Emma and the Werewolves (38 page)

“
I hope Mrs. Bates and Miss
Fairfax are—”

“
Very well, I am much
obliged to you. My mother is delightfully well; and Jane caught no
cold last night. How is Mr. Woodhouse? I am so glad to hear such a
good account. Mrs. Weston told me you were here. Oh! then, said I,
I must run across, I am sure Miss Woodhouse will allow me just to
run across and entreat her to come in; my mother will be so very
happy to see her—and now we are such a nice party, she cannot
refuse. ‘Aye, pray do,’ said Mr. Frank Churchill, ‘Miss Woodhouse’s
opinion of the instrument will be worth having.’ But, said I, I
shall be more sure of succeeding if one of you will go with me.
‘Oh,’ said he, ‘wait half a minute, till I have finished my job;’
—For, would you believe it, Miss Woodhouse, there he is, in the
most obliging manner in the world, fastening in the rivet of my
mother’s spectacles. The rivet came out, you know, this morning. So
very obliging! For my mother had no use of her spectacles—could not
put them on. And, by the bye, every body ought to have two pair of
spectacles; they should indeed. Jane said so. I meant to take them
over to John Saunders the first thing I did, but something or other
hindered me all the morning; first one thing, then another, there
is no saying what, you know. At one time Patty came to say she
thought the kitchen chimney wanted sweeping. Oh, said I, Patty do
not come with your bad news to me. Here is the rivet of your
mistress’s spectacles out. Then the baked apples came home, Mrs.
Wallis sent them by her boy; they are extremely civil and obliging
to us, the Wallises, always—I have heard some people say that Mrs.
Wallis can be uncivil and give a very rude answer, but we have
never known any thing but the greatest attention from them. And it
cannot be for the value of our custom now, for what is our
consumption of bread, you know? Only three of us besides dear Jane
at present—and she really eats nothing—makes such a shocking
breakfast, you would be quite frightened if you saw it. I dare not
let my mother know how little she eats—so I say one thing and then
I say another, and it passes off. But about the middle of the day
she gets hungry, and there is nothing she likes so well as these
baked apples, and they are extremely wholesome, for I took the
opportunity the other day of asking Mr. Perry; I happened to meet
him in the street. Not that I had any doubt before—I have so often
heard Mr. Woodhouse recommend a baked apple. I believe it is the
only way that Mr. Woodhouse thinks the fruit thoroughly wholesome.
We have apple-dumplings, however, very often. Patty makes an
excellent apple-dumpling. Well, Mrs. Weston, you have prevailed, I
hope, and these ladies will oblige us.”

Emma would be “very happy
to wait on Mrs. Bates, &c.,” and they did at last move out of
the shop, with no farther delay from Miss Bates than, “How do you
do, Mrs. Ford? I beg your pardon. I did not see you before. I hear
you have a charming collection of new ribbons from town. Jane came
back delighted yesterday. Thank ye, the gloves do very well—only a
little too large about the wrist; but Jane is taking them
in.”

“
What was I talking of?”
said she, beginning again when they were all in the
street.

Emma wondered on what, of all the medley,
she would fix.

