Mrs Norris was beginning an eager assurance of the affability he might depend on,when she was stopped by Sir Thomas's saying with authority,‘I do not advise your going to Brighton,William,as I trust you may soon have more convenient opportunities of meeting,but my daughters would be happy to see their cousins anywhere;and you will find Mr Rushworth most sincerely disposed to regard all the connections of our family as his own.’
‘I would rather find him private secretary to the first Lord than anything else,’was William's only answer,in an under voice,not meant to reach far,and the subject dropped.
As yet Sir Thomas had seen nothing to remark in Mr Crawford's behaviour;but when the Whist table broke up at the end of the second rubber,and leaving Dr Grant and Mrs Norris to dispute over their last play,he became a looker-on at the other,he found his niece the object of attentions,or rather of professions of a somewhat pointed character.
Henry Crawford was in the first glow of another scheme about Thornton Lacey,and not being able to catch Edmund's ear,was detailing it to his fair neighbour with a look of considerable earnestness.His scheme was to rent the house himself the following winter,that he might have a home of his own in that neighbourhood;and it was not merely for the use of it in the hunting season (as he was then telling her),though that consideration had certainly some weight,feeling as he did,that in spite of all Dr Grant's very great kindness,it was impossible for him and his horses to be accommodated where they now were without material inconvenience;but his attachment to that neighbourhood did not depend upon one amusement or one season of the year:he had set his heart upon having a something there that he could come to at any time,a little home stall at his command where all the holidays of his year might be spent,and he might find himself continuing,improving,and perfecting that friendship and intimacy with the Mansfield Park family which was increasing in value to him every day.Sir Thomas heard and was not offended.There was no want of respect in the young man's address;and Fanny's reception of it was so proper and modest,so calm and uninviting,that he had nothing to censure in her.She said little,assented only here and there,and betrayed no inclination either of appropriating any part of the compliment to herself or of strengthening his views in favour of Northamptonshire.Finding by whom he was observed,Henry Crawford addressed himself on the subject to Sir Thomas,in a more everyday tone,but still with feeling.
‘I want to be your neighbour,Sir Thomas,as you have perhaps heard me telling Miss Price.May I hope for your acquiescence and for your not influencing your son against such a tenant?’
Sir Thomas,politely bowing,replied-‘It is the only way,sir,in which I could not wish you established as a permanent neighbour;but I hope,and believe,that Edmund will occupy his own house at Thornton Lacey.Edmund,am I saying too much?’
Edmund,on this appeal,had first to hear what was going on,but on understanding the question,was at no loss for an answer.
‘Certainly,sir,I have no idea but of residence.But,Crawford,though I refuse you as a tenant,come to me as a friend.Consider the house as half your own every winter,and we will add to the stables on your own improved plan,and with all the improvements of your improved plan that may occur to you this spring.’
‘We shall be the losers,’continued Sir Thomas.‘His going,though only eight miles,will be an unwelcome contraction of our family circle;but I should have been deeply mortified,if any son of mine could reconcile himself to doing less.It is perfectly natural that you should not have thought much on the subject,Mr Crawford.But a parish has wants and claims which can be known only by a clergyman constantly resident,and which no proxy can be capable of satisfying to the same extent.Edmund might,in the common phrase,do the duty of Thornton,that is,he might read prayers and preach,without giving up Mansfield Park;he might ride over,every Sunday,to a house nominally inhabited,and go through divine service;he might be the clergyman of Thornton Lacey every seventh day,for three or four hours,if that would content him.But it will not.He knows that human nature needs more lessons than a weekly sermon can convey,and that if he does not live among his parishioners and prove himself by constant attention their well-wisher and friend,he does very little either for their good or his own.’
Mr Crawford bowed his acquiescence.
‘I repeat again,’added Sir Thomas,‘that Thornton Lacey is the only house in the neighbourhood in which I should not be happy to wait on Mr Crawford as occupier.’
Mr Crawford bowed his thanks.
‘Sir Thomas,’said Edmund,‘undoubtedly understands the duty of a parish priest.-We must hope his son may prove that he knows it too.’
Whatever effect Sir Thomas's little harangue might really produce on Mr Crawford,it raised some awkward sensations in two of the others,two of his most attentive listeners,Miss Crawford and Fanny.-One of whom,having never before understood that Thornton was so soon and so completely to be his home,was pondering with downcast eyes on what it would be,not to see Edmund every day;and the other,startled from the agreeable fancies she had been previously indulging on the strength of her brother's deion,no longer able,in the picture she had been forming of a future Thornton,to shut out the church,sink the clergyman,and see only the respectable,elegant,modernised,and occasional residence of a man of independent fortune-was considering Sir Thomas,with decided ill will,as the destroyer of all this,and suffering the more from that involuntary forbearance which his character and manner commanded,and from not daring to relieve herself by a single attempt at throwing ridicule on his cause.
