Emma in Love (10 page)

Emma paused by the gate, and collected herself for the meeting with Jane Fairfax. She had dreamed and invented too long, for her own good; she must appear a casual visitor, albeit one who brought an invitation of some significance to Miss Fairfax's French friend and her employer both.— But, before she could assume the superior and pleasant air for which Mrs. Knightley was as well known as Miss Woodhouse once had been, a short, brown-haired woman appeared on the crest of the lawn; and, as if well accustomed to scampering on the turf there, came down at speed to greet the guest.

“My goodness – Oh, I do believe it is Mrs. Knightley, Augusta! Mrs. Knightley is come to call on us here!”

The announcement was answered almost as soon as it was voiced. Mrs. Elton, as tall and splendidly attired as the other was quietly clothed, descended the lawn as if obeying a summons from a deity, the only one such permitted to dictate the movements of Augusta Elton. A flat basket, filled with peonies and roses, hung on her arm. A silence accompanied the regal descent.

Mrs. Elton assured Mrs. Knightley that she and Mrs. Smallridge (for such indeed was the woman recognised by Emma as the interloper at Hartfield on the occasion of her earlier visit there) had lived in hope of a visit
from Mrs. Knightley. She then proceeded to come up very close, lower her voice, and, in doing so, spill the contents of the flower basket on the ground. Mrs. Smallridge obediently stooped to pick them up.

“My dear Mrs. Knightley,” said Mrs. Elton in a loud whisper, accompanied by an ejection from the lips of a spitting which was unparalleled in Emma's experience, “my dear Emma – we must speak and act with the greatest circumspection. Poor Jane—”

Here Mrs. Elton broke off, allowing Emma the opportunity of observing her companion for a possible reaction to this ominous reference to her children's governess. As Emma had imagined would be the case, Mrs. Smallridge did all she could to conceal her feelings: a clear irritation was, however, visible on her features; and, in order to conceal this further, she stooped to retrieve a fallen bloom, permitting herself a brush from a stinging nettle as she did so. The ensuing cries of compassion from Mrs. Elton; the appearance of Mr. Elton himself, at the sounds of distress from the lower area of the garden – all these assisted in a prevention of Emma's closer inspection of Mrs. Smallridge's true reactions to the subject of Miss Fairfax.

“A sting from a nettle can be very unpleasant at this time of year!” announced Mr. Elton, who bowed to Emma, handed a silk handkerchief to Mrs. Smallridge, and took his wife's hand in his all at the same time.
“There should be none of the noxious weed in the garden – I shall speak to Jesse forthwith on the subject – indeed, I shall dock his wages; he must learn, despite his young age, to do a job properly if it is to be done at all.”

“Indeed, Mr. Elton, you talk of a dock,” said Emma gravely. “I believe you will find that a dock leaf will bring greater relief to a nettle sting than a silk bandanna.”

She walked to the side of the palisade, where further specimens of the offending weed, along with the wide-leafed medicinal plant, grew against wooden palings. Emma plucked one, and handed it to Mrs. Smallridge. The leaf was applied to the angry blister which formed on the hand; Mrs. Smallridge professed herself cured; Mrs. Elton cried out in admiration.

“We are shown to lack the countrywoman's mastery of local lore! Here, in dear Highbury, the wives and witches have not changed their ways!— No, a country herb will prove more efficacious than a surgeon, each man or woman their own apothecary! But—” and here, his wife elbowed away Mr. Elton, who appeared to have been delivered, as if by express, at the bottom of the slope only to find himself now incapable of bestirring from his pose – “but there is no potion, of modern medicine or of country history, which can cure a broken heart— do not you agree, Mrs. Knightley?”

Here, once more, Emma observed a look akin to hatred cross the face of Mrs. Smallridge. The look was
directed upwards, as if the church of St. Mary placed on an eminence above the Vicarage, or at least the upper reaches of the lawn, might be held responsible for the inconvenience suffered by that personage. What did become visible, on the crest of the sward, however, was Jane Fairfax, in a white dress and carrying a bunch of flowers. Emma began to understand; and found it hard to restrain a smile.

“Poor Jane!” said Mrs. Elton once more, her whisper now modified, but loud enough to cause the young woman to whom she alluded to turn her head abruptly, in the walk she had taken to be a solitary one; and to look down, startled at the assembled group.

