曼斯菲尔德庄园 Chapter 28

CHAPTER XXVIII ,Her uncle and both her aunts were in the drawing-room when Fanny went down. To the former she was an interesting object, and he saw with pleasure the general elegance ¹ of her appearance, and her being in remarkably ² good looks. The neatness and propriety ³ of her dress was all that he would allow himself to commend in her presence, but upon her leaving the room again soon afterwards, he spoke ⁵ of her beauty with very decided ⁶ praise. ,"Yes," said Lady Bertram, "she looks very well. I sent Chapman to her." ,"Look well! Oh, yes!" cried Mrs. Norris, "she has good reason to look well with all her advantages: brought up in this family as she has been, with all the benefit of her cousins' manners before her. Only think, my dear Sir Thomas, what extraordinary advantages you and I have been the means of giving her. The very gown you have been taking notice of is your own generous present to her when dear Mrs. Rushworth married. What would she have been if we had not taken her by the hand?" ,Sir Thomas said no more; but when they sat down to table the eyes of the two young men assured him that the subject might be gently touched again, when the ladies withdrew, with more success. Fanny saw that she was approved; and the consciousness of looking well made her look still better. From a variety of causes she was happy, and she was soon made still happier; for in following her aunts out of the room, Edmund, who was holding open the door, said, as she passed him, "You must dance with me, Fanny; you must keep two dances for me; any two that you like, except the first." She had nothing more to wish for. She had hardly ever been in a state so nearly approaching high spirits in her life. Her cousins' former gaiety on the day of a ball was no longer surprising to her; she felt it to be indeed very charming, and was actually practising her steps about the drawing-room as long as she could be safe from the notice of her aunt Norris, who was entirely ⁷ taken up at first in fresh arranging and injuring the noble fire which the butler had prepared. ,Half an hour followed that would have been at least languid under any other circumstances, but Fanny's happiness still prevailed. It was but to think of her conversation with Edmund, and what was the restlessness of Mrs. Norris? What were the yawns of Lady Bertram? ,When the carriages were really heard, when the guests began really to assemble, her own gaiety of heart was much subdued ¹¹: the sight of so many strangers threw her back into herself; and besides the gravity and formality of the first great circle, which the manners of neither Sir Thomas nor Lady Bertram were of a kind to do away, she found herself occasionally called on to endure something worse. She was introduced here and there by her uncle, and forced to be spoken to, and to curtsey, and speak again. This was a hard duty, and she was never summoned to it without looking at William, as he walked about at his ease in the background of the scene, and longing ¹² to be with him. ,The entrance of the Grants and Crawfords was a favourable ¹³ epoch ¹⁴. The stiffness of the meeting soon gave way before their popular manners and more diffused intimacies ¹⁵: little groups were formed, and everybody grew comfortable. Fanny felt the advantage; and, drawing back from the toils ¹⁶ of civility, would have been again most happy, could she have kept her eyes from wandering between Edmund and Mary Crawford. _She_ looked all loveliness--and what might not be the end of it? Her own musings were brought to an end on perceiving Mr. Crawford before her, and her thoughts were put into another channel by his engaging her almost instantly for the first two dances. Her happiness on this occasion was very much _a_ _la_ _mortal_, finely chequered. To be secure of a partner at first was a most essential good-- for the moment of beginning was now growing seriously near; and she so little understood her own claims as to think that if Mr. Crawford had not asked her, she must have been the last to be sought after, and should have received a partner only through a series of inquiry ¹⁷, and bustle ¹⁸, and interference, which would have been terrible; but at the same time there was a pointedness ¹⁹ in his manner of asking her which she did not like, and she saw his eye glancing for a moment at her necklace, with a smile--she thought there was a smile--which made her blush and feel wretched. And though there was no second glance to disturb her, though his object seemed then to be only quietly agreeable, she could not get the better of her embarrassment ²⁰, heightened as it was by the idea of his perceiving it, and had no composure till he turned away to some one else. Then she could gradually rise up to the genuine satisfaction of having a partner, a voluntary partner, secured against the dancing began. ,When the company were moving into the ballroom ²¹, she found herself for the first time near Miss Crawford, whose eyes and smiles were immediately and more unequivocally directed as her brother's had been, and who was beginning to speak on the subject, when Fanny, anxious to get the story over, hastened to give the explanation of the second necklace: the real chain. Miss Crawford listened; and all her intended compliments and insinuations to Fanny were forgotten: she felt only one thing; and her eyes, bright as they had been before, shewing they could yet be brighter, she exclaimed with eager pleasure, "Did he? Did Edmund? That was like himself. No other man would have thought of it. I honour him beyond expression." And she looked around as if longing to tell him so. He was not near, he was attending a party of ladies out of the room; and Mrs. Grant coming up to the two girls, and taking an arm of each, they followed with the rest. ,Fanny's heart sunk, but there was no leisure for thinking long even of Miss Crawford's feelings. They were in the ballroom, the violins were playing, and her mind was in a flutter that forbade its fixing on anything serious. She must watch the general arrangements, and see how everything was done. ,In a few minutes Sir Thomas came to her, and asked if she were engaged; and the "Yes, sir; to Mr. Crawford," was exactly what he had intended to hear. Mr. Crawford was not far off; Sir Thomas brought him to her, saying something which discovered to Fanny, that _she_ was to lead the way and open the ball; an idea that had never occurred to her before. Whenever she had thought of the minutiae ²² of the evening, it had been as a matter of course that Edmund would begin with Miss Crawford; and the impression was so strong, that though _her_ _uncle_ spoke the contrary, she could not help an exclamation ²³ of surprise, a hint of her unfitness, an entreaty ²⁴ even to be excused. To be urging her opinion against Sir Thomas's was a proof of the extremity ²⁵ of the case; but such was her horror at the first suggestion, that she could actually look him in the face and say that she hoped it might be settled otherwise; in vain, however: Sir Thomas smiled, tried to encourage her, and then looked too serious, and said too decidedly, "It must be so, my dear," for her to hazard another word; and she found herself the next moment conducted by Mr. Crawford to the top of the room, and standing ²⁶ there to be joined by the rest of the dancers, couple after couple, as they were formed. ,John has been known for his sartorial elegance.约翰因为衣着讲究而出名 。,I thought she was remarkably restrained in the circumstances. 我认为她在那种情况下非常克制
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