Emma
the injustice and selfishness of angry feelings, she acknowledged that
Jane Fairfax would have neither elevation nor happiness beyond her
desert. But poor Harriet was such an engrossing charge! There was
little sympathy to be spared for any body else. Emma was sadly fearful
that this second disappointment would be more severe than the first.
Considering the very superior claims of the object, it ought; and
judging by its apparently stronger effect on Harriet’s mind, producing
reserve and self-command, it would.—She must communicate the painful
truth, however, and as soon as possible. An injunction of secresy had
been among Mr. Weston’s parting words. “For the present, the whole
affair was to be completely a secret. Mr. Churchill had made a point of
it, as a token of respect to the wife he had so very recently lost; and
every body admitted it to be no more than due decorum.”—Emma had
promised; but still Harriet must be excepted. It was her superior duty.
In spite of her vexation, she could not help feeling it almost
ridiculous, that she should have the very same distressing and delicate
office to perform by Harriet, which Mrs. Weston had just gone through
by herself. The intelligence, which had been so anxiously announced to
her, she was now to be anxiously announcing to another. Her heart beat
quick on hearing Harriet’s footstep and voice; so, she supposed, had
poor Mrs. Weston felt when _she_ was approaching Randalls. Could the
event of the disclosure bear an equal resemblance!—But of that,
unfortunately, there could be no chance.
“Well, Miss Woodhouse!” cried Harriet, coming eagerly into the room—“is
not this the oddest news that ever was?”
“What news do you mean?” replied Emma, unable to guess, by look or
voice, whether Harriet could indeed have received any hint.
“About Jane Fairfax. Did you ever hear any thing so strange? Oh!—you
need not be afraid of owning it to me, for Mr. Weston has told me
himself. I met him just now. He told me it was to be a great secret;
and, therefore, I should not think of mentioning it to any body but
you, but he said you knew it.”
“What did Mr. Weston tell you?”—said Emma, still perplexed.
“Oh! he told me all about it; that Jane Fairfax and Mr. Frank Churchill
are to be married, and that they have been privately engaged to one
another this long while. How very odd!”
It was, indeed, so odd; Harriet’s behaviour was so extremely odd, that
Emma did not know how to understand it. Her character appeared
absolutely changed. She seemed to propose shewing no agitation, or
disappointment, or peculiar concern in the discovery. Emma looked at
her, quite unable to speak.
“Had you any idea,” cried Harriet, “of his being in love with her?—You,
perhaps, might.—You (blushing as she spoke) who can see into every
body’s heart; but nobody else—”
“Upon my word,” said Emma, “I begin to doubt my having any such talent.
Can you seriously ask me, Harriet, whether I imagined him attached to
another woman at the very time that I was—tacitly, if not
openly—encouraging you to give way to your own feelings?—I never had
the slightest suspicion, till within the last hour, of Mr. Frank
Churchill’s having the least regard for Jane Fairfax. You may be very
sure that if I had, I should have cautioned you accordingly.”
“Me!” cried Harriet, colouring, and astonished. “Why should you caution
me?—You do not think I care about Mr. Frank Churchill.”
“I am delighted to hear you speak so stoutly on the subject,” replied
Emma, smiling; “but you do not mean to deny that there was a time—and
not very distant either—when you gave me reason to understand that you
did care about him?”
“Him!—never, never. Dear Miss Woodhouse, how could you so mistake me?”
turning away distressed.
“Harriet!” cried Emma, after a moment’s pause—“What do you mean?—Good
Heaven! what do you mean?—Mistake you!—Am I to suppose then?—”
She could not speak another word.—Her voice was lost; and she sat down,
waiting in great terror till Harriet should answer.
Harriet, who was standing at some distance, and with face turned from
her, did not immediately say any thing; and when she did speak, it was
in a voice nearly as agitated as Emma’s.
“I should not have thought it possible,” she began, “that you could
have misunderstood me! I know we agreed never to name him—but
considering how infinitely superior he is to every body else, I should
not have thought it possible that I could be supposed to mean any other
person. Mr. Frank Churchill, indeed! I do not know who would ever look
at him in the company of the other. I hope I have a better taste than
to think of Mr. Frank Churchill, who is like nobody by his side. And
that you should have been so mistaken, is amazing!—I am sure, but for
believing that you entirely approved and meant to encourage me in my
attachment, I should have considered it at first too great a
presumption almost, to dare to think of him. At first, if you had not
told me that more wonderful things had happened; that there had been
matches of greater disparity (those were your very words);—I should not
have dared to give way to—I should not have thought it possible—But if
_you_, who had been always acquainted with him—”
“Harriet!” cried Emma, collecting herself resolutely—“Let us understand
each other now, without the possibility of farther mistake. Are you
speaking of—Mr. Knightley?”
“To be sure I am. I never could have an idea of any body else—and so I
thought you knew. When we talked about him, it was as clear as
possible.”
“Not quite,” returned Emma, with forced calmness, “for all that you
then said, appeared to me to relate to a different person. I could
almost assert that you had _named_ Mr. Frank Churchill. I am sure the
service Mr. Frank Churchill had rendered you, in protecting you from
the gipsies, was spoken of.”
