AKA "The Thing About Flannel Waistcoats"
Barton Park had spared no effort to properly celebrate the marriage of Edward and Elinor. And that was, as had been nearly every action of Sir John Middleton and his family, a blessing to Elinor. After all, there was no other option. John Dashwood could not be expected to find it prudent to host the wedding of his eldest sister, and his wife less so; for Fanny even lamented the time and expense required to stay near Barton, and to visit the happy couple thereafter.
Lady Middleton entertained as she always did, with the utmost elegance. At the wedding dinner, candles shone from every window. The usual fall wreaths and rustic harvest decorations had multiplied and expanded to give a decided air of prosperity to the usually colorless and square great house. Greek dishes of pomegranates and gilded acorns lent an Eastern and festive touch to the décor. Everything was brown and red and gold. All was lovely, except for the parts that were disemboweled by the Middleton offspring, but such was to be expected without the Steele girls present to keep them at bay.
In the midst of all this autumn decadence, Marianne Dashwood looked particularly well. The burnished apple color of her new dress only served to contrast with her honey-colored curls. Marianne's glorious hair managed to escape its restraints in places, although it was tied up in the currently popular imitation of Grecian ladies. Her fair face, which grew steadily warmer and more flushed throughout the evening, as dinner and dances and drink commenced, surely did not elude the notice of the sober colonel.
Brandon himself had broken out of his usual constraints to be more expansive and joyous than on most occasions. Even his clothing reflected this; he wore a well-cut suit that was a warmer brown than usual, and his waistcoat, for all it might be flannel, was a rich red. It closely approached the color of Marianne's own dress, and the two could not have blended their ensembles better if they had planned it. This surely did not escape Mrs. Jennings.
"How well-aligned the Colonel and Miss Marianne are, Charlotte!" she cried. Down to the colors they choose to wear, in fact—the same dull red. They'll be in harmony before the year is out, I am sure of it!"
The dinner was interrupted throughout, by lively toasting, largely on the part of Sir John and his Army friends. Desirous of more male companionship than the Colonel, Mr. Palmer, or Edward Ferrars could offer, (he did not count the Dashwood git) Sir John had invited several of his former colleagues to Barton Park for the festivities. Two of that number were in the service still, and although they did not wear their red coats, their rigid posture and formal bearing clearly indicated their profession. After the dinner, when the dancing began, the Army men set to it with great vigor and enjoyment. Marianne approached the great fireplace, and unintentionally found herself on the fringes of conversation with the two military friends of Sir John. Major Revere, the tall ruddy one, raised a glass to her.
"Miss," he acknowledged with cheerful admiration, for any militia man would admit that the new Miss Dashwood was very agreeable to look at. He then turned back to his shorter companion, one Lieutenant Silas Eccleston, dark, handsome, and with an elegance that compensated for his lack of stature. The two were apparently catching up after some time stationed at an extensive distance.
"The Major lost his command," finished Eccleston, "and I cannot think of a fate more soundly deserved, but a pity that it came at the price of the lives of one quarter of his men."
"Indeed," agreed Revere. "An army man must be in all things prudent, and not to provide the boys with at least one piece of adequate coverage from the elements in all that wind and rain! Masters' letter said that almost half his troop came down with fever."
"As I always say," Lieutenant Silas said with a friendly nod at Marianne, "A soldier without a undercoat of wool, or at least flannel, is a fool, and very likely a dead man should the worst occur."
"Indeed. The mark of a sensible soldier. All the reasonable generals set the example. Even the wild Americans are not without that sense. They say that the Virginia rebel Washington blatantly wore a flannel waistcoat to his inauguration! However—" Revere dropped his voice—" is it really true that the Major refused to provide proper clothing for his men when the rest of the regiments did?"
"Yes—and the poor privates could not afford the added cost—" Eccleston's voice trailed off as the two Army men wandered away from Marianne. That young woman's cheeks began to burn with a slow flush as the terrible realization hit her—That very item of clothing which had led her to ridicule Colonel Brandon, was in fact, part of a respected military uniform, and the sign of good sense and prudence in any British soldier!
She swallowed hard. The rebel general there in the Americas had practically been crowned King of his new colonial nation, and he had chosen to wear flannel as an example of good sense to his subjects? Marianne's romantic side had idolized the American rebels, including the magnificent Washington, troublesome as they had been to the Empire. She still followed their progress in the evenings, when it was her habit to read Sir John's gifted newspaper. More often than she would admit, Marianne supturretiously confiscated it from the table on which Mrs. Dashwood usually laid it, unread.
Marianne walked several paces away from where they had stood, lost in thought, as her cheeks flamed ever brighter. She faced the fireplace, and looked at her shoes, seeing nothing, but hearing, as if it had been recorded for her, the harsh cuts of a memory.
It had been more than a year ago. Marianne was protesting to her mother and Elinor.
"Thirty-five," she had said, "has nothing to do with matrimony."
Elinor protested, very logically, and laid out specific and well-backed arguments. Marianne had blithely sailed past them.
