No More Learning

Knightley and Harriet Smith! --Such an elevation on her
side! Such a debasement on his! It was horrible to Emma to think how it
must sink him in the general opinion, to foresee the smiles, the sneers,
the merriment it would prompt at his expense; the mortification and
disdain of his brother, the thousand inconveniences to himself. --Could
it be? --No; it was impossible. And yet it was far, very far, from
impossible. --Was it a new circumstance for a man of first-rate abilities
to be captivated by very inferior powers? Was it new for one, perhaps
too busy to seek, to be the prize of a girl who would seek him? --Was
it new for any thing in this world to be unequal, inconsistent,
incongruous--or for chance and circumstance (as second causes) to direct
the human fate?

Oh! had she never brought Harriet forward! Had she left her where she
ought, and where he had told her she ought! --Had she not, with a
folly which no tongue could express, prevented her marrying the
unexceptionable young man who would have made her happy and respectable
in the line of life to which she ought to belong--all would have been
safe; none of this dreadful sequel would have been.

How Harriet could ever have had the presumption to raise her thoughts to
Mr. Knightley! --How she could dare to fancy herself the chosen of such
a man till actually assured of it! --But Harriet was less humble, had
fewer scruples than formerly. --Her inferiority, whether of mind or
situation, seemed little felt. --She had seemed more sensible of Mr.
Elton’s being to stoop in marrying her, than she now seemed of Mr.
Knightley’s. --Alas! was not that her own doing too? Who had been at
pains to give Harriet notions of self-consequence but herself? --Who but
herself had taught her, that she was to elevate herself if possible,
and that her claims were great to a high worldly establishment? --If
Harriet, from being humble, were grown vain, it was her doing too.



CHAPTER XII


Till now that she was threatened with its loss, Emma had never known
how much of her happiness depended on being _first_ with Mr. Knightley,
first in interest and affection. --Satisfied that it was so, and feeling
it her due, she had enjoyed it without reflection; and only in the
dread of being supplanted, found how inexpressibly important it had
been. --Long, very long, she felt she had been first; for, having no
female connexions of his own, there had been only Isabella whose claims
could be compared with hers, and she had always known exactly how far
he loved and esteemed Isabella. She had herself been first with him for
many years past. She had not deserved it; she had often been negligent
or perverse, slighting his advice, or even wilfully opposing him,
insensible of half his merits, and quarrelling with him because he would
not acknowledge her false and insolent estimate of her own--but still,
from family attachment and habit, and thorough excellence of mind, he
had loved her, and watched over her from a girl, with an endeavour to
improve her, and an anxiety for her doing right, which no other creature
had at all shared. In spite of all her faults, she knew she was dear
to him; might she not say, very dear? --When the suggestions of hope,
however, which must follow here, presented themselves, she could not
presume to indulge them. Harriet Smith might think herself not unworthy
of being peculiarly, exclusively, passionately loved by Mr. Knightley.
_She_ could not. She could not flatter herself with any idea of
blindness in his attachment to _her_. She had received a very recent
proof of its impartiality. --How shocked had he been by her behaviour to
Miss Bates! How directly, how strongly had he expressed himself to her
on the subject! --Not too strongly for the offence--but far, far too
strongly to issue from any feeling softer than upright justice and
clear-sighted goodwill. --She had no hope, nothing to deserve the name
of hope, that he could have that sort of affection for herself which was
now in question; but there was a hope (at times a slight one, at
times much stronger,) that Harriet might have deceived herself, and be
overrating his regard for _her_. --Wish it she must, for his sake--be the
consequence nothing to herself, but his remaining single all his life.
Could she be secure of that, indeed, of his never marrying at all, she
believed she should be perfectly satisfied. --Let him but continue the
same Mr. Knightley to her and her father, the same Mr. Knightley to
all the world; let Donwell and Hartfield lose none of their precious
intercourse of friendship and confidence, and her peace would be
fully secured. --Marriage, in fact, would not do for her. It would be
incompatible with what she owed to her father, and with what she felt
for him. Nothing should separate her from her father. She would not
marry, even if she were asked by Mr. Knightley.

