‘I have done nothing but give good counsel to Anne,’ she replied, collecting herself. ‘She has no mother, and it is up to me to guide her. Had I any scruples about the part I have played, I would have lost them when you spoke to me just now. I am not accustomed to being addressed in such a manner. You are a hotheaded young man, Commander Wentworth, with nothing to offer Anne but a long engagement followed by a lifetime of uncertainty and loneliness. I want something better for her. I want her to have the comforts she is accustomed to, and the company of a husband who does not spend half his life at sea.’
‘I could soon have given her the comforts she needs. We are at war! There are plenty of opportunities for a resolute young man to make his fortune, for never was there a better friend to a penniless young captain of ability and ambition than Napoleon Bonaparte. I mean to rise in the world, and I would have taken Anne with me.’
‘A baronet’s daughter does not need a sailor to lift her,’ she remarked in a superior tone.
‘With my prize money I could have given her a better home than the one she has now. In a few years’ time—’
‘—you are likely to be as poor as you are now, for you spend your money as quickly as you win it.’
‘With a wife to support, I would have changed my ways. I would not have wanted to spend my money rashly, for I would have had someone else to spend it on. I would have had a reason to invest in the funds, and watch my capital grow.’
‘So says every young man, until he is married, but then it is a different story. He finds the pleasures of youth hard to abandon, and the call of his friends too strong, and his wife is left to manage on whatever her husband chooses to give her.’
‘And what this husband would have chosen to give her would have been his hand and his heart.’ I saw a smile of derision on her lips. ‘So, you would rather see Anne married to a man she does not love, than allow her to follow her heart?’
‘Love! Young people always talk about love, but nine times out of ten it is nothing but a passing fancy. Anne is young. She will soon find someone else, and you will fall in love again the next time you are ashore.’
‘You presume too much,’ I said. ‘You cannot know my feelings. You have no right to say that they will change, or that I am so fickle. I love Anne.’
‘And are you the only one involved in matrimony? Is it enough for you to love her? Pray, consider, she must also love you.’
‘And so she does.’
‘But not enough to marry you.’
‘No,’ I said, bitterly. ‘You talk of men’s fickleness, but it is women’s fickleness that is to blame, here, today: Anne’s for not loving me enough to follow her feelings, and yours for persuading her to abandon me, in the hope of a better marriage in the future, to a man she will not care for. It is the curse of the Elliots, and all about them, to care more about money and status than affection and true worth.’
‘Have a care, Commander,’ she said warningly, ‘for that statement smacks of bitterness.’
‘You must forgive me, Lady Russell, but I am feeling bitter. When a man has lost everything he holds most dear, through the offices of others, he is prone to that particular emotion. Anne would never have rejected me if you had not interfered.’
She gave a tentative smile.
‘Come, what is done is done,’ she said, holding out her hand for me to shake. ‘Let us part as friends.’
I would not take it.
‘You are no friend of mine, and you are no friend of Anne’s either, Lady Russell. I will bid you good day.’
And so saying, I hurried away.
Luckily, my brother was out when I returned, so I did not immediately have to tell him what had happened. I paced the room, but I could not bear to be indoors and I was soon outside again, trying to ride off the worst of my despair.
To be loved, accepted, and then rejected. It was too much. I could not bear it.
In vain did I tell myself that it was better this way, that if she did not love me it was better to find out now rather than later, when the engagement had been spoken of, or, worse yet, when we were married.
I thought of Harville, and his prosperous love. His wife did not mind a little discomfort. She believed in Harville, and knew he would make his fortune. Lucky man. If I had such a woman beside me . . . But I did not want another woman. I wanted Anne. Try as I might, I could not drive her out of my mind. The way she looked at me, the way our tastes and thoughts and feelings coincided, the way she made me feel inside . . .
I could not root out those feelings. I had been rejected, and I wanted to feel them no more, but my heart was not under my command. I loved her still.
At last, weary in body as well as in spirit, I returned home.
I had some respite from my brother, as he was not at home, but at luncheon he returned.
‘Well, brother, do not keep me in suspense. You went to see Sir Walter. What did he say? Did he welcome you with open arms, or did he tell you to come back when you had received a knighthood?’ he asked.
I did not want to speak of it, but it could not be avoided.
‘He gave his consent, but Anne has withdrawn hers,’ I said shortly.
