; I am sure I should be very sorry to leave you so soon, but
something has happened that would make it very dreadful for me to be in
the same house with Captain Tilney. ”
Eleanor’s work was suspended while she gazed with increasing
astonishment; but Henry began to suspect the truth, and something, in
which Miss Thorpe’s name was included, passed his lips.
“How quick you are! ” cried Catherine: “you have guessed it, I declare!
And yet, when we talked about it in Bath, you little thought of its
ending so. Isabella--no wonder now I have not heard from her--Isabella
has deserted my brother, and is to marry yours! Could you have believed
there had been such inconstancy and fickleness, and everything that is
bad in the world? ”
“I hope, so far as concerns my brother, you are misinformed. I hope
he has not had any material share in bringing on Mr. Morland’s
disappointment. His marrying Miss Thorpe is not probable. I think you
must be deceived so far. I am very sorry for Mr. Morland--sorry that
anyone you love should be unhappy; but my surprise would be greater at
Frederick’s marrying her than at any other part of the story. ”
“It is very true, however; you shall read James’s letter yourself.
Stay--There is one part--” recollecting with a blush the last line.
“Will you take the trouble of reading to us the passages which concern
my brother?
”
“No, read it yourself,” cried Catherine, whose second thoughts were
clearer. “I do not know what I was thinking of” (blushing again that she
had blushed before); “James only means to give me good advice. ”
He gladly received the letter, and, having read it through, with close
attention, returned it saying, “Well, if it is to be so, I can only
say that I am sorry for it. Frederick will not be the first man who has
chosen a wife with less sense than his family expected. I do not envy
his situation, either as a lover or a son. ”
Miss Tilney, at Catherine’s invitation, now read the letter likewise,
and, having expressed also her concern and surprise, began to inquire
into Miss Thorpe’s connections and fortune.
“Her mother is a very good sort of woman,” was Catherine’s answer.
“What was her father? ”
“A lawyer, I believe. They live at Putney. ”
“Are they a wealthy family? ”
“No, not very. I do not believe Isabella has any fortune at all: but
that will not signify in your family. Your father is so very liberal!
He told me the other day that he only valued money as it allowed him to
promote the happiness of his children. ” The brother and sister looked
at each other. “But,” said Eleanor, after a short pause, “would it be to
promote his happiness, to enable him to marry such a girl? She must be
an unprincipled one, or she could not have used your brother so. And how
strange an infatuation on Frederick’s side! A girl who, before his eyes,
is violating an engagement voluntarily entered into with another man! Is
not it inconceivable, Henry? Frederick too, who always wore his heart so
proudly! Who found no woman good enough to be loved! ”
“That is the most unpromising circumstance, the strongest presumption
against him. When I think of his past declarations, I give him up.
Moreover, I have too good an opinion of Miss Thorpe’s prudence to
suppose that she would part with one gentleman before the other
was secured. It is all over with Frederick indeed! He is a deceased
man--defunct in understanding. Prepare for your sister-in-law, Eleanor,
and such a sister-in-law as you must delight in! Open, candid, artless,
guileless, with affections strong but simple, forming no pretensions,
and knowing no disguise. ”
“Such a sister-in-law, Henry, I should delight in,” said Eleanor with a
smile.
“But perhaps,” observed Catherine, “though she has behaved so ill by our
family, she may behave better by yours. Now she has really got the man
she likes, she may be constant. ”
“Indeed I am afraid she will,” replied Henry; “I am afraid she will
be very constant, unless a baronet should come in her way; that is
Frederick’s only chance. I will get the Bath paper, and look over the
arrivals. ”
“You think it is all for ambition, then? And, upon my word, there are
some things that seem very like it. I cannot forget that, when she first
knew what my father would do for them, she seemed quite disappointed
that it was not more. I never was so deceived in anyone’s character in
my life before. ”
“Among all the great variety that you have known and studied. ”
“My own disappointment and loss in her is very great; but, as for poor
James, I suppose he will hardly ever recover it. ”
“Your brother is certainly very much to be pitied at present; but we
must not, in our concern for his sufferings, undervalue yours. You feel,
I suppose, that in losing Isabella, you lose half yourself: you feel a
void in your heart which nothing else can occupy. Society is becoming
irksome; and as for the amusements in which you were wont to share at
Bath, the very idea of them without her is abhorrent. You would not,
for instance, now go to a ball for the world. You feel that you have no
longer any friend to whom you can speak with unreserve, on whose regard
you can place dependence, or whose counsel, in any difficulty, you could
rely on. You feel all this? ”
“No,” said Catherine, after a few moments’ reflection, “I do not--ought
I? To say the truth, though I am hurt and grieved, that I cannot still
love her, that I am never to hear from her, perhaps never to see her
again, I do not feel so very, very much afflicted as one would have
thought. ”
“You feel, as you always do, what is most to the credit of human nature.
