The number of acres contained in this garden was such as Catherine could not listen to without dismay,being more than double the extent of all Mr Allen's ,as well as her father's including church yard and orchard.The walls seemed countless in number,endless in length;a village of hot houses seemed to rise among them,and a whole parish to be at work within the enclosure.The General was flattered by her looks of surprise,which told him almost as plainly,as he soon forced her to tell him in words,that she had never seen any gardens at all equal to them before; and he then modestly owned that,‘without any ambition of that sort himself without any solicitude about it, he did not believe them to be unrivalled in the kingdom.If he had a hobby horse,it was that.He loved a garden.Though careless enough in most matters of eating,he loved good fruit or if he did not,his friends and children did.There were great vexations however attending such a garden as his.The utmost care could not always secure the most valuable fruits.The pinery had yielded only one hundred in the last year.Mr Allen,he supposed,must feel these inconveniences as well as himself.’
‘No,not at all.Mr Allen did not care about the garden,and never went into it.’
With a triumphant smile of self satisfaction,the General wished he could do the same,for he never entered his,without being vexed in some way or other,by its falling short of his plan.
‘How were Mr Allen's succession houses worked?’describing the nature of his own as they entered them.
‘Mr Allen had only one small hot house,which Mrs Allen had the use of for her plants in winter,and there was a fire in it now and then.’
‘He is a happy man!’said the General,with a look of very happy contempt.
Having taken her into every division,and led her under every wall,till she was heartily weary of seeing and wondering,he suffered the girls at last to seize the advantage of an outer door,and then expressing his wish to examine the effect of some recent alterations about the tea house,proposed it as no unpleasant extension of their walk,if Miss Morland were not tired.‘But where are you going,Eleanor? Why do you choose that cold,damp path to it?Miss Morland will get wet.Our best way is across the park.’
‘This is so favourite a walk of mine,’said Miss Tilney,‘that I always think it the best and nearest way.But perhaps it may be damp.’
It was a narrow winding path through a thick grove of old Scotch firs;and Catherine,struck by its gloomy aspect,and eager to enter it,could not,even by the General's disapprobation,be kept from stepping forward.He perceived her inclination,and having again urged the plea of health in vain,was too polite to make further opposition.He excused himself however from attending them: ‘The rays of the sun were not too cheerful for him,and he would meet them by another course.’He turned away;and Catherine was shocked to find how much her spirits were relieved by the separation.The shock however being less real than the relief,offered it no injury;and she began to talk with easy gaiety of the delightful melancholy which such a grove inspired.
‘I am particularly fond of this spot,’said her companion,with a sigh.‘It was my mother's favourite walk.’
Catherine had never heard Mrs Tilney mentioned in the family before,and the interest excited by this tender remembrance,showed itself directly in her altered countenance,and in the attentive pause with which she waited for something more.
‘I used to walk here so often with her!’added Eleanor;‘though I never loved it then,as I have loved it since.At that time indeed I used to wonder at her choice.But her memory endears it now.’
‘And ought it not,’reflected Catherine,‘to endear it to her husband?Yet the General would not enter it.’Miss Tilney continuing silent,she ventured to say,‘Her death must have been a great affliction!’
‘A great and increasing one,’replied the other,in a low voice.‘I was only thirteen when it happened;and though I felt my loss perhaps as strongly as one so young could feel it,I did not,I could not then know what a loss it was.’She stopped for a moment,and then added,with great firmness,‘I have no sister,you know and though Henry though my brothers are very affectionate,and Henry is a great deal here,which I am most thankful for,it is impossible for me not to be often solitary.’
‘To be sure you must miss him very much.’
‘A mother would have been always present.A mother would have been a constant friend;her influence would have been beyond all other.’
‘Was she a very charming woman?Was she handsome?Was there any picture of her in the Abbey?And why had she been so partial to that grove?Was it from dejection of spirits?’ were questions now eagerly poured forth; the first three received a ready affirmative,the two others were passed by;and Catherine's interest in the deceased Mrs Tilney augmented with every question,whether answered or not.Of her unhappiness in marriage,she felt persuaded.The General certainly had been an unkind husband.He did not love her walk: could he therefore have loved her?And besides,handsome as he was,there was a something in the turn of his features which spoke his not having behaved well to her.
‘Her picture,I suppose,’blushing at the consummate art of her own question,‘hangs in your father's room?’
‘No; it was intended for the drawing room;but my father was dissatisfied with the painting,and for some time it had no place.Soon after her death I obtained it for my own,and hung it in my bed chamber where I shall be happy to show it you; it is very like.’ Here was another proof.A portrait very like of a departed wife,not valued by the husband! He must have been dreadfully cruel to her!