It must be her ardent wish that Harriet might be disappointed; and she
hoped, that when able to see them together again, she might at least
be able to ascertain what the chances for it were. --She should see them
henceforward with the closest observance; and wretchedly as she had
hitherto misunderstood even those she was watching, she did not know how
to admit that she could be blinded here. --He was expected back every
day. The power of observation would be soon given--frightfully soon it
appeared when her thoughts were in one course. In the meanwhile, she
resolved against seeing Harriet. --It would do neither of them good,
it would do the subject no good, to be talking of it farther. --She was
resolved not to be convinced, as long as she could doubt, and yet had
no authority for opposing Harriet’s confidence. To talk would be only to
irritate. --She wrote to her, therefore, kindly, but decisively, to beg
that she would not, at present, come to Hartfield; acknowledging it to
be her conviction, that all farther confidential discussion of _one_
topic had better be avoided; and hoping, that if a few days were allowed
to pass before they met again, except in the company of others--she
objected only to a tete-a-tete--they might be able to act as if they
had forgotten the conversation of yesterday. --Harriet submitted, and
approved, and was grateful.

This point was just arranged, when a visitor arrived to tear Emma’s
thoughts a little from the one subject which had engrossed them,
sleeping or waking, the last twenty-four hours--Mrs. Weston, who had
been calling on her daughter-in-law elect, and took Hartfield in her
way home, almost as much in duty to Emma as in pleasure to herself, to
relate all the particulars of so interesting an interview.

Mr. Weston had accompanied her to Mrs. Bates’s, and gone through his
share of this essential attention most handsomely; but she having then
induced Miss Fairfax to join her in an airing, was now returned with
much more to say, and much more to say with satisfaction, than a quarter
of an hour spent in Mrs. Bates’s parlour, with all the encumbrance of
awkward feelings, could have afforded.

A little curiosity Emma had; and she made the most of it while her
friend related. Mrs. Weston had set off to pay the visit in a good deal
of agitation herself; and in the first place had wished not to go at all
at present, to be allowed merely to write to Miss Fairfax instead, and
to defer this ceremonious call till a little time had passed, and Mr.
Churchill could be reconciled to the engagement’s becoming known; as,
considering every thing, she thought such a visit could not be paid
without leading to reports:--but Mr. Weston had thought differently; he
was extremely anxious to shew his approbation to Miss Fairfax and her
family, and did not conceive that any suspicion could be excited by it;
or if it were, that it would be of any consequence; for “such things,”
he observed, “always got about. ” Emma smiled, and felt that Mr. Weston
had very good reason for saying so. They had gone, in short--and very
great had been the evident distress and confusion of the lady. She had
hardly been able to speak a word, and every look and action had shewn
how deeply she was suffering from consciousness. The quiet, heart-felt
satisfaction of the old lady, and the rapturous delight of her
daughter--who proved even too joyous to talk as usual, had been a
gratifying, yet almost an affecting, scene. They were both so truly
respectable in their happiness, so disinterested in every sensation;
thought so much of Jane; so much of every body, and so little of
themselves, that every kindly feeling was at work for them. Miss
Fairfax’s recent illness had offered a fair plea for Mrs. Weston to
invite her to an airing; she had drawn back and declined at first, but,
on being pressed had yielded; and, in the course of their drive,
Mrs. Weston had, by gentle encouragement, overcome so much of her
embarrassment, as to bring her to converse on the important subject.
Apologies for her seemingly ungracious silence in their first reception,
and the warmest expressions of the gratitude she was always feeling
towards herself and Mr. Weston, must necessarily open the cause; but
when these effusions were put by, they had talked a good deal of the
present and of the future state of the engagement. Mrs. Weston was
convinced that such conversation must be the greatest relief to her
companion, pent up within her own mind as every thing had so long been,
and was very much pleased with all that she had said on the subject.