Such feelings ought to be investigated, that they may know themselves. ”
Catherine, by some chance or other, found her spirits so very much
relieved by this conversation that she could not regret her being led
on, though so unaccountably, to mention the circumstance which had
produced it.
CHAPTER 26
From this time, the subject was frequently canvassed by the three young
people; and Catherine found, with some surprise, that her two young
friends were perfectly agreed in considering Isabella’s want of
consequence and fortune as likely to throw great difficulties in the way
of her marrying their brother. Their persuasion that the general would,
upon this ground alone, independent of the objection that might be
raised against her character, oppose the connection, turned her feelings
moreover with some alarm towards herself. She was as insignificant,
and perhaps as portionless, as Isabella; and if the heir of the Tilney
property had not grandeur and wealth enough in himself, at what point
of interest were the demands of his younger brother to rest? The very
painful reflections to which this thought led could only be dispersed by
a dependence on the effect of that particular partiality, which, as she
was given to understand by his words as well as his actions, she had
from the first been so fortunate as to excite in the general; and by a
recollection of some most generous and disinterested sentiments on the
subject of money, which she had more than once heard him utter, and
which tempted her to think his disposition in such matters misunderstood
by his children.
They were so fully convinced, however, that their brother would not
have the courage to apply in person for his father’s consent, and so
repeatedly assured her that he had never in his life been less likely to
come to Northanger than at the present time, that she suffered her mind
to be at ease as to the necessity of any sudden removal of her own. But
as it was not to be supposed that Captain Tilney, whenever he made his
application, would give his father any just idea of Isabella’s conduct,
it occurred to her as highly expedient that Henry should lay the whole
business before him as it really was, enabling the general by that means
to form a cool and impartial opinion, and prepare his objections on
a fairer ground than inequality of situations. She proposed it to him
accordingly; but he did not catch at the measure so eagerly as she had
expected. “No,” said he, “my father’s hands need not be strengthened,
and Frederick’s confession of folly need not be forestalled. He must
tell his own story. ”
“But he will tell only half of it. ”
“A quarter would be enough. ”
A day or two passed away and brought no tidings of Captain Tilney. His
brother and sister knew not what to think. Sometimes it appeared to
them as if his silence would be the natural result of the suspected
engagement, and at others that it was wholly incompatible with it.
The general, meanwhile, though offended every morning by Frederick’s
remissness in writing, was free from any real anxiety about him, and had
no more pressing solicitude than that of making Miss Morland’s time at
Northanger pass pleasantly. He often expressed his uneasiness on this
head, feared the sameness of every day’s society and employments would
disgust her with the place, wished the Lady Frasers had been in the
country, talked every now and then of having a large party to dinner,
and once or twice began even to calculate the number of young dancing
people in the neighbourhood. But then it was such a dead time of year,
no wild-fowl, no game, and the Lady Frasers were not in the country.
And it all ended, at last, in his telling Henry one morning that when he
next went to Woodston, they would take him by surprise there some day
or other, and eat their mutton with him. Henry was greatly honoured and
very happy, and Catherine was quite delighted with the scheme. “And when
do you think, sir, I may look forward to this pleasure? I must be at
Woodston on Monday to attend the parish meeting, and shall probably be
obliged to stay two or three days. ”
“Well, well, we will take our chance some one of those days. There is
no need to fix. You are not to put yourself at all out of your way.
Whatever you may happen to have in the house will be enough. I think I
can answer for the young ladies making allowance for a bachelor’s table.
