Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters

by Jane Austen; Ben H. Winters

  “Ah,” said Mrs. Dashwood, handing Elinor a file with which to remove the prawn residue clinging ’neath her nails. “I am happy—and he is acquitted.”

  “Not entirely. It may be proper to conceal their engagement (if they are engaged) from Mrs. Smith—and if that is the case, it must be highly expedient for Willoughby to be but little among us on these islands at present. But this is no excuse for their concealing it from us.”

  “Concealing it from us! My dear child, do you accuse Willoughby and Marianne of concealment? This is strange indeed, when your eyes have been reproaching them every day for incautiousness.”

  “I lack no proof of their affection,” said Elinor; “but of their engagement I do.”

  “I am perfectly satisfied of both.”

  “Yet not a syllable has been said to you on the subject, by either of them.”

  “I have not wanted syllables where actions have spoken so plainly. Has not his behaviour to Marianne and to all of us, for at least the last fortnight, declared that he loved and considered her as his future wife? Have we not perfectly understood each other? Has not my consent been daily asked by his looks, his manner, his attentive and affectionate respect? My Elinor, is it possible to doubt their engagement?”

  “I confess,” replied Elinor, “that every circumstance except one is in favour of their engagement; but that one is the total silence of both on the subject, and with me it almost outweighs every other.”

  “How strange this is! You must think wretchedly indeed of Willoughby! Has he been acting a part in his behaviour to your sister all this time? And what is that five-pointed shape you are tracing in prawn guts on the table linen?”

  “Oh! It is merely a—a sort of—a shape that has—that keeps occurring to me somehow.”

  “How odd. Well, do you suppose Willoughby really indifferent to her?”

  “You must remember, my dear mother, that I have never considered this matter as certain. I have had my doubts, I confess; but they are fainter than they were, and they may soon be entirely done away. If we find they write to one another, every fear of mine will be removed.”

  “A mighty concession indeed! But what if the iron sides of the correspondence ship are pierced and sunk by the tusks of some demonic walrus, as you know happens with distressing frequency! I require no such proof. Nothing in my opinion has ever passed to justify doubt; no secrecy has been attempted; all has been uniformly open and unreserved. You cannot doubt your sister’s wishes. It must be Willoughby therefore whom you suspect. But why? Is he not a man of honour and feeling? Has there been any inconsistency on his side to create alarm? Can he be deceitful?”

  “I hope not, I believe not,” cried Elinor, her finger now obsessively tracing the five-pointed star pattern, independent of her control. “I sincerely love Willoughby; and suspicion of his integrity cannot be more painful to yourself than to me. I confess I was startled by his manners this morning. He did not speak like himself, and did not return your kindness with any cordiality. But all this may be explained by such a situation of his affairs as you have supposed: either ‘twas Mrs. Smith’s displeasure, or a pirate captain’s vengeful incarnation, that drove him hence.”

  “You speak very properly. Willoughby certainly does not deserve to be suspected. He has saved Marianne from the giant octopus, and Margaret from the toothsome bluefish! Though we have not known him long, he is no stranger in this part of the world; and who has ever spoken to his disadvantage?”

  They saw nothing of Marianne till dinner-time, when she entered the room and took her place at the table without saying a word. The butter buckets were warmed, the prawns were served in their prawn-boats, but the conversation was strained. Margaret was lost in her own contemplations; Marianne’s eyes were red and swollen, and it seemed as if her tears were even then restrained with difficulty. She avoided the looks of them all, could neither eat nor speak, and after some time, on her mother’s silently pressing her hand with tender compassion, she burst into tears, tore off her butter-bib, and fled the room.

  CHAPTER 16

  MARIANNE WOULD HAVE THOUGHT herself very inexcusable had she been able to sleep the first night after Willoughby’s departure for Sub-Marine Station Beta. She would have been ashamed to look her family in the face the next morning, had she not risen from her bed in more need of repose than when she lay down in it. She was awake the whole night, and she wept the greatest part of it. She got up with a headache, was unable to talk, and unwilling to take even a spoonful of the light breakfast of cold bass-belly soup that Mrs. Dashwood had prepared. Her sensibility was potent enough!

