When I reached the parsonage I retired to the library and took down the peerage in order to seek for an explanation of my father’s partiality for her, but I could not find any evidence that she was important enough to appeal to him. A thought flickered into my mind that he must be growing more mellow with age, but it quickly flickered out again, and wasting no more time on his quixotic behaviour I set out for the church to preach my sermon.
There were fewer coughs and colds than previously, and more attention paid to my words of wisdom. Indeed, from the comments afterwards I was delighted to find that almost as much attention had been paid to my words of wisdom as to the new style of knot in my cravat.
Sunday 24 March
It is amazing how many things there are to be seen to here after only a week’s absence: parishioners to be visited and either soothed, berated, congratulated, comforted or uplifted; plans for new stiles to be approved; gardens to be examined; matchmakers to be avoided – and sisters to be aided and abetted, for a note arrived from Morris and I have instructed one of the grooms to take it over to the abbey tomorrow, since I do not plan to return there until Tuesday and I am sure she will like it as soon as possible.
Monday 25 March
Having finished my business sooner than expected, and being, I must confess, eager to see Catherine again, I returned to the abbey this afternoon. I found that Catherine was both more foolish and more adorable than I had suspected, for when I took the back stairs to my chamber I came upon her suddenly, and she looked at me as if I were a spectre.
‘Good God!’ she said in horrified accents. ‘How came you here? How came you up that staircase?’
Surprised, I said that it was my nearest way from the stable-yard to my own chamber, at which she blushed deeply and said no more, but she was clearly disturbed and I could not rest until I had found out why.
On enquiring how she came to such a remote part of the house, she said that she had been to see my mother’s room. I should have known at once what was in her mind, for what mother in a novel can ever have died a natural death? She must always have been dispatched by some cruel hand; either that or imprisoned in the labyrinthine caves beneath the crumbling edifice whilst being reported as dead. But I was still in a business frame of mind and I had not yet adjusted my thoughts to Northanger Abbey or to Catherine’s sensibilities, and I asked in surprise if there was anything extraordinary to be seen there.
She replied quickly, ‘No, nothing at all.’
She still looked pale, however, and I thought she might have become lost and not liked to admit it. I was surprised that Eleanor had left her to wander the house alone, and said so, to which she replied quickly that Eleanor had shown her over the greatest part of the house on Saturday, but that they had been prevented from visiting this part – dropping her voice – ‘because your father was with us.’
Since she seemed interested in my mother’s room, I remarked that it was commodious, ‘Large and cheerful-looking, and the dressing-closets so well disposed! It always strikes me as the most comfortable apartment in the house,’ I said, ‘and I rather wonder that Eleanor should not take it for her own. She sent you to look at it, I suppose?’
‘No.’
I was surprised.
‘It has been your own doing entirely?’ I enquired.
She said nothing.
‘Eleanor, I suppose, has talked of her a great deal?’ I wondered.
‘Yes, a great deal. That is – no, not much, but what she did say was very interesting. Her dying so suddenly,’ she said slowly, and with hesitation, ‘and you – none of you being at home – and your father, I thought – perhaps had not been very fond of her.’
A light began to dawn.
‘And from these circumstances, you infer perhaps the probability of some negligence’ – involuntarily she shook her head – ‘or it may be – of something still less pardonable?’
She raised her eyes towards me searchingly and I was at once amused and appalled at her terrible imaginings, as well as being filled with an ache of tolerant tenderness for her naïveté.
‘My mother’s illness,’ I said, ‘the seizure which ended in her death, was sudden, but the malady itself was constitutional. Frederick and I (we were both at home) saw her repeatedly; and from our own observation can bear witness to her having received every possible attention which could spring from the affection of those about her, or which her situation in life could command.’
‘But your father,’ said Catherine, ‘was he afflicted?’
‘For a time, greatly so. You have erred in supposing him not attached to her. He loved her, I am persuaded, as well as it was possible for him to – we have not all, you know, the same tenderness of disposition – and I will not pretend to say that while she lived, she might not often have had much to bear, but though his temper injured her, his judgment never did. His value of her was sincere; and, if not permanently, he was truly afflicted by her death.’
‘I am very glad of it,’ said Catherine, blushing. ‘It would have been very shocking!’
‘If I understand you rightly,’ I said, wondering how far her dreadful imaginings had gone, ‘you had formed a surmise of such horror as I have hardly words to—’
Her eyes fell.
‘Dear Miss Morland, consider the dreadful nature of the suspicions you have entertained,’ I said more kindly. ‘Remember the country and the age in which we live. Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing around you. Does our education prepare us for such atrocities? Do our laws connive at them? Could they be perpetrated without being known, in a country like this, where social and literary intercourse is on such a footing, where every man is surrounded by a neighbourhood of voluntary spies, and where roads and newspapers lay everything open? Dearest Miss Morland, what ideas have you been admitting?’
We had reached the end of the gallery, and although I had done my best to be gentle with her, she wept tears of shame and ran off to her own room before I could stop her.
Eleanor coming upon me then, in time to see Catherine running away, was at a loss, and I said, ‘My dear Eleanor, the antiquity of the abbey, together with your account of our dear mother’s death and her preserved room, have filled Catherine’s head with ideas that would make Mrs Radcliffe blush! She has fancied our father a murderer, and our mother his poor, helpless victim.’
‘Oh no! Oh, Henry, I am sorry for it. I am so used to the abbey myself, and so used to our mother’s death, that I never thought what effect it might all have on her.’
‘Should I go after her?’
‘No, leave her alone for a while so that she might compose herself. It is nearly time to dress for dinner and the activity will ensure she does not brood for too long. The idea that our father might be a murderer must have been very unsettling for her. Was she really very upset?’
‘She was, but not about that. She fled in shame, for I had discovered her secret fears and shown them to be absurd.’
‘Then she has been shamed in her own eyes before the man she loves.’
‘Loves? Do you not think you go too far, too fast?’ I asked.
‘Do I? I do not think so.’
‘She is very young,’ I said, as I gave her my arm and escorted her back to her own room where her maid awaited her.
‘Younger than you, certainly, but not too young to know her own mind, nor too young to fall in love. Or to marry.’
She looked at me expectantly.
‘My thoughts have been tending in that direction,’ I admitted, ‘but today’s adventure has shown me that she needs to see more of the world before she will be able to accept my hand; or, rather, before I will feel justified in offering it to her. Whilst she still thinks it possible, nay, likely, that a retired general, a respectable man in every way, with neighbours often visiting, can murder his wife and conceal the crime, or imprison his wife and pretend she has died, then she is not old enough for marriage.’