Persuasion: The Wild and Wanton Edition Page 15

  The first heedless scheme had been to go in the morning and return at night; but to this Mr. Musgrove, for the sake of his horses, would not consent; and when it came to be rationally considered, a day in the middle of November would not leave much time for seeing a new place, after deducting seven hours, as the nature of the country required, for going and returning. They were, consequently, to stay the night there, and not to be expected back till the next day’s dinner. This was felt to be a considerable amendment; and though they all met at the Great House at rather an early breakfast hour, and set off very punctually, it was so much past noon before the two carriages, Mr. Musgrove’s coach containing the four ladies, and Charles’s curricle, in which he drove Captain Wentworth, were descending the long hill into Lyme, and entering upon the still steeper street of the town itself, that it was very evident they would not have more than time for looking about them, before the light and warmth of the day were gone.

  After securing accommodations, and ordering a dinner at one of the inns, the next thing to be done was unquestionably to walk directly down to the sea. They were come too late in the year for any amusement or variety which Lyme, as a public place, might offer. The rooms were shut up, the lodgers almost all gone, scarcely any family but of the residents left; and, as there is nothing to admire in the buildings themselves, the remarkable situation of the town, the principal street almost hurrying into the water, the walk to the Cobb, skirting round the pleasant little bay, which, in the season, is animated with bathing machines and company; the Cobb itself, its old wonders and new improvements, with the very beautiful line of cliffs stretching out to the east of the town, are what the stranger’s eye will seek; and a very strange stranger it must be, who does not see charms in the immediate environs of Lyme, to make him wish to know it better. The scenes in its neighbourhood, Charmouth, with its high grounds and extensive sweeps of country, and still more, its sweet, retired bay, backed by dark cliffs, where fragments of low rock among the sands, make it the happiest spot for watching the flow of the tide, for sitting in unwearied contemplation; the woody varieties of the cheerful village of Up Lyme; and, above all, Pinny, with its green chasms between romantic rocks, where the scattered forest trees and orchards of luxuriant growth, declare that many a generation must have passed away since the first partial falling of the cliff prepared the ground for such a state, where a scene so wonderful and so lovely is exhibited, as may more than equal any of the resembling scenes of the far-famed Isle of Wight: these places must be visited, and visited again, to make the worth of Lyme understood.

  The party from Uppercross passing down by the now deserted and melancholy looking rooms, and still descending, soon found themselves on the sea-shore; and lingering only, as all must linger and gaze on a first return to the sea, who ever deserved to look on it at all, proceeded towards the Cobb, equally their object in itself and on Captain Wentworth’s account: for in a small house, near the foot of an old pier of unknown date, were the Harvilles settled. Captain Wentworth turned in to call on his friend; the others walked on, and he was to join them on the Cobb.

  They were by no means tired of wondering and admiring; and not even Louisa seemed to feel that they had parted with Captain Wentworth long, when they saw him coming after them, with three companions, all well known already, by description, to be Captain and Mrs. Harville, and a Captain Benwick, who was staying with them.

  Captain Benwick had some time ago been first lieutenant of the Laconia; and the account which Captain Wentworth had given of him, on his return from Lyme before, his warm praise of him as an excellent young man and an officer, whom he had always valued highly, which must have stamped him well in the esteem of every listener, had been followed by a little history of his private life, which rendered him perfectly interesting in the eyes of all the ladies. He had been engaged to Captain Harville’s sister, and was now mourning her loss. They had been a year or two waiting for fortune and promotion. Fortune came, his prize-money as lieutenant being great; promotion, too, came at last; but Fanny Harville did not live to know it. She had died the preceding summer while he was at sea.

  Captain Wentworth believed it impossible for man to be more attached to woman than poor Benwick had been to Fanny Harville, or to be more deeply afflicted under the dreadful change. He considered his disposition as of the sort which must suffer heavily, uniting very strong feelings with quiet, serious, and retiring manners, and a decided taste for reading, and sedentary pursuits. To finish the interest of the story, the friendship between him and the Harvilles seemed, if possible, augmented by the event which closed all their views of alliance, and Captain Benwick was now living with them entirely. Captain Harville had taken his present house for half a year; his taste, and his health, and his fortune, all directing him to a residence inexpensive, and by the sea; and the grandeur of the country, and the retirement of Lyme in the winter, appeared exactly adapted to Captain Benwick’s state of mind. The sympathy and good-will excited towards Captain Benwick was very great.

  “And yet,” said Anne to herself, as they now moved forward to meet the party, her eyes straying to the spectacularly built form of Captain Wentworth without her permission, “he has not, perhaps, a more sorrowing heart than I have. I cannot believe his prospects so blighted for ever. He is younger than I am; younger in feeling, if not in fact; younger as a man. He will rally again, and be happy with another.”

  They all met, and were introduced. Captain Harville was a tall, dark man, with a sensible, benevolent countenance; a little lame; and from strong features and want of health, looking much older than Captain Wentworth. Captain Benwick looked, and was, the youngest of the three, and, compared with either of them, a little man. He had a pleasing face and a melancholy air, just as he ought to have, and drew back from conversation.

