by Joan Aiken
At this interesting moment he was called on by the others to regulate the game, and determine some disputable point; and his attention was so totally engaged in the business, and afterwards by the course of the game, as never to revert to what he had been saying before; and Emma, though suffering a good deal from curiosity, dared not remind him.
He proved a very useful addition to their table. Without him, it would have been a party of such very near relations as could have felt little interest, and perhaps maintained little complaisance; but his presence gave variety and secured good manners. He was, in fact, excellently qualified to shine at a round game, and few situations made him appear to greater advantage. He played with spirit, and had a great deal to say; and though no wit himself, could sometimes make use of the wit of an absent friend, and had a lively way of retailing a common-place, or saying a mere nothing, that had great effect at a card-table. The ways and good jokes of Osborne Castle were now added to his ordinary means of entertainment. He repeated the smart sayings of one lady, detailed the oversights of another, and indulged them even with a copy of Lord Osborne’s style of overdrawing himself on both cards.
The clock struck nine while he was thus agreeably occupied; and when Nanny came in with her master’s basin of gruel, he had the pleasure of observing to Mr Watson that he should leave him at supper while he went home to dinner himself. The carriage was ordered to the door, and no entreaties for his staying longer could now avail; for he well knew that if he stayed he must sit down to supper in less than ten minutes, which to a man whose heart had been long fixed on calling his next meal a dinner, was quite insupportable. On finding him determined to go, Margaret began to wink and nod at Elizabeth to ask him to dinner for the following day, and Elizabeth at last not able to resist hints which her own hospitable, social temper more than half seconded, gave the invitation – ‘Would he give Robert the meeting, they should be very happy?’
‘With the greatest pleasure’ was his first reply. In a moment afterwards, ‘That is, if I can possibly get here in time; but I shoot with Lord Osborne, and therefore must not engage. You will not think of me unless you see me.’ And so he departed, delighted with the uncertainty in which he had left it.
***
Margaret, in the joy of her heart, under circumstances which she chose to consider as peculiarly propitious, would willingly have made a confidante of Emma when they were alone for a short time the next morning, and had proceeded so far as to say, ‘The young man who was here last night, my dear Emma, and returns to-day, is more interesting to me than perhaps you may be aware—;’ but Emma, pretending to understand nothing extraordinary in the words, made some very inapplicable reply, and jumping up, ran away from a subject which was odious to her feelings. As Margaret would not allow a doubt to be repeated of Musgrave’s coming to dinner, preparations were made for his entertainment much exceeding what had been deemed necessary the day before; and taking the office of superintendence entirely from her sister, she was half the morning in the kitchen herself, directing and scolding.
After a great deal of indifferent cooking and anxious suspense, however, they were obliged to sit down without their guest. Tom Musgrave never came; and Margaret was at no pains to conceal her vexation under the disappointment, or repress the peevishness of her temper. The peace of the party for the remainder of that day and the whole of the next, which comprised the length of Robert’s and Jane’s visit, was continually invaded by her fretful displeasure and querulous attacks. Elizabeth was the usual object of both. Margaret had just respect enough for her brother’s and sister’s opinion to behave properly by them, but Elizabeth and the maids could never do anything right; and Emma, whom she seemed no longer to think about, found the continuance of the gentle voice beyond her calculation short. Eager to be as little among them as possible, Emma was delighted with the alternative of sitting above with her father, and warmly entreated to be his constant companion each evening; and as Elizabeth loved company of any kind too well not to prefer being below at all risks; as she had rather talk of Croydon with Jane, with every interruption of Margaret’s perverseness, than sit with only her father, who frequently could not endure talking at all, the affair was so settled, as soon as she could be persuaded to believe it no sacrifice on her sister’s part. To Emma the change was most acceptable and delightful. Her father, if ill, required little more than gentleness and silence, and being a man of sense and education, was, if able to converse, a welcome companion. In his chamber Emma was at peace from the dreadful mortifications of unequal society and family discord; from the immediate endurance of hard-hearted prosperity, low-minded conceit, and wrong-headed folly, engrafted on an untoward disposition. She still suffered from them in the contemplation of their existence, in memory and in prospect; but for the moment she ceased to be tortured by their effects. She was at leisure; she could read and think, though her situation was hardly such as to make reflection very soothing. The evils arising from the loss of her uncle were neither trifling nor likely to lessen; and when thought had been freely indulged, in contrasting the past and the present, the employment of mind and dissipation of unpleasant ideas which only reading could produce made her thankfully turn to a book.
The change in her home, society, and style of life, in consequence of the death of one friend and the imprudence of another, had indeed been striking. From being the first object of hope and solicitude to an uncle who had formed her mind with the care of a parent, and of tenderness to an aunt whose amiable temper had delighted to give her every indulgence; from being the life and spirit of a house where all had been comfort and elegance, and the expected heiress of an easy independence, she was become of importance to no one – a burden on those whose affections she could not expect, an addition in a house already overstocked, surrounded by inferior minds, with little chance of domestic comfort, and as little hope of future support. It was well for her that she was naturally cheerful, for the change had been such as might have plunged weak spirits in despondence.
