Sense And Sensibility And Sea Monsters (28 page)

Edward assured them himself of his being in town, within a very short time, by twice calling in Berkeley Causeway. His hermit-crab shell calling card was found on the table when they returned from a diverting morning at Mr. Pennywhistle’s Aqua-Museo-Quarium, where they had spent an hour and a quarter mesmerised by the antics of a troupe of flying fish who had been trained in sub-aqueous acrobatics. Elinor was pleased that Edward had called; and still more pleased that she had missed him.

The Dashwoods were so prodigiously delighted with the Middletons that they determined to give them a dinner; soon after their acquaintance began, they invited them to dine in Harley Piscina, where they had taken a very good docking for three months. Their sisters and Mrs. Jennings were invited likewise, and John Dashwood was careful to secure Colonel Brandon. Always glad to be where the Miss Dashwoods were, he received his civilities with some surprise, but much more pleasure. He prepared his best dress uniform and neatly combed his tentacles.

They were to meet Mrs. Ferrars; but Elinor could not learn whether her sons were to be of the party. The expectation of seeing
her
, however, was enough to make her interested in the engagement.

The evening promised other amusements as well. Given the minimal time required for the preparation and consumption of foodstuffs, the custom of dinner parties in Sub-Marine Station Beta placed a large emphasis on the after-dinner entertainment. As taken as was Fanny Dashwood with the Middletons, it came as no surprise to Elinor that she intended to present for them the most rarified of amusements—namely of arranging for their domestic servants to compete in various contests of skill and strength against enhanced sea creatures.

The important Tuesday arrived, and Elinor found Lucy professing a state of extreme anxiety as they disembarked from their gondola at the home of the Dashwoods.

“Pity me, dear Miss Dashwood!” said Lucy. “There is nobody here but you that can feel for me. I declare I can hardly stand. Good gracious! In a moment I shall see the person that all my happiness depends on— that is to be my mother!”

Mrs. Ferrars was a little, thin woman, upright in her figure, and serious in her aspect. Her complexion was sallow; and her features small, without beauty, and naturally without expression. As Fanny presented her with that evening’s main course, an elegantly presented large loaf of beef-steak–flavoured gelatin paste, she felt it unnecessary to present a peroration on the deficiencies of Station cuisine; she simply wrinkled her sour nose and said “Ick.” Of the few syllables that did escape her that evening, not one fell to the share of Miss Dashwood, whom she eyed with the spirited determination of disliking her at all events.

Elinor could not
now
be made unhappy by this behaviour. A few months ago, it would have hurt her exceedingly; but it was not in Mrs. Ferrars’s power to distress her by it now; and the difference of her manners to the Miss Steeles, a difference which seemed purposely made to humble her more, only amused her. She could not but smile to see the
graciousness of both mother and daughter towards Lucy, the very person whom of all others (had they known as much as she did) they would have been most anxious to mortify.

She herself, who had comparatively no power to wound them, sat pointedly slighted by both. But while she smiled at a graciousness so misapplied, she could not reflect on the mean-spirited folly from which it sprung without thoroughly despising them all four, and idly trying to recall a method of swiftly murdering a person with two fingers pressed to the throat, which she had once been taught by a drunken Sir John.

The dinner was a grand one, the servants were numerous, and everything bespoke the Mistress’s inclination for show, and the Master’s ability to support it. The after-dinner entertainment was truly remarkable; first came a display in which a household servant played three hands of
Jeu d’enfer
against a sea horse; and then one in which their housemaid was caged inside a giant razor-clam from which she had to fight her way out. Mrs. Ferrars, not to be satisfied, pronounced the clamshell a weak one, its razors dull, and averred that, were she a younger woman, she might have broken free much quicker.

Before departing Norland, Elinor had whittled out of flotsam a very pretty pair of parakeets for her sister-in-law; and these birds, catching the eye of John Dashwood on his following the other gentlemen into the room, were officiously handed by him to Colonel Brandon for his admiration.

“These are done by my eldest sister,” said he, “and you, as a man of taste, will, I dare say, be pleased with them. I do not know whether you have seen any of her Elinor’s work before, but she is reckoned to whittle extremely well.”