  When breakfast was over she walked out by herself, and wandered in hip-high galoshes through the miry bottomlands to the cottage’s southeast, machete idly chopping at the tangled marsh reeds, indulging the recollection of past enjoyment and crying over the present reverse.

  The evening passed off in the equal indulgence of feeling. She played over every favourite shanty that she had used to play to Willoughby, every air in which their voices had been oftenest joined, and sat at the instrument gazing on every line of music that he had written out for her. She spent whole hours at the pianoforte alternately singing and crying; her voice often totally suspended by her tears. She read nothing but what they had been used to read together, paging for hours on end through the dog-eared tales of deserted islands, revisiting the madness, wolf attacks, and cannibalism which had been the amusement of their idle hours together.

  Such violence of affliction indeed could not be supported for ever; like a tide loses force with the waning moon, it sunk within a few days into a calmer melancholy; but her solitary walks and silent meditations still produced occasional effusions of sorrow as lively as ever.

  No letter from Willoughby came; and none seemed expected by Marianne. Her mother was surprised, and Elinor again became uneasy. But Mrs. Dashwood could find explanations whenever she wanted them.

  “Remember, Elinor,” said she, “how Sir John often rows out to the post-ship by dinghy, and carries our letters back from it. We have already agreed that secrecy may be necessary, and we must acknowledge that it could not be maintained if their correspondence were to pass through Sir John’s hands.”

  Elinor could not deny the truth of this, and she tried to find in it a motive sufficient for their silence. But there was one method so direct, so simple, and in her opinion so eligible of knowing the real state of the affair, and of instantly removing all mystery, that she could not help suggesting it to her mother.

  “Why do you not ask Marianne,” said she, “whether or not she is engaged to Willoughby? From you, her kind and indulgent mother, the question could not give offence.”

  “I would not ask such a question for the world. Supposing it possible that they are not engaged, what distress would such an enquiry inflict! It would be most ungenerous. I would not attempt to force the confidence of anyone, and of my child much less.” Elinor thought this generosity overstrained, considering her sister’s youth, and urged the matter further, but in vain; common sense, common care, common prudence, were all sunk like capsized frigates in the ocean of Mrs. Dashwood’s romantic delicacy.

  One morning, about a week after his leaving the country, Marianne was prevailed on to join her sisters in their usual walk, instead of wandering away by herself. Hitherto she had carefully avoided every companion in her rambles. When Elinor intended to tromp through the quaggy mudflats, she directly stole away towards the beaches; Margaret pleaded for her aid in exploring the island’s southern, cave-pocked face, to discover the truth about the creatures she still swore resided therein, or again ascending Mt. Margaret—but Marianne had chased the memory of the column of curious steam from her mind, too subsumed in her own melancholy contemplations to partake in Margaret’s mounting anxieties. But at length she was secured for a walk by the exertions of Elinor, who greatly disapproved such continual seclusion.

  They walked along the bramble-strewn path that followed the rushing brook—the very
same brook into which Marianne had once tumbled, precipitating her first encounter with the lamented Willoughby. Their journey was undertaken in silence, for Marianne’s mind could not be controlled, and Elinor, satisfied with gaining one point, would not then attempt more. A long stretch of the road lay before them; and on reaching that point, they stopped to look around them.

  Amongst the objects in the scene, they soon discovered an animated one; it was a man riding upstream on the back of a porpoise, a mode of transportation exceedingly rare outside the cosmopolitan districts of Sub-Marine Station Beta. Travelling upon a domesticated sea-beast for a mount marked him certain as a gentleman; and in a moment afterwards Marianne rapturously exclaimed, “It is he! It is indeed! I know it is!” and hastened to meet him.

  Elinor cried out, “Indeed, Marianne, I think you are mistaken. It is not Willoughby. The person is not tall enough for him, and has not his air. And look, too, how he rides unsteady on the back of the porpoise— surely Willoughby would have a surer hand at the fish-rein.”

