Snowbear

A Mansfield Park and Pride & Prejudice fanfiction

Chapter Nine:

Anticipating dinner, Tom had no sooner doffed his hat and stood to collect himself in the hallway – he was always a little muddled and numb immediately after a long day and a transformation – than he noticed Fanny approaching him, tears running down her face.

Seeing they were alone, she removed his opal ring from her finger – hand trembling – and held it out to him. "I'm so sorry, Mr. Bertram – I am so very, very sorry to go back on my word." Sucking in a long, raspy breath, she sobbed, "But I c-cannot marry y-you."

"The deuce is all this, Fanny?" he demanded, tired and put out but trying (though not really succeeding) to look sympathetic to her freshest bout of tears. He was beginning to wonder, rather uncharitably, if she ever made it a full week without crying. "What's brought it on? D'you want to marry Crawford now? Has my mutton-headed brother convinced you of our little man's ardent affections at last?"

"No, I don't wish to..." she stammered, stumbling over her words, eyes still streaming "...to marry Mr. Crawford..." Truly, she was starting to wonder if she wouldn't rather be sent away from Mansfield – from Northamptonshire altogether – than suffer that particular fate. "And Edmund isn't mutton-headed."

"He's mutton-headed if I say he is mutton-headed," growled Tom, yet convinced this was his doing. Who else's, after all? "Fanny." His voice was more tempered here, kinder. "Do calm down. I'm not about to ring a peal over you simply because you changed your mind, vexed as I am admittedly feeling about it." He brought a hand to the narrow strip of skin – previously nut-brown and now faded to a light bronze – between his hairline and the edge of his mask, near his upper forehead. "This close to Christmas, I haven't the slightest notion what I'm to do about getting a bride now..." He sighed agitatedly, spinning on his heel before turning back to face her again. "Tell me why."

"Edmund is going to miss his ordination," she cried. "It is meant to take place tomorrow – I saw the letter from Mr. Owen."

Tom growled, "You mean he showed you the letter, of course."

"And he refuses to go back to Lessingby until I've given you up." The ring dropped from her outstretched hand and fell to the carpet with a muffled thunk. "Taking the cloth means everything to him! How can I–" Bending over to retrieve the ring and not realising Tom was doing the same, she accidentality knocked heads with him. "Ouch!"

"Bother this." A hand to his own throbbing head, he turned and strode determinedly down the opposite end of the hallway.

"Mr. Bertram–" She stretched her arm out further, leaning forward onto her toes. "My aunt's ring..."

"Keep it – I'm going to set Edmund to rights, and we can pretend this dashed frustrating conversation never happened. Oh, damn it, my head!"

Fanny mustered her courage and ran after him, lifting her skirts and panting. "Pray, don't – oh, don't! You leave him alone."

"Fanny!"

"Don't hurt him." Each beat of her heart seemed to pound painfully against her aching ribcage.

"You're being ridiculous." He quickened his pace, hoping she'd fall behind. "When have I ever harmed so much as one hair on my brother's dense, self-righteous head?"

There here ensued an uncomfortable pause. Indeed, she could name a few, and he knew it; he did not always play nice. "Mr. Bertram, please!" Her steps slowed involuntarily, legs shaking with the effort to keep up.

She was dreadfully dizzy.

"Trust me," he called over his shoulder. "And go to dinner, for pity's sake – it's draughty in this hallway. I won't have you sneezing throughout our entire wedding. Think how that would look!"

The last thing Fanny wished to do was eat – her stomach was in knots. Still, she obediently turned around and started back towards the dining-room.

She did not know how she could possibly show herself before her uncle and aunt as she currently was, all blotchy from weeping, nose and eyes red and swollen...

All week she had suffered, mostly in silence, while her uncle glowered and Edmund attacked her – albeit so gently each strategy felt far more akin to rough brotherly embraces than to real blows, which only made it worse – every way he could think to, appealing to her sense and modesty and reminding her of all Tom's failings.

He had not given up since that day walking in the shrubbery, and her greatest fear had become her aunt noticing she wore her opal ring – Tom insisted she not put it away – before anyone was allowed to talk to her of the engagement; because, naturally, she had no ready explanation other than the absolute truth...

Nothing had worked, however, as she was resolute upon keeping her promise.

