Sense and Sensibility

CHAPTER 31

From a night of more sleep than she had expected, Marianne awoke thenext morning to the same consciousness of misery in which she hadclosed her eyes.

Elinor encouraged her as much as possible to talk of what she felt; andbefore breakfast was ready, they had gone through the subject again andagain; and with the same steady conviction and affectionate counsel onElinor's side, the same impetuous feelings and varying opinions onMarianne's, as before. Sometimes she could believe Willoughby to be asunfortunate and as innocent as herself, and at others, lost everyconsolation in the impossibility of acquitting him. At one moment shewas absolutely indifferent to the observation of all the world, atanother she would seclude herself from it for ever, and at a thirdcould resist it with energy. In one thing, however, she was uniform,when it came to the point, in avoiding, where it was possible, thepresence of Mrs. Jennings, and in a determined silence when obliged toendure it. Her heart was hardened against the belief of Mrs.Jennings's entering into her sorrows with any compassion.

”No, no, no, it cannot be,” she cried; ”she cannot feel. Her kindnessis not sympathy; her good-nature is not tenderness. All that she wantsis gossip, and she only likes me now because I supply it.”

Elinor had not needed this to be assured of the injustice to which hersister was often led in her opinion of others, by the irritablerefinement of her own mind, and the too great importance placed by heron the delicacies of a strong sensibility, and the graces of a polishedmanner. Like half the rest of the world, if more than half there bethat are clever and good, Marianne, with excellent abilities and anexcellent disposition, was neither reasonable nor candid. She expectedfrom other people the same opinions and feelings as her own, and shejudged of their motives by the immediate effect of their actions onherself. Thus a circumstance occurred, while the sisters were togetherin their own room after breakfast, which sunk the heart of Mrs.Jennings still lower in her estimation; because, through her ownweakness, it chanced to prove a source of fresh pain to herself, thoughMrs. Jennings was governed in it by an impulse of the utmost goodwill.

With a letter in her outstretched hand, and countenance gaily smiling,from the persuasion of bringing comfort, she entered their room, saying,

”Now, my dear, I bring you something that I am sure will do you good.”

Marianne heard enough. In one moment her imagination placed before hera letter from Willoughby, full of tenderness and contrition,explanatory of all that had passed, satisfactory, convincing; andinstantly followed by Willoughby himself, rushing eagerly into the roomto inforce, at her feet, by the eloquence of his eyes, the assurancesof his letter. The work of one moment was destroyed by the next. Thehand writing of her mother, never till then unwelcome, was before her;and, in the acuteness of the disappointment which followed such anecstasy of more than hope, she felt as if, till that instant, she hadnever suffered.

The cruelty of Mrs. Jennings no language, within her reach in hermoments of happiest eloquence, could have expressed; and now she couldreproach her only by the tears which streamed from her eyes withpassionate violence--a reproach, however, so entirely lost on itsobject, that after many expressions of pity, she withdrew, stillreferring her to the letter of comfort. But the letter, when she wascalm enough to read it, brought little comfort. Willoughby filledevery page. Her mother, still confident of their engagement, andrelying as warmly as ever on his constancy, had only been roused byElinor's application, to intreat from Marianne greater openness towardsthem both; and this, with such tenderness towards her, such affectionfor Willoughby, and such a conviction of their future happiness in eachother, that she wept with agony through the whole of it.

All her impatience to be at home again now returned; her mother wasdearer to her than ever; dearer through the very excess of her mistakenconfidence in Willoughby, and she was wildly urgent to be gone.Elinor, unable herself to determine whether it were better for Marianneto be in London or at Barton, offered no counsel of her own except ofpatience till their mother's wishes could be known; and at length sheobtained her sister's consent to wait for that knowledge.

Mrs. Jennings left them earlier than usual; for she could not be easytill the Middletons and Palmers were able to grieve as much as herself;and positively refusing Elinor's offered attendance, went out alone forthe rest of the morning. Elinor, with a very heavy heart, aware of thepain she was going to communicate, and perceiving, by Marianne'sletter, how ill she had succeeded in laying any foundation for it, thensat down to write her mother an account of what had passed, and entreather directions for the future; while Marianne, who came into thedrawing-room on Mrs. Jennings's going away, remained fixed at the tablewhere Elinor wrote, watching the advancement of her pen, grieving overher for the hardship of such a task, and grieving still more fondlyover its effect on her mother.

