“I suppose Mr. Merridew has a right to do what he pleases?” said Hester; “and as it does not matter to us—”
“You speak a great deal too fast,” said Emma, offended. “Say it doesn’t matter to you: but it may to me a great deal, and therefore I take a great interest in it. Do you think parents have a right to do what they please? If they make us come into the world, whether we wish it or not, of course they are bound to do their best for us. I am the youngest myself, and I hope I know my place; but then there was no money at all among us. Papa spent it all himself; so certainly we had share and share alike, for there was nothing. When that’s the case nobody can have a word to say. But the Merridews have a good deal, and everyone ought to have his just share. Not but what I like Algernon Merridew very much. He is always very agreeable, and I think it very nice both of Ellen and him that they should have been so kind to me and given me my chance, though you say we’re no relations. I am sure I always thought we were relations, for my part.”
“Did you think Reginald was your relation too?”
“Well, not perhaps quite so far as that—a connection I should have said; but it does not matter very much now,” Emma said, with a little simper of satisfaction. “What a good thing Roland found out about grandpapa and grandmamma, Hester—and how fortunate that they should have asked me! If everything goes right I shall feel that I owe the happiness of my life to it. When a girl goes out upon a visit, she never knows what may happen before she gets home—or even she may never need to go home at all. I don’t know if I shall, I am sure. To talk about anything taking place from Roland’s house would be absurd. Why, we don’t even know the clergyman! and nobody cares a bit about us. If there was any meaning in home it should be from Elinor’s, you know—for everybody knows us there.”
“What do you mean about ‘anything taking place’?—and from—from what?” Hester asked, who never paid too much attention to Emma’s monologues, and had altogether lost the thread of her discoursings now.
“Oh,” cried Emma, clasping Hester’s arm close, “how you do make one blush! Of course you know very well what I mean. If he speaks before I go away—and I am sure I hope he will, for it would be such a nuisance to have him following me up to Kilburn!—I don’t suppose there would be any occasion for waiting long. Why should people wait when they are well off enough, and nothing to be gained by it? When the man has not got settled in a proper situation, or when there is not enough to live upon, then of course they must put it off; but in such a case as ours—I mean this, you know—it might as well be here as anywhere,” Emma said, reflectively. “Cousin Catherine has always been very kind to me. Rather than let grandpapa and grandmamma be disturbed at their age, I shouldn’t wonder if she would give the breakfast—especially considering the double connection, and that it is such a very good thing to get me settled. You needn’t laugh, Hester. It is not a thing to laugh at. Unless I had settled, what should I have done? You are an only daughter, you don’t know what it is to be the youngest and have no proper home.”
These words mollified Hester, who had been in lofty opposition, half disgusted, half indignant. She was brought down by this appeal to her sympathy. “But you are happy with your brother?” she said.
“Oh, yes—happy enough; Roland is very kind. And though it’s a small house, it is tolerably nice, and two maids with nothing particular to do. But it is very dull, you know, and I don’t know many people. And you must always take into consideration that at any moment Roland might marry, and then where should I be? Why, he admires you very much. He might just as likely as not, next time he comes, make you an offer; and then where should I be?”
“You think, I suppose,” said Hester, loftily, “that when a man makes an offer, as you say, that is all about it; there is no opposition to be looked for on the girl’s side?”
“Well, you know,” said Emma, “I call you one of the high-flown ones. There are always some like that. But in an ordinary way what do girls want but their chance? And when they’ve got it, what folly to refuse—at least in my position, Hester. If I don’t get settled, what have I to look forward to? Roland will marry sooner or later. He’s an awful flirt, and though he admires you very much, I shouldn’t advise you to have anything to do with him unless you just marry him out and out. I should think he’d make a good husband. But don’t be engaged to him, Hester; mind my words. Be married in three weeks, or have nothing to say to him—that is my advice. Oh, you need not be huffy. I am sure I don’t want you or anyone to marry him, at least till I am settled. But if I don’t settle now, he is sure, of course, to marry some time; and then where shall I be? This is
