“Aye, that’s very properly said. Very true. It is such a pretty riddle, my dear, that I can easily guess what fairy brought it. Nobody could have written so prettily but you, Emma.” She only nodded and smiled.
After a little thinking and a very tender sigh, Mr. Woodhouse added, “Ah! It is no difficulty to see who you take after! Your dear mother was so clever at all those things! It makes me think of poor Isabella. I am glad we shall have her here next week. Have you thought, my dear, where you will put her? And what room there will be for the children?”
“Oh yes! She will have her own room, of course, the room she always has. And there is the nursery for the children, just as usual.”
“Yes, but the children never sleep—nor does John. They are up all the night long, running everywhere while John paces. And they all keep disappearing into the forest, for what reason I haven’t the slightest notion. It worries me exceedingly, with so many wild vampires about. But it will be wonderful to see Isabella—it is so long since she was here! How sorry she will be to not see Miss Taylor here when she comes!”
“We must ask Mr. and Mrs. Weston to dine with us while Isabella is here.”
“Yes, my dear, but we must set the table with only half the food. The children will not partake, and neither will their father, nor Mr. Weston, nor Mr. George Knightley. And they will insist on a cold room without a fire. Oh, Emma! I am saddened that Isabella is coming for only one week.”
“Harriet must give us as much of her company as she can while my sister and brother-in-law are here. I am sure she will be pleased with the children.”
“Poor little dears, having to live in London—how glad they will be to come,” he said. “They are very fond of being at Hartfield, Harriet.”
“I daresay they are, sir.”
“Henry is a fine boy, and John is very like his mamma. They have pale blue eyes, just like their father. And they all stare at me without blinking—makes me quite agitated. I think their father is too rough with them very often.”
“He appears rough to you,” said Emma, “because you are so very gentle yourself. But if you could compare him with other papas, you would not think him rough. He wishes his boys to be active and hardy, he once told me, so that some day they can hunt for small animals on their own. And if they misbehave, he can give them a sharp word now and then. But he is an affectionate father. The children are all fond of him.”
“And then their Uncle George Knightley comes in and tosses them up to the ceiling in a very frightful way!”
“But they like it, Papa. There is nothing they like so much.”
“Well, I cannot understand it.”
“That is the case with us all, Papa. One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other.”
***
Later in the morning, Mr. Elton came to call again. Emma opened the door and greeted him. Harriet turned away, but Emma received him with the usual smile, and she returned the paper to him, careful not to touch his hand.
“Here is the riddle which you were so obliging to leave with us; thank you for the sight of it. We admired it so much that I have ventured to write it into Miss Smith’s collection. Your friend will not take it amiss, I trust. Of course, I have not copied the last two lines.”
Mr. Elton certainly did not know what to say. Seeing the open book on the table, he took it and examined it very attentively.
“I have no hesitation in saying,” replied Mr. Elton, “that if my friend feels at all as I do, I am sure that if he could see his little riddle honoured as I see it,” looking at the book again and replacing it on the table, “he would consider it the proudest moment of his life.”
After this speech he was gone in an instant, leaving tender and sublime feelings of pleasure for Harriet to share.
Chapter 10
The next morning, under a dark, overcast sky, Emma and Harriet paid a charitable visit to a poor, sick family who lived a little way out of Highbury.
Their road to this detached cottage was down Vicarage Lane, where the blessed abode of Mr. Elton was located. An old and not very good house, the vicarage had been very much smartened up by Mr. Elton, and there could be no possibility of Emma and Harriet passing by without slowing their pace and observing it.
“Oh, what a sweet house!” said Harriet. “How very beautiful! Made more beautiful by the black curtains that Miss Nash admires so much to keep the sunlight out.”
Harriet, of course, had never in her life been inside the vicarage, and her curiosity to see it was so extreme that Emma could only regard it as proof of her love for Mr. Elton.
“I wish we could see inside,” said Emma, “but I cannot think of any tolerable pretence for going in.”
As they passed the vicarage, Harriet turned to Emma with a look of consternation. “Miss Woodhouse, this road is quite isolated, and we are quite alone. Do you not fear that we shall encounter some of those vicious creatures?”
Emma smiled with sympathy and comfort. “Dear Harriet, we are travelling on Vicarage Road. It is holy and blessed. No vampire would dare tread near such sacred ground.”
“True, quite true. Oh, Miss Woodhouse, you are so courageous! And so wise! I am filled with gratitude that you have chosen me to be your friend.”
“My befriending you, dear Harriet, is ample evidence of my great wisdom.”
They continued walking. After a mutual silence of some minutes, Harriet said, “I do so wonder, Miss Woodhouse, why you are not married, or going to be married, so charming as you are!”
Emma laughed and replied, “My being charming, Harriet, is not quite enough to induce me to marry—I must find at least one other person charming. And not only am I not going to be married at present, but I have very little intention of ever marrying at all.”
“Ah! So you say. But I cannot believe it.”
