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Page 81
"I know it all, I know it all," cried Mrs Smith. "He had been
introduced to Sir Walter and your sister before I was acquainted with him,
but I heard him speak of them for ever. I know he was invited
and encouraged, and I know he did not choose to go. I can satisfy you,
perhaps, on points which you would little expect; and as to his marriage,
I knew all about it at the time. I was privy to all the fors and againsts;
I was the friend to whom he confided his hopes and plans; and though
I did not know his wife previously, her inferior situation in society,
indeed, rendered that impossible, yet I knew her all her life afterwards,
or at least till within the last two years of her life, and can answer
any question you may wish to put."
"Nay," said Anne, "I have no particular enquiry to make about her.
I have always understood they were not a happy couple. But I should
like to know why, at that time of his life, he should slight
my father's acquaintance as he did. My father was certainly disposed
to take very kind and proper notice of him. Why did Mr Elliot draw back?"
"Mr Elliot," replied Mrs Smith, "at that period of his life,
had one object in view: to make his fortune, and by a rather quicker
process than the law. He was determined to make it by marriage.
He was determined, at least, not to mar it by an imprudent marriage;
and I know it was his belief (whether justly or not, of course
I cannot decide), that your father and sister, in their civilities
and invitations, were designing a match between the heir
and the young lady, and it was impossible that such a match
should have answered his ideas of wealth and independence.
That was his motive for drawing back, I can assure you.
He told me the whole story. He had no concealments with me.
It was curious, that having just left you behind me in Bath,
my first and principal acquaintance on marrying should be your cousin;
and that, through him, I should be continually hearing of your father
and sister. He described one Miss Elliot, and I thought
very affectionately of the other."
"Perhaps," cried Anne, struck by a sudden idea, "you sometimes
spoke of me to Mr Elliot?"
"To be sure I did; very often. I used to boast of my own Anne Elliot,
and vouch for your being a very different creature from--"
She checked herself just in time.
"This accounts for something which Mr Elliot said last night,"
cried Anne. "This explains it. I found he had been used to hear of me.
I could not comprehend how. What wild imaginations one forms where
dear self is concerned! How sure to be mistaken! But I beg your pardon;
I have interrupted you. Mr Elliot married then completely for money?
The circumstances, probably, which first opened your eyes
to his character."
Mrs Smith hesitated a little here. "Oh! those things are too common.
When one lives in the world, a man or woman's marrying for money
is too common to strike one as it ought. I was very young,
and associated only with the young, and we were a thoughtless,
gay set, without any strict rules of conduct. We lived for enjoyment.
I think differently now; time and sickness and sorrow have given me
other notions; but at that period I must own I saw nothing reprehensible
in what Mr Elliot was doing. `To do the best for himself,'
passed as a duty."
"But was not she a very low woman?"
"Yes; which I objected to, but he would not regard. Money, money,
was all that he wanted. Her father was a grazier, her grandfather
had been a butcher, but that was all nothing. She was a fine woman,
had had a decent education, was brought forward by some cousins,
thrown by chance into Mr Elliot's company, and fell in love with him;
and not a difficulty or a scruple was there on his side,
with respect to her birth. All his caution was spent in being secured
of the real amount of her fortune, before he committed himself.
Depend upon it, whatever esteem Mr Elliot may have for his own situation
in life now, as a young man he had not the smallest value for it.
His chance for the Kellynch estate was something, but all the honour
of the family he held as cheap as dirt. I have often heard him declare,
that if baronetcies were saleable, anybody should have his
for fifty pounds, arms and motto, name and livery included;
but I will not pretend to repeat half that I used to hear him say
on that subject. It would not be fair; and yet you ought to have proof,
for what is all this but assertion, and you shall have proof."
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