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Page 85
There was one circumstance in the history of her grievances
of particular irritation. She had good reason to believe that
some property of her husband in the West Indies, which had been
for many years under a sort of sequestration for the payment
of its own incumbrances, might be recoverable by proper measures;
and this property, though not large, would be enough to make
her comparatively rich. But there was nobody to stir in it.
Mr Elliot would do nothing, and she could do nothing herself,
equally disabled from personal exertion by her state of
bodily weakness, and from employing others by her want of money.
She had no natural connexions to assist her even with their counsel,
and she could not afford to purchase the assistance of the law.
This was a cruel aggravation of actually straitened means.
To feel that she ought to be in better circumstances,
that a little trouble in the right place might do it,
and to fear that delay might be even weakening her claims,
was hard to bear.
It was on this point that she had hoped to engage Anne's good offices
with Mr Elliot. She had previously, in the anticipation
of their marriage, been very apprehensive of losing her friend by it;
but on being assured that he could have made no attempt of that nature,
since he did not even know her to be in Bath, it immediately occurred,
that something might be done in her favour by the influence of the woman
he loved, and she had been hastily preparing to interest Anne's feelings,
as far as the observances due to Mr Elliot's character would allow,
when Anne's refutation of the supposed engagement changed
the face of everything; and while it took from her the new-formed hope
of succeeding in the object of her first anxiety, left her at least
the comfort of telling the whole story her own way.
After listening to this full description of Mr Elliot, Anne could not but
express some surprise at Mrs Smith's having spoken of him so favourably
in the beginning of their conversation. "She had seemed to recommend
and praise him!"
"My dear," was Mrs Smith's reply, "there was nothing else to be done.
I considered your marrying him as certain, though he might not yet
have made the offer, and I could no more speak the truth of him,
than if he had been your husband. My heart bled for you,
as I talked of happiness; and yet he is sensible, he is agreeable,
and with such a woman as you, it was not absolutely hopeless.
He was very unkind to his first wife. They were wretched together.
But she was too ignorant and giddy for respect, and he had never loved her.
I was willing to hope that you must fare better."
Anne could just acknowledge within herself such a possibility
of having been induced to marry him, as made her shudder at the idea
of the misery which must have followed. It was just possible that
she might have been persuaded by Lady Russell! And under such
a supposition, which would have been most miserable, when time had
disclosed all, too late?
It was very desirable that Lady Russell should be no longer deceived;
and one of the concluding arrangements of this important conference,
which carried them through the greater part of the morning,
was, that Anne had full liberty to communicate to her friend
everything relative to Mrs Smith, in which his conduct was involved.
Chapter 22
Anne went home to think over all that she had heard. In one point,
her feelings were relieved by this knowledge of Mr Elliot.
There was no longer anything of tenderness due to him. He stood as
opposed to Captain Wentworth, in all his own unwelcome obtrusiveness;
and the evil of his attentions last night, the irremediable mischief
he might have done, was considered with sensations unqualified, unperplexed.
Pity for him was all over. But this was the only point of relief.
In every other respect, in looking around her, or penetrating forward,
she saw more to distrust and to apprehend. She was concerned
for the disappointment and pain Lady Russell would be feeling;
for the mortifications which must be hanging over her father and sister,
and had all the distress of foreseeing many evils, without knowing
how to avert any one of them. She was most thankful for her own
knowledge of him. She had never considered herself as entitled to reward
for not slighting an old friend like Mrs Smith, but here was
a reward indeed springing from it! Mrs Smith had been able to tell her
what no one else could have done. Could the knowledge have
been extended through her family? But this was a vain idea.
She must talk to Lady Russell, tell her, consult with her,
and having done her best, wait the event with as much composure
as possible; and after all, her greatest want of composure would be
in that quarter of the mind which could not be opened to Lady Russell;
in that flow of anxieties and fears which must be all to herself.
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