In this way months ran on at Wharton.Our Whartons had come down in the latter half of August, and at the beginning of September Mr Wharton returned to London.Everett, of course, remained, as he was still learning the lesson of which he was in truth becoming a little weary; and at last Emily had also been persuaded to stay in Hertfordshire.Her father promised to return, not mentioning any precise time, but giving her to understand that he would come before the winter.He went, and probably found that his taste for the Eldon and for whist had returned to him.In the middle of November old Mrs Fletcher arrived.Emily was not aware of what was being done; but, in truth, the Fletchers and Whartons combined were conspiring with a view of bringing her back to her former self.Mrs Fletcher had not yielded without some difficulty,--for it was a part of this conspiracy that Arthur was to be allowed to marry the widow.But John had prevailed.'He'll do it anyway, mother,' he had said, whether you and I like it or not.And why on earth shouldn't he do as he pleases?'
'Think what the man was, John!'
'It's more to the purpose to think what the woman is.Arthur has made up his mind, and if I know him, he's not the man to be talked out of it.' And so the old woman had given in, and had at last consented to go forward as the advanced guard of Fletchers, and lay siege to the affections of the woman whom she had once so thoroughly discarded from her heart.
'My dear,' she said, when they first met, 'if there has been anything wrong between you and me, let it be among the things that are past.You always used to kiss me.Give me a kiss now.'
Of course Emily kissed her; and after that Mrs Fletcher patted her and petted her, and gave her lozenges, which she declared in private to be 'the sovereignest thing on earth' for debilitated nerves.And then it came out by degrees that John Fletcher and his wife and all the little Fletchers were coming to Wharton for the Christmas weeks.Everett had gone, but was also to be back for Christmas, and Mr Wharton's visit was also postponed.It was absolutely necessary that Everett should be at Wharton for the Christmas festivities, and expedient that Everett's father should be there to see them.In this way Emily had no means of escape.
Her father wrote telling her of his plans, saying that he would bring her back after Christmas.Everett's heirship had made these Christmas festivities,--which were, however, to be confined to the two families,--quite a necessity.In all this not a word was said about Arthur, nor did she dare to ask whether he was expected.The younger Mrs Fletcher, John's wife, opened her arms to the widow in a manner that almost plainly said that she regarded Emily as her future sister-in-law.John Fletcher talked to her about Longbarns, and the children,--complete Fletcher talk,--as though she were already one of them, never, however, mentioning Arthur's name.The old lady got down a fresh supply of the lozenges from London because those she had by her might perhaps be a little stale.And then there was another sign which after a while became plain to Emily.No one in either family ever mentioned her name.It was not singular that none of them should call her Mrs Lopez, as she was Emily to all of them.But they never so described her even in speaking to the servants.
And the servants themselves, as far as possible, avoided that odious word.The thing was to be buried, if not into oblivion, yet in some speechless grave.And it seemed that her father was joined in this attempt.When writing to her he usually made some excuse for writing also to Everett, or, in Everett's absence, to the baronet,--so that the letter for his daughter might be enclosed and addressed simply to 'Emily'.
She understood it all, and though she was moved to continual solitary tears by this ineffable tenderness, yet she rebelled against them.They should never cheat her back into happiness by such wiles as that! It was not fit that she should yield to them.As a woman utterly disgraced it could not become her again to laugh and be joyful, to give and take loving embraces, to sit and smile, perhaps a happy mother, at another man's hearth.For their love she was grateful.For his love she was more than grateful.How constant must be his heart, how grand his nature, how more than manly his strength of character, when he was thus true to her through all the evil she had done! Love him! Yes;--she would pray for him, worship him, fill the remainder of her days with thinking of him, hoping for him, and making his interests her own.Should he ever be married,--and she would pray that he might,--his wife, if possible, should be her friend, his children should be her darlings, and he should always be her hero.But they should not, with all their schemes, cheat her into disgracing him by marrying him.
At last her father came, and it was he who told her that Arthur was expected on the day before Christmas.'Why did you not tell me before, papa, so that I might have asked you to take me away?'
'Because I thought, my dear, that it was better that you should be constrained to meet him.You would not wish to live all your life in terror of seeing Arthur Fletcher?'
'Not all my life.'
'Take the plunge and it will be over.They have all been very good to you.'
'Too good, papa.I didn't want it.'
'They are your oldest friends.There isn't a young man in England I think so highly of as John Fletcher.When I am gone, where are you to look for friends?'
'I'm not ungrateful, papa.'
'You can't know them all, and yet keep yourself altogether separate from Arthur.Think what it would be to me never to be able to ask him to the house.He is the only one of the family that lives in London, and now it seems that Everett will spend most of his time down here.Of course it is better that you should meet him and have done with it.' There was no answer to be made to this, but still she was fixed in her resolution that she would never meet him as her lover.