Let me see; Monday will be a busy day with you, we will not come on
Monday; and Tuesday will be a busy one with me. I expect my surveyor
from Brockham with his report in the morning; and afterwards I cannot in
decency fail attending the club. I really could not face my acquaintance
if I stayed away now; for, as I am known to be in the country, it would
be taken exceedingly amiss; and it is a rule with me, Miss Morland,
never to give offence to any of my neighbours, if a small sacrifice of
time and attention can prevent it. They are a set of very worthy men.
They have half a buck from Northanger twice a year; and I dine with them
whenever I can. Tuesday, therefore, we may say is out of the question.
But on Wednesday, I think, Henry, you may expect us; and we shall be
with you early, that we may have time to look about us. Two hours and
three quarters will carry us to Woodston, I suppose; we shall be in the
carriage by ten; so, about a quarter before one on Wednesday, you may
look for us. ”
A ball itself could not have been more welcome to Catherine than
this little excursion, so strong was her desire to be acquainted with
Woodston; and her heart was still bounding with joy when Henry, about an
hour afterwards, came booted and greatcoated into the room where she
and Eleanor were sitting, and said, “I am come, young ladies, in a
very moralizing strain, to observe that our pleasures in this world
are always to be paid for, and that we often purchase them at a great
disadvantage, giving ready-monied actual happiness for a draft on the
future, that may not be honoured. Witness myself, at this present hour.
Because I am to hope for the satisfaction of seeing you at Woodston on
Wednesday, which bad weather, or twenty other causes, may prevent, I
must go away directly, two days before I intended it. ”
“Go away! ” said Catherine, with a very long face. “And why? ”
“Why! How can you ask the question? Because no time is to be lost in
frightening my old housekeeper out of her wits, because I must go and
prepare a dinner for you, to be sure. ”
“Oh! Not seriously! ”
“Aye, and sadly too--for I had much rather stay. ”
“But how can you think of such a thing, after what the general said?
When he so particularly desired you not to give yourself any trouble,
because anything would do. ”
Henry only smiled. “I am sure it is quite unnecessary upon your sister’s
account and mine. You must know it to be so; and the general made such
a point of your providing nothing extraordinary: besides, if he had not
said half so much as he did, he has always such an excellent dinner
at home, that sitting down to a middling one for one day could not
signify. ”
“I wish I could reason like you, for his sake and my own. Good-bye. As
tomorrow is Sunday, Eleanor, I shall not return. ”
He went; and, it being at any time a much simpler operation to Catherine
to doubt her own judgment than Henry’s, she was very soon obliged to
give him credit for being right, however disagreeable to her his going.
But the inexplicability of the general’s conduct dwelt much on her
thoughts. That he was very particular in his eating, she had, by her own
unassisted observation, already discovered; but why he should say
one thing so positively, and mean another all the while, was most
unaccountable! How were people, at that rate, to be understood? Who but
Henry could have been aware of what his father was at?
From Saturday to Wednesday, however, they were now to be without Henry.
This was the sad finale of every reflection: and Captain Tilney’s letter
would certainly come in his absence; and Wednesday she was very sure
would be wet. The past, present, and future were all equally in gloom.
Her brother so unhappy, and her loss in Isabella so great; and Eleanor’s
spirits always affected by Henry’s absence! What was there to interest
or amuse her? She was tired of the woods and the shrubberies--always so
smooth and so dry; and the abbey in itself was no more to her now than
any other house. The painful remembrance of the folly it had helped
to nourish and perfect was the only emotion which could spring from a
consideration of the building. What a revolution in her ideas! She, who
had so longed to be in an abbey! Now, there was nothing so charming
to her imagination as the unpretending comfort of a well-connected
parsonage, something like Fullerton, but better: Fullerton had its
faults, but Woodston probably had none. If Wednesday should ever come!