“Oh! Miss Woodhouse, how you do forget!”
“My dear Harriet, I perfectly remember the substance of what I said on
the occasion. I told you that I did not wonder at your attachment; that
considering the service he had rendered you, it was extremely
natural:—and you agreed to it, expressing yourself very warmly as to
your sense of that service, and mentioning even what your sensations
had been in seeing him come forward to your rescue.—The impression of
it is strong on my memory.”
“Oh, dear,” cried Harriet, “now I recollect what you mean; but I was
thinking of something very different at the time. It was not the
gipsies—it was not Mr. Frank Churchill that I meant. No! (with some
elevation) I was thinking of a much more precious circumstance—of Mr.
Knightley’s coming and asking me to dance, when Mr. Elton would not
stand up with me; and when there was no other partner in the room. That
was the kind action; that was the noble benevolence and generosity;
that was the service which made me begin to feel how superior he was to
every other being upon earth.”
“Good God!” cried Emma, “this has been a most unfortunate—most
deplorable mistake!—What is to be done?”
“You would not have encouraged me, then, if you had understood me? At
least, however, I cannot be worse off than I should have been, if the
other had been the person; and now—it _is_ possible—”
She paused a few moments. Emma could not speak.
“I do not wonder, Miss Woodhouse,” she resumed, “that you should feel a
great difference between the two, as to me or as to any body. You must
think one five hundred million times more above me than the other. But
I hope, Miss Woodhouse, that supposing—that if—strange as it may
appear—. But you know they were your own words, that _more_ wonderful
things had happened, matches of _greater_ disparity had taken place
than between Mr. Frank Churchill and me; and, therefore, it seems as if
such a thing even as this, may have occurred before—and if I should be
so fortunate, beyond expression, as to—if Mr. Knightley should
really—if _he_ does not mind the disparity, I hope, dear Miss
Woodhouse, you will not set yourself against it, and try to put
difficulties in the way. But you are too good for that, I am sure.”
Harriet was standing at one of the windows. Emma turned round to look
at her in consternation, and hastily said,
“Have you any idea of Mr. Knightley’s returning your affection?”
“Yes,” replied Harriet modestly, but not fearfully—“I must say that I
have.”
Emma’s eyes were instantly withdrawn; and she sat silently meditating,
in a fixed attitude, for a few minutes. A few minutes were sufficient
for making her acquainted with her own heart. A mind like hers, once
opening to suspicion, made rapid progress. She touched—she admitted—she
acknowledged the whole truth. Why was it so much worse that Harriet
should be in love with Mr. Knightley, than with Frank Churchill? Why
was the evil so dreadfully increased by Harriet’s having some hope of a
return? It darted through her, with the speed of an arrow, that Mr.
Knightley must marry no one but herself!
Her own conduct, as well as her own heart, was before her in the same
few minutes. She saw it all with a clearness which had never blessed
her before. How improperly had she been acting by Harriet! How
inconsiderate, how indelicate, how irrational, how unfeeling had been
her conduct! What blindness, what madness, had led her on! It struck
her with dreadful force, and she was ready to give it every bad name in
the world. Some portion of respect for herself, however, in spite of
all these demerits—some concern for her own appearance, and a strong
sense of justice by Harriet—(there would be no need of _compassion_ to
the girl who believed herself loved by Mr. Knightley—but justice
required that she should not be made unhappy by any coldness now,) gave
Emma the resolution to sit and endure farther with calmness, with even
apparent kindness.—For her own advantage indeed, it was fit that the
utmost extent of Harriet’s hopes should be enquired into; and Harriet
had done nothing to forfeit the regard and interest which had been so
voluntarily formed and maintained—or to deserve to be slighted by the
person, whose counsels had never led her right.—Rousing from
reflection, therefore, and subduing her emotion, she turned to Harriet
again, and, in a more inviting accent, renewed the conversation; for as
to the subject which had first introduced it, the wonderful story of
Jane Fairfax, that was quite sunk and lost.—Neither of them thought but
of Mr. Knightley and themselves.
Harriet, who had been standing in no unhappy reverie, was yet very glad
to be called from it, by the now encouraging manner of such a judge,
and such a friend as Miss Woodhouse, and only wanted invitation, to
give the history of her hopes with great, though trembling
delight.—Emma’s tremblings as she asked, and as she listened, were
better concealed than Harriet’s, but they were not less. Her voice was
not unsteady; but her mind was in all the perturbation that such a
development of self, such a burst of threatening evil, such a confusion
of sudden and perplexing emotions, must create.—She listened with much
inward suffering, but with great outward patience, to Harriet’s
detail.—Methodical, or well arranged, or very well delivered, it could
not be expected to be; but it contained, when separated from all the
feebleness and tautology of the narration, a substance to sink her
spirit—especially with the corroborating circumstances, which her own
memory brought in favour of Mr. Knightley’s most improved opinion of
Harriet.
Harriet had been conscious of a difference in his behaviour ever since
those two decisive dances.—Emma knew that he had, on that occasion,
found her much superior to his expectation. From that evening, or at
least from the time of Miss Woodhouse’s encouraging her to think of