“On the misery of what she had suffered, during the concealment of so
many months,” continued Mrs. Weston, “she was energetic. This was one
of her expressions. ‘I will not say, that since I entered into the
engagement I have not had some happy moments; but I can say, that I have
never known the blessing of one tranquil hour:’--and the quivering lip,
Emma, which uttered it, was an attestation that I felt at my heart. ”

“Poor girl! ” said Emma. “She thinks herself wrong, then, for having
consented to a private engagement? ”

“Wrong! No one, I believe, can blame her more than she is disposed
to blame herself. ‘The consequence,’ said she, ‘has been a state of
perpetual suffering to me; and so it ought. But after all the punishment
that misconduct can bring, it is still not less misconduct. Pain is no
expiation. I never can be blameless. I have been acting contrary to all
my sense of right; and the fortunate turn that every thing has taken,
and the kindness I am now receiving, is what my conscience tells me
ought not to be. ’ ‘Do not imagine, madam,’ she continued, ‘that I was
taught wrong. Do not let any reflection fall on the principles or the
care of the friends who brought me up. The error has been all my own;
and I do assure you that, with all the excuse that present circumstances
may appear to give, I shall yet dread making the story known to Colonel
Campbell. ’”

“Poor girl! ” said Emma again. “She loves him then excessively, I
suppose. It must have been from attachment only, that she could be
led to form the engagement. Her affection must have overpowered her
judgment. ”

“Yes, I have no doubt of her being extremely attached to him. ”

“I am afraid,” returned Emma, sighing, “that I must often have
contributed to make her unhappy. ”

“On your side, my love, it was very innocently done. But she
probably had something of that in her thoughts, when alluding to the
misunderstandings which he had given us hints of before. One natural
consequence of the evil she had involved herself in,” she said, “was
that of making her _unreasonable_. The consciousness of having done
amiss, had exposed her to a thousand inquietudes, and made her captious
and irritable to a degree that must have been--that had been--hard for
him to bear. ‘I did not make the allowances,’ said she, ‘which I ought
to have done, for his temper and spirits--his delightful spirits, and
that gaiety, that playfulness of disposition, which, under any other
circumstances, would, I am sure, have been as constantly bewitching to
me, as they were at first. ’ She then began to speak of you, and of the
great kindness you had shewn her during her illness; and with a blush
which shewed me how it was all connected, desired me, whenever I had
an opportunity, to thank you--I could not thank you too much--for every
wish and every endeavour to do her good. She was sensible that you had
never received any proper acknowledgment from herself. ”

“If I did not know her to be happy now,” said Emma, seriously, “which,
in spite of every little drawback from her scrupulous conscience, she
must be, I could not bear these thanks;--for, oh! Mrs. Weston, if there
were an account drawn up of the evil and the good I have done Miss
Fairfax! --Well (checking herself, and trying to be more lively), this
is all to be forgotten. You are very kind to bring me these interesting
particulars. They shew her to the greatest advantage. I am sure she is
very good--I hope she will be very happy. It is fit that the fortune
should be on his side, for I think the merit will be all on hers. ”

Such a conclusion could not pass unanswered by Mrs. Weston. She thought
well of Frank in almost every respect; and, what was more, she loved him
very much, and her defence was, therefore, earnest. She talked with a
great deal of reason, and at least equal affection--but she had too much
to urge for Emma’s attention; it was soon gone to Brunswick Square or
to Donwell; she forgot to attempt to listen; and when Mrs. Weston ended
with, “We have not yet had the letter we are so anxious for, you know,
but I hope it will soon come,” she was obliged to pause before she
answered, and at last obliged to answer at random, before she could at
all recollect what letter it was which they were so anxious for.

“Are you well, my Emma? ” was Mrs. Weston’s parting question.

“Oh! perfectly. I am always well, you know. Be sure to give me
intelligence of the letter as soon as possible. ”

Mrs. Weston’s communications furnished Emma with more food for
unpleasant reflection, by increasing her esteem and compassion, and her
sense of past injustice towards Miss Fairfax. She bitterly regretted
not having sought a closer acquaintance with her, and blushed for the
envious feelings which had certainly been, in some measure, the cause.
Had she followed Mr. Knightley’s known wishes, in paying that attention
to Miss Fairfax, which was every way her due; had she tried to know her
better; had she done her part towards intimacy; had she endeavoured
to find a friend there instead of in Harriet Smith; she must, in all
probability, have been spared from every pain which pressed on her
now. --Birth, abilities, and education, had been equally marking one as
an associate for her, to be received with gratitude; and the other--what
was she? --Supposing even that they had never become intimate friends;
that she had never been admitted into Miss Fairfax’s confidence on this
important matter--which was most probable--still, in knowing her as
she ought, and as she might, she must have been preserved from the
abominable suspicions of an improper attachment to Mr. Dixon, which she
had not only so foolishly fashioned and harboured herself, but had so
unpardonably imparted; an idea which she greatly feared had been made a
subject of material distress to the delicacy of Jane’s feelings, by the
levity or carelessness of Frank Churchill’s. Of all the sources of evil
surrounding the former, since her coming to Highbury, she was persuaded
that she must herself have been the worst. She must have been a
perpetual enemy. They never could have been all three together, without
her having stabbed Jane Fairfax’s peace in a thousand instances; and on
Box Hill, perhaps, it had been the agony of a mind that would bear no
more.

