Work Text:
“With bated breath, Amelia crept closer and put her eye to the crack in the boards; but scarcely had she caught a glimpse of the pirates’ lair when she abruptly drew back with a stifled cry. There, quite at his ease in the midst of the frightful-looking men, stood Florian.”
Catherine Tilney could not quite suppress her gasp.
“Oh! I knew that he was in league with them!” she exclaimed. “Or, rather, I did not quite know – but I was afraid that there must be something amiss, for his disappearance was so very sudden and peculiar. How perfectly horrid!”
“Poor Florian!” cried her husband. “Are you so eager to think him a villain? No, I will not believe it. Have we not been informed that he is exceedingly handsome? Does he not have, besides, the voice of an angel? How could such a man be a pirate?”
“It is very strange,” admitted Catherine. “But he must have some connection to the pirates, for why else should old Rodolfo have been so afraid of him?”
“I cannot answer you,” said Henry, “but I do not mean to lose hope in Florian quite yet. However, I am afraid that the only way of settling the question is to read on. Shall I?”
“Oh, yes – pray, do!”
As Henry continued his reading, Catherine reluctantly dragged her eyes away from his face and back to her needlework. She delighted in looking at him almost as much as she did in listening. Not only did he give each character a distinct voice – his mobile countenance brought their every feeling alive, and Catherine doubted whether any Drury Lane actor could have given a more enchanting performance.
It is therefore small wonder that her attention was soon drawn away from her work again. The shirt that she was toiling away at could hardly compete with Florian’s impassioned speech to the frightful Captain Silvereye (now revealed to be his father!) or with the glorious duel which followed. Nor was it possible to spare more than the briefest glance for her stitches when Florian, reunited with Amelia at last, confessed his undying devotion – not when Henry met her eyes with such a look as he declaimed the words.
And so, just when it seemed that Amelia and Florian were about to make their escape, Henry’s reading was again interrupted by an exclamation.
“Oh, dear!” Catherine gazed at her work in despair. “I have made a wretched tangle of it! This piece is sewn on upside down, and that seam is dreadfully crooked.” She turned the half-made shirt over in her hands, discovering more evidence of her distraction wherever her eyes alighted. “There is no helping it – I shall have to take the entire thing apart and start over.”
“Ah,” said Henry solemnly, “but we may consider the matter in a more advantageous light. Is there not a fine moral to be drawn from this mishap? It is a dull truism to state that one must reap what one sows – but it is no less true that one may, on occasion, be obliged to rip what one sews.”
In the usual course of things, such an observation would have been rewarded with a bright peal of laughter. This time, however, Catherine succeeded only in mustering up rather a weak smile, and there was a little tremble in her voice as she said, “Mother was right, I suppose, when she said that I should be a sad housekeeper. I try so very hard to be less scatter-brained, but I cannot seem to help it.”
Henry was suddenly reminded of some little trouble which had occurred with the mince-pies at dinner and of a letter, arrived a day or two ago from Fullerton, which had contained two crossed sheets of brisk advice. Mrs Morland was a kindly, well-meaning woman, but rather plainspoken – and the words of a parent, he very well knew, were easily taken to heart.
“My dear,” he said in a gentler tone, “surely there is no need to exhaust your eyes further tonight. The shirt will keep until morning, and I dare say it will not look half as bad in daylight. Besides, I should much rather have you by my side than behind that worktable.”
When the tale of Amelia’s adventures was resumed, it was thus with Catherine’s head resting on Henry’s shoulder, and though the perils encountered by the hero and the heroine sometimes made her shiver, his arm about her waist was a constant reassurance. The sad, abandoned heap of fabric on the worktable was soon entirely forgotten.
Mrs Morland might not have approved of such a style of housekeeping, but as both residents of the house were quite content, perhaps her opinion need not signify.