Sorry for the delay. Yesterday I finished writing my other story (Pirates and Prejudice), so I had no time for another chapter for this story.

Recap from previous chapter: Nicholson and Matthews are found to be murderers and are locked in their room, awaiting the arrival of some soldiers to take them to London. Sir Thomas has spoken with Maria to end her engagement. Sir T wants everyone gone while he breaks the news to Mr Rushworth, in case he becomes aggressive/ dangerous. So the young people all go for a ride.
Oh, and Henry accidentally showed his feelings a bit too much to Fanny and she is very confused about it.

Chapter 15 Departures

Henry had to bite his tongue various times during the ride. Fanny was very quiet and looked pensive. He was afraid he had ruined his chances by speaking his mind at the breakfast table. It was now difficult to stay quiet. She seemed to need the silence to think. But how hard it was for him to not break out in apologies, explanations and other declarations!
He determined that he should leave her the space and wait until she wanted to talk about it.

He started to look around him, observing the fields, which had started to look bare. There were hardly any leaves left on the trees.
He looked ahead at Edmund and Mary. They seemed hardly to be talking to each other. Mary was mostly in conversation with Julia. Maria appeared also to be very quiet, which Henry could understand. It must have been very hard for her that she could not marry the man that she was engaged to. He suspected she didn't love Rushworth, but still there had been plans and dreams and, he guessed, the thought of marriage had been so long on her mind it must be difficult to let it go.

He looked back towards his sister. It seemed the play had driven a wedge between her and Edmund. It was rather sad to see. Henry had seen Edmund sometimes looking at Mary with some longing.
He knew she was often selfish and quite shallow. He knew she had broken hearts before. Wryly he thought about the women that had their hearts broken by himself.
If not for Fanny, he would still be that same person.

Both of them were quiet for most of the ride. On the way back they passed the parsonage again.
A servant called out to him. "Mr Crawford, sir. This express just arrived, along with a stack of letters."
Henry motioned to the rest of the group to continue. He would catch up on them.
He thanked the servant and took the bundle from his hands.
He briefly flicked through it and saw that this must be the evidence that his contact in London sent. How quick! He had not expected this so soon.

He urged his horse on and soon he had caught up with the others. Both Edmund and Fanny looked at him. "More news from London," he answered to their unspoken question.

They all brought their horses to the stables and then entered the house. Edmund thought it best that the ladies would all go to the drawing room first. He needed to find out how his father had fared with his conversation with Rushworth. Henry went with the rest of the group to the drawing room. Lady Bertram and her sister were there, doing their usual activities. Nothing seemed to be amiss.

Soon Sir Thomas and Edmund also entered. Henry was surprised to see Sir Thomas with a black eye. Sir Thomas walked towards Maria and asked how she was. She just nodded and said she was as well as could be.

"I am afraid I have more shocking news to bring," he said to the whole room.
"From today on, Maria is no longer engaged to Mr Rushworth."

Gasps were heard all around the room. It seemed Mrs Norris was the one who was shocked the most.
"I am sure it must be Fanny's fault," Mrs Norris declared. "She was always trying to get Mr Rushworth's attention and now of course he does no longer want to marry Maria." Here her eyes flamed in anger towards Fanny.

"Mrs Norris." Sir Thomas raised his voice in anger. "Stop talking nonsense this instant! Fanny would never do that. It might have even been the other way around." Here Henry looked at Fanny's shocked face. This was a rather careless statement of Sir Thomas.

"Let me continue, and without any interruptions please," he said. "I have been informed, by verifiable sources, that Rushworth's sole purpose for marrying Maria was her dowry, so he could pay off a substantial debt. Besides that, I have reason to believe that he is a rake of the worst kind. I do not wish my daughter to be bound to a person like that."

Opposed to after his news about Nicholson and Matthews, the room now stayed completely silent.

Sir Thomas now looked at Henry. "I believe you received news?" Henry nodded and then stood up, as did Edmund.

