Emma in Love (17 page)

She had been mistaken, again, when she had believed the tale spun by a liar and thief who posed as a French noblewoman, but who was in equal probability as much a denizen of the slums of Bristol as was young Abdy's sister – both women whores and vagrants – kept by slavers, beaten by their masters as they went out to vend their souls.— Here Emma shivered so violently, that she was drawn to rise, and go over to the fire. The sunlight and fine furniture of Donwell Abbey had never seemed so greatly welcome to her, as they did now.

Then there was the matchmaking.— Emma, whose spirits were irrepressible, and whose faults were not one-tenth as numerous as her perfections (in the eyes of
those, like Mr. Knightley and Mrs. Weston, who loved her, at any rate) found her heart lift and her good humour recover, when she recalled the occasion, deep in the midst of her first night of happiness with Mr. Knightley, of her breathless promise to him that she would meddle no longer in the lives and loves of others. She had had – Emma would always have, however great her abandon into ecstasy – the sense of being in the right – the desire to inform Mr. Knightley that he, also, had attempted to make a match, for his brother; but she had not had the opportunity to hear Mr. Knightley's reply, for he had kissed her, just then, too hard.

It had been something to the effect that news would arrive soon, on that score. She had responded to his caresses and had not thought more of it; a flush of reminiscence coupled with a mischievous smile succeeded each other, as Emma walked this time to the windows of the dining-room and opened them on to a lawn green and gold with the first rays of an autumnal sun. Whatever George – at last she had called his name! – whatever the dear man had planned for his brother, it could no longer be marriage with the woman who had styled herself Baroness. Emma began to see the humour in the situation; and as a figure walked quietly up the lawn and paused by the window, she was no longer able to resist indulging her desire to laugh.

“Mrs. Knightley?” Jane Fairfax stood by the dining-room
windows of Donwell Abbey; she was pale, but Emma saw she wore a fine comb studded with precious stones, set in her dark hair. Her expression was serious: Emma swallowed her laughter as best she could.

“My dear Miss Fairfax! Come in.” It was a pleasure, to Emma, to show the poor governess that others such as Mrs. Elton or Mrs. Smallridge, might call her Jane, and ask of her a thousand menial tasks.— Here at Donwell she would remain as she had always been, Miss Fairfax, esteemed niece of Highbury's best-loved spinster, dear Miss Bates.

“I have news to bring you which you may not find pleasant,” said the young woman, in a quiet and measured tone. “I will be frank – I do not know how to commence, Mrs. Knightley. But I must inform you – I am engaged to be married! You must be the first to know.”

Emma's mind went through imaginings impossible to record, so fast-moving and untoward were they.— For Jane could surely not have decided to marry Captain Brocklehurst, rouge and white gown and fine slippers and all? No, it could not be! Had Mrs. Churchill died, then? Had Frank been called to Enscombe, as he had been summoned by his aunt all of four years ago, because she was departing this world? And if this were so, surely it would be in the worst of taste, that he should propose marriage to Miss Fairfax, while his wife
lay dying? But Frank was not known for his good taste, Emma reflected; had she not incurred Jane's dislike herself by joining him in a flirtation which was most unsavoury for all who witnessed it?— But was Frank not, perhaps, another such as his brother-in-law? Why did he bring the Captain to Highbury alone, if not to indulge in a friendship which must not be spoken of? Did Frank too, with all his posies and his fine words, love the Captain more than he loved Jane?

One other possibility remained, when Emma had banished all these from her mind. It was too far-fetched. She knew of lonely women who had joined the movement for the Second Coming of the Messiah, who had worshipped Joanna Southcott and her famous box, at Exeter. Did Jane mean to wed the Lord? Was she betrothed to Christ?