In this manner they had continued about a quarter of an hour, whenMarianne, whose nerves could not then bear any sudden noise, wasstartled by a rap at the door.

”Who can this be?” cried Elinor. ”So early too! I thought we HAD beensafe.”

Marianne moved to the window--

”It is Colonel Brandon!” said she, with vexation. ”We are never safefrom HIM.”

”He will not come in, as Mrs. Jennings is from home.”

”I will not trust to THAT,” retreating to her own room. ”A man who hasnothing to do with his own time has no conscience in his intrusion onthat of others.”

The event proved her conjecture right, though it was founded oninjustice and error; for Colonel Brandon DID come in; and Elinor, whowas convinced that solicitude for Marianne brought him thither, and whosaw THAT solicitude in his disturbed and melancholy look, and in hisanxious though brief inquiry after her, could not forgive her sisterfor esteeming him so lightly.

”I met Mrs. Jennings in Bond Street,” said he, after the firstsalutation, ”and she encouraged me to come on; and I was the moreeasily encouraged, because I thought it probable that I might find youalone, which I was very desirous of doing. My object--my wish--my solewish in desiring it--I hope, I believe it is--is to be a means ofgiving comfort;--no, I must not say comfort--not present comfort--butconviction, lasting conviction to your sister's mind. My regard forher, for yourself, for your mother--will you allow me to prove it, byrelating some circumstances which nothing but a VERY sincereregard--nothing but an earnest desire of being useful--I think I amjustified--though where so many hours have been spent in convincingmyself that I am right, is there not some reason to fear I may bewrong?” He stopped.

”I understand you,” said Elinor. ”You have something to tell me of Mr.Willoughby, that will open his character farther. Your telling it willbe the greatest act of friendship that can be shewn Marianne. MYgratitude will be insured immediately by any information tending tothat end, and HERS must be gained by it in time. Pray, pray let mehear it.”

”You shall; and, to be brief, when I quitted Barton last October,--butthis will give you no idea--I must go farther back. You will find me avery awkward narrator, Miss Dashwood; I hardly know where to begin. Ashort account of myself, I believe, will be necessary, and it SHALL bea short one. On such a subject,” sighing heavily, ”can I have littletemptation to be diffuse.”

He stopt a moment for recollection, and then, with another sigh, wenton.

”You have probably entirely forgotten a conversation--(it is not to besupposed that it could make any impression on you)--a conversationbetween us one evening at Barton Park--it was the evening of adance--in which I alluded to a lady I had once known, as resembling, insome measure, your sister Marianne.”

”Indeed,” answered Elinor, ”I have NOT forgotten it.” He looked pleasedby this remembrance, and added,

”If I am not deceived by the uncertainty, the partiality of tenderrecollection, there is a very strong resemblance between them, as wellin mind as person. The same warmth of heart, the same eagerness offancy and spirits. This lady was one of my nearest relations, anorphan from her infancy, and under the guardianship of my father. Ourages were nearly the same, and from our earliest years we wereplayfellows and friends. I cannot remember the time when I did notlove Eliza; and my affection for her, as we grew up, was such, asperhaps, judging from my present forlorn and cheerless gravity, youmight think me incapable of having ever felt. Hers, for me, was, Ibelieve, fervent as the attachment of your sister to Mr. Willoughby andit was, though from a different cause, no less unfortunate. Atseventeen she was lost to me for ever. She was married--marriedagainst her inclination to my brother. Her fortune was large, and ourfamily estate much encumbered. And this, I fear, is all that can besaid for the conduct of one, who was at once her uncle and guardian.My brother did not deserve her; he did not even love her. I had hopedthat her regard for me would support her under any difficulty, and forsome time it did; but at last the misery of her situation, for sheexperienced great unkindness, overcame all her resolution, and thoughshe had promised me that nothing--but how blindly I relate! I havenever told you how this was brought on. We were within a few hours ofeloping together for Scotland. The treachery, or the folly, of mycousin's maid betrayed us. I was banished to the house of a relationfar distant, and she was allowed no liberty, no society, no amusement,till my father's point was gained. I had depended on her fortitude toofar, and the blow was a severe one--but had her marriage been happy, soyoung as I then was, a few months must have reconciled me to it, or atleast I should not have now to lament it. This however was not thecase. My brother had no regard for her; his pleasures were not whatthey ought to have been, and from the first he treated her unkindly.The consequence of this, upon a mind so young, so lively, soinexperienced as Mrs. Brandon's, was but too natural. She resignedherself at first to all the misery of her situation; and happy had itbeen if she had not lived to overcome those regrets which theremembrance of me occasioned. But can we wonder that, with such ahusband to provoke inconstancy, and without a friend to advise orrestrain her (for my father lived only a few months after theirmarriage, and I was with my regiment in the East Indies) she shouldfall? Had I remained in England, perhaps--but I meant to promote thehappiness of both by removing from her for years, and for that purposehad procured my exchange. The shock which her marriage had given me,”he continued, in a voice of great agitation, ”was of triflingweight--was nothing to what I felt when I heard, about two yearsafterwards, of her divorce. It was THAT which threw this gloom,--evennow the recollection of what I suffered--”

