I was so distressed by this that I cried out, without thinking,
"But surely, Colonel Campbell, you will not think to sell your own daughter?"
He blinked.
"I am surprised and distressed, my dear Jane, that you should entertain such a thought, let alone give voice to it. Were our circumstances ten times worse, and Mr Dixon's bank balance a hundred times the size, I should never have countenanced any such proposal were I not convinced that my own, dear Theodora herself would view it with approval."
Of course, I saw immediately that this was true, and my apology was as heartfelt as I could make it. I promised, moreover, to do every thing to help and support darling Dora in her time of waiting, and assured the colonel that his confidence would be safe with me.
So, for a month or two, I strove to learn to love, or at least like Mr Dixon. I had not realised that the Colonel was on such terms with him, nor that the whole family had been placed under such an obligation. Heavy work it was, too, and Dora did not make it any easier. This newly revealed indebtedness did not sit easy with me, either. I fear I have a mind that is strongly averse to owing anything to anyone, and I have been more aware of this than ever since I realised how much I really owe the Campbells.
But I buckled to, practised liking Mr Dixon for an hour every day, as assiduously as I practised on our old Clementi, and congratulated myself that at least I had attained indifference, until there came the news of the famous fight of the Windsor Castle packet with the French privateer Jeune Richard, and of the part played by both the crew and the passengers in the capture of the infamous marauder.
So now I had to contend with someone as yet unseen who was not only a paragon of all the virtues, a master of all knowledge and all courtesy, and the possessor of all the points of manly beauty, but also the saviour of our family fortunes and, to crown it all, a hero.
It was too much, it really was, and I make no doubt that it was the sheer mortification resulting from this, combined with the constant economies I had been practising ever since Colonel Campbell's revelation of his straitened circumstances, which led to my being laid up most of the ensuing winter with my old, familiar malady.
More Sport for our Neighbours Page 29