Nothing at all would persuade her, not for a moment, until she realised Edmund would absolutely not leave Mansfield again until he could prevent the marriage he saw as being so unequal, not in terms of wealth, but in that of mind and morals, and would lose out on his dream.

It felt, among other tender pains, very like playing into the Crawfords' own cruel game; Mary would surely thank her for preventing him, and the thought made her ill.

Hesitating outside the dining-room door, Fanny finally resolved to go back upstairs to her attic room and wash her face; it would be better, perhaps, to be chided for being late to dinner than to be in trouble for appearing out of sorts on time.

It was a long walk on tired legs, all the way up to the attic, and she was just dabbing her face dry when she heard a knock at her door.

"Come in." Her voice was hoarse, but she managed to make it sound less despairing than it had been perhaps twenty minutes or so ago.

The latch clicked and Tom entered, looking strange and out of place in the room – this was the first time, she thought, he'd been in here since that bizarre night hiding with spooky Roger Smith... "As Edmund is so precious fond of giving you letters to read, this seemed the most appropriate method." From his raised fingers dangled a folded – even sealed – piece of paper. "Here. For you, little creepmouse."

She took the letter curiously, breaking the wax seal – this was definitely Edmund's, written in his own hand – and squinting in the low light of the single candle she'd lit, she took in its contents.

"My dearest Fanny," she read aloud, "Tom has bade me desist in my attempts to change your mind and insisted I give my full and unreserved blessing to your upcoming marriage. He has informed me, and I plead ignorance for I never imagined it would wound so deeply, of the distress my words caused you, and so I wish them unsaid, for your sake, with all my heart. Pray let us be friends again as though I never thought to advise you differently in this matter." Her eyes flitted from the letter to Tom, leaning against a low beam near the cold, ash-strewn fireplace, his arms folded across his chest. "You saw Edmund write this?"

He nodded, a little too readily – there was clear pride in his stance.

Her puffy, dark-ringed eyes narrowed suspiciously. "You made him write it."

Shrugging, he gestured at the letter. "Read on – there's more." The corners of his mouth curled upward. "It gets better."

Pressing a hand to her mouth, she gasped out, "Oh my. He assures me he will be ordained, there being no question of it, this year or the next, and I must not see his choice either to remain or stay at Mansfield tomorrow as any impediment to keeping my own promises."

"Don't worry – I didn't do anything to him to make him write that."

She thought of how he had twisted Henry Crawford's arm and felt somewhat doubtful of this.

"Oh, come now, don't look at me like that! I promise you I only spoke to him – isn't my word good enough?"

She nodded her consent, but couldn't help asking, "Did you use another of your lies?"

His lips pursed and he looked momentarily confused. Then, somewhere in his eyes behind the mask's slits, a glimmer of comprehension appeared. "You mean did I bluff?" A shake of the head. "Nah, I hadn't any need to go so far. Edmund does care deeply about you – you've always been an especially dear object to him – therefore, convincing him of your acute distress proved more than enough."

Her fingernails dug into the paper, leaving little crescent-shaped marks in the folded corners. "I thank you for thinking of me." Though she was not entirely sure he did.

"Well, then, may I safely conclude you and I are still engaged?"

"Yes, to be sure." If he yet believed her suitable, capable of saving him, this was inducement enough for her to keep her word, and it did take a great deal of anxiety off her mind.

After offering her his arm and insisting upon escorting her down to dinner, Tom added, as they were leaving the room, "Should anything of this sort occur again between tonight and our wedding – if you should have further doubts – come find me and I shall set it to rights. I am usually but a few doors away." He stopped, considering, clearing his throat. "Hem. That is, not actually a few doors – my rooms being on other side of the house and you being in the scary attic..." His mouth pulled itself comically out of shape, into an exaggerated wince. "But, well, hang it all, you must know what I meant to say!"

Dinner was an awkward affair – for all he would later swear, albeit at Tom's glared prompting, the letter he'd written Fanny had not been composed under duress, Edmund could scarcely look at either his cousin or his brother for the full duration of the meal.

Sir Thomas was sullen and, although he drank his wine and ate a little of the cold meat brought out after the soup, most of his plate remained untouched; he had thought Edmund to have greater influence over Fanny's mind and was aggrieved to have brought the young man – the only one doing as he ought and not causing anybody particular grief – home seemingly for no reason at all.

