The following is based on the 2007 BBC miniseries Cranford, which was adapted from Cranford, Mr. Harrison's Confessions, and My Lady Ludlow, all by the Victorian novelist Elizabeth Gaskell.

Chapter 6: Captain Brown Reforms

To keep its inhabitants well supplied with gossip, the town of Cranford required nothing more than a steady stream of revelations and a few outright catastrophes. The year 1843 had thus far provided an extraordinary quantity of both.

To be sure, some of the news had been rather sobering. Illness had very nearly taken Sophy Hutton from them, and it was God's own mercy that her father had been spared yet another loss. Some of the more free-thinking members of the community had dared to whisper that if the young lady had survived, it was down to the efforts of the man of science in their midst. But everyone, pious or otherwise, had to agree that Frank Harrison had once more demonstrated his worth to the village.

The young doctor had seen to poor Mr. Carter as well, and worked another miracle there. Of course it was a shame that Mr. Carter would henceforth be a cripple, but hadn't he been very brave! In fact, to hear Mrs. Forrester tell it, Mr. Carter might as well have survived the Battle of Waterloo.

And when the community had barely finished uttering its prayers of thanks that Miss Hutton and Mr. Carter had remained in its midst, a pair of travelers arrived in town, as if to complete the blessing.

Peter Jenkyns, a son of Cranford, had returned from abroad, and so had Major Gordon, the Brown family's occasional visitor. That first arrival was a source of great joy, to say nothing of relief, to Mr. Jenkyns's surviving sister, Miss Matty, and as well a subject of tremendous interest to the ladies of the village.

Major Gordon's return had prompted an entirely different turn of events: He had at last led Jessie Brown to the altar, and forever banished that sadness from her eyes.

Jessie's surreptitious romance had been a revelation to her poor father, Captain Brown, who had heretofore esteemed his new son-in-law merely as an old family friend and welcome visitor. All the meaningful glances and modest gifts exchanged between the major and Jessie had completely escaped his notice. Why, he hadn't even realized that when she played the spinet and the major sang, their duets were invariably love songs! But the late Miss Deborah Jenkyns had seen it, and Miss Matty too, and the latter had delicately revealed as much to the captain.

Well, Captain Brown had done with misreading people and their intentions. Of that he was resolved. If he'd been too blind to notice a courtship conducted over the course of a decade, or to see that his daughter had very nearly sacrificed her best chance of happiness, and for his sake, he wasn't going to make that mistake a second time.

Besides, he had good neighbors here in Cranford, kind people who had been true friends to him, to Jessie. It was time he returned the favor, and so he now gave himself over to observation of the community, inwardly chuckling to think what a remarkable ally he'd have made for the sharp-eyed Miss Pole if she'd only known what he was about. But providing gossip was not his objective, no, not at all.

No, he had been turning over in his mind a scene he had beheld on the day of the railway explosion. It occupied his mind still, for all that it had lasted but a few moments.

While he'd been bandaged up by the doctors, his friend Mr. Carter had been taken into the next room to prepare for surgery, and Captain Brown could see that Miss Galindo had accompanied him – a strange thing, or so it had seemed at the time. But apparently Carter merely had some commission for her, a document to draft, and so Captain Brown had thought no more about it until things had taken an interesting turn. Carter needed to sign the document but was in a bad way, and so the lady had offered to steady his hand with hers. But from where he was sitting, Brown could see she was very nearly in tears, and as Carter lay there in his miserable state, he was looking up at her with such longing.

Brown wasn't certain what had taken place between them before that, but he knew what he had seen with that one good eye of his: Carter was in love with her, or she with him, or perhaps each with the other.

But since then there had been no announcement, no banns read in church on Sunday, and Carter was moping about at Hanbury, with that Beckett fellow always tending to him. And whenever the captain had met Miss Galindo these days, he'd seen the sorrow in those lovely brown eyes. She and Carter made a pair, didn't they – or no, they didn't, which was precisely the problem.

What the devil was wrong with men? Captain Brown wondered. When confronted with fine women, loyal women, they ran for miles – well, perhaps he shouldn't put it that way, not with what had happened to poor old Carter. But God knows, Major Gordon had made a retreat, gone abroad with his regiment, and tried to forget his Jessie. Surely a man's pride wasn't worth years of loneliness, or the breaking of a woman's heart.

It was not, Captain Brown thought, that Edward Carter would treat a woman dishonorably. No indeed; he was a man of impeccable reputation and sober mien. Still, his estimable character might well be the problem! Boldness was in order, not caution, and perhaps their Mr. Carter would never dare anything without a little encouragement.

Carter was a widower, like himself, but with few friends and no near relations – a cheerless existence Brown couldn't bear to contemplate for long. With no wife, no children to brighten him up, how did Carter bear it? Captain Brown could while away his evenings listening to Jessie play the spinet, or swapping tales of military exploits with his son-in-law, or chatting about Dickens with his neighbors. He even rather enjoyed the fussing and gossip and occasional indignation of the ladies of Cranford, yes, even all the times Miss Deborah Jenkyns had dressed him down for one thing or another.

But Mr. Carter had built himself a life without such complications or, for that matter, pleasures. Oh, he had ideals, all right, and rather radical notions, which Captain Brown admired but didn't always understand, but he was altogether too austere, too solitary.

Still, for all that Carter was serious, distant, and reserved, Captain Brown had taken a liking to him, much as he had warmed to Deborah Jenkyns. Brown chuckled to himself. There was no concealing a good heart, even behind layers of formality. What was it Shakespeare had written about a good heart? Confound it, he couldn't remember the quotation – something about the sun and the moon, and constancy. Anyway, Deborah Jenkyns had had a good heart, and so had Edward Carter.

The trouble was that while Mr. Carter had lost a limb, it had been his heart that had sustained the real damage, or at least he was guarding against the intrusions of well-meaning neighbors and friends.

Well, Captain Brown was his friend, and there you had it. Carter would not be permitted to lock himself away, whether behind doors of wood and iron, or of chilly reserve. Of that Brown was resolved.

And then there was Miss Galindo, Miss Laurentia Galindo, a baronet's daughter, and a spinster past the age of 35. She was older even than his Jessie had been, and yet…and here Captain Brown reproached himself once more for having countenanced Charles Maulver's harsh comment that Jessie had lost her bloom. What fools men were! His Jessie had spent all those years nursing her sister and pining for the major, only to have Charles Maulver turn up and pass judgment on her. What did he know? The major had returned, and so had the glow in Jessie's cheeks. In fact she'd never been prettier.

And with a little tending, Miss Galindo would brighten up too, not that she really needed much of that. Her features were fine, her bearing regal, her figure tidy, and she was, Brown thought, altogether a charming woman. Indeed, it was all to the good that she was no simpering girl with a head full of romance and a mouth full of gossip. She was modest, yes, and often quiet, but she had within her that secret wit, the spirit and humor to challenge a man. Privately Captain Brown thought Miss Galindo the equal of a Shakespearean heroine – a Rosalind, perhaps, or a Beatrice or Portia. A woman with wit and a good, sound heart – yes, that was it. He was counting on the tenderness of her heart.

It would be a sin to permit such a woman to fade into years of neglect and penury – life could be so cruel to spinsters, Brown thought – and surely any decent man would quite agree with him.

And Edward Carter was a decent man, and a sensible one. Brown hoped to God that would be enough.

To be continued...