Merriment & Wisdom

A Mansfield Park fanfiction

Part Thirty-Seven:

Promises, As They Are Planned

To Mary Crawford's mind, all went as she intended with her visit into Tom's sickroom. Edmund was weary, yet he smiled and bid her enter when she knocked; he accepted her condolences with warmth of feeling and did not once bring up their quarrel at the ball.

Her dark eyes had darted – almost as an afterthought – to Tom's still form on the bed.

Exhausted from a coughing fit he had experienced shortly before Mary arrived, he breathed – rhythmic and raspy – but in so shallow a tone as to be nearly inaudible, his chest rising and falling almost imperceptibly.

She'd nearly been shaking when she saw him so unmoving. Surely not... Surely not yet... Still, she could not help asking, with an uncertain glance over her shoulder, back to Edmund, "Am I come too late?"

Momentarily confused, he batted his eyes and took a step nearer the bedside. Then, as if finally realising what her question meant, he blurted, "Oh, no – good heavens, Miss Crawford, no – my brother only sleeps."

So she left, in better spirits than most women have ever left the sickroom of a friend, unaware she'd been unguarded enough to firmly bar herself unwittingly from the very future with Edmund she saw glittering so near, so within reach.

Shifting on his pillow and turning his head to face Edmund as soon as the door shut behind Mary Crawford, Tom tsked, very softly, "Ah, poor Miss Crawford – I might have known she was waiting for me to pop off." He didn't sound bitter, though, or even as if he blamed her. He gave a little pitying groan. "Well, I hope she hasn't opened the champagne just yet." Because he was about to take her happiness – her plans for a large income and a perfect husband – away before it could even remotely be hers.

"I beg your pardon?" Edmund had heard that his brother spoke, but not what the words were. "Did you need something, Tom?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact – come closer, I want to talk to you."

"You should rest."

Tom let out a hacking cough. "Damn," he wheezed. "Not again."

Edmund began to turn, making for the pitcher of water resting on the wooden chest in front of the bed.

"Don't you dare," gasped Tom, lifting a hand and motioning snappishly with his pointed index finger. "I don't want water. You come here and talk to me. I have something I need to say to you."

Edmund obliged and came closer.

"Closer." His brother sounded almost petulant. "D'you expect me – an invalid – to scream to you across the bloody room?"

"Tom, I'm close enough – what is it?"

Tom grudgingly conceded his weakened vision brought on by illness and from the low lighting of the room might have affected his perception and made his brother seem further off than he actually was. "I don't know how you read your Bible in this rubbish light, Parson Bertram."

"I tried opening the curtains and you wailed and covered your face," Edmund pointed out. "Then you were sick. Twice."

Tom considered this, sucking his teeth pensively, licking at them with a tongue that felt as dry as sandpaper. "Oh. Right. Yes. I'd forgotten. I remember now." Then, "Edmund, if I die–"

"You're going to recover."

"If I die..." He trailed off, wheezing again. "No, perhaps that's not the best way to begin." He knew, after all, if he did die, Edmund would look after the house, the family, the property – all of it – that he would do it better than him. "I need a favour. I don't know how to ask. Is it too grim if I call it a last request? I made a promise to someone..." He inhaled sharply. "If I die, I can't keep it. I'm not afraid of dying. Not on its own. That bugger God will sort me out however he chooses in the end, I suppose."

"Tom!"

"Right. Forgive me. For a moment there, I almost forgot who I was speaking to."

"This promise," said Edmund, haltingly, "could I keep it for you?"

"Very easily, I'm afraid," croaked Tom, lowering his eyelids pitifully. "But it will require you to give something up. Something you've wanted for a long time." He let out a long, dragging breath. "I think you'll be happier for it in the end, or I wouldn't ask – but... I don't want you to hate me more than you already do..."

"Don't talk nonsense – I don't hate you, Tom."