“
I declare I cannot
recollect what I was talking of. Oh! my mother’s spectacles. So
very obliging of Mr. Frank Churchill! ‘Oh!’ said he, ‘I do think I
can fasten the rivet; I like a job of this kind excessively.’
—Which you know shewed him to be so very . . . . Indeed I must say
that, much as I had heard of him before and much as I had expected,
he very far exceeds any thing . . . . I do congratulate you, Mrs.
Weston, most warmly. He seems every thing the fondest parent could
. . . . ‘Oh!’ said he, ‘I can fasten the rivet. I like a job of
that sort excessively.’ I never shall forget his manner. And when I
brought out the baked apples from the closet, and hoped our friends
would be so very obliging as to take some, ‘Oh!’ said he directly,
‘there is nothing in the way of fruit half so good, and these are
the finest-looking home-baked apples I ever saw in my life.’ That,
you know, was so very . . . . And I am sure, by his manner, it was
no compliment. Indeed they are very delightful apples, and Mrs.
Wallis does them full justice—only we do not have them baked more
than twice, and Mr. Woodhouse made us promise to have them done
three times—but Miss Woodhouse will be so good as not to mention
it. The apples themselves are the very finest sort for baking,
beyond a doubt; all from Donwell—some of Mr. Knightley’s most
liberal supply. He sends us a sack every year; and certainly there
never was such a keeping apple anywhere as one of his trees—I
believe there is two of them. My mother says the orchard was always
famous in her younger days. But I was really quite shocked the
other day—for Mr. Knightley called one morning, and Jane was eating
these apples, and we talked about them and said how much she
enjoyed them, and he asked whether we were not got to the end of
our stock. ‘I am sure you must be,’ said he, ‘and I will send you
another supply; for I have a great many more than I can ever use.
William Larkins let me keep a larger quantity than usual this year.
I will send you some more, before they get good for nothing.’ So I
begged he would not—for really as to ours being gone, I could not
absolutely say that we had a great many left—it was but half a
dozen indeed; but they should be all kept for Jane; and I could not
at all bear that he should be sending us more, so liberal as he had
been already; and Jane said the same. And when he was gone, she
almost quarrelled with me—No, I should not say quarrelled, for we
never had a quarrel in our lives; but she was quite distressed that
I had owned the apples were so nearly gone; she wished I had made
him believe we had a great many left. Oh, said I, my dear, I did
say as much as I could. However, the very same evening William
Larkins came over with a large basket of apples, the same sort of
apples, a bushel at least, and I was very much obliged, and went
down and spoke to William Larkins and said every thing, as you may
suppose. William Larkins is such an old acquaintance! I am always
glad to see him. But, however, I found afterwards from Patty, that
William said it was all the apples of that sort his master had; he
had brought them all—and now his master had not one left to bake or
boil. William did not seem to mind it himself, he was so pleased to
think his master had sold so many; for William, you know, thinks
more of his master’s profit than any thing; but Mrs. Hodges, he
said, was quite displeased at their being all sent away. She could
not bear that her master should not be able to have another
apple-tart this spring. He told Patty this, but bid her not mind
it, and be sure not to say any thing to us about it, for Mrs.
Hodges would be cross sometimes, and as long as so many sacks were
sold, it did not signify who ate the remainder. And so Patty told
me, and I was excessively shocked indeed! I would not have Mr.
Knightley know any thing about it for the world! He would be so
very . . . . I wanted to keep it from Jane’s knowledge; but,
unluckily, I had mentioned it before I was aware.”

Miss Bates had just done as Patty opened the
door; and her visitors walked upstairs without having any regular
narration to attend to, pursued only by the sounds of her desultory
good-will.

“
Pray take care, Mrs.
Weston, there is a step at the turning. Pray take care, Miss
Woodhouse, ours is rather a dark staircase—rather darker and
narrower than one could wish. Miss Smith, pray take care. Miss
Woodhouse, I am quite concerned, I am sure you hit your foot. Miss
Smith, the step at the turning.”

* * * *

Chapter X

T
he
appearance of the
little sitting-room as
they entered, was tranquillity itself; Mrs. Bates, deprived of her
usual employment, slumbering on one side of the fire, Frank
Churchill, at a table near her, most deedily occupied about her
spectacles, and Jane Fairfax, standing with her back to them,
intent on her pianoforte.

Busy as he was, however, the young man was
yet able to shew a most happy countenance on seeing Emma again.

“
This is a pleasure,” said
he, in rather a low voice, “coming at least ten minutes earlier
than I had calculated. You find me trying to be useful; tell me if
you think I shall succeed.”

“
What!” said Mrs. Weston,
“have not you finished it yet? you would not earn a very good
livelihood as a working silversmith at this rate.”

“
I have not been working
uninterruptedly,” he replied, “I have been assisting Miss Fairfax
in trying to make her instrument stand steadily, it was not quite
firm; an unevenness in the floor, I believe. You see we have been
wedging one leg with paper. This was very kind of you to be
persuaded to come. I was almost afraid you would be hurrying
home.”