"You will excuse me now," Sir Thomas said to his family. "One more thing. Rushworth is packing his bags as we speak. I hope he will have left within the hour. I do not want to scare anyone, but I do believe we should be careful and alert." Here he briefly touched his black eye.
"This means that none of you, especially the ladies, should go anywhere on your own. Ask a footman to accompany you if you go to your room etc." He grimaced. "I hope that the state of my eye will assure you I am perfectly serious about my instructions."

Then he left the room and Henry and Edmund followed him.
Suddenly Sir Thomas turned. "I do not wish to have Fanny staying there. I am afraid she will be verbally attacked. I should have spoken with more care, but Mrs Norris has the ability to vex me in such a way that I nearly forget myself. Edmund, could you get Fanny and bring her as well please?"
Edmund nodded and went back into the drawing room.

Soon all four of them were gathered in the study. The first thing Sir Thomas said was, "I am so truly sorry Fanny, for what I said. I should have reacted more carefully on what your aunt said. I only hope that they will forget it soon."
Fanny nodded, looking still very frightened.

"Now, Crawford, you had news?" Sir Thomas asked.

"Yes sir," Henry replied. "Just when we returned from our ride and passed the parsonage, a servant handed me this and said it had just been delivered." They now all looked at the paper.

The one on the top was a note.

Crawford, it will surprise you that I have already been able to send the evidence concerning Rushworth. It turns out that someone else had already done the work for us. One of my contacts received this from an investigator working for Lord G-. I hope the documents speak for themselves. This could send Rushworth to debtor's prison if he is not able to pay it back in time. Yours etc.

"This is very fortunate!" Edmund exclaimed. "Now, let's see what the documents say."

One by one they perused the letters. The first one showed the amount of debt that Rushworth had to pay back to Lord G-, complete with signatures. Henry nearly whistled when he saw the amount.
"That is an enormous amount!"
"Maria's dowry would never have been enough for him!" Sir Thomas said.

"How is it possible that he has such a large debt?" Fanny wondered.
Henry thought for a moment and then explained. "Lord G- was one of a certain type of person. Very wealthy and very shrewd. These people lend money to others and require interest upon paying back. They often appear quite generous, but in the end you are always loosing out. I have heard about at least two fellows who had a debt to someone like Lord G-, an amount so exorbitant that they were forced to give up their estates to their creditors to settle their debt.
Those type of men get rich over foolish people's backs.
I don't know why Rushworth required such an amount of money, but it was lent to him and now he has to pay it back on a very high interest rate. He has likely waited too long and now the amount has risen out of proportions."

Fanny nodded at his explanation, and the other two as well.

"How did you know this?" Edmund asked. Henry grimaced. "Living in London can give you insight in certain matters. You can understand that this type of news is devoured by the gossips."

"Now, what is next?" Sir Thomas said. They turned back to the documents and found more notes about debts. These were not as large and all had different dates in which they had to be paid back.

"This amounts to such a total that I cannot help but think he might have to sell Sotherton, or maybe at least rent it out to gain some money from it. Even though his estate brings up £12000 annually, for now, he still would get into trouble."
Sir Thomas nodded at Edmund. "Yes, whatever he does, he will have problems!"

Fanny now grimaced. "I cannot imagine his mother will be happy with this news."
Sir Thomas let out a slight chuckle. "That is an understatement, Fanny."

The last few pages were something different. Edmund looked it through first and the further he read, the more his face became red with indignation and mortification. He then handed the document to his father, who also looked it through.
"As I said before, a rake of the worst kind!"

Henry agreed when he saw the pages. It appeared to be a list of names of women that had been seduced by Rushworth and had given birth to a child as a consequence.
"I feel for these women!" Edmund said. "And their children. They will all be shunned for life, because of that scoundrel's actions!" He sounded truly angry.
"I wonder why that investigator had to add this list and why these women are mentioned by name. Would the number not have been enough?"

Henry thought about that. "Perhaps somehow the investigators wanted to use this as a sort of leverage to make Rushworth pay? I do hope this list is not common knowledge and I think it very careless to have it sent to people they don't know. Of course we will not divulge this information, but still it is very shocking. I did not need this list to know what a rake he is."

