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Her greatest astonishment, however, was reserved for her husband.
Robert did not yield.
“I have given my word as a father and a gentleman,” said he, with a firmness Lucy had scarcely heard from him before. “I do not see that it is my place to withdraw it merely because you disagree.”
Lucy stared at him, apparently uncertain whether to be more offended by his decision or by the discovery that he was capable of making one.
“And Annabelle’s prospects?” she demanded. “Have you considered what she might have secured for herself?”
“I have always believed,” Robert replied, growing more confident as he proceeded, “that our daughters would be happier if permitted to choose for themselves. I have given my blessing, and I do not intend to reverse myself now.”
It was a remarkable speech, not least because Robert seemed to be hearing much of it for the first time himself.
Finding her father thoroughly pleased with his own authority, and her mother in a state of indignation that threatened to consume the entire household, and the matter finally settled, Annabelle withdrew quietly to her room, where, for the first time in months, she allowed herself a few tears of pure joy and relief.
Mr. Merrier called the following morning, conducting himself with such perfect propriety that even Lucy could find nothing to criticise. Taking Annabelle’s hands in the little front parlour, he confessed that he had never been so frightened in his life as when asking her father for his blessing.
“I do not believe I shall ever again be so terrified of a gentleman reading his newspaper in a dressing-gown,” he assured her.
The news reached Elinor and Marianne over their tea, courtesy of Mrs. Jennings, who had heard it from Charlotte, who had heard it from a housemaid. Marianne laughed until she could scarcely speak, while Elinor set down her cup with an expression of profound satisfaction. She observed, “I am delighted Robert Ferrars has found a backbone while it may still do some good.”
“She has lost Henry,” Marianne added, “lost Annabelle’s imagined prospects, and lost an argument with her own husband—all in the space of a month. And, if I understand correctly, the last defeat occurred while she was out buying lace!”
“She has lost a great deal of her pride, I think. It is a great deal to lose in one morning,” Elinor agreed. “I find I am not sorry for her in the smallest degree, which may reflect poorly upon my character, but I cannot bring myself to regret it.”
Marianne dissolved into laughter.
“And the best of it,” said she, when she had recovered sufficiently, “is that Annabelle has secured precisely the husband she wanted, her father believes himself a hero, and Lucy has managed to defeat herself without anyone having to lift a finger against her.”
“Not quite without assistance,” Elinor replied, her eyes bright with amusement. “Her daughters have plainly learned a great deal from her. They have merely chosen to employ their education in a more agreeable cause.”
“And Lucy?”
Elinor lifted her teacup.
“Lucy, I imagine, will spend the remainder of the Season explaining to anyone who will listen that the whole affair was conducted in the most shocking manner.”
“Then she will have the additional satisfaction,” Marianne said, “of knowing that everyone who hears the story will understand exactly why it was necessary.”
At this, the two sisters laughed together with an enjoyment that neither made the least attempt to conceal.
Chapter LII.
Henry had relocated to the Willoughbys’ London house to make room for Mary and her family to come and be with her family before the wedding, and particularly to spend time with Anne whom she may not see for some years to come. He arrived to find the house turned nearly upside down with the business of it, Sophia already deep in correspondence about a wedding-gift that she would not describe to anyone, and the Captain, home from Cambridge for the summer, lying full length across the hall sofa with his boots on the arm of it in a manner his mother had given up correcting.
“Lord Chancellor,” said Charles, without getting up, by way of greeting, and then, relenting, swung his long legs down and crossed the hall in three strides to seize his brother properly. “You are to be married!”
“Indeed, I have come to spend time with my family before I am a married man who may no longer go whenever and wherever he pleases.”
The Captain grinned, and clapped him on the shoulder, and then, with the particular relish of a young man newly returned from a shared ordeal, said, “Do you know who I have been reading moral philosophy under this year? You will never guess it. Whewell.”
“Not my Whewell.”
“Your very own. He is teaching still, terrorising a fresh generation, and I promise you he has not softened in the least. He looked at me and asked me, the first week, whether I was any relation to a Henry Brandon who had been, I quote, ‘the only man in ten years to argue with me about Paley and turn out to be in the right of it,’ and when I said you were my brother he looked at me for a long moment as if trying to work out how the family had produced two such different articles, and then said, ‘Well. I shall lower my expectations accordingly,’ and walked off.”
Henry laughed outright. “He once kept me after a lecture for forty minutes because I had used the word ‘obviously’ in an essay, and made me define it, and then made me admit that nothing in the whole of moral philosophy was obvious, and that I had been lazy to say so.”
“He did the very same to me, over the word ‘clearly.’ I believe he keeps a list.” Charles shook his head, half admiring. “He asked after you again in the spring. Wanted to know whether the brother who was mending Dorset roofs instead of going to the Bar had come to his senses yet. I told him you were about to marry a clergyman’s daughter and devote the rest of your life to drains, and he said that was, on the whole, a more sensible use of a good mind than most of what Cambridge produced, and that he hoped you would not let anyone talk you out of it.”