‘Ah.’ He said no more, but sat down at the table, then remarked, ‘I told you she would have no taste for living at sea.’
‘She was played upon by Lady Russell. She was happy to accept me on her own account, and would have braved her father’s lack of warmth, but Lady Russell told her I was not good enough for her—told her that she would hold me back— and she did not have the courage to stand out against her.’
‘I am not surprised. Lady Russell has been like a mother to her for the last five years.’
‘So she told me.’ I paused, as luncheon was brought in, and when we were alone again, I said, ‘But there is a time when every young woman must follow her own inclination, and leave her mother behind.’
‘It seems that, for Anne, that time has not yet come. You had better have something to eat,’ he remarked as my food sat untouched on my plate.
‘I am not hungry.’
‘Come now, it is all for the best. A wife would have been an encumbrance. You would not have been so fearless in battle, knowing you had a wife to mourn you if you were killed, and perhaps children as well.’
‘Hah! Why should I be killed?’ I retorted, sweeping his remarks aside.
‘And if you had been,’ he went on, ignoring me, ‘how would Anne have lived?’
I was uncomfortable with the thought of it, but I told my brother he should not dwell on such nonsense.
‘Make your fortune, come back to Monkford, and ask the lady again,’ was my brother’s advice.
‘That I shall never do. I cannot marry a woman who has no faith in me, and who has no constancy. A word, once given, should be kept. Faithfulness, courage and resolve, these are the things I value. These are the things Anne had, or I thought she had. But I was mistaken, for she had them not,’ I said, still in pain.
‘Then you are lucky to have escaped a match that would not have been to your tastes, for you must have found her out eventually,’ was my brother’s unsympathetic reply.
‘Very true,’ I said.
But I did not mean it.
I could not think it a good thing that Anne had rejected me, and if she had come to me and told me that she had made a mistake, I would have welcomed her with open arms. To have her once again, to hold her . . . but she did not come.
I excused myself from Edward’s whist club this evening.
‘What, staying at home to brood?’ he asked.
I denied it, saying that I was in no mood for company and would read a book instead, but I could not concentrate. I could not stop thinking about Anne. She would not have rejected me if she had truly loved me . . .
But it was folly to think of her, I told myself. She was shallow. Her heart was not as deep as mine, or she could not have told me to go. I would not regret her. I would learn my lesson. I would avoid the fairer sex. I wo
uld win such prizes from the Navy as would set me up for life, and I would have none but the sea as my mistress, for, even with all her moods, she was less capricious than a woman.
I would remain a bachelor for the rest of my days.
1814
Monday 25 July
And so, the Laconia has come into Plymouth at last. The war is over, my fortune is made, and my time at sea is at an end.
I can hardly believe it. The Navy has dominated my life for so many years that it is like a part of me, and I cannot imagine how I will feel when it has gone. No more living on board ship; no more sailing the oceans; no more coming into distant ports, with all the excitement it brings; no more hot, clear skies; no more foreign tongues around me; no more markets with strange and wonderful produce, or palm trees swaying beside white beaches.
And yet, although I am sad to see it go, I find I am looking forward to my new life on shore. I have been away from England for so long that it has all the novelty of a foreign port. The soft, damp sir, the muted colours and the cooling breeze all have their charm, and I am glad to be home.
Tuesday 26 July
I went on shore for a few hours this afternoon, and I was greeted everywhere by cheers and thanks. Men shook me by the hand and children trailed after me, whilst women blessed me for saving them from the scourge of Napoleon. I tried to tell them that I had not won the war single-handedly, but they would have none of it, for they wanted someone to praise, and I was close at hand. And indeed, for the war to have ended at last, when it had been waging for so many years that the children who swarmed around me had never known a time of peace, was a great thing, after all.
Impromptu plays were being performed, with Napoleon— played by a variety of men of all sizes and girths—being defeated as the Allies went into Paris. There were many ribald comments, but it was all good-humoured, and there was the feel of a holiday in the air.
At last I returned to the ship.
‘Admiral Croft is here to see you,’ said my lieutenant, as I went on board, and there, sure enough, was Benjamin.
We clapped each other on the back, and congratulated each other on our service, and when we had talked of Sophia and Edward and all Benjamin’s family, we settled down to talk of other things.