The evening of this day was very long, and melancholy, at Hartfield.
The weather added what it could of gloom. A cold stormy rain set in, and
nothing of July appeared but in the trees and shrubs, which the wind was
despoiling, and the length of the day, which only made such cruel sights
the longer visible.

The weather affected Mr. Woodhouse, and he could only be kept tolerably
comfortable by almost ceaseless attention on his daughter’s side, and by
exertions which had never cost her half so much before. It reminded
her of their first forlorn tete-a-tete, on the evening of Mrs. Weston’s
wedding-day; but Mr. Knightley had walked in then, soon after tea,
and dissipated every melancholy fancy. Alas! such delightful proofs of
Hartfield’s attraction, as those sort of visits conveyed, might shortly
be over. The picture which she had then drawn of the privations of the
approaching winter, had proved erroneous; no friends had deserted them,
no pleasures had been lost. --But her present forebodings she feared
would experience no similar contradiction. The prospect before her now,
was threatening to a degree that could not be entirely dispelled--that
might not be even partially brightened. If all took place that
might take place among the circle of her friends, Hartfield must be
comparatively deserted; and she left to cheer her father with the
spirits only of ruined happiness.

The child to be born at Randalls must be a tie there even dearer than
herself; and Mrs. Weston’s heart and time would be occupied by it.
They should lose her; and, probably, in great measure, her husband
also. --Frank Churchill would return among them no more; and Miss
Fairfax, it was reasonable to suppose, would soon cease to belong to
Highbury. They would be married, and settled either at or near Enscombe.
All that were good would be withdrawn; and if to these losses, the
loss of Donwell were to be added, what would remain of cheerful or
of rational society within their reach? Mr. Knightley to be no longer
coming there for his evening comfort! --No longer walking in at all
hours, as if ever willing to change his own home for their’s! --How was
it to be endured? And if he were to be lost to them for Harriet’s sake;
if he were to be thought of hereafter, as finding in Harriet’s society
all that he wanted; if Harriet were to be the chosen, the first,
the dearest, the friend, the wife to whom he looked for all the best
blessings of existence; what could be increasing Emma’s wretchedness but
the reflection never far distant from her mind, that it had been all her
own work?

When it came to such a pitch as this, she was not able to refrain from
a start, or a heavy sigh, or even from walking about the room for a
few seconds--and the only source whence any thing like consolation
or composure could be drawn, was in the resolution of her own better
conduct, and the hope that, however inferior in spirit and gaiety might
be the following and every future winter of her life to the past, it
would yet find her more rational, more acquainted with herself, and
leave her less to regret when it were gone.



CHAPTER XIII


The weather continued much the same all the following morning; and
the same loneliness, and the same melancholy, seemed to reign at
Hartfield--but in the afternoon it cleared; the wind changed into a
softer quarter; the clouds were carried off; the sun appeared; it was
summer again. With all the eagerness which such a transition gives, Emma
resolved to be out of doors as soon as possible. Never had the exquisite
sight, smell, sensation of nature, tranquil, warm, and brilliant after
a storm, been more attractive to her. She longed for the serenity they
might gradually introduce; and on Mr. Perry’s coming in soon after
dinner, with a disengaged hour to give her father, she lost no time
in hurrying into the shrubbery. --There, with spirits freshened, and
thoughts a little relieved, she had taken a few turns, when she saw Mr.
Knightley passing through the garden door, and coming towards her. --It
was the first intimation of his being returned from London. She had
been thinking of him the moment before, as unquestionably sixteen miles
distant. --There was time only for the quickest arrangement of mind. She
must be collected and calm. In half a minute they were together. The
“How d’ye do’s” were quiet and constrained on each side. She asked after
their mutual friends; they were all well. --When had he left them? --Only
that morning. He must have had a wet ride. --Yes. --He meant to walk with
her, she found. “He had just looked into the dining-room, and as he was
not wanted there, preferred being out of doors. ”--She thought he neither
looked nor spoke cheerfully; and the first possible cause for it,
suggested by her fears, was, that he had perhaps been communicating his
plans to his brother, and was pained by the manner in which they had
been received.

