Dining at the Park was an event which possessed neither interest nor
novelty. Margaret did not anticipate any pleasure beyond the minor ones
of excellent food and elegant surroundings. Her mind was, however, so
pleasantly occupied with the event of the morning that she dressed for
the engagement with a happy smile and, on joining her mother and Mr.
Atherton in the hall, and preparing to set out for their walk to the
Park, she looked so pretty that Mrs. Dashwood gazed at her with the
tenderest affection and Mr. Atherton with an admiration which for once
was genuine.
As they crossed the grounds of the Park, Mrs. Dashwood’s replies were
absent-minded and Margaret said nothing at all. Mr. Atherton had to
supply all the conversation himself, a feat which was to him no feat at
all, for he barely stopped talking all the way, and yet arrived untired
and with fresh stores of information to be expended at the dining-table
of Barton Park. Here, however, he was unable to have things as he
liked. Sir John Middleton was fond of talking himself. Mrs. Jennings
had no notion of being silent, and Miss Nancy Steele seldom paused
except for breath. It was a thoroughly noisy party, and for the most
part a happy one. Lady Middleton was pleased with her appearance, and
that of her dining-table, and only Mrs. Dashwood and her daughter fell
short of enjoyment.
Mrs. Dashwood was at her best only in her own house. She did not care
for dinner engagements or desultory conversation, and the glare, heat
and noise at Barton Park were irksome to her. Margaret was as usual the
subject of much jesting, but shared this honour with Miss Steele, who
soon succeeded in inducing the main stream of the wit to flow in her
direction.
Mr. Atherton was placed between them, with the usual allusion to roses
and thorns, and it was supposed that Miss Steele and Margaret would
enter into competition to secure his notice. Miss Steele’s victory was
almost too easy.
“Take care, cousin, the Doctor shall hear of this,” called Sir John
from the head of the table. “Don’t imagine you are safe. I have his
address I think. Dr. Davis, Dash Street, Plymouth, isn’t it? We’ll soon
let him know how you behave.”
“What does it matter to me what the Doctor hears?” called Miss Nancy in
delighted protest. “He’d better mind his own business I say, and so I
should say if he were here, right to his face.”
“We’ll get him here, cousin. That’s what we’ll do, and see if you don’t
call another tune.”
“A fine thing it would be if I couldn’t speak to anyone but him. I
wonder what he would have thought of me yesterday, for there was a very
fine young man in the coach with me, and he was most excessively polite
with the baggage, and asked me if I would have the window up, and did
I like a corner seat. Most attentive, he was! And he got down, not
half a mile from Barton Park, and I heard him tell the guard he was a
stranger, and he asked for some direction, but there was an old woman
coughing in the road and I could not hear any more.”
Sir John’s attention was attracted. He did not always pay Miss Steele
the compliment of listening to her, but a man in the neighbourhood
with whom he was unacquainted, a stranger, was a matter of interest to
him. He wondered who could have a guest without his having previous
knowledge of it.
Mrs. Jennings surmised. “Was it, perhaps, Mr. Willoughby coming to
visit Mrs. Smith?”
Miss Nancy was positive. “La, now! Should I call Mr. Willoughby a
stranger after all that’s come and gone? Why, I should be ashamed to
mention him in the present company.”
Mrs. Dashwood, on hearing her daughter’s disappointment thus delicately
referred to, engaged Lady Middleton in a more animated conversation
than that lady often experienced. Margaret, however, heard good Mrs.
Jennings say:
“Sh! Sh! We don’t speak of that now. Miss Marianne would not like it
remembered! If this was not Mr. Willoughby, who in the world can it
have been?”
“His name was Pennington,” said Miss Nancy.
“Ha! Ha! cousin, so you’ve exchanged names and addresses I see. The
poor, poor Doctor! I wouldn’t give a button for his chance now.”
“No, Sir John, there you are wrong. I hope I know my dignity better
than to be asking a strange young man for his address. I just peeped at
the label on his luggage when he got down at a change, and the name was
Pennington, as large as life.”
“Pennington? I don’t know a Pennington,” considered Sir John. “But I
tell you what, cousin! We will find out and invite him to the ball next
week, and we will get the Doctor too, and, with Mr. Atherton here, we
will be able to find out who _is_ your beau after all. Only tell ’em
from me that if they want to cut each other’s throats they must do it
outside on the lawn there. Her ladyship will not have bloodshed in the
drawing-room.”
Her ladyship caught only the last word, but it suggested to her a
mode of release from a conversation which had become wearisome. She
immediately got the ladies moving away from the dining-room, where they
left Sir John and Mr. Atherton to discuss their wine and politics, with
the usual parting admonition that they should be speedy.
In the drawing-room the party divided into two groups. Lady Middleton
and her mother listened with sympathy to the account Mrs. Dashwood gave
of Thomas’s health and very ready was the offer of hospitality for Mr.
Atherton at the Park to relieve the household at the Cottage of their
guest. Mrs. Dashwood again had reason to feel that, however tedious
their society might be, they were indeed the kindest of neighbours.
Margaret meanwhile was the recipient of Miss Nancy’s confidences so
heart-rendingly curtailed at the dining-table, and it was not long
before she became privately convinced that her acquaintance of the
morning and Miss Nancy’s beau were one and the same. How far he
deserved the latter appellation she was still uncertain. Possibly he
did not deserve it at all; but the thought was unpleasant, and she
was grateful to Lady Middleton for suggesting that she should try the
instrument, which had not been touched for many weeks. She remained
there till it was time for tea.
The gentlemen appeared in the drawing-room, and Mr. Atherton received
the kindest invitation from Lady Middleton, seconded with prodigious
warmth by Sir John, to take up his quarters at the Park until his own
house should be ready for him.
Mr. Atherton did not demur. It was not beyond his power to convey
suitable thanks to Sir John and Lady Middleton, the right regrets
to Mrs. Dashwood, the assurance of undying admiration to Margaret,
and the suggestion of increasing attention to Miss Steele all in the
same sentence and almost in the same breath. The circumstance was
undoubtedly of value to him. His consequence would be increased by
his association with Barton Park and, though anxious for some reasons
to improve his position with Margaret, opportunities must offer, even
when separated from her by half a mile. The society at the Park was
very congenial to him. The same obtuseness of feeling, conventionality
of expression and denseness in understanding, which were his, also
distinguished the inmates of the Park.
At Barton Cottage he had not been perfectly at ease. He had not, he
must confess to himself, found Mrs. Dashwood so gracious and charming
as he had been led to expect, and the lady whom he held himself
destined to install at the parsonage was less able in conversation
and not so easily entertained as he had hoped. She had yawned twice
during his reading of “The Lady of the Lake,” and was at all times
disconcertingly silent. Not that he was disconcerted by her silence.
Not in the least! But he must admit to himself that the agreeable
circle at the Park had been a great relief.
Margaret heard the invitation given and accepted with calm
satisfaction, and the evening ended with a quiet stroll back across
the Park grounds with her mother, followed by Sir John’s man, who was
to pack Mr. Atherton’s personal belongings and take them to the Park,
where he himself remained.
It was a welcome change, and Mrs. Dashwood’s tender solicitude for
Thomas when she got home was deepened by the feeling that she and
Margaret had reason to feel very much obliged to him indeed.