"But he talked of flannel waistcoats," said Marianne; "and with me a flannel waistcoat is invariably connected with aches, cramps, rheumatisms, and every species of ailment that can afflict the old and the feeble."
Now, when she thought of her words, her face flamed scarlet. She felt a little sick, and put her hand against the mantelpiece to steady herself. The music from the great room one door away swirled around her, but she was too downcast to notice. It was a mark of her juvenile lack of sense that she had so quickly made the connection between flannel and age, for after her narrow escape some months ago at Cleveland, Marianne herself had taken to wearing an extra layer of cloth beneath her gowns, which was, now that she thought of it, flannel in at least one of its examples. Besides which, she had accepted several of Elinor's knitted shawls. The chills following her illness had never quite left her, a fact that she was still ashamed to betray to anyone. Random attacks of cold and fatigue overtook Marianne on the best of days, although she pushed through them—for surely at her time of life she could not still be ill!
The worry attended by these symptoms remained unuttered, even to Elinor. Marianne held it close to her heart. She was still conscious of her unfeeling words when she remembered the manner in which she had condemned her sister's self-control. Perhaps, in some imitation of Elinor's superiority in behavior—"No. I compare it to what it ought to have been. I compare it with yours." –she was now sparing her elder sister the strain of solicitude on her behalf. However there was one other who certainly noticed. Twice now she had caught herself mid-shiver, throwing off the tiredness that assailed her now and then, and had seen the Colonel's eyes on her, grave and somber. The set of his mouth concerned her more than anything else. He looked as if he were unutterably sad, yet wished to speak.
Still, there was another day, another memory, that cut even deeper. Marianne put her hand against the mantel, in much the manner that Edward had manhandled their cottage mantel that day he had tried to explain just why he was not married to Miss Steele. She could hear the cut of Willoughby's golden voice in her memory, and she was for once not reminded of her lost love, but of her own cruelty.
"Brandon is just the kind of man," said Willoughby one day, when they were talking of him together, "whom every body speaks well of, and nobody cares about; whom all are delighted to see, and nobody remembers to talk to."
"That is exactly what I think of him," cried Marianne.
"I do not dislike him." Willoughby had continued later. "I consider him, on the contrary, as a very respectable man, who has every body's good word, and nobody's notice; who, has more money than he can spend, more time than he knows how to employ, and two new coats every year."
"Add to which," cried Marianne, "that he has neither genius, taste, nor spirit. That his understanding has no brilliancy, his feelings no ardour, and his voice no expression."
She did not feel that way now. How could she? Nearly since the dread at the London assembly had burst on her, the colour in which she held the Colonel had shifted. He had always been stalwart. Now he became a comfort, even an ally. Marianne began to desire, stealthily, blind to it herself, his presence, almost as if Brandon were a talisman against further disappointment and betrayal. There could be no doubt that an eminent and respectable person such as he was had his uses; Marianne's mother would let her do almost anything within the bounds of propriety if the Colonel were there to supervise; and Brandon could never say no to Marianne. If she had been Margaret's age, and of higher spirits, she might have been tempted to take rather horrible advantage of him.
Every word of Willoughby's, in fact, had been false. Marianne now had a more realistic idea of the Colonel's budget. Though he was of an income exactly near what she had stated as ideal to Elinor, he had had to clear the estate of years' debts, and with only the last four years to do it in, it was a mark of his genius that he had been able to make Delaford profitable. The fact that he had done it without sign of obvious external privation spoke to his worth as an executor. Moreover, Marianne could also testify that Brandon was never idle. Between seeing to his tenants at Delaford, maintaining the estate, serving the community, business in Town, and caring for Miss Williams, he was far less at Barton than she wished him to be. There at least, he offered a her refuge from Mrs. Jennings' endless gossip and prattle.
Marianne let her eyes fall to the floor and attempted to collect her spirits, drawing back from the fire. She was still on the very edge of the room and did not wish to draw attention to herself. Her face was uncomfortably warm but she felt in danger of catching a chill, despite the warmth of her long-sleeved dress. Her reply to Willoughby on that occasion had been worse than his insults. And she was beginning to suspect—although the impression was still unformed—that the Colonel might have far more strength of feeling than she had imagined all those months ago. Perhaps he hid it nearly as well as Elinor. About Elinor she had been entirely wrong. Elinor who now on the other side of the great hall, was laughing, her head thrown back as Marianne had never seen her. She had just finished a set with Edward and looked as well as spoke, her happiness.
Marianne smiled a little, but the unfortunate memory made it difficult to struggle out of her reverie. Again, she remembered Willoughby, with more pain than pleasure:
"There are some people who cannot bear a party of pleasure. Brandon is one of them. He was afraid of catching cold I dare say, and invented this trick for getting out of it. I would lay fifty guineas the letter was of his own writing."
"I have no doubt of it," replied Marianne.
Well she had doubt of it now. In fact, she knew it to be completely otherwise—
"Miss Dashwood."
Marianne started, guilty—and turned to face the Colonel with a conscious look.