They walked together. He was silent. She thought he was often looking
at her, and trying for a fuller view of her face than it suited her to
give.
And this belief produced another dread. Perhaps he wanted to
speak to her, of his attachment to Harriet; he might be watching for
encouragement to begin. --She did not, could not, feel equal to lead the
way to any such subject. He must do it all himself. Yet she could
not bear this silence. With him it was most unnatural. She
considered--resolved--and, trying to smile, began--

“You have some news to hear, now you are come back, that will rather
surprize you. ”

“Have I? ” said he quietly, and looking at her; “of what nature? ”

“Oh! the best nature in the world--a wedding. ”

After waiting a moment, as if to be sure she intended to say no more, he
replied,

“If you mean Miss Fairfax and Frank Churchill, I have heard that
already. ”

“How is it possible? ” cried Emma, turning her glowing cheeks towards
him; for, while she spoke, it occurred to her that he might have called
at Mrs. Goddard’s in his way.

“I had a few lines on parish business from Mr. Weston this morning, and
at the end of them he gave me a brief account of what had happened. ”

Emma was quite relieved, and could presently say, with a little more
composure,

“_You_ probably have been less surprized than any of us, for you have
had your suspicions. --I have not forgotten that you once tried to give
me a caution. --I wish I had attended to it--but--(with a sinking voice
and a heavy sigh) I seem to have been doomed to blindness. ”

For a moment or two nothing was said, and she was unsuspicious of having
excited any particular interest, till she found her arm drawn within
his, and pressed against his heart, and heard him thus saying, in a tone
of great sensibility, speaking low,

“Time, my dearest Emma, time will heal the wound. --Your own excellent
sense--your exertions for your father’s sake--I know you will not allow
yourself--. ” Her arm was pressed again, as he added, in a more
broken and subdued accent, “The feelings of the warmest
friendship--Indignation--Abominable scoundrel! ”--And in a louder,
steadier tone, he concluded with, “He will soon be gone. They will soon
be in Yorkshire. I am sorry for _her_. She deserves a better fate. ”

Emma understood him; and as soon as she could recover from the flutter
of pleasure, excited by such tender consideration, replied,

“You are very kind--but you are mistaken--and I must set you right. --
I am not in want of that sort of compassion. My blindness to what was
going on, led me to act by them in a way that I must always be ashamed
of, and I was very foolishly tempted to say and do many things which may
well lay me open to unpleasant conjectures, but I have no other reason
to regret that I was not in the secret earlier. ”

“Emma! ” cried he, looking eagerly at her, “are you, indeed? ”--but
checking himself--“No, no, I understand you--forgive me--I am pleased
that you can say even so much. --He is no object of regret, indeed! and
it will not be very long, I hope, before that becomes the acknowledgment
of more than your reason. --Fortunate that your affections were not
farther entangled! --I could never, I confess, from your manners, assure
myself as to the degree of what you felt--I could only be certain that
there was a preference--and a preference which I never believed him to
deserve. --He is a disgrace to the name of man. --And is he to be rewarded
with that sweet young woman? --Jane, Jane, you will be a miserable
creature. ”

“Mr. Knightley,” said Emma, trying to be lively, but really confused--“I
am in a very extraordinary situation. I cannot let you continue in your
error; and yet, perhaps, since my manners gave such an impression, I
have as much reason to be ashamed of confessing that I never have been
at all attached to the person we are speaking of, as it might be natural
for a woman to feel in confessing exactly the reverse. --But I never
have. ”

He listened in perfect silence. She wished him to speak, but he would
not. She supposed she must say more before she were entitled to his
clemency; but it was a hard case to be obliged still to lower herself in
his opinion. She went on, however.