The colonel, though disclaiming all pretensions to connoisseurship, warmly admired the driftwood budgies, as he would have done anything created by Miss Dashwood, and they were handed round for general inspection. Mrs. Ferrars, not aware of their being Elinor’s work, particularly requested to look at them; and after they had received gratifying
testimony of Lady Middleton’s approbation, Fanny presented them to her mother, considerately informing her, at the same time, that they were done by Miss Dashwood.

“Hum,” said Mrs. Ferrars, “very pretty,” and dropped them on the ground, causing one of the parakeet’s tailfeathers to snap off.

Perhaps Fanny thought for a moment that her mother had been quite rude enough, for, colouring a little, she immediately said, “They are very pretty, ma’am—ain’t they?” But then again, the dread of having been too civil, too encouraging herself, probably came over her, for she dropped the other parakeet (causing
its
tail to fall off) and presently added, “Do you not think they are something in Miss Morton’s style of whittling, Ma’am? She
does
sculpt most delightfully! How masterfully her diorama of the late, lamented Sub-Marine Station Alpha was done! One nearly felt that one was there!”

“Beautifully indeed! But
she
does every thing well. Have you seen her peel a banana? It is like listening to a symphony.”

Marianne could not bear this. She was already greatly displeased with Mrs. Ferrars, and such ill-timed praise of another, at Elinor’s expense, though she had not any notion of what was principally meant by it, provoked her immediately to say with warmth, “This is admiration of a very particular kind! What is Miss Morton to us?” And so saying, she took the parakeets out of her sister-in-law’s hands, and reattached their dismembered tailfeathers with bandages she removed for the purpose from the still-bleeding, shell-sliced housemaid.

“It is Elinor of whom
we
think and speak,” Marianne continued angrily. “Who knows, or who cares, for this Miss Morton!”

Mrs. Ferrars looked exceedingly angry, and drawing herself up more stiffly than ever, pronounced in retort this bitter philippic, “Miss Morton is Lord Morton’s daughter.
The
Lord Morton! He, the great hydraulic engineer of his or any age; he who was so dreadfully betrayed!”

It was not necessary for Mrs. Ferrars to relate the details; all present were familiar with the tragic story of Lord Morton and Sub-Marine
Station Alpha. The great man had been commissioned by the Crown to create the original underwater fortress, and his plans for the Station had been flawless, his execution exemplary. How could Lord Morton have known that Sir Bradley, his faithful amanuensis and chief engineer, was a merman in disguise, an ally to the sea creatures bent on the destruction of all mankind? This Bradley, cursed be the name, had waited patiently, tail disguised, for the entire Station to be constructed and inhabited by a city’s worth of good English souls, before he triggered the gate-failure that flooded Morton’s masterwork in an instant, and took the lives of so many brave undersea pioneers, Lord Morton included. The fortunate ones had been drowned, while the rest were shortly feasted upon by the swimming army of deep-sea murder-beasts that poured into the breached gate.

For Marianne to sully the name of Lord Morton in such company was a grave
faux pas
; Fanny looked very angry, and her husband was all in a fright at his sister’s audacity. Elinor was much more hurt by Marianne’s warmth than by what produced it; but Colonel Brandon’s eyes, as they were fixed on Marianne, declared that he noticed only what was amiable in it, the affectionate heart which could not bear to see a sister slighted in the smallest point. His tentacles performed a sort of gentle, romantic sway as he gazed upon her.

Marianne’s feelings did not stop here. She moved to her sister’s chair, and putting one arm round her neck, and one cheek close to hers, said in a low, but eager, voice, “Dear, dear Elinor, don’t mind them. Don’t let them make
you
unhappy.”

She could say no more; her spirits were quite overcome, and hiding her face on Elinor’s shoulder, she burst into tears. Mrs. Jennings, with a very intelligent “Ah! poor dear,” immediately gave her her salts, and Sir John instantly changed his seat to one close by Lucy Steele, and gave her, in a whisper, a brief account of the whole shocking Willoughby affair.

And then the bell was rung for the next act of the floor show, in which a man was to play badminton against a fur seal.

