He got up and walked to the gate again,and ‘wished he had had the key about him at the time.’Fanny thought she discerned in his standing there,an indication of relenting,which encouraged her to another attempt,and she said,therefore,‘It is a pity you should not join them.They expected to have a better view of the house from that part of the park,and will be thinking how it may be improved;and nothing of that sort,you know,can be settled without you.’
She found herself more successful in sending away,than in retaining a companion.Mr Rushworth was worked on.‘Well,’said he,‘if you really think I had better go;it would be foolish to bring the key for nothing.’And letting himself out,he walked off without further ceremony.
Fanny's thoughts were now all engrossed by the two who had left her so long ago,and getting quite impatient,she resolved to go in search of them.She followed their steps along the bottom walk,and had just turned up into another,when the voice and the laugh of Miss Crawford once more caught her ear;the sound approached,and a few more windings brought them before her.They were just returned into the wilderness from the park,to which a side gate,not fastened,had tempted them very soon after their leaving her,and they had been across a portion of the park into the very avenue which Fanny had been hoping the whole morning to reach at last;and had been sitting down under one of the trees.This was their history.It was evident that they had been spending their time pleasantly,and were not aware of the length of their absence.Fanny's best consolation was in being assured that Edmund had wished for her very much,and that he should certainly have come back for her,had she not been tired already;but this was not quite sufficient to do away the pain of having been left a whole hour,when he had talked of only a few minutes,nor to banish the sort of curiosity she felt,to know what they had been conversing about all that time;and the result of the whole was to her disappointment and depression,as they prepared,by general agreement,to return to the house.
On reaching the bottom of the steps to the terrace,Mrs Rushworth and Mrs Norris presented themselves at the top,just ready for the wilderness,at the end of an hour and half from their leaving the house.Mrs Norris had been too well employed to move faster.Whatever cross accidents had occurred to intercept the pleasures of her nieces,she had found a morning of complete enjoyment-for the housekeeper,after a great many courtesies on the subject of pheasants,had taken her to the dairy,told her all about their cows,and given her the receipt for a famous cream cheese;and since Julia's leaving them,they had been met by the gardener,with whom she had made a most satisfactory acquaintance,for she had set him right as to his grandson's illness,convinced him it was an ague,and promised him a charm for it;and he,in return,had shown her all his choicest nursery of plants,and actually presented her with a very curious specimen of heath.
On this rencounter they all returned to the house together,there to lounge away the time as they could with sofas,and chit-chat,and Quarterly Reviews,till the return of the others,and the arrival of dinner.It was late before the Miss Bertrams and the two gentlemen came in,and their ramble did not appear to have been more than partially agreeable,or at all productive of anything useful with regard to the object of the day.By their own accounts they had been all walking after each other,and the junction which had taken place at last seemed,to Fanny's observation,to have been as much too late for re-establishing harmony,as it confessedly had been for determining on any alteration.She felt,as she looked at Julia and Mr Rushworth,that hers was not the only dissatisfied bosom amongst them;there was gloom on the face of each.Mr Crawford and Miss Bertram were much more gay,and she thought that he was taking particular pains,during dinner,to do away any little resentment of the other two,and restore general good humour.
Dinner was soon followed by tea and coffee,a ten miles'drive home allowed no waste of hours,and from the time of their sitting down to table,it was a quick succession of busy nothings till the carriage came to the door,and Mrs Norris,having fidgeted about,and obtained a few pheasant's eggs and a cream cheese from the housekeeper,and made abundance of civil speeches to Mrs Rushworth,was ready to lead the way.At the same moment Mr Crawford approaching Julia,said,‘I hope I am not to lose my companion,unless she is afraid of the evening air in so exposed a seat.’The request had not been foreseen,but was very graciously received,and Julia's day was likely to end almost as well as it began.Miss Bertram had made up her mind to something different,and was a little disappointed-but her conviction of being really the one preferred comforted her under it,and enabled her to receive Mr Rushworth's parting attentions as she ought.He was certainly better pleased to hand her into the barouche than to assist her in ascending the box-and his complacency seemed confirmed by the arrangement.
‘Well,Fanny,this has been a fine day for you,upon my word!’said Mrs Norris,as they drove through the park.‘Nothing but pleasure from beginning to end!I am sure you ought to be very much obliged to your aunt Bertram and me,for contriving to let you go.A pretty good day's amusement you have had!’
Maria was just discontented enough to say directly,‘I think you have done pretty well yourself,ma'am.Your lap seems full of good things,and here is a basket of something between us,which has been knocking my elbow unmercifully.’