“I have very little to say for my own conduct. --I was tempted by his
attentions, and allowed myself to appear pleased. --An old story,
probably--a common case--and no more than has happened to hundreds of my
sex before; and yet it may not be the more excusable in one who sets up
as I do for Understanding. Many circumstances assisted the temptation.
He was the son of Mr. Weston--he was continually here--I always found
him very pleasant--and, in short, for (with a sigh) let me swell out the
causes ever so ingeniously, they all centre in this at last--my vanity
was flattered, and I allowed his attentions. Latterly, however--for some
time, indeed--I have had no idea of their meaning any thing. --I thought
them a habit, a trick, nothing that called for seriousness on my side.
He has imposed on me, but he has not injured me. I have never been
attached to him. And now I can tolerably comprehend his behaviour. He
never wished to attach me. It was merely a blind to conceal his real
situation with another. --It was his object to blind all about him; and
no one, I am sure, could be more effectually blinded than myself--except
that I was _not_ blinded--that it was my good fortune--that, in short, I
was somehow or other safe from him. ”

She had hoped for an answer here--for a few words to say that her
conduct was at least intelligible; but he was silent; and, as far as she
could judge, deep in thought. At last, and tolerably in his usual tone,
he said,

“I have never had a high opinion of Frank Churchill. --I can suppose,
however, that I may have underrated him. My acquaintance with him has
been but trifling. --And even if I have not underrated him hitherto, he
may yet turn out well. --With such a woman he has a chance. --I have no
motive for wishing him ill--and for her sake, whose happiness will be
involved in his good character and conduct, I shall certainly wish him
well. ”

“I have no doubt of their being happy together,” said Emma; “I believe
them to be very mutually and very sincerely attached. ”

“He is a most fortunate man! ” returned Mr. Knightley, with energy. “So
early in life--at three-and-twenty--a period when, if a man chuses a
wife, he generally chuses ill. At three-and-twenty to have drawn such
a prize! What years of felicity that man, in all human calculation,
has before him! --Assured of the love of such a woman--the disinterested
love, for Jane Fairfax’s character vouches for her disinterestedness;
every thing in his favour,--equality of situation--I mean, as far as
regards society, and all the habits and manners that are important;
equality in every point but one--and that one, since the purity of her
heart is not to be doubted, such as must increase his felicity, for it
will be his to bestow the only advantages she wants. --A man would always
wish to give a woman a better home than the one he takes her from;
and he who can do it, where there is no doubt of _her_ regard, must,
I think, be the happiest of mortals. --Frank Churchill is, indeed, the
favourite of fortune. Every thing turns out for his good. --He meets
with a young woman at a watering-place, gains her affection, cannot even
weary her by negligent treatment--and had he and all his family sought
round the world for a perfect wife for him, they could not have found
her superior. --His aunt is in the way. --His aunt dies. --He has only to
speak. --His friends are eager to promote his happiness. --He had used
every body ill--and they are all delighted to forgive him. --He is a
fortunate man indeed! ”

“You speak as if you envied him. ”

“And I do envy him, Emma. In one respect he is the object of my envy. ”

Emma could say no more. They seemed to be within half a sentence
of Harriet, and her immediate feeling was to avert the subject, if
possible. She made her plan; she would speak of something totally
different--the children in Brunswick Square; and she only waited for
breath to begin, when Mr. Knightley startled her, by saying,

“You will not ask me what is the point of envy. --You are determined, I
see, to have no curiosity. --You are wise--but _I_ cannot be wise. Emma,
I must tell you what you will not ask, though I may wish it unsaid the
next moment. ”

“Oh! then, don’t speak it, don’t speak it,” she eagerly cried. “Take a
little time, consider, do not commit yourself. ”

“Thank you,” said he, in an accent of deep mortification, and not
another syllable followed.

Emma could not bear to give him pain. He was wishing to confide in
her--perhaps to consult her;--cost her what it would, she would listen.
She might assist his resolution, or reconcile him to it; she might give
just praise to Harriet, or, by representing to him his own independence,
relieve him from that state of indecision, which must be more
intolerable than any alternative to such a mind as his. --They had
reached the house.

“You are going in, I suppose? ” said he.