E
LINOR’S CURIOSITY TO SEE
Mrs. Ferrars was satisfied, as was her curiosity to know how a fur seal might wield a badminton racquet. She had found in Mrs. Ferrars everything that could make a further connection between the families undesirable. She had seen enough of her pride, her meanness, and her determined prejudice, to comprehend all the difficulties that must have perplexed the engagement of Edward and herself, had he been otherwise free.

“My dear friend,” cried Lucy, as soon as they met the next day, “I come to talk to you of my happiness. Could anything be so flattering as Mrs. Ferrars’s way of treating me yesterday? So exceeding affable as she was! Arranging me a seat up front, where I could best view the floorshow, but draping me considerately with a poncho. You know how I dreaded the thoughts of seeing her; but the very moment I was introduced, there was such an affability in her behaviour. She had quite took a fancy to me. Now was not it so? You saw it all; and was not you quite struck with it?”

“She was certainly very civil to you.”

“Civil! Did you see nothing but civility? I saw a vast deal more. Such kindness as fell to the share of nobody but me!”

Elinor wished to talk of something else; rifling through her mind for other topics of interest, she recalled the subject of the swordfish and the tiny cracks she had noticed in the Dome, and enquired whether Lucy had ever seen such a crack before, during her time in-Station—but Lucy would not allow the subject to be changed; she still pressed her to admit she had reason for her happiness, and Elinor was obliged to go on.

“If they had known your engagement,” said she, “nothing could be
more flattering than their treatment of you; but as that was not the case—”

“I guessed you would say so,” replied Lucy quickly, “but there was no reason in the world why Mrs. Ferrars should seem to like me, if she did not. Mrs. Ferrars is a charming woman, and so is your sister-in-law. They are both delightful women, indeed! I wonder I should never hear you say how agreeable Mrs. Dashwood was!”

To this Elinor had no answer to make, and did not attempt any.

“Are you ill, Miss Dashwood? You seem low. You don’t speak. Sure you ain’t well?”

“I never was in better health.” In truth, as the conversation on the hated topic continued, Elinor felt the familiar terrifying darkness swimming about her eyes, saw the familiar star pattern begin to form itself in her mind. She took a series of deep breaths, in desperate hope that she could keep the eerie vision at bay. What was this torment? Why would it not leave her be?

“I am glad of it with all my heart,” Lucy continued. “But I cannot help notice you are squeezing your eyes shut and holding your head between your legs. I should be sorry to have
you
ill. Heaven knows what I should have done without your friendship.”

Elinor was prevented from making any response by the door’s being thrown open, the servant’s announcing Mr. Ferrars, and Edward immediately walking in.

It was a very awkward moment; and the countenance of each showed that it was so. They all looked exceedingly foolish; and Edward seemed to have as great an inclination to walk out of the room again, as to advance farther into it. The very circumstance, which they would each have been most anxious to avoid, had fallen on them. They were not only all three together, but were together without the relief of any other person. There they were, like three fish, caught unexpectedly together in the same net—all wishing they could be eaten straightaway, rather than continue together in their current company.

The ladies recovered themselves first. It was not Lucy’s business to put herself forward; the appearance of secrecy must still be kept up. After slightly addressing him, she said no more. For Elinor’s part, she was only glad that Edward’s familiar, comforting presence had for now dispelled the five-pointed design, and the weird, suffocating darkness, from her mind.

Elinor resolved that she would not allow the presence of Lucy, nor the consciousness of some injustice towards herself, deter her from saying that she was happy to see him. She would not be frightened by Lucy from paying him those attentions which, as a friend and almost a relation, were his due.

Her manners gave some reassurance to Edward, and he had courage enough to sit down; but his embarrassment still exceeded that of the ladies in a proportion; for his heart had not the indifference of Lucy’s, nor could his conscience have quite the ease of Elinor’s.

It only contributed to the awkwardness when a loud bang was heard against the glass back wall of the docking; turning their heads, they saw that a servant, who had been changing the water filtration tank and come detached from the breathing hose of his special Ex-Domic Float-Suit, was clamouring for their attention. The operations of the Station’s various life-sustaining apparatuses were meant to be entirely invisible to the inhabitants, and the man’s noisy exhibition was a rather embarrassing violation of decorum; Elinor and her guests studiously ignored him, and his increasingly insistent thrashing became the background to the ensuing uncomfortable exchange.