‘I am just on my way back to Taunton,’ he said. ‘Sophy and I are looking at some estates down there. We mean to rent one as soon as possible, for now the war is over, we need somewhere to live. You must come and stay with us when we are settled.’
‘I would like nothing better.’
He told me he had just come from London, where he had been seeing to some business.
‘I have never seen anything like it,’ he said. ‘The streets are thronged with people morning, noon and night. The fuss that was made of the Russians last month was enormous. The Tsar could scarcely appear without provoking spontaneous cheering. The crowd loved him, and they loved his sister, the Grand Duchess, too. A pretty young woman if ever there was one, though young to be a widow, poor lady.’
‘The war has made many widows,’ I said.
‘Ay,’ he said, thinking of some he had known. He roused himself. ‘There was talk of her marrying again, to cement an alliance with England, but I heard the royal dukes were not to her taste. And then, of course, there were the usual arguments about the Princess of Wales, with the Whigs backing her efforts to attend the Royal Drawing-Room and the old Queen saying she could not be received. The public were on Princess Caroline’s side, they booed the Regent when he passed in his carriage, and shouted out, “Love your wife!” but he, as always, took no notice.’
‘And did you see any of the great military men?’
‘It was impossible not to. Blücher was there. He was unable to move without people congratulating him, in fact, he was so surrounded by well-wishers in Hyde Park that he had to stand with his back against a tree! Wellington was there, too, but refused any pomp and circumstance, and rode round with a single groom. There were celebrations everywhere, and still are, with the Regent giving dinner-parties at Carlton House—a fairyland, by all accounts—and making plans for the Jubilee.’
‘London seems awash with news!’
‘It is. If you can get a leave of absence, you must go and see the Jubilee celebrations next week. They promise to be spectacular. There are coloured lanterns in St James’s Park, and there is a Chinese bridge across the canal. There is to be a balloon ascent, and a re-enactment of the storm of Badajoz. And there is something that will interest you, as a naval man, for there is to be a mock Battle of the Nile on the Serpentine.’
‘And how are they to manage that?’ I asked, astonished at the idea of staging a battle in London!
‘With ship’s barges, fitted out with miniature cannon.’
‘It is a good thing we had more than barges at our disposal, or we would never have won anything!’ I remarked. ‘But I will go if I can.’
He took his leave, and I found myself looking forward to the coming weeks: a trip to London, a sojourn with Sophia, and, at last, a chance to visit Edward and meet his new wife.
Friday 29 July
I saw Jenson this afternoon. His ship had just come in, and we exchanged news. He told me that Lencet had been killed in action in January, and he asked about Harville, whom he had not seen since we all served together in the year nine. I told him of Harville’s wound two years ago, but that otherwise Harville, Harriet and their children were well. I told him, too, that Harville’s sister, Fanny, was engaged to Benwick, and he was pleased to hear it.
We talked of our plans now that the war was over. Jenson told me he had decided to go into his family’s business in the wine trade, and was planning to expand it by buying a fleet of ships, so that they could transport the wine as well as buying and selling it.
‘And I suppose you will captain the flagship?’ I asked.
‘Of course!’
I told him about the celebrations in London and we decided to go there. He agreed to join me for breakfast, so that we may set out tomorrow together.
Saturday 30 July
Jenson and I were in the middle of breakfast, making the final plans for our trip to London, when a note arrived for me.
‘I will take a turn on deck,’ said he, preparing to rise.
‘No need,’ I said. ‘It is from Harville. Stay. You will like to hear what he says.’ I unfolded the letter and began to read it aloud. ‘He is in Plymouth . . . is glad I am put in to shore . . . Oh, no!’ I said, as I saw unhappy news, ‘Oh, no!’
‘What is it?’ Jenson asked.
I shook my head in disbelief. I could barely bring myself to say the words.
‘It is Fanny, Harville’s sister. She is dead.’
‘Dead?’ he asked in horror.
I could do no more than nod my head.
‘All the beauty . . . such a superior mind . . . this is terrible news,’ he said. ‘She had all her life before her.’
I read on, my eyes quickly scanning the page, and letting out a groan when I saw what Harville had asked of me.
‘No! Oh, no, I cannot!’ I cried aloud, shrinking from it. And yet, even as I did so, I knew it must be done, and that there was no one better than me to do it.
Captain Wentworth's Diary Page 11