She was very much pressed by Robert and Jane to return with them to Croydon, and had some difficulty in getting a refusal accepted, as they thought too highly of their own kindness and situation to suppose the offer could appear in a less advantageous light to anybody else. Elizabeth gave them her interest, though evidently against her own, in privately urging Emma to go.
‘You do not know what you refuse, Emma,’ said she, ‘nor what you have to bear at home. I would advise you by all means to accept the invitation; there is always something lively going on at Croydon. You will be in company almost every day, and Robert and Jane will be very kind to you. As for me, I shall be no worse off without you than I have been used to be; but poor Margaret’s disagreeable ways are new to you, and they would vex you more than you think for, if you stay at home.’
Emma was of course uninfluenced, except to greater esteem for Elizabeth, by such representations, and the visitors departed without her.
Emma Watson
Jane Austen’s Unfinished Novel Completed
JOAN AIKEN
Chapter 1
What a very fortunate circumstance it was that Robert and Jane chose this day to visit their friends at Alford,’ said Emma Watson, walking into the wash-house with a large bundle of table-linen in her arms.
‘Indeed yes!’ agreed her sister Elizabeth, briskly giving a stir to various tubs of laundry soaking in solutions of household soda and unslaked lime. ‘Those cloths you have there, Emma, can go straight into the copper, unless any of them is badly stained.’
‘Only this handkerchief of my father’s, which has ink on it.’
‘Spread it out in a pan of oxalic acid. Or spirits of sorrel. You will find the bottles next door, on the shelf.’
The wash-house at Stanton Parsonage was a large, draughty room with a York stone floor, a copper, and a range of wooden tubs. The bleaching-room, next to it, was used for ironing, mangling, and drying. These two r
ooms were, of course, on the ground floor, with doors and windows giving on to the stable-yard; all the windows were wide open at the moment to let out the steam.
Both sisters wore pattens, and had tied voluminous linen aprons over their cambric gowns.
‘I do think that Margaret, at least, might have stayed behind and helped us, since she knew poor old Nanny was laid up with her bad foot,’ observed Emma dispassionately, spreading out the stained kerchief in a pan of bleaching solution.
‘Hah! Margaret would be of no more use than a child of three. Less! She would grumble and stand about and argue and complain that the soda spoilt her white hands. No; we go on very well as we are, Emma! I am infinitely obliged to you for your good nature in sharing the work with me, and only thankful that it is such a capital drying-day; if we can get the bed-linen out into the orchard by nine o’clock, everything may well be put away before our guests return for dinner. For once it is an advantage that they like to keep late, fashionable hours.’
‘I am only sorry that you could not go with them, Elizabeth; you never seem to get a day’s holiday.’
‘Oh, it pleases me much better to get this great wash done,’ said Elizabeth simply. ‘Besides I would not, no, I would not at all have wished to go along with Robert and Jane today – not for the universe, indeed! The visit would only arouse the most painful recollections; in fact—’ Her voice was choked, she stood silently over the boiling copper, biting her lips in an effort to control a rising sob, as she stirred the white and steamy brew with a wooden batten.
Emma threw a quick, unhappy glance at her elder sister.
Elizabeth Watson was now twenty-nine, long past all hope of matrimonial prospects. The sisters had been parted for fourteen years, and Emma’s last recollections of Elizabeth were from when the latter was fifteen, a tall, lively, handsome girl, with a fresh complexion and a wonderful head of thick, pale-gold hair, like that of a Nordic princess; now her face was thin, careworn, and at the moment flushed and greasy with steam; the hair, lank and flat, long since concealed under an old-maid’s cap.
It is so unfair, thought Emma helplessly; Eliza was far prettier than either Margaret or Penelope; why should she have been obliged to waste her youth and good looks in this kind of task while they may go away visiting and enjoying themselves?
In a wish to distract her sister’s sad thoughts, she asked a question:
‘Who is this friend of our brother’s that they are to visit at Alford?’
The question was not a lucky one. Elizabeth’s mouth quivered again, but she regained hold of herself and replied:
‘His name is Purvis – I think you have heard me speak of Purvis?’
‘Yes, now I remember, you mentioned him the other evening when you were driving me to the Assembly in Dorking.’
But, recalling the context, Emma’s heart sank, for she could see this was the very last topic to allay her sister’s sad recollections. But the latter went on, as if talking eased her:
‘Purvis was my first, my only love. At the time, he was a curate, over in Abinger. He used to come and relieve my father sometimes on Sundays. And he – I – we liked each other very well. Everybody thought it would have been a match between us. But I am sorry to say that our sister Penelope set him against me. She told him untrue tales about me, that I had a flirtatious disposition and had formerly been plighted to Jeffrey Fortescue – which was wholly untrue – and so – and so – that was the ruin of my happiness.’
‘But why, why, should Penelope play you such a terrible trick?’
‘Because, my dear, she wanted him for herself. She thinks any trick fair for a husband – I only wish she may gain one for herself!’
‘She failed, then, in her plan to ensnare Purvis?’