An image of the Baroness and Jane together succeeded this; then Emma, staring still at her unexpected visitor, began to see the comb in Miss Fairfax's dark hair.— Yes, she said to herself, and with an effort restrained a cry of surprise. It is old Mrs. Knightley's jewellery that Jane Fairfax wears! She cannot have been presented them by Mr. Knightley – not by George …

“I am engaged to John Knightley,” said Jane Fairfax in a voice that was still modest and low. “We met at Cromer; we had both lost our loves – John his Isabella, if you will pardon me, Emma – and I Frank Churchill,
to whom I had been betrothed. In speaking of our sadness, we found comfort; and we shall find love. I shall be your sister, dear Emma. We have at times not been as one, despite knowing each other all our lives.”

With these words Jane Fairfax began to weep. Emma, who saw she must put her best face on it – and who was able, within a very short time, to convince herself that she alone was responsible for the match – went forward to comfort her; and it was thus, clasped as sisters should be, that Mr. Knightley – who appeared very pleased with himself indeed – found his Emma and the future Mrs. John Knightley in the dining-room at Donwell.

“My breakfast does not come, Emma,” said Mr. Knightley; and Emma, seeing he teased her, instructed him to pull the bell-rope if he wished to be served.

“This is splendid news, Emma,” said Mr. Knightley, after Jane Fairfax had been persuaded to accept tea – but no more. “I was informed, when John returned from Norfolk.— I kept the matter quiet, as our mother's estates had to be settled, to the benefit of the new couple – and I teased you on the subject of the Baroness, my dear Emma: forgive me!”

Emma smiled; though she resolved to pay Mr. Knightley out for his deception, when she next had the chance.

“We shall have the wedding here in October,” continued Mr. Knightley. “And you, my dear Emma, are
the one to make our nephews and nieces happy at the arrival of a new mother – is she not, dear Miss Fairfax?”

Jane Fairfax was too overcome to do anything other than sip at her tea and murmur her willing assent.

Time passed. A few more tomorrows and the boating party would have come and gone; the new lake, dredged and cleaned for the purpose, much admired; and the engagement of John Knightley, its proud owner, to the secretive Miss Fairfax, be known by all and very thoroughly discussed.

What could not be known, in advance, was the number of guests Mrs. Knightley – for it was she, as the future Mrs. John Knightley declared herself too shy to issue any invitations – was determined to summon to the event. Mrs. Elton – just returned from Lyme with Mrs. Smallridge, and Miss Whynne in attendance on all the children, for Emma's nephews and nieces had been happy to be informed that another trip to the seaside lay
in store – was unable to direct the exclusive nature of the boating party, or to prevent the whole of Highbury being cordially welcomed to the site of the new lake. Had she known, she would very likely have sent a refusal before it was too late. That Mrs. Cole and Mrs. Gilbert were expected – and that old Abdy was to be conveyed there in a chair, for his last glimpse of a stretch of water he had navigated as a lad, would have been reprehensible to the Vicar's wife; and Mr. Elton, as it occurred on the evening of the festivities, was sent to Mr. Perry for medicaments to counter the shock and sadness of his Augusta;— but, unfortunately for any of the few who did not attend, Mr. Perry along with Mrs. Perry and all the little Perrys, was also on the shores of the very fine lake that day, and those who felt unwell must go unvisited.

Emma took particular care to demonstrate her new sense of a wholeness in the village, on the occasion of the boating party. She accepted invitations from those who were newly arrived in Highbury, and even from those who were in trade – and she reminded John Knightley, when he remonstrated with her, that the very best people, such as Mr. Weston, made their living in this fashion; and that Miss Bates, who had not a scruple when it came to entertaining the Westons, should be listened to more often; for her words were inclined to spell out the truth a great deal more than the
pontifications of certain distinguished lawyers and members of other elevated professions.

She did not say that Miss Bates's odd habits with speech had led to an understanding of the predilections of those she spoke of – though Emma thought she could recall very well that Miss Bates, on the occasion of Emma's visit to her apartment in the main street of Highbury, had looked from the window and muttered “bugger Brocklehurst”— though Emma could not swear to it.