“No,”--replied Emma--quite confirmed by the depressed manner in which
he still spoke--“I should like to take another turn. Mr. Perry is not
gone. ” And, after proceeding a few steps, she added--“I stopped you
ungraciously, just now, Mr. Knightley, and, I am afraid, gave you
pain. --But if you have any wish to speak openly to me as a friend, or
to ask my opinion of any thing that you may have in contemplation--as
a friend, indeed, you may command me. --I will hear whatever you like. I
will tell you exactly what I think. ”

“As a friend! ”--repeated Mr. Knightley. --“Emma, that I fear is a
word--No, I have no wish--Stay, yes, why should I hesitate? --I
have gone too far already for concealment. --Emma, I accept your
offer--Extraordinary as it may seem, I accept it, and refer myself to
you as a friend. --Tell me, then, have I no chance of ever succeeding? ”

He stopped in his earnestness to look the question, and the expression
of his eyes overpowered her.

“My dearest Emma,” said he, “for dearest you will always be, whatever
the event of this hour’s conversation, my dearest, most beloved
Emma--tell me at once. Say ‘No,’ if it is to be said. ”--She could
really say nothing. --“You are silent,” he cried, with great animation;
“absolutely silent! at present I ask no more. ”

Emma was almost ready to sink under the agitation of this moment. The
dread of being awakened from the happiest dream, was perhaps the most
prominent feeling.

“I cannot make speeches, Emma:” he soon resumed; and in a tone of
such sincere, decided, intelligible tenderness as was tolerably
convincing. --“If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it
more. But you know what I am. --You hear nothing but truth from me. --I
have blamed you, and lectured you, and you have borne it as no other
woman in England would have borne it. --Bear with the truths I would
tell you now, dearest Emma, as well as you have borne with them. The
manner, perhaps, may have as little to recommend them. God knows, I have
been a very indifferent lover. --But you understand me. --Yes, you see,
you understand my feelings--and will return them if you can. At present,
I ask only to hear, once to hear your voice. ”

While he spoke, Emma’s mind was most busy, and, with all the wonderful
velocity of thought, had been able--and yet without losing a word--to
catch and comprehend the exact truth of the whole; to see that Harriet’s
hopes had been entirely groundless, a mistake, a delusion, as complete a
delusion as any of her own--that Harriet was nothing; that she was every
thing herself; that what she had been saying relative to Harriet
had been all taken as the language of her own feelings; and that her
agitation, her doubts, her reluctance, her discouragement, had been all
received as discouragement from herself. --And not only was there time
for these convictions, with all their glow of attendant happiness; there
was time also to rejoice that Harriet’s secret had not escaped her, and
to resolve that it need not, and should not. --It was all the service
she could now render her poor friend; for as to any of that heroism of
sentiment which might have prompted her to entreat him to transfer his
affection from herself to Harriet, as infinitely the most worthy of the
two--or even the more simple sublimity of resolving to refuse him at
once and for ever, without vouchsafing any motive, because he could not
marry them both, Emma had it not. She felt for Harriet, with pain and
with contrition; but no flight of generosity run mad, opposing all that
could be probable or reasonable, entered her brain. She had led her
friend astray, and it would be a reproach to her for ever; but her
judgment was as strong as her feelings, and as strong as it had ever
been before, in reprobating any such alliance for him, as most unequal
and degrading. Her way was clear, though not quite smooth. --She spoke
then, on being so entreated. --What did she say? --Just what she ought,
of course. A lady always does. --She said enough to shew there need not
be despair--and to invite him to say more himself. He _had_ despaired at
one period; he had received such an injunction to caution and silence,
as for the time crushed every hope;--she had begun by refusing to hear
him. --The change had perhaps been somewhat sudden;--her proposal of
taking another turn, her renewing the conversation which she had
just put an end to, might be a little extraordinary! --She felt its
inconsistency; but Mr. Knightley was so obliging as to put up with it,
and seek no farther explanation.

Seldom, very seldom, does complete truth belong to any human disclosure;
seldom can it happen that something is not a little disguised, or a
little mistaken; but where, as in this case, though the conduct is
mistaken, the feelings are not, it may not be very material. --Mr.
Knightley could not impute to Emma a more relenting heart than she
possessed, or a heart more disposed to accept of his.