This is intolerable, thought Emma. A true sense of compassion filled her, for the governess who could not even walk alone without the commentary and irritation of Mrs. Elton and Mrs. Smallridge. I shall go up and rescue her. She needs to find a friend in whom she can place her confidences. She shall come back with me to the Abbey, if she so wishes; and no plea on the part of her employer shall prevent her from accompanying me.

These were Emma's thoughts, which were as rapidly succeeded by a determination to have Jane Fairfax teach at the school at Hartfield, and be freed for ever from the tyranny of the life of a governess. Yes – until she is ready to wed, went Emma's calculations. It is a better thing by far that she should be independent, before Captain
Brocklehurst brings himself to propose marriage to Miss Fairfax— And Emma imagined the beautiful young teacher at the pianoforte in the drawing-room at Hartfield, and the Captain standing by the corner of the shrubbery – just where he had stood earlier with her, entranced by the accomplishment of the young woman he would soon make his bride.

“Mrs. Knightley! My dear Emma!” said Mrs. Elton in a tone which suggested she had already attempted without success to bring herself to her visitor's attention. “I must inform you that it is all most unsatisfactory. We saw Mr. Frank Churchill – yes, none other than he – climb the wall at the eastern boundary of the Vicarage grounds, not half an hour ago. He handed a bouquet to poor Jane. She is quite undone, Mrs. Knightley!”

“The children are in the midst of their lessons,” said Mrs. Smallridge. “It is hard enough to persuade the girls to read the sermons dear Mr. Elton has been kind enough to have bound for them—”

“Sermons?” cried Emma, for she saw Mr. Elton's lips swell with self-importance at the mention of his utterances from the pulpit of St. Mary's. “I think Mr. Elton is as well suited to the composing of a riddle as a sermon, Mrs. Smallridge! It is to be hoped the right album has been put before your daughters – or there will be poems and snippets recited at table that are good enough to bring a blush to any cheek!”

This reference to Mr. Elton's ridiculous riddle, presented to Emma before that reverend gentleman had had the opportunity of visiting Bath and catching there his wife, Augusta, and considered by Emma to be a manifestation of the vicar's love for Harriet Smith, brought an abrupt silence to the sunken garden. Mrs. Elton remarked on the profusion of horse flies to be found at this time of year near the river, and Mrs. Smallridge muttered that she had matters concerning her daughters to attend to, with some urgency.

“The dear Smallridge children are given a French lesson when they tire of a sermon, in the absence of Miss Fairfax,” said Mrs. Elton to Emma when a measure of composure had been regained and the little party strolled along a path which followed the recently-deflected river-bed to higher ground. Emma could not help noting that the sight of the governess walking alone was thus circumvented.

“Indeed—” cried Mrs. Smallridge, who now produced a note of triumph, as if the absconding of Miss Fairfax from the schoolroom could be seen as a stroke of good fortune rather than the opposite. “Here she is! The lesson is doubtless concluded. My dear Baronne, how can I thank you for your kindness today?”

Emma, who had determined to deliver her invitation to the Eltons and their guest, for dinner at Donwell Abbey the following evening; and after this to find Miss
Fairfax and suggest to her, in the utmost confidence, that she consider a post at Hartfield when the school was permanently established there, found her speech halted at the sight of the young woman who now stepped from the open windows of the Vicarage on to the lawn. She had not seen, and for all the admiration expressed at the time, she had not understood, the extraordinary beauty and vivacity of Miss Fairfax's friend, the new visitor to Highbury.

In turn, the Baroness d'Almane walked briskly up to Emma and took her hand. Emma had only the time to see how very strong her eyebrows were – black, forceful and thick, above intense dark eyes – before Mr. Elton, betraying both awkwardness and an irritation that matched that of Mrs. Smallridge, remarked that they were all indeed most obliged to the ‘
chère Baronne
' for the tuition she had just delivered to the children in the Vicarage schoolroom. He murmured something to the effect that Miss Fairfax was sadly indisposed – but here came Miss Fairfax, as if summoned by his words; walking listlessly; but here nonetheless, and her hand the next to be taken by her friend.

Emma issued her invitation. Everything turned to the subject of Miss Fairfax's supposed indisposition. Mrs. Elton would send notice later. Dear Emma would be good enough to understand. Reflecting that she had succeeded once again in not encountering “poor Jane”,
and would therefore be horribly teased by Mr. Knightley on her return, Emma took her leave; and, refusing Mr. Elton's carriage, started on her way back to the Abbey on foot.

She would make no reference – so she determined, and would not permit anyone, least of all Mr. Knightley, to make her break her word – to Miss Fairfax's true state of mind, when she arrived home. Nor – as she would in any case be incapable of such a thing – did she have any desire to describe the unutterably altered condition of her own.