  Captain Harville, though not equalling Captain Wentworth in manners, was a perfect gentleman, unaffected, warm, and obliging. Mrs. Harville, a degree less polished than her husband, seemed, however, to have the same good feelings; and nothing could be more pleasant than their desire of considering the whole party as friends of their own, because the friends of Captain Wentworth, or more kindly hospitable than their entreaties for their all promising to dine with them. The dinner, already ordered at the inn, was at last, though unwillingly, accepted as a excuse; but they seemed almost hurt that Captain Wentworth should have brought any such party to Lyme, without considering it as a thing of course that they should dine with them.

  There was so much attachment to Captain Wentworth in all this, and such a bewitching charm in a degree of hospitality so uncommon, so unlike the usual style of give-and-take invitations, and dinners of formality and display, that Anne felt her spirits not likely to be benefited by an increasing acquaintance among his brother-officers. “These would have been all my friends,” was her thought; and she had to struggle against a great tendency to lowness.

  On quitting the Cobb, they all went indoors with their new friends, and found rooms so small as none but those who invite from the heart could think capable of accommodating so many. Anne had a moment’s astonishment on the subject herself; but it was soon lost in the pleasanter feelings which sprang from the sight of all the ingenious contrivances and nice arrangements of Captain Harville, to turn the actual space to the best account, to supply the deficiencies of lodging-house furniture, and defend the windows and doors against the winter storms to be expected. The varieties in the fitting-up of the rooms, where the common necessaries provided by the owner, in the common indifferent plight, were contrasted with some few articles of a rare species of wood, excellently worked up, and with something curious and valuable from all the distant countries Captain Harville had visited, were more than amusing to Anne; connected as it all was with his profession, the fruit of its labours, the effect of its influence on his habits, the picture of repose and domestic happiness it presented, made it to her a something more, or less, than gratification.

  Captain Harville was no reader; but
he had contrived excellent accommodations, and fashioned very pretty shelves, for a tolerable collection of well-bound volumes, the property of Captain Benwick. His lameness prevented him from taking much exercise; but a mind of usefulness and ingenuity seemed to furnish him with constant employment within. He drew, he varnished, he carpentered, he glued; he made toys for the children; he fashioned new netting-needles and pins with improvements; and if everything else was done, sat down to his large fishing-net at one corner of the room.

  Anne thought she left great happiness behind her when they quitted the house; and Louisa, by whom she found herself walking, burst forth into raptures of admiration and delight on the character of the navy; their friendliness, their brotherliness, their openness, their uprightness; protesting that she was convinced of sailors having more worth and warmth than any other set of men in England; that they only knew how to live, and they only deserved to be respected and loved.

  They went back to dress and dine; and so well had the scheme answered already, that nothing was found amiss; though its being “so entirely out of season,” and the “no thoroughfare of Lyme,” and the “no expectation of company,” had brought many apologies from the heads of the inn.

  Anne found herself by this time growing so much more hardened to being in Captain Wentworth’s company than she had at first imagined could ever be, that the sitting down to the same table with him now, and the interchange of the common civilities attending on it (they never got beyond), was become a mere nothing in comparison to the battle Anne did with her mind when she was alone. In his presence, while watching him smile and flirt with the girls around him, it was almost easier to forget him than in his absence.

  The nights were too dark for the ladies to meet again till the morrow, but Captain Harville had promised them a visit in the evening; and he came, bringing his friend also, which was more than had been expected, it having been agreed that Captain Benwick had all the appearance of being oppressed by the presence of so many strangers. He ventured among them again, however, though his spirits certainly did not seem fit for the mirth of the party in general.

  While Captains Wentworth and Harville led the talk on one side of the room, and by recurring to former days, supplied anecdotes in abundance to occupy and entertain the others, it fell to Anne’s lot to be placed rather apart with Captain Benwick; and a very good impulse of her nature obliged her to begin an acquaintance with him. He was shy, and disposed to abstraction; but the engaging mildness of her countenance, and gentleness of her manners, soon had their effect; and Anne was well repaid the first trouble of exertion. He was evidently a young man of considerable taste in reading, though principally in poetry; and besides the persuasion of having given him at least an evening’s indulgence in the discussion of subjects, which his usual companions had probably no concern in, she had the hope of being of real use to him in some suggestions as to the duty and benefit of struggling against affliction, which had naturally grown out of their conversation.

  For, though shy, he did not seem reserved; it had rather the appearance of feelings glad to burst their usual restraints; and having talked of poetry, the richness of the present age, and gone through a brief comparison of opinion as to the first-rate poets, trying to ascertain whether Marmion or The Lady of the Lake were to be preferred, and how ranked the Giaour and The Bride of Abydos; and moreover, how the Giaour was to be pronounced, he showed himself so intimately acquainted with all the tenderest songs of the one poet, and all the impassioned descriptions of hopeless agony of the other; he repeated, with such tremulous feeling, the various lines which imaged a broken heart, or a mind destroyed by wretchedness, and looked so entirely as if he meant to be understood, that she ventured to hope he did not always read only poetry, and to say, that she thought it was the misfortune of poetry to be seldom safely enjoyed by those who enjoyed it completely; and that the strong feelings which alone could estimate it truly were the very feelings which ought to taste it but sparingly.