  “He has, he has,” cried Marianne, “I am sure he has. His air, his coat, his horse, his otter-skin cap. I knew how soon he would come.”

  She walked eagerly on as she spoke, and Elinor quickened her pace to keep up with her. They were soon within thirty yards of the gentleman. Marianne looked again; her heart sunk within her; and abruptly turning round, she was hurrying back when a voice called out, begging her to stop. She turned round with surprise to see and welcome Edward Ferrars.

  He was the only person in the world who could at that moment be forgiven for not being Willoughby; the only one who could have gained a smile from her; but she dispersed her tears to smile on him, and in her sister’s happiness forgot for a time her own disappointment.

  He called an uneasy “Whoa!” to the porpoise, slipped carefully from its back onto the shore, and watched as it swam rapidly back towards the inlet. Edward greeted the girls warmly, and together they walked back to the house on Barton Cove.

  He was welcomed by them all with great cordiality, but especially by Marianne, who showed more warmth of regard in her reception of him than even Elinor herself. To Marianne, indeed, the meeting between Edward and her sister was but a continuation of that unaccountable coldness which she had often observed at Norland in their mutual behaviour. On Edward’s side she found a deficiency of all that a lover ought to look and say on such an occasion. He was confused, seemed scarcely sensible of pleasure in seeing them, looked neither rapturous nor gay, said little but what was forced from him by questions—”Was your ship beset by the sea-fiends on its way in?” “Indeed”; “Where any crewmen killed?” “Some”—and distinguished Elinor by no mark of affection. Marianne saw and listened with increasing surprise. She began almost to feel a dislike of Edward; and it ended by carrying back her thoughts to Willoughby, whose manners formed a striking contrast.

  After a short silence, Marianne asked Edward about their old estate.

  “How does dear, dear Norland look?”

  “Dear, dear Norland,” said Elinor, “probably looks much as it always does at this time of the year. The woods covered with dead leaves, the beaches strewn with matted heaps of dried seaweed.”

  “Oh,” cried Marianne, “with what transporting sensation have I formerly seen them wash up on the shore in their brackish clumps! How have I delighted, as I walked, to see them surround my feet, pulled playfully about by the undertow! Now there is no one to regard them. They are seen only as a nuisance, swept hastily off, and driven as much as possible from the sight.”

  “It is not every one,” said Elinor, “who has your passion for sargassum.”

  “No; my feelings are not often shared, not often understood. But sometimes they are.” As she said this, she sunk into a reverie for a few moments.

  “Have you an agreeable habitation here?” Edward inquired. “Are the Middletons pleasant people?”

  “No, not at all,” answered Marianne. “We could not be more unfortunately situated.”

  “Marianne,” cried her sister, “how can you say so? How can you be so unjust? They are a very respectable family, Mr. Ferrars, and towards us have behaved in the friendliest manner. Have you forgot, Marianne, how many pleasant days we have owed to them?”

  “No,” said Marianne, in a low voice, “nor how many painful moments.”

  Elinor took no notice of this; and directing her attention to their visitor, endeavoured to support something like discourse with him, by talking of their present residence, its conveniences, and Sir John’s ingenious and ancient methods for guarding the shores, notwithstanding the more-than-man-sized jellyfish that had invaded the dance at the beach. These tales extorted from Edward only the occasional questions and remarks. His coldness and reserve mortified her severely: she was vexed and half angry; but resolving to regulate her behaviour to him by the past rather than the present, she avoided every appearance of resentment or displeasure, and treated him as she thought he ought to be treated from the family connection.

  CHAPTER 17

  MRS. DASHWOOD WAS SURPRISED only for a moment at seeing Edward. He received the kindest welcome from her; and shyness, coldness, reserve could not stand against such a reception. They had begun to fail him before he entered the house, and they were quite overcome by the captivating manners of Mrs. Dashwood. Indeed a man could not very well be in love with either of her daughters, without extending the passion to her; and Elinor had the satisfaction of seeing him soon become more like himself. More than likely, she reflected, he was still recovering from sea-sickness, after a long and uneasy journey by water from Sussex; indeed, she thought she detected flecks of vomit on the collar of his tailcoat.