It did come, and exactly when it might be reasonably looked for. It
came--it was fine--and Catherine trod on air. By ten o’clock, the chaise
and four conveyed the trio from the abbey; and, after an agreeable drive
of almost twenty miles, they entered Woodston, a large and populous
village, in a situation not unpleasant. Catherine was ashamed to say
how pretty she thought it, as the general seemed to think an apology
necessary for the flatness of the country, and the size of the village;
but in her heart she preferred it to any place she had ever been at,
and looked with great admiration at every neat house above the rank of
a cottage, and at all the little chandler’s shops which they passed. At
the further end of the village, and tolerably disengaged from the rest
of it, stood the parsonage, a new-built substantial stone house, with
its semicircular sweep and green gates; and, as they drove up to the
door, Henry, with the friends of his solitude, a large Newfoundland
puppy and two or three terriers, was ready to receive and make much of
them.
Catherine’s mind was too full, as she entered the house, for her either
to observe or to say a great deal; and, till called on by the general
for her opinion of it, she had very little idea of the room in which she
was sitting. Upon looking round it then, she perceived in a moment that
it was the most comfortable room in the world; but she was too guarded
to say so, and the coldness of her praise disappointed him.
“We are not calling it a good house,” said he. “We are not comparing
it with Fullerton and Northanger--we are considering it as a mere
parsonage, small and confined, we allow, but decent, perhaps, and
habitable; and altogether not inferior to the generality; or, in other
words, I believe there are few country parsonages in England half so
good. It may admit of improvement, however. Far be it from me to say
otherwise; and anything in reason--a bow thrown out, perhaps--though,
between ourselves, if there is one thing more than another my aversion,
it is a patched-on bow. ”
Catherine did not hear enough of this speech to understand or be pained
by it; and other subjects being studiously brought forward and supported
by Henry, at the same time that a tray full of refreshments was
introduced by his servant, the general was shortly restored to his
complacency, and Catherine to all her usual ease of spirits.
The room in question was of a commodious, well-proportioned size, and
handsomely fitted up as a dining-parlour; and on their quitting it to
walk round the grounds, she was shown, first into a smaller apartment,
belonging peculiarly to the master of the house, and made unusually tidy
on the occasion; and afterwards into what was to be the drawing-room,
with the appearance of which, though unfurnished, Catherine was
delighted enough even to satisfy the general. It was a prettily shaped
room, the windows reaching to the ground, and the view from them
pleasant, though only over green meadows; and she expressed her
admiration at the moment with all the honest simplicity with which she
felt it. “Oh! Why do not you fit up this room, Mr. Tilney? What a pity
not to have it fitted up! It is the prettiest room I ever saw; it is the
prettiest room in the world! ”
“I trust,” said the general, with a most satisfied smile, “that it will
very speedily be furnished: it waits only for a lady’s taste! ”
“Well, if it was my house, I should never sit anywhere else. Oh! What a
sweet little cottage there is among the trees--apple trees, too! It is
the prettiest cottage! ”
“You like it--you approve it as an object--it is enough. Henry, remember
that Robinson is spoken to about it. The cottage remains. ”
Such a compliment recalled all Catherine’s consciousness, and silenced
her directly; and, though pointedly applied to by the general for her
choice of the prevailing colour of the paper and hangings, nothing like
an opinion on the subject could be drawn from her. The influence of
fresh objects and fresh air, however, was of great use in dissipating
these embarrassing associations; and, having reached the ornamental part
of the premises, consisting of a walk round two sides of a meadow, on
which Henry’s genius had begun to act about half a year ago, she was
sufficiently recovered to think it prettier than any pleasure-ground she
had ever been in before, though there was not a shrub in it higher than
the green bench in the corner.
A saunter into other meadows, and through part of the village, with a
visit to the stables to examine some improvements, and a charming game
of play with a litter of puppies just able to roll about, brought them
to four o’clock, when Catherine scarcely thought it could be three. At
four they were to dine, and at six to set off on their return. Never had
any day passed so quickly!
She could not but observe that the abundance of the dinner did not seem
to create the smallest astonishment in the general; nay, that he was
even looking at the side-table for cold meat which was not there. His
son and daughter’s observations were of a different kind. They had
seldom seen him eat so heartily at any table but his own, and never
before known him so little disconcerted by the melted butter’s being
oiled.
At six o’clock, the general having taken his coffee, the carriage again
received them; and so gratifying had been the tenor of his conduct
throughout the whole visit, so well assured was her mind on the subject
of his expectations, that, could she have felt equally confident of the
wishes of his son, Catherine would have quitted Woodston with little
anxiety as to the How or the When she might return to it.