Now he looked at Fanny who looked so shocked that there were tears in her eyes. Henry thought she must be thinking about how close it had come for her to be on that list. She truly had been fortunate to escape that fate.

"I am sorry, Fanny, to sit in on a conversation as this. My only defence is that I did not exactly know what type of news there was," Sir Thomas said.
"Do not worry, uncle," she said, with some wry humour. "In the past days I have heard so many shocking things that I was sure my limits must have been reached. It appears I was wrong on that account." She grimaced.
Sir Thomas briefly smiled at her. Henry was impressed at her response. She was not afraid to say anything and even appeared to make a little light of it.

Edmund then asked. "So, what do we have to do now with this information? It only confirmed what we already knew. He will be leaving very soon. Do we have to warn him that they're onto him? Or do we have to detain him as well, so he can be deported to London?"

"Your contact did not say anything of the kind," observed Sir Thomas to Henry.
"That is true," Henry replied. "What we now have is written proof that our suspicions were valid. And we have already acted upon our suspicions."

"He will be gone from here soon and then he will meet his due, one way or another," Sir Thomas said. "I don't think we need to do anything with this, despite destroying the documents."

"I cannot help but think," Fanny began, "that if he leaves without some sort of punishment, he will continue to impose on other women and ruin more lives."
Her uncle nodded. "You are right. But what can we do?"
It stayed quiet for a while.

Someone knocked on the door. It was Baddeley. "Sir, as you requested I have come to tell you that Mr Rushworth has left with his things."
"Thank you Baddeley," Sir Thomas said. "Is there someone who could follow him subtly to see where he is going? I do not wish him to come back at night and do more harm."
"I will see to it, sir," Baddeley said and then bowed and left the room again.
"I am so glad to have Baddeley around," Sir Thomas sighed.

"Now, back to our problem. I believe I might have some sort of solution. It is not something that I would normally wish to use, but it might aid us."
Henry looked expectantly at him.
"We could use the power of gossip. Of course it would need to be very subtle and not be retraceable to us. But if we can spread word about his true nature, we can warn people to not fall for him."

Edmund slowly nodded. "While I detest gossip, I can see this might be a useful tool for now."

"I think I approve of this idea," Henry said and he saw Fanny nod as well.

"I will think up a way to get this started," Sir Thomas said. "Now, I believe you young people ought to go and change. It is clear that you have been horse riding." He laughed at their faces.

"Sir, may I ask," Henry began, "How did you come by that black eye?"
Sir Thomas grimaced. "It was nothing really. I believe he panicked when I told him the news. He became aggressive, but before he could do more, Baddeley came in and pulled him away."
"I am glad that it is nothing worse, sir," Edmund smirked.

"Fanny?" her uncle now said. He had stood up and walked towards her, placing his hands on her shoulders. "Do not be afraid. With those three gone by the end of the day, I believe you will be safe again. I do not want to know what Rushworth did to you and you don't have to tell me. I surmised some things from what others said and wrote to me when I was away. I will protect your name and yourself!"

Fanny looked to the floor. "Thank you, sir," was her soft answer.

Then all three walked out of the office.

Fanny had been surprised that she was also allowed in the little meeting. She had first thought it would be best that she did not become involved, so that her uncle would not be suspicious about her interest in the subject.
But he himself had asked her to come and she had understood he did not want her to be subject to a verbal attack, which no doubt would have followed in the drawing room.

Her aunt's vile comment had shocked her to the core, but her uncle's reaction even more. Was nothing hidden? Did he know about Mr Rushworth's unwelcome attentions? How had he known? The meeting had revealed even more distressing news. How glad she was she would never see the man again! But she felt truly upset about all those other women. Her own experiences had been traumatic, but in comparison with the women on that list, she really had had a narrow escape.

Without speaking she followed Edmund upstairs to her room. She quickly got out her riding clothes, but then stood for a while in front of the window, looking out over the gardens.

She thought about the amounts of money. How someone could run up so many debts, was beyond her. She grimaced when she remembered Edmund's comment soon after Rushworth's engagement to Maria. He had said: "If he had not 12000 a year he would be a very stupid fellow."
Even with that money he was stupid, foolish and dangerous.
For a moment Fanny felt pity for Mrs Rushworth. She had not liked the lady, but she did not deserve to have a son like this.