  His looks shewing him not pained, but pleased with this allusion to his situation, she was emboldened to go on; and feeling in herself the right of seniority of mind, she ventured to recommend a larger allowance of prose in his daily study; and on being requested to particularize, mentioned such works of our best moralists, such collections of the finest letters, such memoirs of characters of worth and suffering, as occurred to her at the moment as calculated to rouse and fortify the mind by the highest precepts, and the strongest examples of moral and religious endurances.

  Captain Benwick listened attentively, and seemed grateful for the interest implied; and though with a shake of the head, and sighs which declared his little faith in the efficacy of any books on grief like his, noted down the names of those she recommended, and promised to procure and read them.

  Their conversation had just concluded when Anne raised her head, her lips tingling with the small smile she knew was curving their corners — she was so out of practice at smiling — when her gaze caught that of Captain Wentworth. He was glowering at her as he had not since being distracted by the presence of his dear friends in Lyme. His brows were lowered over his eyes so much that they cast those light orbs in complete darkness. His mouth was set in a grim line. However, as soon as Anne caught him staring, he seemed to shake himself. His mouth relaxed; his brows rose. He looked slightly chagrined and even ventured so far as to offer her a pained half-smile. He broke their eye contact and visibly forced his face into a relaxed expression, whereupon he turned to his right and engaged Louisa in animated conversation, and Anne knew she had been mentally dismissed. The sting of his actions lasted through the remainder of dinner.

  When the evening was over, Anne could not but be amused at the idea of her coming to Lyme to preach patience and resignation to a young man whom she had never seen before; nor could she help fearing, on more serious reflection, that, like many other great moralists and preachers, she had been eloquent on a point in which her own conduct would ill bear examination.

  She gave her excuses to the girls and took a quick turn around the lodging house to help clear her mind. It was ineffective at best. As she turned back to walk to her room, her thoughts were embroiled in the foolhardiness of allowing his cut at the dinner table to harm her. She was staring at her feet in the dim light, trying to ensure that she would not trip, and so she did not see the person who was leaning against the door to her room until it was too late. With a startled cry, Anne walked right into warm, towering man. She was walking so quickly that the sudden halt to her progress resulted in backward motion. Anne’s arms were whirling, trying to find something to grab hold of to soften her inevitable fall when strong, capable hands gripped her arms and pulled her in until her face was crushed against a wide expanse of chest.

  She gasped in shock, and the scent she knew better than any filled her lungs. In the panic of self-preservation, Anne jerked back and flung her arms to the side in hopes that she would dislodge his hands from her person.

  He immediately removed them, and, contrarily, a small part of her heart protested. She roughly shoved that part aside and stared blankly upward where she knew his head must be, though she could not see it through the dark. “C-Captain Wentworth?”

  The frightened quality of her voice irked her, and he obviously heard it, for he moved to the left slightly until a glimmer of light from her room’s window illuminated the side of his face, casting familiar and yet unfamiliar features in light and shadow. He must have assumed the fear in her voice was caused by meeting a stranger in the dark. She felt relief that he had not guessed what she was truly afraid of was what she would do to the man whose identity she had known certainly upon her first breath. Even now, she feared she was swaying too close to him, seeking the comfort of his warmth when she was so very cold inside.

  “Yes, it is me.” His voice rumbled more deeply than ever, and Anne cursed the effect it had on her traitorous body. “I did not mean to frighten you.”

  She made some noise or other that sh
e hoped portrayed it was nothing. It took all of her focus to maintain decorum.

  He shifted impatiently, and she was reminded once again that this man before her hated her passionately. In an obvious bid to get whatever he was doing here over with, he began to speak in a rush. “I came to thank you for befriending Benwick.”

  Disappointment nearly crushed her. Was she to be thanked now for consorting with other men? “He is a good man,” she offered lamely, hoping he would go away so she could retreat into her room to lick her wounds.

  His ragged intake of air confused her. “Yes. He is.” Several heartbeats of silence later, he continued, “I — that is to say — please be gentle with him. He is not ready for another broken heart.”

  Suddenly, his glower at the dinner table reappeared on the back of Anne’s eyes. His anger now gained context, and with it, more hurt heaped upon her soul. “I would never hurt him,” she nearly hissed. “And I do not seek more from him than friendship. Nor does he from me.”

  The resounding thud of one of his boots upon the plank walk was the only warning she had that he had moved. The next instant, his hands were upon her arms again, and he was pushing her backward. Her back met with the pillar across from her room, but he kept coming, crowding into her body with his own. She felt every inch of his body against hers, and she could not breathe through the panic and exhilaration that froze her lungs.

  “Oh, thank God,” she thought she heard him breathe, the words slipping by her ear with a ruffle of her hair. He pressed closer for an instant, and she felt his arousal growing slowly against her belly, but then his entire body stiffened.