But honestly now, do not you rather expect it than otherwise?"
"No," said Fanny stoutly, "I do not expect it at all."
"Not at all!" cried Miss Crawford with alacrity.
"I wonder at that. But I dare say you know exactly--
I always imagine you are--perhaps you do not think him
likely to marry at all--or not at present."
"No, I do not," said Fanny softly, hoping she did not err
either in the belief or the acknowledgment of it.
Her companion looked at her keenly; and gathering greater
spirit from the blush soon produced from such a look,
only said, "He is best off as he is," and turned the subject.
CHAPTER XXX
Miss Crawford's uneasiness was much lightened by
this conversation, and she walked home again in spirits
which might have defied almost another week of the same
small party in the same bad weather, had they been put
to the proof; but as that very evening brought her brother
down from London again in quite, or more than quite,
his usual cheerfulness, she had nothing farther to try
her own. His still refusing to tell her what he had gone
for was but the promotion of gaiety; a day before it
might have irritated, but now it was a pleasant joke--
suspected only of concealing something planned as a pleasant
surprise to herself.
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