"Good, try to keep that viewpoint, would you? Pray remember, it's not just you cleaning up my mess – I'm giving you the thing I love most in the world if I have to leave it. And I truly believe, Edmund, you could learn, with time, to prefer soft light eyes to dark sparkling ones. I think, too, you might well be plenty content without a live-in harpist in the home – little though you imagine it now. I do know you love harp music, but it becomes awfully twangy after a bit. Its magic spoils easily – like milk."

And – getting at last to the point, the heart of the matter – he told Edmund, then, as succinctly as possible, exactly what he wanted him to do if he died.

Tom doggedly, with many halting pauses and even a bit of teeth-gnashing, described a life that would be admittedly sombre and grey for a while, sad at first due to the ghost of an unfortunate past hovering over it, but would soon settle into domestic bliss with precious few quarrels or even differences of opinion.

"But it means," Tom concluded with a little, self-conscious sniff, "your Miss Crawford will never, never have Mansfield Park. She'll never have this house." Indeed, Mary would not be Edmund's Miss Crawford ever again. A fact which might, in the end, do him a world of good. "Poor Miss Crawford – I hope she hasn't begun counting the silver."


It was late enough for the carriage to be sent for, by the time Mary and Henry were prepared to leave the house and make their way back to the parsonage, yet they opted, instead, to walk.

They had, the pair of them, much to discuss in light of the proof this visit had confirmed regarding all they'd initially suspected when Mrs. Grant told them the news.

"Walk, indeed," muttered Mrs. Norris, in theory to Fanny, who she was herding rather heartlessly towards the stairs, declaring it too late for herself to go back to the White House until the morning, for she'd surely fall and break her neck with there being scarcely a moon tonight, but – in practice – to nobody who was actually following her line of thought. "By what illumination?" She gave a little indignant scoff. "Fairy lights?"

Fanny's one consolation, however, was that Lady Bertram had not had the Crawfords to stay the night as Mrs. Norris seemed to think would have been ideal.

If the notion had been put into Lady Bertram's head accompanied by the Crawford siblings both wishing it so and thus, with very little effort, making it clear they would like nothing better, she might have done, almost as an afterthought, but such had mercifully not occurred.

It would be bad enough, Fanny knew, with her aunt Norris about the corridors at all hours, preventing her from walking freely as she wished – she didn't want actual, proper guests on top of that.

Some small resentment in Fanny had been kindled towards Mr. Crawford this night; she hadn't forgiven him for not having followed his sister into Tom's sickroom, which would have forced her aunt Norris to permit her in as well. Instead, he had been hand-wringing and tea-sipping all the evening away, making big pitying eyes at her. Fanny, though she tried to remind herself she was being more than a touch irrational, expecting someone to read her mind and save her, just like that, simply couldn't see the good in a hand-wringing friend. For all Mr. Crawford's pretty claims of undying friendship and esteem, he wasn't exactly going to assist her by staring at her and sitting beside her aunts for hours on end.

It was positively maddening.

Tom was supposed to be Henry Crawford's friend, too – they were acquainted before Fanny herself arrived at Mansfield as a bride – so why would he not wish to see him? Was he so precious fond of Lady Bertram suddenly as to stay in her drawing-room very near to an entire night, preventing anybody else from leaving it?

And then Mary had come back – looking too pleased for Fanny's comfort, however much she attempted to hide her jubilation with poise and restraint – and reseated herself at her brother's side, and it had been nothing but the both of them hemming and speaking in coddling undertones for what felt to be ages.

Susan did her best to move things along, but she had not the Crawfords' power in the situation and was forced to give it up when even the strongest hints she dared make to Lady Bertram on Fanny's behalf received nothing but blank stares in return.

Nodding a terse goodnight to Mrs. Norris, Fanny began to ascend the stairs ahead of her aunt, ignoring her tiredness and shortness of breath, hoping – by this exertion – to keep well in front of her and not have to address her again until breakfast.

