She seldom saw him: never alone. He probably avoided
being alone with her. What was to be inferred? That his
judgment submitted to all his own peculiar and bitter share
of this family affliction, but that it was too keenly
felt to be a subject of the slightest communication.
This must be his state. He yielded, but it was with
agonies which did not admit of speech. Long, long would
it be ere Miss Crawford's name passed his lips again,
or she could hope for a renewal of such confidential
intercourse as had been.
It _was_ long. They reached Mansfield on Thursday,
and it was not till Sunday evening that Edmund began
to talk to her on the subject. Sitting with her on
Sunday evening--a wet Sunday evening--the very time of
all others when, if a friend is at hand, the heart must
be opened, and everything told; no one else in the room,
except his mother, who, after hearing an affecting sermon,
had cried herself to sleep, it was impossible not to speak;
and so, with the usual beginnings, hardly to be traced
as to what came first, and the usual declaration that
if she would listen to him for a few minutes, he should
be very brief, and certainly never tax her kindness
in the same way again; she need not fear a repetition;
it would be a subject prohibited entirely: he entered
upon the luxury of relating circumstances and sensations
of the first interest to himself, to one of whose
affectionate sympathy he was quite convinced.
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