It was fortunate for Mrs. Norris she was not dining with them that evening, as – along with all of the above – Sir Thomas was mentally cursing her for a fool, for putting them all, however long ago, into a situation which had turned into this.

He was thinking, too, what had she ever done for the good of the family, for all her pretty speeches; Maria's marriage did not seem to him so wonderful upon revision – Rushworth, his wealth and standing aside, wasn't the son he wanted. And now both his eldest children would be married to people he did not wish them to be with. Julia and Edmund might do well for themselves – he thought he had detected a tenderness in Edmund for Miss Crawford, and she would do quite well, her good family name and her 20,000 pounds a pleasant thing to ponder when coupled with her equally pleasing personage and pretty manners, if she would have anything to do with them after the snub of her brother, doubtful enough in and of itself...

Julia might have more sense than Tom, though he sometimes wondered.

How could he help it?

Further, as much as Sir Thomas had been growing fond of Fanny since his return from Antigua, recent events had made him cool towards her.

That she should have accepted Tom under the pangs of distress was understandable, in this much he could yet (and stoutly, too) defend her, but her stubborn unwillingness, now she was made to understand it was the family's fervent wish, to end the engagement made the baronet think he had misjudged a great many of what he'd perceived to be her finer qualities.

Nor could the mounting tension in all present save for the always tranquil Lady Bertram, daintily cutting up her meat and sipping her watered-down wine with as much peace in her heavy-lidded expression as she would have had were she on Holiday and half asleep on some exotic veranda, be eased by Tom's insistence this night on sitting beside Fanny and – with a coy glance from behind the slits of his mask – daring anyone to order him to move to his usual seat.

If he had touched her – if he had so much as ran his fingertips over the back of her knuckles as she reached for her silverware, perhaps to draw attention (possibly his mother's) to the opal ring she wore, he would have lit a fuse which would have sent both Edmund and Sir Thomas over the edge. He did not do so, of course, though some of his movements suggested he very well might at any moment, but he certainly seemed to enjoy dancing along this delicate edge, of towing the line between mere taunting and out-and-out provoking.

Fanny was miserable. She could not eat much and wished exceedingly to be back in her cold attic room, to burrow under the familiar linens, blankets, and coverlet of her bed where no one would look at her.

If it had been Edmund, if this whole crucible were undertaken for the sake of real love, she might have – for all its worst horrors – endured near as tranquilly as her aunt Bertram ate her dinner; but to be doing all of this simply to marry Tom, so she did not have to marry Mr. Crawford, to suffer – knowingly on all sides – the punishment of an attachment and not a single advantage apart from knowing – as such a thing was very much ingrained within her – a true lady, whatever her social or familial standing, must keep her promises.

Remarkably, however, had she but known what awaited her after dinner, she would have wished the same dreadful meal stretched on into eternity so she might avoid it.

Rather than permit her to go into the drawing-room and assist her aunt as she was expecting to do, as she nearly always did for at least an hour after dinner, especially if Aunt Norris was not staying the night, Tom decided she was to come with him into his father's study.

And once there, he loudly declared his father would – as the wedding itself must take place at Christmas – consent to his mother being told at last of their plans.

Had Fanny known what Tom was going to say here, and with such ready cool insolence, she would have bolted and made herself scarce before being in a position to be dragged through the doorway and made to seem as though she'd had any part in this shocking speech of her cousin's, but instead she stood rooted to the spot and was blushing cherry-red.

"I regret to inform you, sir, if you will not permit me to tell my mother and fix the date, securing the parish church for the 25th" – and Tom's eyes momentarily disappeared as he blinked very slowly behind his mask – "we – that is, Fanny and myself – will be departing from Mansfield with Smith and the carriage horses to Gretna Green tomorrow night."

This was too much.

Eyes wide, Fanny's lips parted, jaw hanging low, as Sir Thomas shifted his gaze to her, silently asking if this were – any part, little as it seemed likely – her scheme, and receiving all the answer he needed in her gawping doe-eyed expression.

No, poor girl; in this alleged plan of elopement, at least, she was perfectly innocent. She knew nothing; Tom could say as he liked that they'd settled it between them, but it was plain to anyone looking at her she'd never heard a word about it till this very moment.