"Go, go," Fanny muttered under her breath, closing her eyes and gripping the railing as she envisioned Henry and Mary walking in the wane moonlight like happy children after a party, "leave. Let there be an end of this suspense. You've seen all you wished to now. Tom is dying, I suppose, if Miss Crawford's so contented as that. Go and plot your pretty futures and condemn me!"

What need had Mary Crawford to stay the night when, if all went how she was planning, she might spend every night of the rest of her life here?

She might well, most evenings hereafter, be tucking in the little dark-eyed, precocious children of herself and Sir Edmund before retiring to the very sitting room Fanny occupied now.

Children who would have little but a passing regard for their poor aunt Fanny dressed in her perpetual mourning colours, installed in a cottage some place, and would know their uncle Tom only from an outdated portrait in the hall, Sir Thomas & Family.

They would recognise their own father's likeness readily along with, perhaps, their Aunt Rushworth, but Tom would be an unexplained stranger.

Fanny had never personally known her grandmother Ward from Huntington (her memory of her Portsmouth grandmother, Grandmother Price, was extraordinarily dim, but it was at least existent) and, in truth, rarely thought of the woman with any considerable interest.

If she'd been much of a mother in her day, poor old Grandmother Ward, none of her three still-living daughters had ever said so.

Fanny couldn't imagine Mary and Edmund's children to be any different. It was outside of human nature and the manner of childhood to even suppose they could be. Tom would never cross their minds.

They might, poor mites, never comprehend, even when they were quite grown up, that their father very nearly was too poor to tempt their mother's hand and they owed their entire existence to a neglected fall – to the death of the smirking young man beside their grandfather in the portrait they passed every day.

It was to this very portrait Fanny crept out with her candle, some minutes later, when she found she could not fall asleep despite being wearied to the very bone.

If she couldn't get by Aunt Norris to see him, she could see his likeness – such as it was.

She gazed upon his face as long as she dared before a sudden scuffling sound – which, in retrospect, she thought might only have been a servant, drawn by the twinkle of light, or a mouse, or even her elusive pug puppy – made her blow her candle out in haste and race back, in the dark, down several long corridors, to Tom's sitting room.

There she panted, one hand on her heart, her back pressed to the door, and slowly slid down onto her bottom.


"So, has Edmund Bertram asked you yet, dearest minx?" inquired Henry, offering his sister his arm as they walked.

Mary took it. "Thank you, Henry, I was having such a difficult time seeing where I was going. I do wish it wasn't always so deadly-dark in the country at night."

"If he's asked you – if you're to be Lady Bertram – you might have a garden of lanterns to light your way to and fro in future."

"Henry... Pray, don't tease." She cocked her head at him and gave his arm a little reprimanding tug. "Of course he hasn't asked yet. His thoughts are all for his brother, as well they should be – but I imagine he will, when it's done, when there are – God rest the current Mr. Bertram's soul – two poor young men less in the world."

"I'm pleased for you, sister, truly." Henry smiled off into the middle distance – as much of it as he could make out, anyway. "You will have your large income and good husband, as you deserve, at last. Although, it does puzzle me why you must wait to speak what you feel."

Mary pursed her lips in confused concentration. "Whatever can you mean by that?"

"Dearest, these things are a matter of dates, and dates can be muddied and mucked about – otherwise what would be the point?" He sighed. Such a sigh as said it was all a trifle to be quickly smoothed over – only a mere trifle. "If you and Edmund Bertram had an understanding – a reasonable promise between yourselves to be married as soon as matters come to be as they are expected to so very shortly – who would have to know? Who would say you'd talked about it too soon, made your plans in too much haste? Don't suppose Lady Bertram, who can't recall what she had for breakfast, even, would remember exactly when you and her son declared your intentions toward each other!"

She rolled her eyes, yet she smiled still. "I take your point, Henry, I do. I see just what you're getting at, and it does you little real discredit, but we are not living in a society run by savages. Some small delay is to be expected – in spite of my eagerness to marry – for mourning, for the propriety of it all."

