Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave - Stephanie Barron [102]
And so, I thought, taking the import of her first words, I am warned off. Even a second son of a wastrel is too good for a Miss Austen, without fortune or connexion to recommend her. I could not but think a primary object of Fanny's confidence was to apprise me of my danger in encouraging Lieutenant Hearst's attentions; by suggesting his fickleness, she hoped to wound me, and thus win his attention for herself. Though she lacks the appearance of jealousy, her character suggests she cannot be immune to its bite. But how amusing that she should feel that emotion towards me, when I had despaired of my power before one of her beauty and fortune!
“As a woman so much older than yourself, I must own I have encountered men as charming as the Lieutenant elsewhere,” I said carefully. “Amiable as he may be, I have seen his equal before. Your more sheltered life to date must excuse you.”
At this, she coloured prettily. “I may express too great a partiality for the Lieutenant,” she said. “How else can one who is promised to him be expected to regard him, but as the epitome of all that is good and admirable in a man?” “Promised!” I cried, attempting in vain to recover my wits. “I had not an idea of it! And your mother approves?”
“Oh, Lord! Mamma knows nothing about it,” Fanny said composedly. “The match is unlikely to meet with favour from her, any more than it would have won Isobel's consent—and you know, Isobel's father was my guardian, and at his death the charge passed to her, until I should marry or reach the age of twenty-five. My Uncle John Collins had long acted in lieu of my father, and had strongly advised my mother to find me a husband befitting my fortune—I am possessed of no less than thirty thousand pounds. Me so far persuaded Mamma of the sum's significance, and warned her so repeatedly against fortune hunters, that she will not have me even dance with any man who can claim less than five or ten thousand a year, much less a second son.”
“You do not share her scruple?”
“Where love exists, how can fortune matter?”
How, indeed! Fortune, or lack of it, has been the main impediment to every trifling attachment of my life; it was certainly the means of dividing me from my first love, and my truest—Tom Lefroy.2 Young as we both were, I do not believe we lacked anything conducive to our mutual affection and happiness, but fortune. But I forbore to give way to self-pity, and agreed with Miss Delahoussaye that her comfortable means must allow her to bestow her affections where her heart chose.
“And you have been promised to the Lieutenant how long?”
“These three weeks.”
Three weeks. His attentions to me must, therefore, have been as nothing; I had been deceived by flattery yet again. It is not to be borne!
“I declare,” Miss Delahoussaye said expansively, “but it is a change! I have been wild about Tom for ages, but he was ever of a mind to abuse me unmercifully; and there was a time last summer when I almost thought him promised to a Miss King, and gave him up for lost. But apparently that went off, and when he came to us at Scargrave, there was never a man more attentive! I must believe it the effect of my purple silk; it is a cunning gown, and might almost make my eyes the same shade.”
I made some answer, equal to her speech in its lack of sense, and she continued almost without pause.
“Mamma thought nothing of his presence at the house, it being taken up with mourning; and he would look glum as all whenever she appeared, and pretend to dance attendance on you, only to brighten immediately once she was out of sight, and profess himself violently in love! A capital scheme, I declare! Only now there is the trial, and Tom and I must live apart, and barely speak; not a ball are we to have, or any amusement—”
“Miss Delahoussaye,” I interrupted, “I fail to see where my advice is wanted.”
“But you must tell me what to do!”
“In what manner may I be of assistance?”
“Tom—Lieutenant Hearst—was to go to Isobel the night the Earl died. We had determined that she should be