"Oh," added Tom, snapping his fingers, "and as there isn't time to have all the banns read out, and our dear Fanny is only eighteen, if we are to marry here in Mansfield – we're going to need a marriage licence. I suppose you can procure one for us?"

Sir Thomas folded his hands together and leaned heavily upon his desk. Creeeak. "You do not think much of my intellect, do you?"

"Sir?" said Tom, a quiver of doubt in his tone.

"I know perfectly well you will not elope to Gretna Green." He smiled tightly. "Gretna Green is a full day's journey, by the quickest route with all going well, and the conditions of your curse would make such extensive travelling without prior accommodations near-impossible for you."

"With all due respect, you cannot be certain I haven't made arrangements."

His lips were bloodless with cold rage. "And which arrangements would these be?"

"Well, er..." He rubbed his hands together. "That is... Well, you must know Yates has relatives in Scotland – perhaps I've arranged something with them." He glanced over his shoulder at Fanny. "Or, perhaps, I mean to leave the carriage with Smith partway and carry my bride on my back for the rest – I've done it before."

Fanny's pale brow wrinkled. She hadn't the foggiest idea what he was talking about. Tom had never carried her on his back in his life; he probably, even years ago when she was a child and they'd played many games he was really too old for, would have considered it undignified.

Father and son stared at each other for a long moment, each daring the other to break eye-contact first.

"Tom."

Tom set his jaw and stared harder.

To Fanny's immense shock, Sir Thomas finally looked away, glancing downward at the papers on his desk but not as if he were actually seeing them. "Damn you, Tom, have it your own way, then – tell your mother as you wish – I have done with you." He beckoned Fanny with a curled finger, and she stepped forward. "Never say to me I did not warn you against this step."

"Never, sir," she agreed, speaking to the scuffs on the floor more than to her uncle by all appearances.

"And from this day forward, you will ask my assistance in nothing." Pointing with a paper knife, he motioned to his son at her side. "I wash my hands of you and wish by God I had never brought you into this house. As you wish to be Tom's wife, you will hereafter be obliged to appeal to him for all your needs. See how well he treats you compared to what you are accustomed to, and if you can tell me in a year's time you do not repent your actions, I shall be very much surprised indeed."

Tears welled in her eyes, and she struggled against letting them fall. Two of them escaped, running down the bridge of her nose and splashing onto the desk's edge.

Tom bowed and – taking her arm – dragged her back through the doorway. "Come, Fanny."

In the hallway again, the door closed behind them, Tom exhaled and leaned back against the panelling, chest rising and falling rapidly; it was only then Fanny realised his hands, as he lifted and watched them as though they were unattached from the rest of his body, were shaking violently.

"You were frightened," she murmured, impressed as – from his demeanour in the room – she might never have guessed.

"You cannot imagine how." He dragged in a few more slow breaths, regaining control. "Bluffing usually doesn't work with him." Turning his head, he smiled. "But it needed to be done." Did it? "We are both safe forever – you from Crawford and I from Lady Ravenshaw's niece and from living the rest of my life as one cursed."

"My uncle will never forgive me," she whispered, pulling her arms around herself and shuddering.

"Oh, don't be so pitifully dense, of course he'll forgive you – he's forgiven me for a good deal worse than this in the past, and you've got a much prettier face than I can boast of." He shrugged. "It jolly well pricks my vanity to say so, but it's true enough. You're not the same little runt you were when we left for Antigua and no mistake. At any rate, little mouse, I daresay you're harder to stay cross with."

Fanny was uncertain she believed him. "I can't imagine what you–"

"Oh, if it's an example you're after: he forgave me for losing the Mansfield living for Edmund when my uncle Norris–" Tom broke off, seeing she was stricken. He had decency enough to look uncomfortable upon her account. "Dash it, you didn't know, did you?"

She took a step back, away from him, shaking her head, feeling unwell.

No, she hadn't known.

Of course she hadn't.

If she had, despite everything, curse or no curse, Mr. Crawford or no Mr. Crawford, she wasn't sure she could have agreed to marry him – not knowing he was responsible for bringing the Grants and Crawfords into their lives, responsible for sending Edmund, once he was ordained, as far away as Thornton Lacey when he might have been always as near as a walk to Mansfield Parsonage...

But there was no helping it now.

She simply must cope with the man she'd accepted.