The day grew hotter as it wore on; and Emma would have wished she had taken the offer of Mr. Elton and his carriage if it had not been for the near certainty of the company of either the vicar or his wife, all the way to Donwell. It was preferable to walk.

Besides this, her thoughts were in turmoil. She wondered at the nature of the friendship between the Baroness and Jane Fairfax: she could not help it, but she did. Ideas of Captain Brocklehurst, the fine wedding she envisaged and the ensuing comforts of life at Enscombe – for Jane would be near Frank Churchill, she would be as a sister to him by then, as Emma had decided, and they would be lifelong friends – were all gone to dust.
What must be known; must be explained and understood, was the how, the why and the wherefore of Jane's first encounter with the Frenchwoman. What was her name? Had Jane Fairfax travelled so far – much farther than Emma herself – that she had met so fascinating a creature without, as it might be said, evincing the least surprise at such a phenomenon? Where had Jane Fairfax been?— But Emma knew Mrs. Smallridge's horizons did not stretch to Paris. Could this superior person have been met with at Weymouth? Emma's surmises went far and fast: did Colonel and Mrs. Campbell, of whom Miss Bates spoke so often, have the entrée to a world inhabited by such as the Baroness d'Almane? It seemed improbable in the extreme; but Emma cursed herself for resolutely refusing to listen in all those past years when Miss Bates had read aloud from Jane Fairfax's letters on the subject of Colonel and Mrs. Campbell, their daughter Mrs. Dixon, and the long (and to Emma insufferably trying) evenings enjoyed by that family at Weymouth.

It was not simply a question of the circles in which Miss Fairfax and the Baroness had become acquainted. There was another matter: Emma did not wish to acknowledge it to herself, but as she walked, and the heat increased, her thoughts narrowed, and dwelt only there. Jane's hand had lain a second longer than was customary, even between friends, in the Baroness's
grasp. Emma recalled the cool, strong hand in which her own had been held. But only for a matter of a few trifling instants – a courtesy unnoticed by the Frenchwoman, a greeting with no significance other than that of the most elementary politeness. Had Emma, after a first, quiet glance of appraisal, even been seen? Or seen as much or more than on the first occasion, when Mr. Knightley, much taken with the beautiful stranger to Highbury, had strolled with her in the lime walk?

No, Emma would not think of Mr. Knightley and the visitor – and if she did not, it was because a voice told her of the lack of interest in such as Mr. Knightley, in the heart of the Baroness. She cared for good company. She was exquisite. She was capable, no doubt, of inspiring admiration, even love, in the breasts of men. But the hand she held the longest would belong to Jane Fairfax, or another of her sex. Emma did not know how she was apprised of this; how she knew it, as a horse scents danger or a child the presence of love; but she did. And she knew her questions must be answered; or she would not sleep or rest.

The crest of the hill was reached, but a long trudge lay ahead before the Abbey walls were arrived at. Emma paused by the side of the road, and confessed herself to be hot, though to what extent her condition arose from the temperature of the day and how much from the novel agitation which now possessed her, it would be
impossible to say. She was not sorry, therefore, to hear the wheels of a trap, as it came up the long steep hill behind her; and for a moment – but this would have been too fortunate indeed! – she thought she distinguished the sound of Mr. Perry's carriage – the very conveyance which, by meriting a mention all of four years ago in the secret correspondence of Jane Fairfax and Frank Churchill, had betrayed the existence of their clandestine engagement.

How refreshing it would be, to meet Mr. Perry here! Emma thought of the good doctor as she considered her childhood: a litany of warm and cool drinks, of wrapping up against the cold by Mrs. Weston – or “poor Miss Taylor” – to the specifications of Mr. Perry. And she recalled most of all, perhaps, the kindness of the old doctor, when her father lay dying: he had been ready to appear at any hour of the night or day. He had prescribed as great a quantity of gruel as Mr. Woodhouse could sup, and had refused him nothing that seemed to suggest itself as a remedy for the incurable ailment of extreme old age. Mr. Perry stood for all that Emma did
not
think of, at this strange time; and she welcomed the chance to have him come forward in her thoughts – wholesome, as bland and innocent as her childhood and young womanhood had been. But the carriage did not contain Mr. Perry, as soon became evident. It was Augusta Elton who drew up in her trap; the door was
flung open, and Emma mounted; the day was too hot for the producing of excuses or reasons to continue with a walk.