He had, in fact, been wholly unsuspicious of his own influence. He had
followed her into the shrubbery with no idea of trying it. He had come,
in his anxiety to see how she bore Frank Churchill’s engagement, with no
selfish view, no view at all, but of endeavouring, if she allowed him an
opening, to soothe or to counsel her. --The rest had been the work of
the moment, the immediate effect of what he heard, on his feelings. The
delightful assurance of her total indifference towards Frank Churchill,
of her having a heart completely disengaged from him, had given birth
to the hope, that, in time, he might gain her affection himself;--but
it had been no present hope--he had only, in the momentary conquest of
eagerness over judgment, aspired to be told that she did not forbid his
attempt to attach her. --The superior hopes which gradually opened were
so much the more enchanting. --The affection, which he had been asking
to be allowed to create, if he could, was already his! --Within half
an hour, he had passed from a thoroughly distressed state of mind, to
something so like perfect happiness, that it could bear no other name.

_Her_ change was equal. --This one half-hour had given to each the same
precious certainty of being beloved, had cleared from each the same
degree of ignorance, jealousy, or distrust. --On his side, there had been
a long-standing jealousy, old as the arrival, or even the expectation,
of Frank Churchill. --He had been in love with Emma, and jealous of Frank
Churchill, from about the same period, one sentiment having probably
enlightened him as to the other. It was his jealousy of Frank Churchill
that had taken him from the country. --The Box Hill party had decided
him on going away. He would save himself from witnessing again
such permitted, encouraged attentions. --He had gone to learn to be
indifferent. --But he had gone to a wrong place. There was too much
domestic happiness in his brother’s house; woman wore too amiable a form
in it; Isabella was too much like Emma--differing only in those striking
inferiorities, which always brought the other in brilliancy before
him, for much to have been done, even had his time been longer. --He had
stayed on, however, vigorously, day after day--till this very morning’s
post had conveyed the history of Jane Fairfax. --Then, with the gladness
which must be felt, nay, which he did not scruple to feel, having never
believed Frank Churchill to be at all deserving Emma, was there so much
fond solicitude, so much keen anxiety for her, that he could stay no
longer. He had ridden home through the rain; and had walked up directly
after dinner, to see how this sweetest and best of all creatures,
faultless in spite of all her faults, bore the discovery.

He had found her agitated and low. --Frank Churchill was a villain. --
He heard her declare that she had never loved him. Frank Churchill’s
character was not desperate. --She was his own Emma, by hand and word,
when they returned into the house; and if he could have thought of Frank
Churchill then, he might have deemed him a very good sort of fellow.



CHAPTER XIV


What totally different feelings did Emma take back into the house from
what she had brought out! --she had then been only daring to hope for
a little respite of suffering;--she was now in an exquisite flutter of
happiness, and such happiness moreover as she believed must still be
greater when the flutter should have passed away.

They sat down to tea--the same party round the same table--how often
it had been collected! --and how often had her eyes fallen on the same
shrubs in the lawn, and observed the same beautiful effect of the
western sun! --But never in such a state of spirits, never in any thing
like it; and it was with difficulty that she could summon enough of her
usual self to be the attentive lady of the house, or even the attentive
daughter.

Poor Mr. Woodhouse little suspected what was plotting against him in the
breast of that man whom he was so cordially welcoming, and so anxiously
hoping might not have taken cold from his ride. --Could he have seen the
heart, he would have cared very little for the lungs; but without the
most distant imagination of the impending evil, without the slightest
perception of any thing extraordinary in the looks or ways of either,
he repeated to them very comfortably all the articles of news he had
received from Mr. Perry, and talked on with much self-contentment,
totally unsuspicious of what they could have told him in return.

As long as Mr. Knightley remained with them, Emma’s fever continued;
but when he was gone, she began to be a little tranquillised and
subdued--and in the course of the sleepless night, which was the tax
for such an evening, she found one or two such very serious points
to consider, as made her feel, that even her happiness must have some
alloy. Her father--and Harriet. She could not be alone without feeling
the full weight of their separate claims; and how to guard the comfort
of both to the utmost, was the question. With respect to her father,
it was a question soon answered. She hardly knew yet what Mr. Knightley
would ask; but a very short parley with her own heart produced the most
solemn resolution of never quitting her father.