A chill ran up her spine as she began to fear she wouldn't need a year to repent her choice.

At first, Lady Bertram could hardly speak for her stunned surprise. She said, again and again, "Tom, marry Fanny? I cannot say I see any reason for it." To Fanny, aside, taking her wrist gently, "Though I am very pleased, my dear, to finally learn why you are wearing my ring and to discover you came by it honestly." She lowered her voice. "My sister Norris seemed to hint you had taken it from my jewel box, but I told her you could not have done any such thing, as I gave it to Tom such a very long time ago, and besides stealing is not in your nature – you are too good for such meanness. I told my sister as much.

"I meant, for some time, to ask you about it but somehow could never quite remember to – there is always so much heaviness to be considered that one quite forgets trifles, you know. But I am pleased for your own sake your character is exonerated, even if I did not really doubt you."

And here Fanny – and Tom, too, as well as the rest of the household, including the servants – had fully believed her aunt never saw the ring at all, believed her entirely imperceptive of the change to Fanny's left hand!

What else might such seemingly blank, sleepy eyes have taken note of and nearly dismissed in the same placid glance?

"But Tom!" she cried, turning back to her son. "I am astonished. You wish to marry Fanny? Whatever for?"

Tom and Edmund – who was present – exchanged glances as the younger brother was silently asking the elder if he would disclose the real reason or would try to save face.

"Because, ma'am, we believe it would contribute greatly to our mutual benefit and happiness – we should deeply appreciate your blessing."

Edmund snorted and had to attempt to disguise the noise as a cough.

"But I cannot spare her, you know." Lady Bertram's expression grew pinched with distress. "I cannot do without her! I think it is too unfeeling. You cannot have more need of Fanny than I do. No, indeed; you cannot take her from me."

"Why, ma'am, I shall do nothing of the sort!" Tom told her brightly. "Only think, there could be no surer way of keeping her here with you always than if she married the gentleman who is to inherit this house."

(Edmund kept his face turned away; he could not bear the knowledge he must most likely conceal from her forever, that Fanny might now be on the point of becoming the future mistress of Everingham, and for that sort of honour he knew his mother should not have been half so sorry to lose, half so prone to badly missing, her stationary niece.)

Considering this, Lady Bertram softened; it was like seeing the raised fur of an alarmed cat startled out of its wits smoothing back down when offered a tender stroke and a bowl of milk from a familiar hand and learning the imagined danger was never present to begin with. "But you will be sure to take her away on Holiday after your wedding and if Mrs. Norris does not come to sit with me, I do not know who shall."

"I do not plan any such thing in the immediate future," Tom assured her, taking his mother's hand and kissing it before folding his own over it very sweetly indeed. "My wife will be quite at your disposal."

She peered into her son's face, then studied Fanny's heightened colour for a moment. "Humph, we certainly are a handsome family!"

They sat down for over a quarter of an hour before anything further was said about the matter, and Lady Bertram, signalling for Fanny to come and help her untangle a small mess she'd made of her needlework, finally said, "I daresay you were aware, Fanny, that it is the duty of every young woman to accept such a very exceptional offer – I remember I thought of my own duty just the same when I accepted Sir Thomas. I was about your age then. I never realised how similar we are until tonight. I hope you know I am proud of your amiable compliance, though I still cannot properly account for Tom's making you an offer at all! Can you guess what has tempted him to it?"

In a low voice, hoping to prevent them being overheard by her uncle and Edmund, Fanny admitted she could not and hoped this would be the end of the conversation and she would be dismissed back to her former seat.

"I would say the mischief was done at the ball – you remember I sent Chapman to help you that night, and you looked so remarkably well? – except Tom was not there, so I cannot account for it at all!"

The following morning Fanny suffered greatly from sore eyes and a headache which pulsed wickedly just above the one eye that was sorest and made her feel as if a hammer were being taken to her brow.

Although not usually one to shirk her responsibilities, whatever her aunt Norris was fond of saying, when she found herself the last person left in the breakfast-room (Tom was not there, Edmund and Sir Thomas had already had their respective breakfasts, and her aunt Bertram finished well before she did and – taking up Pug in her arms – left with a dreamy expression on her face) and unsolicited by anyone, she crept upstairs to the East room to be alone rather than to the drawing-room to make herself useful.