  Now his affections seemed to reanimate towards them all, and his interest in their welfare again became perceptible. And yet, though he was attentive and kind, still he was not in spirits. The whole family perceived it, and Mrs. Dashwood, attributing it to some want of liberality in his mother, sat at the dinner table indignant against all selfish parents.

  “What are Mrs. Ferrars’s views for you at present, Edward?” said she, when dinner was over and they had drawn round the fire; the night was queerly cold, and the fog seemed to gather around the very windows of their shanty, and seep in under the door. “Are you still to be a great politician, in spite of yourself?”

  “No. I hope my mother is now convinced that I have no more talents than inclination for a public life!”

  “But how is your fame to be established? For famous you must be to satisfy all your family; and with no inclination for expense, no affection for strangers, no profession, and no assurance, you may find it a difficult matter.”

  “I shall not attempt it. I have no wish to be distinguished; and have every reason to hope I never shall. Thank Heaven!”

  “You have no ambition, I well know. Your wishes are all moderate.”

  “As moderate as those of the rest of the world. I wish as well as everybody else to be perfectly happy; but, like everybody else it must be in my own way. Greatness will not make me so.”

  “Strange that it would!” cried Marianne. “What have wealth or grandeur to do with happiness?”

  “Grandeur has but little,” said Elinor, “but wealth has much to do with it.”

  “Elinor, for shame!” said Marianne. “Money can only give happiness where there is nothing else to give it. Beyond a competence, it can afford no real satisfaction, as far as mere self is concerned.”

  “Perhaps,” said Elinor, pulling another blanket on top of the two in which she was already wrapped, “we may come to the same point. Your competence and my wealth are very much alike, I dare say; without them, every kind of external comfort must be wanting. Your ideas are only more noble than mine. Come, what is your competence?”

  “About eighteen hundred or two thousand a year; not more than that.”

  Elinor laughed. “Two thousand a year! One thousand I call wealth! I guessed how it would end.”

  “And yet two thousand a year
is a very moderate income,” said Marianne. “A family cannot well be maintained on a smaller. A proper establishment of torchmen, a canoe or two, and treasure dogs, cannot be supported on less. Lead bars on all seaward windows cost at least five hundred alone. I am sure I am not extravagant in my demands.”

  Elinor smiled again, to hear her sister describing so accurately their future expenses at Combe Magna.

  “Treasure dogs!” repeated Edward. “But why must you have treasure dogs? Everybody does not treasure hunt.”

  Marianne coloured as she replied, “But most people do.”

  “I wish,” said Margaret, turning for the first time in many hours from where she sat staring out the fog-crowded southerly window and the mysterious prospect without. “That somebody would give us all a large fortune a-piece.”

  “Oh that they would!” cried Marianne, her cheeks glowing at the delight of such imaginary happiness.

  “I wish also,” Margaret added in a quiet and trembling voice, though the conversation had already moved forward. “That we were far, far from this queer and terrifying place, and that its secrets, whatever they may be, would remain buried here forever.”

  “We are all unanimous in the wish for fortune, I suppose,” said Elinor, “in spite of the insufficiency of wealth. Only I wonder what one would do with it!”

  Marianne looked as if she had no doubt on that point.

  “What magnificent orders would travel from this family to London,” said Edward, “in such an event! What a happy day for booksellers, music-sellers, and driftwood collectors! You, Miss Dashwood, would give a general commission for every new chunk of wood to be sent you, so you might whittle them with your singular expertise—and as for Marianne, I know her greatness of soul, there would not be music enough in London to content her. And books!—The Encyclopedia of Accidental Drownings, The True Account of Roger Smithson’s Journey through the Bowel of a Whale—she would buy them all: She would buy up every copy, I believe, to prevent their falling into unworthy hands! Should not you, Marianne? Forgive me, if I am very saucy. I think this beverage is rather potent.”