"What do they bring but disappointment
and sorrow? Not till after Easter! How shall I bear it?
And my poor aunt talking of me every hour!"
Fanny checked the tendency of these thoughts as well as
she could, but she was within half a minute of starting
the idea that Sir Thomas was quite unkind, both to her aunt
and to herself. As for the main subject of the letter,
there was nothing in that to soothe irritation. She was
almost vexed into displeasure and anger against Edmund.
"There is no good in this delay," said she. "Why is not
it settled? He is blinded, and nothing will open his eyes;
nothing can, after having had truths before him so long
in vain. He will marry her, and be poor and miserable.
God grant that her influence do not make him cease
to be respectable!" She looked over the letter again.
"'So very fond of me!' 'tis nonsense all. She loves
nobody but herself and her brother. Her friends leading
her astray for years! She is quite as likely to have led
_them_ astray. They have all, perhaps, been corrupting
one another; but if they are so much fonder of her than
she is of them, she is the less likely to have been hurt,
except by their flattery.
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