It was not, on so chill a morning, a pleasant place to be loitering – not without a fire – and she knew she mustn't stay very long, but she hoped to collect her wits and for her blurred vision to clear a bit before she must go back downstairs for warmth and to be at the disposal of others.

She was surprised to discover Edmund there already, waiting for her, standing to look out the window with his hands behind his back, and – for the most fleeting of moments, so automatically, so naturally as was only her way – was very glad to see him before the gloom of the last few interactions between them coupled with her headache dampened her joy considerably.

He had lit a fire for her, and her heart warmed at the sight of its gentle, crackling glow; this was a kindness to bring a smile beyond the confines of her present pain and misery.

And Edmund took this smile as his invitation to begin speaking, though he thought she did not look at all well and – if this forthcoming tête-à-tête were taking place after her spending a usual day with his mother and aunt – he would have discerned her headache and asked her how long she had had it; as the matter stood, however, he thought her engagement and the stress of the family's troubles inducement enough for a great many aliments and, a little guilty, decided to say nothing in that regard.

"Please," she sighed, holding out a hand. "I could not bear another reason from you why I must..." She sucked in a breath, then shakily released it. "That is, I know Tom was very unfair to... But I..."

He took her hand and kissed it, assuring her this was not about her and his brother – no, there was another matter he wished to consult her about.

"I hope you don't imagine, because we have been at odds, I do not esteem your opinion greatly – you are one of my two dearest objects, and the other has not yet come into being. I may not yet speak of her openly."

Fanny swallowed and silently prayed God wouldn't let this conversation go the way she feared it would – not now. Not when she couldn't possibly withstand another blow to the heart.

"You see, a respectable clergyman ought to have a wife, and although she certainly has her faults – what is all affability and manners and what is pure ridiculousness are unfortunately blended in her, I freely admit, as I do not pretend to be such a lover as cannot see reason – I first began to think seriously of her when I considered how kind she tried to be to you."

Strange, how he should suddenly confess – and to her, who he believed her friend and clearly wanted for her sister – Miss Crawford to be ridiculous; Fanny had, despite his early appraisal of her faults (though to be sure he never used the word ridiculous before), rather thought Edmund too far gone to see it.

It was worse, though, if he did see her for what she was and was willing to overlook these faults entirely.

He went on, smiling a little, as if to himself, "I had a great deal of time to observe and think, for it was only myself and Miss Bennet and the Owens at Lessingby, and if I was hesitant, if I was uncertain, meeting Miss Crawford again now, seeing what can or cannot be reasonably breached between two different tempers, wherein concerns a man and a woman, has cleared my doubt – I think it most prudent that I make Mary – if you can pardon my usage of her Christian name – an offer." His brow wrinkled, watching her face twist, vaguely wondering why on earth she appeared as if he had reached over and struck her. Still, he pressed forward as brightly as if they had been only on the sweetest of terms as of late, hoping to smooth it all over with this olive branch. "I only wondered if you – you who knows my heart best, dearest Fanny – thought me capable of bringing out her better qualities and dulling those which she sets off wrongly even when her heart is in the right place."

"Do not ask this advice of me," Fanny said at last, when it was apparent some answer must be given. "You have told me so much in the past, about your love of Miss Crawford, that I think you might now be..." She put a hand to her head and groaned. "So much I think you may now be sorry for, asking me..."

"You defend your friend, as is only right," said Edmund, misunderstanding her entirely – as she, it will turn out, misunderstood him also. "But I have told you my views on Miss Crawford's mind being tainted no longer concern me – I have done. Why ought it prevent me from attaching myself to Mary despite her faults?"

Fanny was aghast. Did he really suppose Miss Crawford would take him despite his being a clergyman? Had Mary since given him reason to suppose such?

Oh.

Oh, no, indeed not.

She saw it clearly, dreadfully, now: Miss Crawford would prevent his ever taking the cloth, once she had a foothold, once they were engaged.

It was too much for Fanny, who – before she could stop herself – hoarsely blurted, with vehemence, "Oh, fix it, then, if you will! Commit and condemn yourself!"

Edmund was understandably hurt. Fanny had never spoken to him so harshly before, and although she seemed already to regret her uncharacteristic outburst, he couldn't prevent one of his own.

Coldly, walking to the door to leave her, he said, with a glance down at the opal ring on her finger, "You would know, I suppose, a great deal about condemning yourself in marriage."

