Mansfield Park "The Crawfords' redemption"

Chapter 4

Henry was watching his beloved Fanny in a pale, tremulous state, opening the letter as if it were her death warrant, starting to read it with obvious fear. After what could not have been more than two or three lines, her hand fell, letter and all, and her slight body toppled where it sat.

He was just in time to catch her, or she would have fallen face-first into the dirt. And there he sat, the love of his life in his arms, out cold, himself shocked into the extreme and aware of the indecency of his holding her in such a public place. He decided quickly and picked up the letter, put it in his pocket, then picked up Fanny almost as easily for she weighed next to nothing, and he took her to his hotel instead of to her own home.

He might be sorry for it later, but his main concern was Fanny, and she needed a doctor, not her uncaring parents or their indifferent servant. She would not be missed, except maybe by her one sister.

He soon reached the hotel and ordered a doctor to be sent for, and a private room with a sofa. The butler showed him into a room, and told him a boy had been dispatched to get the best doctor in town, until then one of the servants, a matronly lady of middle age, came in to assist him.

To say that Henry was worried was an understatement, he was nearly in a panic, keeping calm only through extreme self-control. What was in that letter besides the happy news of her cousin's betrothal to Mary? Something had her in an anxious state even before she opened the letter, and she had told him it was the news that she feared.

Had she feared to hear of Bertram's engagement?

These thoughts flashed through his mind, but only to have something to tell the doctor, he didn't realise their meaning yet. She was still out cold, breathing normally, looking more at peace than when she was conscious, actually, but she seemed frightfully pale and thin. He could no longer control himself, he had to take her small, pale hand in his larger browner one. Holding it to his face, he could feel her pulse on his cheek and it seemed strong enough, she was clearly not dying.

He could feel his own heartbeat in his throat, hammering away in his veins, as the servant told him: 'I'll let her smell the salts, sir, and she will probably come to. But she's frightfully thin, better let the doctor see her anyway. You might be wanting to hold the young lady, sir, it is clear she has suffered a great shock and needs someone to comfort her.'

Looking up at the servant, he saw no suspicion or innuendo, just plain concern for a young lady who had fainted. In a split second Henry reached his decision, and he said: 'I'm not a relation, I have no right to hold her, is it enough to hold her hand and stay really close?

'The servant, still just concerned, said: 'In cases like these, sir, it is in the interest of the patient to be comforted, and no-one will think the worse of you for wanting to help her.' But Henry did not want Fanny to wake up in his arms, without having given him permission to hold her, so he said: 'Thank you for your kind understanding, I am aching to hold her and comfort her, but if she wakes in my arms it might make her situation worse, so I'd rather just hold her hand and wait for her own wishes. Is that acceptable?' The servant replied: 'Certainly sir, it seems you know the lady well, so you'll know what her wishes are. Here I go now.'

And she did indeed hold a bottle of salts under Fanny's nose, after which the poor distraught girl wakened, looked at Henry, looked at his hand holding her hand, and whispered: 'Is it really true, is Edmund engaged to your sister?'

His heart wrung by the way she looked, pale, wan, and struck with intense grief, he had to answer her question, and, by now convinced this was what she was afraid of, had probably been afraid of for weeks, he said in a low voice: 'They are my dear Fanny, I thought you'd be happy.'