He had already ate, and declined
staying for their meal. He would walk round the ramparts,
and join them with the carriage. He was gone again;
glad to get away even from Fanny.
He looked very ill; evidently suffering under
violent emotions, which he was determined to suppress.
She knew it must be so, but it was terrible to her.
The carriage came; and he entered the house again at
the same moment, just in time to spend a few minutes with
the family, and be a witness--but that he saw nothing--
of the tranquil manner in which the daughters were
parted with, and just in time to prevent their sitting
down to the breakfast-table, which, by dint of much
unusual activity, was quite and completely ready as
the carriage drove from the door. Fanny's last meal
in her father's house was in character with her first:
she was dismissed from it as hospitably as she had been welcomed.
How her heart swelled with joy and gratitude as she
passed the barriers of Portsmouth, and how Susan's face
wore its broadest smiles, may be easily conceived.
Sitting forwards, however, and screened by her bonnet,
those smiles were unseen.
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