‘Yes, she failed; he did not like her ways. The end of it was, he discontinued his visits here. And, very shortly afterwards, he removed to a greater distance and married a young lady of some fortune who lived in Leith Hill. And,’ said Elizabeth sighing, ‘I hope he has been happy. But I have never, never since seen another man whom I could love as I loved Purvis. Indeed, I have not seen many at all.’
‘How could one sister so betray another?’ demanded Emma hotly, wringing out a couple of napkins with great force and flinging them into the rinse water. ‘It is the most shocking story I ever heard! I do not like the sound of Penelope. I shall be afraid of her. I hope she does not return home for a long time.’
‘Well, my dear, I daresay she will continue to stay with the Shaws in Chichester as long as she is able to stretch out the visit. She has an eye on a gentleman there, you see, a rich Dr Harding, the uncle of her friend Miss Shaw. He is a great deal older; but she is twenty-five now, so she has not much time left to be looking about her. We cannot afford to pick and choose, you know, there is no provision for us. We must all marry if we can. Still, Penelope cannot prolong her stay for ever, so, sooner or later, you will be obliged to meet her again. Do not trust her, though! Penelope has no scruples, none, if she sees a chance to promote her own advantage. But still, I think she will have a considerable respect for you, although you are the youngest.’
‘For me? I see no reason for that, since I have been returned home like a parcel of unwanted goods,’ said Emma drily.
‘But, Emma, you have such an air of refinement and fashion! That is bound to impress Penelope very much. Those fourteen years you spent with Aunt Turner have turned you into a person of quality, my dear!’
‘And much good may it do me,’ returned Emma with a sigh, ‘since she, or rather her new husband, has cast me off.’
‘It was infamous – considering your expectations – you are greatly to be pitied, I am sure. But still, you need by no means despair of forming an eligible connection – considering your looks, and fashionable appearance, and well-bred way of speaking. Only think what an impression you have already made on Tom Musgrave and Lord Osborne! Just from their setting eyes on you at the Dorking Assembly! I was never so surprised as when they came here to the house!’
‘And what use is that, pray, when they are such worthless beings?’
‘How can you be so proud and fastidious?’ cried Elizabeth in amazement. ‘Why, all other girls I know would give their eye-teeth to be honoured, as you were, by both gentlemen coming to call, and giving you such admiring looks. And then Tom Musgrave coming again, the other evening, and staying to play cards! It was beyond anything, indeed.’
‘Yes, but he soon sheered off and never appeared again when he found that our sister Margaret was come home.’
‘Poor thing,’ said Elizabeth, ‘she is under the delusion of Tom Musgrave’s being more seriously in love with her than he ever was with anybody else. She has been expecting him to come to the point since January. But, of course, he never will. I think (quite between ourselves) that he will never marry unless he can marry somebody very great; Miss Osborne, from the castle, perhaps; or at least some young lady of fortune.’
‘Well, whomever he chooses is quite welcome to him. I think him no better than a rattle,’ said Emma, picking up a basket of damp cloths and walking away into the orchard, which lay beyond the stable-yard, past a duck-pond.
It was a dry, blowy day in October, entirely suitable for the sisters’ great wash. The last of the leaves had fallen from the trees, and been burned, but a few late apples scattered the grass. Emma bit into one, and found it still sweet and firm. As she pegged out the cloths on the line, her spirits could not help insensibly rising. The morning was so fine, and, at the age of nineteen, nothing seems impossible; even if you have been sent home like a parcel of unwanted goods. She looked with pleasure at the prospect around her. It was handsomer and far more spacious than that commanded by her former home, which had been with her Aunt Turner in Shrewsbury town.
Stanton Parsonage lay in a snug hollow of the North Downs, with a wide view opening over the small village of Stanton and on towards
Dorking. The parsonage house was old, but respectable and commodious, the gardens pleasing and well-kept, bordered by a line of spruce firs. Up at the top of the hill lay the small ancient church in its cluster of yews.
I am sure I can be happy here! thought Emma, by no means for the first time. Elizabeth and my father are so sweet-tempered and full of candour. If only my sister Margaret had not come home! For I am not sure that I will be able to make friends with her.
The Margaret in question, Emma’s immediate elder, aged twenty-two years, had returned to Stanton several days earlier, accompanied by their eldest brother Robert and his wife Jane, whom she had been visiting at their home in Croydon. Robert, an attorney, was the most prosperous of the family, having been so fortunate as to marry the daughter of the man whose clerk he had been. Jane had a fortune of six thousand pounds and they occupied a very smart house in Croydon, where they gave genteel parties.
Emma was now joined by Elizabeth, carrying a great basket of sheets, which the two sisters, working together, folded, spread, and hung on the clothes-lines.
‘It is a lucky thing Jane does not see us at such work,’ said Elizabeth cheerfully, draping towels over the hedge. ‘She would never be able to lift up her head in Croydon again if it were known that her sisters-in-law did their own wash.’
‘When do you think she and Robert will return home?’ asked Emma, who had taken a strong dislike to her sister-in-law. ‘And do you think Margaret will return again with them?’
‘I think they had rather take you, my dear,’ Elizabeth answered, laughing. ‘Jane, I can see, has been much impressed by your looks and style; she will be proud to show you off to her fine friends in Croydon.’