He could say no more, and rising hastily walked for a few minutes aboutthe room. Elinor, affected by his relation, and still more by hisdistress, could not speak. He saw her concern, and coming to her, tookher hand, pressed it, and kissed it with grateful respect. A fewminutes more of silent exertion enabled him to proceed with composure.

”It was nearly three years after this unhappy period before I returnedto England. My first care, when I DID arrive, was of course to seekfor her; but the search was as fruitless as it was melancholy. I couldnot trace her beyond her first seducer, and there was every reason tofear that she had removed from him only to sink deeper in a life ofsin. Her legal allowance was not adequate to her fortune, norsufficient for her comfortable maintenance, and I learnt from mybrother that the power of receiving it had been made over some monthsbefore to another person. He imagined, and calmly could he imagine it,that her extravagance, and consequent distress, had obliged her todispose of it for some immediate relief. At last, however, and after Ihad been six months in England, I DID find her. Regard for a formerservant of my own, who had since fallen into misfortune, carried me tovisit him in a spunging-house, where he was confined for debt; andthere, in the same house, under a similar confinement, was my unfortunatesister. So altered--so faded--worn down by acute suffering of everykind! hardly could I believe the melancholy and sickly figure beforeme, to be the remains of the lovely, blooming, healthful girl, on whomI had once doted. What I endured in so beholding her--but I have noright to wound your feelings by attempting to describe it--I havepained you too much already. That she was, to all appearance, in thelast stage of a consumption, was--yes, in such a situation it was mygreatest comfort. Life could do nothing for her, beyond giving timefor a better preparation for death; and that was given. I saw herplaced in comfortable lodgings, and under proper attendants; I visitedher every day during the rest of her short life: I was with her in herlast moments.”

Again he stopped to recover himself; and Elinor spoke her feelings inan exclamation of tender concern, at the fate of his unfortunate friend.

”Your sister, I hope, cannot be offended,” said he, ”by the resemblanceI have fancied between her and my poor disgraced relation. Theirfates, their fortunes, cannot be the same; and had the natural sweetdisposition of the one been guarded by a firmer mind, or a happiermarriage, she might have been all that you will live to see the otherbe. But to what does all this lead? I seem to have been distressingyou for nothing. Ah! Miss Dashwood--a subject such as this--untouchedfor fourteen years--it is dangerous to handle it at all! I WILL bemore collected--more concise. She left to my care her only child, alittle girl, the offspring of her first guilty connection, who was thenabout three years old. She loved the child, and had always kept itwith her. It was a valued, a precious trust to me; and gladly would Ihave discharged it in the strictest sense, by watching over hereducation myself, had the nature of our situations allowed it; but Ihad no family, no home; and my little Eliza was therefore placed atschool. I saw her there whenever I could, and after the death of mybrother, (which happened about five years ago, and which left to me thepossession of the family property,) she visited me at Delaford. Icalled her a distant relation; but I am well aware that I have ingeneral been suspected of a much nearer connection with her. It is nowthree years ago (she had just reached her fourteenth year,) that Iremoved her from school, to place her under the care of a veryrespectable woman, residing in Dorsetshire, who had the charge of fouror five other girls of about the same time of life; and for two years Ihad every reason to be pleased with her situation. But last February,almost a twelvemonth back, she suddenly disappeared. I had allowedher, (imprudently, as it has since turned out,) at her earnest desire,to go to Bath with one of her young friends, who was attending herfather there for his health. I knew him to be a very good sort of man,and I thought well of his daughter--better than she deserved, for, witha most obstinate and ill-judged secrecy, she would tell nothing, wouldgive no clue, though she certainly knew all. He, her father, awell-meaning, but not a quick-sighted man, could really, I believe,give no information; for he had been generally confined to the house,while the girls were ranging over the town and making what acquaintancethey chose; and he tried to convince me, as thoroughly as he wasconvinced himself, of his daughter's being entirely unconcerned in thebusiness. In short, I could learn nothing but that she was gone; allthe rest, for eight long months, was left to conjecture. What Ithought, what I feared, may be imagined; and what I suffered too.”