He contrived that she should be seated by
him; and was sufficiently employed in looking out the best baked
apple for her, and trying to make her help or advise him in his
work, till Jane Fairfax was quite ready to sit down to the
pianoforte again. That she was not immediately ready, Emma did
suspect to arise from the state of her nerves; she had not yet
possessed the instrument long enough to touch it without emotion;
she must reason herself into the power of performance; and Emma
could not but pity such feelings, whatever their origin, and could
not but resolve never to expose them to her neighbour again.

At last Jane began, and though the first
bars were feebly given, the powers of the instrument were gradually
done full justice to. Mrs. Weston had been delighted before, and
was delighted again; Emma joined her in all her praise; and the
pianoforte, with every proper discrimination, was pronounced to be
altogether of the highest promise.

“
Whoever Colonel Campbell
might employ,” said Frank Churchill, with a smile at Emma, “the
person has not chosen ill. I heard a good deal of Colonel
Campbell’s taste at Weymouth; and the softness of the upper notes I
am sure is exactly what he and all that party would particularly
prize. I dare say, Miss Fairfax, that he either gave his friend
very minute directions, or wrote to Broadwood himself. Do not you
think so?”

Jane did not look round. She was not obliged
to hear. Mrs. Weston had been speaking to her at the same
moment.

“
It is not fair,” said
Emma, in a whisper; “mine was a random guess. Do not distress
her.”

He shook his head with a
smile, and looked as if he had very little doubt and very little
mercy. Soon afterwards he began again, “How much your friends in
Ireland must be enjoying your pleasure on this occasion, Miss
Fairfax. I dare say they often think of you, and wonder which will
be the day, the precise day of the instrument’s coming to hand. Do
you imagine Colonel Campbell knows the business to be going forward
just at this time? Do you imagine it to be the consequence of an
immediate commission from him, or that he may have sent only a
general direction, an order indefinite as to time, to depend upon
contingencies and conveniences?”

He paused. She could not but hear; she could
not avoid answering, “Till I have a letter from Colonel Campbell,”
said she, in a voice of forced calmness, “I can imagine nothing
with any confidence. It must be all conjecture.”

“
Conjecture—aye, sometimes
one conjectures right, and sometimes one conjectures wrong. I wish
I could conjecture how soon I shall make this rivet quite firm.
What nonsense one talks, Miss Woodhouse, when hard at work, if one
talks at all; your real workmen, I suppose, hold their tongues; but
we gentlemen labourers if we get hold of a word—Miss Fairfax said
something about conjecturing. There, it is done. I have the
pleasure, madam, (to Mrs. Bates,) of restoring your spectacles,
healed for the present.”

He was very warmly thanked both by mother
and daughter; to escape a little from the latter, he went to the
pianoforte, and begged Miss Fairfax, who was still sitting at it,
to play something more.

“
If you are very kind,”
said he, “it will be one of the waltzes we danced last night; let
me live them over again. You did not enjoy them as I did; you
appeared tired the whole time. I believe you were glad we danced no
longer; but I would have given worlds—all the worlds one ever has
to give—for another half-hour.”

She played.

“
What felicity it is to
hear a tune again which has made one happy! If I mistake not that
was danced at Weymouth.”

She looked up at him for a moment, coloured
deeply, and played something else. He took some music from a chair
near the pianoforte, and turning to Emma, said,

“
Here is something quite
new to me. Do you know it? Cramer. And here are a new set of Irish
melodies. That, from such a quarter, one might expect. This was all
sent with the instrument. Very thoughtful of Colonel Campbell, was
not it? He knew Miss Fairfax could have no music here. I honour
that part of the attention particularly; it shews it to have been
so thoroughly from the heart. Nothing hastily done; nothing
incomplete. True affection only could have prompted it.”

Emma wished he would be less pointed, yet
could not help being amused; and when on glancing her eye towards
Jane Fairfax she caught the remains of a smile, when she saw that
with all the deep blush of consciousness, there had been a smile of
secret delight, she had less scruple in the amusement, and much
less compunction with respect to her. This amiable, upright,
perfect Jane Fairfax was apparently cherishing very reprehensible
feelings.