“I must see somebody very superior to anyone I have seen yet to be tempted. Mr. Elton, you know, is quite out of the question. Although the touch of his cold hand sends a shock of passion through my body, I would rather not be tempted. I cannot really change for the better. If I were to marry, I would expect to regret it.”
“Dear me! It is so odd to hear a woman talk so!”
“I have none of the usual inducements of women to marry. Were I to fall in love, indeed, it would be a different thing, but I have never been in love. It is not my way or my nature, and I do not think I ever shall. And without love, I am sure I would be a fool to change such a situation as mine. Fortune I do not need, employment I do not want, and importance I do not lack. I believe few married women are half as much mistress of their husband’s house as I am of Hartfield; and never, never could I expect to be so truly beloved and important, so always first and always right in any man’s eyes, as I am in my father’s.”
“But then, to be an old maid, like Miss Bates?”
“That is as formidable an image as you could present, Harriet. And if I thought I would ever be like Miss Bates—so silly, so satisfied, so smiling, so undistinguishing and unfastidious, and so apt to gossip about everything and everybody around me—I would marry tomorrow.”
“But still, you will be an old maid! And that is so dreadful!”
“Never mind, Harriet. I shall not be a poor old maid; and it is only poverty which makes single women contemptible to the public. A single woman with a very narrow income must be a ridiculous, disagreeable old maid! But a single woman of good fortune is always respectable and may be as sensible and pleasant as anybody else. A very narrow income has a tendency to contract the mind and sour the temper. Those who can barely live and who live in a very small and inferior society may well be narrow-minded and cross.
“This does not apply, however, to Miss Bates. She is too silly to suit me, but she is very much to the taste of everybody, though single and poor. Poverty certainly has not contracted her mind. I really believe that i
f she had only a shilling in the world, she would very likely give away sixpence of it. And nobody is afraid of her—that is a great charm.”
“Dear me! But what will you do? How will you employ yourself when you grow old?”
“If I know myself, Harriet, mine is an active, busy mind, with a great many independent resources; and I do not perceive why I should be more in need of employment at forty or fifty than at twenty-one. Women’s usual occupations will be as open to me then as they are now. If I draw less, I shall read more; if I give up music, I shall take to gardening. If I retire my wooden stake, I shall take to making a needlepoint sheath for it.
“And as for objects of affection, I shall be very well off with my nephews and nieces to care about, with their adorable pale blue eyes. There will be enough of them for every hope and every fear; and though my attachment to them cannot equal that of a parent, it suits me fine. And besides, they will be quite useful, catching the mice and rats at Hartfield for their own pleasure. My nephews and nieces! I shall often have a niece with me.”
“Do you know Miss Bates’s niece, Jane Fairfax?” asked Harriet. “I know you must have seen her a hundred times, but are you acquainted?”
“Oh yes! We are always forced to be acquainted whenever she comes to Highbury. Heaven forbid that I should ever bore people half so much as Miss Bates does about Jane Fairfax. One is sick of the very name Jane Fairfax. Every letter from her to Miss Bates is read forty times over, her compliments to all her friends go round and round again, and if she sends her aunt a pair of garters, one hears of nothing else for a month. I wish Jane Fairfax very well, but she tires me to death. One could almost wish that Jane Fairfax should take a walk down a lonely road some dark night and satisfy the bloodlust of a vampire.”
They were now approaching the cottage of the sick family, and all idle topics were ended. Emma was very compassionate, and the family was as comforted by her personal attention, kindness, counsel, and patience as from her purse. She entered into their troubles with ready sympathy and gave her assistance with as much intelligence as goodwill.
After remaining there as long as she could reasonably give comfort or advice, Emma left the cottage with such an impression of the scene that she said to Harriet, as they walked away, “These are the sights, Harriet, to do one good. How trifling they make everything else appear! I feel now as if I could think of nothing but these poor creatures all the rest of the day. And yet, who can say how soon it may all vanish from my mind?”
“Very true,” said Harriet. “Poor creatures! One can think of nothing else.”
Suddenly, from a thicket of shrubbery, the young ladies heard a shriek that would chill a bowl of steaming porridge.
“Dear Miss Woodhouse!” exclaimed Harriet, as they froze in their tracks. “What was that?”
Emma was already reaching down to unfasten her pink ribbon. “Fear not, Harriet. I shall protect you.”
With blinding speed, the hideous creature leapt out of the bushes, baring his fangs and uttering yet another ear-splitting shriek.
Emma struggled to locate her wooden stake beneath her skirt.
Meanwhile, the vampire clasped its hands onto Harriet’s arms, preventing her from retrieving her own wooden stake. The creature, salivating with lust, drew closer to Harriet’s fair neck.
“Miss Woodhouse! Hurry!”
Then suddenly the vampire’s black eyes grew wide, and its aspect was filled with horror. It screeched loudly, released Harriet from its vice-like grip, cowered quickly back through the hedge, and was gone from sight just as quickly as it had appeared.
“Dear Miss Woodhouse!” wailed Harriet, shaking with distress, the tears flowing down her round cheeks.
Emma embraced Harriet and comforted her. “Oh, my dear, dear Harriet! The creature is gone. It will not harm you now.”
