"Do you wonder? Is there
anything in my present entreaty that you do not understand?
I will explain to you instantly all that makes me urge
you in this manner, all that gives me an interest in
what you look and do, and excites my present curiosity.
I will not leave you to wonder long."
In spite of herself, she could not help half a smile,
but she said nothing.
"You shook your head at my acknowledging that I should
not like to engage in the duties of a clergyman always
for a constancy. Yes, that was the word. Constancy: I am
not afraid of the word. I would spell it, read it,
write it with anybody. I see nothing alarming in the word.
Did you think I ought?"
"Perhaps, sir," said Fanny, wearied at last into speaking--
"perhaps, sir, I thought it was a pity you did not always
know yourself as well as you seemed to do at that moment."
Crawford, delighted to get her to speak at any rate,
was determined to keep it up; and poor Fanny, who had
hoped to silence him by such an extremity of reproof,
found herself sadly mistaken, and that it was only a change
from one object of curiosity and one set of words to another.
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