And Fanny wept inconsolably, as angry with herself as she was with him.

More, perhaps.

Because she forgave Edmund.

She did not forgive her own traitorous tongue.

Nor did she forgive herself for being the cause of Edmund's not being ordained this very day, as he ought to have been.

The misunderstanding, of course, was a remarkably simple one.

Despite the lingering freshness of the wound there, Edmund had not been soliciting Fanny's opinion of his making an offer to Mary Crawford.

He had been thinking of Mary Bennet.

The young lady's kindness to Fanny during Lover's Vows – her willingness to read the part of Cottager's wife in her stead – had first gained his attention and good will, in a general sort of way, though not to any great extent, for another Mary had yet ruled his heart, but at Lessingby with that same heart broken by a woman who did not think well of his chosen career, he'd softened to her and began to wonder if – although she was undeniably very different from Miss Crawford – this other Mary might do just as well for him, if not better, than the first.

She had not Fanny's keen understanding and good nature (no more than she had Miss Crawford's natural grace) and this had been to her detriment in his eyes (Fanny, even compared to Miss Crawford, had long been Edmund's model of the perfect, submissive woman) but he had also pitied her, wondering if it was all a mere case of faulty education, which this new Mary might be all too willing to be corrected in.

He surmised she had had no governess when growing up and that her father was something of a sarcastic recluse who had not taught her to think much on serious subjects when he realised she was not naturally inclined to do so, despite her want of being right and proper, unlike her elder sisters.

And, thinking of what Fanny herself might have been if she'd never come to Mansfield, if she had been brought up among a cruder lot, sympathy came far too easily in that quarter.

He did fret Mary was something too gauche to be a respectable clergyman's wife, yet her manner of devouring Conduct Books and her struggle to master the pianoforte (despite having no real ear for music) clearly showed she desired improvement.

Compared to Miss Crawford, who was very 'take me as I am, for I shall not change', this seemed far more agreeable to a gentleman who must have a willing bride who, while not frugal or thrifty (he did not wish to create another Aunt Norris, certainly), would not expect ready extravagances or big London dinners and fancy society.

Seeing Miss Crawford again had clinched it for him. They could not be, could never be, and little raven-haired Miss Bennet – who was really very pretty in her own right, if only she might learn to squint and pout a trifle less in company – was now his primary object.

Edmund had rather thought Fanny would be delighted, would encourage and promote the match, would welcome poor hapless Miss Bennet as a new cousin with open arms, and – mistaking her reaction – thought her defensive of her friend's loveliness compared to Miss Bennet's seeming deficiency (it truly never occurred to him Fanny might not care whether either Crawford sibling was dead or alive except as they were the darlings of others she actually loved) and thus greatly unfair to him, given what she herself was doing, throwing over Henry Crawford, who certainly would have her even now if she could be wrested away from her promise to Tom...

If anything, he had hoped Fanny might gently advise him as to their over-similarity of gloomy temperament and inclination towards a degree of rigidity and ask him if he thought this was something he, as a husband without a more cheerful wife to raise his spirits, could endure after the first spell of infatuation began to fade and lose its original rosy gleam.

This had been his chief doubt and he had hoped she would advise him a bit and set his mind at ease.

An outburst of ill-will, and from one so sweet as Fanny, he had never remotely considered as a possible outcome of their conversation!

Why, the worst Mary Bennet could do to humiliate him, poor creature, was turn up at some ball or other horribly over-trimmed and trilling like an off-key nightingale, elbowing more accomplished ladies off the piano-stool in her eagerness for her own turn, and he thought such a possible display was not altogether unbearable, though undesirable, thought it something she might very well grow out of in time – whereas Tom's gambling and other excesses, however hampered by the confines of the curse at present, were almost certain to bring Fanny grief!

How dare she judge him!

He had taught her to judge, to reason, and now she abused that very reason!

She had hurt him, perhaps irrevocably.

And he spent a great deal of time that day out of doors, trying to forget altogether she had dealt him this blow which so wounded and for which he did not, at present, know of any balm for.

Everything he might think of to soothe himself and to repair the damage between them only chafed, only jested and poked at scars which were yet too tender to be mocked without causing great pain.

A/N: Reviews welcome, replies could be delayed.