"Ah, well, you must do as you think best, to be sure," said Henry, "but for myself I don't intend to do much in the way of waiting – she and I have waited long enough as it is."

Mary halted suddenly, nearly making her brother stumble. "You really intend, then, to offer your hand to Fanny?"

"And why not?" exclaimed Henry, with passion. "We love each other, have long loved each other, and she will shortly be without home or protection. Oh, there's no need to interrupt. I know what you will say, Mary, how your dear Sir Edmund to be would never dream of putting her out – I know, he is a good man of superior generosity, otherwise he should be most unworthy of you – but why should Fanny be a widow, be made to endure the unhappiness of being displaced – although not physically dispatched – from the property that was nearly her own through her first advantageous marriage, when she could simply be installed in another nearly as good? What joy can Mansfield hold for her that Everingham should not, once she is accustomed to it?"

"Lucky, lucky girl," conceded Mary, smiling to herself at the thought of her friend being set for life; "it is a piece of fortune to lose one husband and have another lined up to replace him. I've heard Mrs. Norris speak of Fanny's luck in snaring a match with Tom under the family's nose – I wonder what she will say regarding her niece's second match, which, in many ways, as far as her chances of happiness are concerned, may well exceed her first!"

Henry tensed, growing angry. "I hope Mrs. Norris will say nothing at all!" His throat emitted a low growl. "At least not within my hearing – I intend to be less tolerant of her than Mr. Bertram was. The old bat will not have a ready reception at Everingham – Mrs. Norris had better keep to Northamptonshire if she knows what's good for her. She quite makes my blood boil. I was most put out with her this evening – I don't know what she said to poor, dear Fanny, right when you went to see Edmund, but she had her upon the verge tears. She was, all the while we were there, struggling against them, trying to not let me see. I hated to leave her like that."

"No one is going to make you entertain Mrs. Norris if you don't wish it – even Edmund wouldn't ask that of you."

"Good."

They began walking again, arms still linked.

"But, do tell me," Mary said after a pause, "what did you mean about not waiting?"

"I intend to offer Fanny my hand and install her in Everingham as soon as tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?" Mary could not be properly and unaffectedly stupefied by much, but this remark certainly did the trick. "Henry! For mercy's sake, how do you intend to pull it off? She's not free yet!"

"Fret not, dear sister," he tutted soothingly, as he used to do when they were younger and Mary fell and skinned her knee or bruised her shin upon their uncle's furniture. "I've thought it all through. If Fanny is installed at Everingham, then we can be married sooner than the period of mourning would otherwise permit – it would be expected, for the sake of her reputation, that we wed the very moment she's free to do so. No one wants to be whispering about a pretty young widow living a long time unattached in a gentleman's home – they want a wedding to make it respectable.

"Society shall urge us to marry as soon as possible, and I'll gladly agree and make all the hasty arrangements.

"Mrs. Crawford – oh, does the name not sound well, Mary? – will be untouched by cruel gossip, because no one need remember the exact dates of her coming to stay in my home – any servants who try to count back on their fingers or go about implying she is anything but a paragon of unsullied virtue will be dismissed without references."

"Well!" cried Mary. "You've astonished me! That's quite a plan! But aren't you afraid of what the Admiral will say? You know how he hates marriage – he'll detest you for rushing into it. Hypocrite. He might well remember the inconvenience the installation of his mistress brought me not so very long ago! A stepmother, even, would have been preferable to the indignity of that."

"Such venom for nothing, sweet sister! My uncle will never detest me," laughed Henry, nearing a euphoric state where nothing could erode his complete happiness. "How he will dote upon Fanny! Just you wait! He will astonish us both in his civility, no doubt. He'll love her as I do – the moment he sees her he shan't be able to help it. And when he learns she is the sister of William Price? Why, he'll be throwing sables and velvet pelisses at her every time she comes to visit him. Better, though, given his prejudices, that he not know about the matter before it is accomplished, of course."

"Of course," echoed Mary, archly.