CHAPTER 27
The next morning brought the following very unexpected letter from
Isabella:
Bath, April
My dearest Catherine, I received your two kind letters with the greatest
delight, and have a thousand apologies to make for not answering them
sooner. I really am quite ashamed of my idleness; but in this horrid
place one can find time for nothing. I have had my pen in my hand to
begin a letter to you almost every day since you left Bath, but have
always been prevented by some silly trifler or other. Pray write to me
soon, and direct to my own home. Thank God, we leave this vile place
tomorrow. Since you went away, I have had no pleasure in it--the dust
is beyond anything; and everybody one cares for is gone. I believe if I
could see you I should not mind the rest, for you are dearer to me than
anybody can conceive. I am quite uneasy about your dear brother, not
having heard from him since he went to Oxford; and am fearful of some
misunderstanding. Your kind offices will set all right: he is the only
man I ever did or could love, and I trust you will convince him of it.
The spring fashions are partly down; and the hats the most frightful you
can imagine. I hope you spend your time pleasantly, but am afraid you
never think of me. I will not say all that I could of the family you are
with, because I would not be ungenerous, or set you against those you
esteem; but it is very difficult to know whom to trust, and young men
never know their minds two days together. I rejoice to say that the
young man whom, of all others, I particularly abhor, has left Bath. You
will know, from this description, I must mean Captain Tilney, who, as
you may remember, was amazingly disposed to follow and tease me, before
you went away. Afterwards he got worse, and became quite my shadow. Many
girls might have been taken in, for never were such attentions; but I
knew the fickle sex too well. He went away to his regiment two days ago,
and I trust I shall never be plagued with him again. He is the greatest
coxcomb I ever saw, and amazingly disagreeable. The last two days he was
always by the side of Charlotte Davis: I pitied his taste, but took no
notice of him. The last time we met was in Bath Street, and I turned
directly into a shop that he might not speak to me; I would not even
look at him. He went into the pump-room afterwards; but I would not have
followed him for all the world. Such a contrast between him and your
brother! Pray send me some news of the latter--I am quite unhappy about
him; he seemed so uncomfortable when he went away, with a cold, or
something that affected his spirits. I would write to him myself, but
have mislaid his direction; and, as I hinted above, am afraid he
took something in my conduct amiss. Pray explain everything to his
satisfaction; or, if he still harbours any doubt, a line from himself
to me, or a call at Putney when next in town, might set all to rights.
I have not been to the rooms this age, nor to the play, except going in
last night with the Hodges, for a frolic, at half price: they teased
me into it; and I was determined they should not say I shut myself up
because Tilney was gone. We happened to sit by the Mitchells, and they
pretended to be quite surprised to see me out. I knew their spite: at
one time they could not be civil to me, but now they are all friendship;
but I am not such a fool as to be taken in by them. You know I have a
pretty good spirit of my own. Anne Mitchell had tried to put on a
turban like mine, as I wore it the week before at the concert, but made
wretched work of it--it happened to become my odd face, I believe, at
least Tilney told me so at the time, and said every eye was upon me; but
he is the last man whose word I would take. I wear nothing but purple
now: I know I look hideous in it, but no matter--it is your dear
brother’s favourite colour. Lose no time, my dearest, sweetest
Catherine, in writing to him and to me, Who ever am, etc.
Such a strain of shallow artifice could not impose even upon Catherine.
Its inconsistencies, contradictions, and falsehood struck her from the
very first. She was ashamed of Isabella, and ashamed of having ever
loved her. Her professions of attachment were now as disgusting as her
excuses were empty, and her demands impudent. “Write to James on her
behalf! No, James should never hear Isabella’s name mentioned by her
again. ”
On Henry’s arrival from Woodston, she made known to him and Eleanor
their brother’s safety, congratulating them with sincerity on it, and
reading aloud the most material passages of her letter with strong
indignation. When she had finished it--“So much for Isabella,” she
cried, “and for all our intimacy! She must think me an idiot, or she
could not have written so; but perhaps this has served to make her
character better known to me than mine is to her. I see what she has
been about. She is a vain coquette, and her tricks have not answered.