It was seen by all, on the very fine day which was selected for the boating party, that John Knightley's prophecies of stormy weather were quite unfounded. His brother's excellent good humour, as calm and unruffled as the day, was also remarked upon; and when, late in the afternoon, the already large throng on the cobbled shore was joined by a party of wild-looking young people, no one saw him complain, or his happy mien falter in the least.

There was too much to talk of: that John Knightley and Jane would live at Hartfield and the school would be permanently established there, was one weighty topic; as was Mrs. Smallridge's search for a governess, and the strangeness of her having asked Miss Bates if she would like to take the position. Emma had had to quash the suggestion rapidly. Besides which, there was talk still of the thieving – it remained a rumour, for Mr. Knightley
had brought no charges, and Mrs. Elton believed her friend's ring to have been retrieved from the piano at Lyme and somehow whisked up to her at Highbury by reason of its being the property of so magical a person as Lady Carinthia Bragge. The maid at Donwell Abbey said nothing, but there had been talk. The happiness which reigned there made any suggestion of loss or theft quite ridiculous.

There was, however, a talking point which, arising as it did on the day of the boating party, was almost unstoppable in its gaining of detail and credence as it passed from simple village family to those who should have known better than to permit its progress amongst the crowd.

A young woman, very beautiful, with dark ringlets and very strong dark eyebrows, had been seen to step into a small rowing-boat and set out across the lake, towards a small wooded island in the centre.

Some said the young lady had kissed Mrs. Weston, who had spoken and laughed very tearfully; and that they had been joined by Mr. Knightley himself, who had wandered off with them to a distant glade. It was reported, by Mrs. Smallridge, that the young stranger had borne more than a passing resemblance to the charming baroness, who had come to Highbury with dear Jane: she even expressed her desire that this young lady might consider the post of governess to her daughters.

It was possible that a cousin, a niece – some said more – had come into the Knightley family. A rumour, short-lived by reason of the esteem in which both the squire of Donwell Abbey and the good lady who once had been the governess to Emma were held, had the dark stranger as their daughter; and it had “poor Miss Taylor” at Hartfield all those years out of a desire to be near Mr. Knightley. The child, put to boarding-school at Bristol, had gone to the bad; she had fallen in with young Abdy's sister when the latter was taken on as a maid at the Sucklings' mansion near there. A large quantity of jewels had subsequently disappeared. No one knew for certain. What was certain was that Emma Knightley stepped into the rowing-boat with her friend, and they set off together for the island – where they remained until it was almost dark. As John Knightley was heard to remark, the equinoctial storms were due to descend on Surrey at any time now; and he would only feel safe when his sister-in-law and her companion had rowed home across still waters already rippling with the first winds of the autumnal gales to come. His betrothed, Miss Fairfax, had, as ever, no comment to make at all.

Emma Tennant was born in London and educated at St Paul's Girls' School. She spent the World War II years and her childhood summers at the family's faux Gothic mansion The Glen in Peeblesshire. Her family also owned estates in Trinidad.

Tennant grew up in the modish London of the 1950s and 1960s. She worked as a travel writer for
Queen
magazine and an editor for
Vogue
, publishing her first novel,
The Colour of Rain
, under a pseudonym when she was twenty-six. Between 1975 and 1979, she edited a literary magazine,
Bananas
, which helped launch the careers of several young novelists.

A large number of books by Tennant have followed: thrillers, children's books, fantasies, and several revisionist takes on classic novels, including a sequel to
Pride
and
Prejudice
called Pemberley. In later years, she began to write about her own life in such books as
Burnt Diaries
(1999), which details her affair with Ted Hughes.

Tennant has been married four times, including to the journalist and author Christopher Booker and the political writer Alexander Cockburn. She has two daughters and a son, author Matthew Yorke. In April 2008, she married her partner of 33 years, Tim Owens.