"I have no fear whatever of her refusing me – you don't think I shall ask in vain, I hope?"

"The gentleness and gratitude of her nature will surely secure her all for your own, Henry, I haven't the slightest doubt... But, oh, promise to have a care – a certain extra tenderness – when recalling her first attachment – I still believe she never fancied a man before Tom Bertram, and it will be difficult, at first, for her to accustom herself to loving another.

"Certain types of women are volatile when coming into second attachments – it erodes their view of romance. Fanny would never aim to wound you by making the comparison, not intentionally, she is much too sweet. But she may be prone to melancholic remembrances, and you mustn't make her feel badly about them."

"As to that" – Henry oozed confidence regarding this point – "once she sees how it is she ought to be loved, by one who respects her as well as himself... One who does not suffer from poor Mr. Bertram's vices of excessive drinking and gambling... One who can be moulded into whatever she wants him to be – for my better self is all in her keeping, you know... She will marvel she ever thought herself really in love with anyone else. I will make her very happy, Mary! I will maker her happier than she has ever yet been herself, or ever seen anyone else. She shall never shed another tear in her life."

"What? Come, come. You talk nonsense. Is she to have no tears of joy on her wedding day?" teased Mary, squeezing her brother's hand. "Such a deadly dull bride she will make without a trace of emotion permitted on her blank, smiling face."

"That will be the exception, of course."

"Oh, how we shall laugh, Henry, over how I cautioned you to forget her, trying to prevent you from dwelling upon your love for her, never imagining this happy end to all our troubles."

"Poor Mr. Bertram, though," Henry allowed at last. "He wasn't so bad as to deserve an untimely demise. He was foolish and made his wife unhappy – but I doubt he really was at all wicked. No more than most hopeless fools of his nature. He was assuredly not the villain I, in my sorrow for Mrs. Bertram, sometimes made him out to be. I hope he does not suffer overmuch."

"No one on earth wishes Mr. Bertram to suffer – certainly, I've always quite liked him, from the first time I met him in town as a passing acquaintance – but Edmund will do more good with all the Bertram property than his brother might have."

"Indeed – and Fanny, our dearest Fanny, will be better protected by me than she ever was by him. I don't take to running off to Newmarket, having my name unfavourably in the papers, and letting myself fall ill."

"Oh, it is so very dark" – Mary waved her free hand in front of their path – "I cannot see my own fingers move when I wiggle them. Henry, should we have sent for the carriage? I'm sure Dr. Grant would have understood."

"Never mind that, I can still a little better than I fancy you can – if I squint – lean more on me. Besides, would you have traded the length of this valuable discussion for more light and a quicker journey?"

She told him she would not, certainly. "But – Henry – pray, do not make it too apparent at first that you are more worthy of Fanny than Tom Bertram was. Do not let her see you know how you might deserve her. Affect humility until you have been married a while. I would not have your wife who ought to be so happy fancy herself deceived in you, and over so healthy and innocent a pride as your own."

"Oh, Fanny isn't deserved by anyone for their personal merits – not when her own are so vastly superior to any earthly man. No, no – the one who deserves her will be he who loves her most devotedly, he who worships her merit."

"And by that right you deserve her?"

"Yes, just so," said Henry, with confidence. "By that right. Love gives me all the right in the world."

"You will have a sweet little wife, just as you deserve." Mary felt him stop. "Though I will not forgive you for hiding in my wardrobe to spy on her when you believed it hopeless – I will not, so never ask me."

He vowed to never.

"Good," said she. Then, "Tell me, have we come to the parsonage now? You stand still, and I think I see a light ahead."

"We are very near it – it is but a few feet away." Henry released his sister's arm. "You see, Mary? All is well. And now we are to go in, and you must sleep – lest Edmund see you with circles under your eyes and change his mind before it is even made up to begin with." She gave his arm a light slap. "And I must get some sleep as well. The greatest day awaits. Tomorrow, I will begin my future and secure what will make me everything."

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