Mansfield Park "The Crawfords' redemption"

Chapter 11

Both Fanny and Henry were now resigned to the upcoming visit of Edmund and Mary, but that did not mean Fanny was not totally out of sorts when the carriage came driving up the lane. Her face drained of colour instantly and her knees buckled. The first meeting was extremely awkward and painful to Fanny, all her regrets came rushing back as she saw the man she had loved all her teenage years for the first time in months, and he was helping another woman out of a carriage.

She stood frozen to the ground, tried to school her expression to neutral, and none to soon, for Henry and her being the only ones waiting outside, Edmund came straight at her and embraced her eagerly: 'My dearest Fanny, how I've missed you!' He had never before touched her so intimately, so closely, with such exultation, she knew not how to handle herself, and was completely overwhelmed.

He continued: 'Let me look at you, my dear, you still look affected by your ordeal, you must have suffered so much. I'm so sorry I never wrote or visited, Fanny, without Crawford you might have just faded away. You know I was totally distraught by...' And he inclined his head to his fair bride-to-be, who was talking to her brother intently, until the latter saw the state Fanny was in and excused himself to rush to her side and support her.

He was just in time, for so much exhuberance from Edmund was more than she could handle. Henry's touch calmed her just enough to hold up under another intense scrutiny by her cousin. Edmund looked at her trembling legs, her desultory expression with true sadness, and held her to his chest again, mumbling softly with intense feeling: 'I'm so very sorry Fanny, I let you down completely, it was so incredibly selfish of me. Can you forgive me?' And he looked at her as if he expected an answer, but there was no way she could speak, held against the man she loved hopelessly, whom she had expected to shake hands with and be done.

When she didn't speak, he gazed at her as if he could see right through her, and he said feelingly: 'I think we need to take a turn in the shrubbery again, like we used to do when one of us had something on his heart. Or have I lost my right to your confidence?'

His eyes promised her he would seek her out, and then he cordially greeted Henry, who was at Fanny's side again from the moment Edmund had released her from his embrace, shaking his hand and saying: 'Crawford, I was thrilled beyond imagination when I heard of your engagement, and Fanny's account of your visit to Everingham was charming and everything we both wanted to hear. But now I'm starting to feel anxious, is everything all right between the two of you?'

Henry looked straight at him and replied frankly: 'Everything is exactly as your cousin and I agreed upon just after I brought her your letter in Portsmouth.' Of course this was not going to reassure Edmund, and he quickly turned back into the rather reserved, upright man Fanny knew and loved with so much intensity.

He said: 'I was nervous meeting you just now, Fanny, I felt I had let you down, nearly losing you to deprivation because I neglected you, put to shame by Crawford who didn't just worry from a distance, but did the right thing straight away. But now I find you not deliriously happy, but fighting tears, even faint. What is going on? I'm going to greet my mother and father, for I suppose they know nothing of this, and then we'll go to the shrubbery and you will tell me. Will you not?'

His plea cut Fanny to the bone, and she finally broke down and cried. Henry now embraced her openly, and said ruefully: 'I guess that is a yes. I'm taking Fanny there now, before your parents can see her, will you join us when you're done here?'

Openly distressed now, Edmund confirmed, and went inside with Miss Crawford, trying to control his face so as not to alarm his parents.

When they reached the shrubbery, Henry sat Fanny down on a bench that was relatively screened from view by a thick laurel hedge. He sat next to her and took her in his arms, letting her cry herself out against his chest, as he had done nearly every day since Fanny had learned the news of Edmund's engagement.