“Dear Miss Woodhouse! I thought my brief, insignificant existence was soon to come to a grisly end!”
“Indeed, Harriet, I feared the same as I watched, helplessly tangled amongst my silly undergarments. But what could have dissuaded the creature from devouring you?”
“Oh! Miss Woodhouse! I cannot imagine! Perhaps he did not like my perfume! Or perhaps because I neglected to bathe this morning!” she said with mortifying embarrassment.
At that moment, the sun peeked out from behind the grey clouds and illuminated something on Harriet’s bosom.
“What is that you are wearing around your neck, my dear Harriet?”
Harriet touched a small silver cross hanging from a fine chain. “Why, it is my Sabbath cross from yesterday’s church service.”
Emma smiled. “Of course! Silver! I think that perhaps you should continue to display your cross on your bosom whenever you venture out.”
“Indeed I shall, Miss Woodhouse! Indeed I shall!”
Harriet felt quite a bit relieved that she wore a modicum of prevention against future attacks.
They walked on. The lane made a slight bend, and when that bend was passed they saw an object before them and realised it was Mr. Elton.
He greeted them warmly, as Emma took caution not to touch his hand, then he joined them on their walk.
The young ladies recounted to Mr. Elton their horrifying experience. But when Harriet displayed her silver cross to the vicar, he quickly moved to the other side of Emma. She thought it peculiar that a man of God should react with fear at the sign of the cross. No, no, rejoined Mr. Elton, he merely wanted to position himself between the ladies and the edge of the road to protect them against any future attacks. How gallant! thought Emma.
The next subject of conversation concerned the wants and sufferings of the poor family they had just visited.
Mr. Elton, meeting Harriet on such a charitable errand as this, thought Emma, will bring a great increase of affection on each side. I should not be surprised if it were to bring about his declaration of love. It certainly would if I were not here. I wish I were anywhere else.
Anxious to separate herself from them as much as she could, Emma stopped under the pretence of having to secure the pink ribbon around her wooden stake and, stooping down, begged them to have the goodness to walk on, and she would follow in half a minute. They did as they were told.
By the time Emma judged it reasonable to have done with her ribbon, she slowly gained on them. Mr. Elton was speaking with animation, Harriet listening with a very pleased attention. But Emma was disappointed when she found that he was only giving Harriet an account of yesterday’s party at his friend Mr. Cole’s house.
They now walked on together quietly till, within view of the vicarage, Emma’s sudden decision to get Harriet into the house made her again find something very much amiss about her pink ribbon and fall behind to secure it once more. She then broke the ribbon off short and, dexterously throwing it into a ditch, was presently obliged to beg them to stop and mentioned her inability to walk home in tolerable comfort.
“Part of my ribbon is gone,” said she, “and I do not know what to do. I really am a most troublesome companion to you both. Mr. Elton, I must beg to stop at your house and ask your housekeeper for a bit of ribbon or string or anything just to keep my wooden stake around my leg.”
Mr. Elton looked all happiness at this proposition; and nothing could exceed his alertness and attention in escorting them into his house and endeavouring to make everything pleasant.
The room they were taken into was the one he chiefly occupied—the windows darkened by curtains and many candles for illumination.
Emma passed into the next room with the housekeeper to receive her assistance. She left the door ajar between the two rooms. By engaging the housekeeper in conversation, Emma hoped to make it practicable for Mr. Elton to make his declaration of love to Harriet. After ten minutes, Emma was then finished and made her appearance.
The two lovers were standing together at one end of the room, Harriet sh
ivering from lack of warmth, there being no activity in the fireplace. Emma could see Harriet’s visible breath but, curiously, no breath coming from Mr. Elton.
Nonetheless, everything looked most promising between them and, for half a minute, Emma felt the glory of having schemed successfully.
But it was not to be; he had not come to the point. He had been most agreeable, most delightful—other little gallantries and allusions had been made—but nothing serious.
Cautious, very cautious is Mr. Elton, thought Emma, as he advances his affections inch by inch, risking nothing till he believes himself secure in Harriet’s affection.
Still, however, though everything had not been accomplished by her ingenious device, Emma could not but flatter herself that the occasion had been of much enjoyment to both and must be leading them forward to the great event.
Chapter 11
Mr. Elton must now be left to himself. It was no longer in Emma’s power to manage his happiness or quicken his decision to marry Harriet.
The visit of Emma’s sister Isabella and her family was so very near at hand that first in anticipation and then in reality, it became henceforth her prime object of interest. And during the ten days of their stay at Hartfield, it was not to be expected that Emma could help Mr. Elton’s decision along.
After all, there are people who the more you do for them, the less they will do for themselves.
Mr. and Mrs. John Knightley’s visit was exciting more than the usual interest. Till this year, every long vacation since their marriage had been divided between Isabella’s home at Hartfield and Donwell Abbey, the home of John’s brother Mr. George Knightley.
But all the holidays of this season were to be given to Emma and Mr. Woodhouse, who consequently were now most nervously happy in anticipating this visit.
Emma and the Vampires Page 6