However, she need not have worried about this. Some weeks later they would hear that Mrs Rushworth had thrown her son out of the house and had disinherited him. They then heard he had gone to London, for he seemed to think it an easier place to hide from his creditors. Of course he was caught and the last bit of news was that he had ended up in debtors' prison and was not likely to get out.

The rest of the day most people in the house seemed to be subdued. They all seemed to be waiting for the soldiers to arrive.

Mr Crawford and Mary had returned to the parsonage. Tom and Yates were playing billiards and Julia was watching them. Edmund and Maria were with the others in the drawing room, where Fanny tried to make herself invisible.

It seemed that, though Sir Thomas had contradicted her assumption, Mrs Norris still blamed Fanny for the broken engagement.
Fanny surmised that her aunt must feel it the most, since it was she who had made the contact and had helped on the match. Maybe she did feel guilty, but was not prepared to take that upon her. So instead she found someone else to blame.

When finally a group of six soldiers arrived, everyone seemed glad that something was happening. Sir Thomas and Baddeley went upstairs with them and soon the two men were led out.

Fanny felt very strange. Overall, those men had been there just one day and a night, but with all that had happened, it felt more like a week.
Tom seemed to really feel it and it would take some days before he was back to his old self.
Lady Bertram was very worried about her husband's black eye and said how glad she was that 'that villain' was gone.
Maria and Julia were very quiet. Not only had the former lost her prospects of a marriage, but they both felt the loss of all the activity keenly. The play, the guests, it was all gone now.

While Sir Thomas did not regret that his arrival had disturbed the theatre, he did feel sorry for his daughters, especially for Maria.
He promised them that, once he had settled himself back in the managing of the estate etc. – in about two weeks' time – he would take both girls to London for part of the season. Because he would be with them, he would be able to decide which people would or wouldn't be suitable for his daughters to be acquainted with. Both girls revived because of this news and they spent many a visit talking with Mary to hear what shops they should visit, what parties were important and what other sorts of entertainment would be had in London.

Sir Thomas had asked whether Fanny would like to come too, but she declined his invitation, saying that she had no desire to see London. He had reacted that he understood, but had added: "When we return, we must hold a coming-out ball for you! You deserve to be admired."
Fanny did not reply to this. She did not feel it at all necessary and did not wish for all the attention that would be brought on by a ball.

One morning, some days after the 'villains' were gone, Fanny went out on a ride with Mr Crawford. It had been some time since they had gone together.
He was mostly his usual self, chatting away, pointing out lovely sights, and looking out for her.

Yet, something had shifted in their friendship. Fanny did not know why, or what she could do about it. At some moments, Mr Crawford even seemed nervous.

He had just told her that his uncle had all but summoned him back to London. He had not been there since he came to Mansfield. He would leave the following day, but was not sure when he would come back, likely in the new year.

They stopped at a place where they regularly paused, as it had such a beautiful view.
Mr Crawford was pacing up and down, while his horse was grazing. He had no eyes for the beauty of nature today.

Fanny was holding the halter of her own horse. She wondered what was the matter. She gathered her courage. "Mr Crawford, I can see that something is the matter. Is there something I can do to help you?"

He stopped in front of her and gave a brief smile. Then he said: "It's just that after all these months I have really come to love this place. I do not wish to go back to London, to my old life."

She smiled at him. "You just told me that you will be coming back in the new year! And, if you truly have changed – as your sister has remarked various times – going back there can help you prove that it is a lasting change. I am sure it will help you to see yourself for who you are." Then she stopped, blushing at her forwardness.

Mr Crawford looked surprised. "Thank you, Miss Price, for making me see it in a different light! I will definitely use my time to test myself!"

Then he hesitated. "I… will really miss all of you, but… I will miss you most!"

Sort of a cliffhanger. what will happen next...? ;-)

P.s. I truly made up everything to do with Mr Rushworth's crimes and whatever type of person this Lord G- was. No idea if anything like that exists.