”Good heavens!” cried Elinor, ”could it be--could Willoughby!”--

”The first news that reached me of her,” he continued, ”came in aletter from herself, last October. It was forwarded to me fromDelaford, and I received it on the very morning of our intended partyto Whitwell; and this was the reason of my leaving Barton so suddenly,which I am sure must at the time have appeared strange to every body,and which I believe gave offence to some. Little did Mr. Willoughbyimagine, I suppose, when his looks censured me for incivility inbreaking up the party, that I was called away to the relief of one whomhe had made poor and miserable; but HAD he known it, what would it haveavailed? Would he have been less gay or less happy in the smiles ofyour sister? No, he had already done that, which no man who CAN feelfor another would do. He had left the girl whose youth and innocencehe had seduced, in a situation of the utmost distress, with nocreditable home, no help, no friends, ignorant of his address! He hadleft her, promising to return; he neither returned, nor wrote, norrelieved her.”

”This is beyond every thing!” exclaimed Elinor.

”His character is now before you; expensive, dissipated, and worse thanboth. Knowing all this, as I have now known it many weeks, guess whatI must have felt on seeing your sister as fond of him as ever, and onbeing assured that she was to marry him: guess what I must have feltfor all your sakes. When I came to you last week and found you alone,I came determined to know the truth; though irresolute what to do whenit WAS known. My behaviour must have seemed strange to you then; butnow you will comprehend it. To suffer you all to be so deceived; tosee your sister--but what could I do? I had no hope of interferingwith success; and sometimes I thought your sister's influence might yetreclaim him. But now, after such dishonorable usage, who can tell whatwere his designs on her. Whatever they may have been, however, she maynow, and hereafter doubtless WILL turn with gratitude towards her owncondition, when she compares it with that of my poor Eliza, when sheconsiders the wretched and hopeless situation of this poor girl, andpictures her to herself, with an affection for him so strong, still asstrong as her own, and with a mind tormented by self-reproach, whichmust attend her through life. Surely this comparison must have its usewith her. She will feel her own sufferings to be nothing. Theyproceed from no misconduct, and can bring no disgrace. On thecontrary, every friend must be made still more her friend by them.Concern for her unhappiness, and respect for her fortitude under it,must strengthen every attachment. Use your own discretion, however, incommunicating to her what I have told you. You must know best whatwill be its effect; but had I not seriously, and from my heart believedit might be of service, might lessen her regrets, I would not havesuffered myself to trouble you with this account of my familyafflictions, with a recital which may seem to have been intended toraise myself at the expense of others.”

Elinor's thanks followed this speech with grateful earnestness;attended too with the assurance of her expecting material advantage toMarianne, from the communication of what had passed.

”I have been more pained,” said she, ”by her endeavors to acquit himthan by all the rest; for it irritates her mind more than the mostperfect conviction of his unworthiness can do. Now, though at firstshe will suffer much, I am sure she will soon become easier. Haveyou,” she continued, after a short silence, ”ever seen Mr. Willoughbysince you left him at Barton?”

”Yes,” he replied gravely, ”once I have. One meeting was unavoidable.”

Elinor, startled by his manner, looked at him anxiously, saying,

”What? have you met him to--”

”I could meet him no other way. Eliza had confessed to me, though mostreluctantly, the name of her lover; and when he returned to town, whichwas within a fortnight after myself, we met by appointment, he todefend, I to punish his conduct. We returned unwounded, and themeeting, therefore, never got abroad.”

Elinor sighed over the fancied necessity of this; but to a man and asoldier she presumed not to censure it.

”Such,” said Colonel Brandon, after a pause, ”has been the unhappyresemblance between the fate of mother and daughter! and so imperfectlyhave I discharged my trust!”

”Is she still in town?”

”No; as soon as she recovered from her lying-in, for I found her nearher delivery, I removed her and her child into the country, and thereshe remains.”

Recollecting, soon afterwards, that he was probably dividing Elinorfrom her sister, he put an end to his visit, receiving from her againthe same grateful acknowledgments, and leaving her full of compassionand esteem for him.