Austen Said:

said Fanny, with gentle earnestness.

cried Miss Crawford,

said she, with an arch smile;

A general silence succeeded. Each was thoughtful. Fanny made the first interruption by saying,

cried Edmund, immediately drawing her arm within his,

turning to Miss Crawford,

She took it, however, as she spoke, and the gratification of having her do so, of feeling such a connexion for the first time, made him a little forgetful of Fanny.

said he.

was his sturdy answer; for he was not yet so much in love as to measure distance, or reckon time, with feminine lawlessness.

said Edmund, taking out his watch.

A few steps farther brought them out at the bottom of the very walk they had been talking of; and standing back, well shaded and sheltered, and looking over a ha-ha into the park, was a comfortable-sized bench, on which they all sat down.

said Edmund, observing her;

said Fanny;

After sitting a little while Miss Crawford was up again.

said she;

Edmund left the seat likewise. "Now, Miss Crawford, if you will look up the walk, you will convince yourself that it cannot be half a mile long, or half half a mile."

said she;

He still reasoned with her, but in vain. She would not calculate, she would not compare. She would only smile and assert. The greatest degree of rational consistency could not have been more engaging, and they talked with mutual satisfaction. At last it was agreed that they should endeavour to determine the dimensions of the wood by walking a little more about it.

Fanny said

and would have moved too, but this was not suffered.

Edmund urged

with an earnestness which she could not resist, and she was left on the bench to think with pleasure of her cousin's care, but with great regret that she was not stronger. She watched them till they had turned the corner, and listened till all sound of them had ceased.

A quarter of an hour, twenty minutes, passed away, and Fanny was still thinking of Edmund, Miss Crawford, and herself, without interruption from any one. She began to be surprised at being left so long, and to listen with an anxious desire of hearing their steps and their voices again. She listened, and at length she heard; she heard voices and feet approaching; but she had just satisfied herself that it was not those she wanted, when Miss Bertram, Mr. Rushworth, and Mr. Crawford issued from the same path which she had trod herself, and were before her.

and

were the first salutations. She told her story.

cried her cousin,

Then seating herself with a gentleman on each side, she resumed the conversation which had engaged them before, and discussed the possibility of improvements with much animation. Nothing was fixed on; but Henry Crawford was full of ideas and projects, and, generally speaking, whatever he proposed was immediately approved, first by her, and then by Mr. Rushworth, whose principal business seemed to be to hear the others, and who scarcely risked an original thought of his own beyond a wish that they had seen his friend Smith's place.

After some minutes spent in this way,

Miss Bertram,

observing the iron gate,

expressed a wish of

in Henry Crawford's opinion;

Go therefore they must to that knoll, and through that gate; but the gate was locked.

Mr. Rushworth wished

but still this did not remove the present evil. They could not get through; and as Miss Bertram's inclination for so doing did by no means lessen, it ended in

Mr. Rushworth's declaring outright that

said Mr. Crawford, when he was gone.

speaking rather lower,

After a moment's embarrassment the lady replied,

This was followed by a short silence. Miss Bertram began again.

he replied;

smiling,

As she spoke, and it was with expression, she walked to the gate: he followed her.

Fanny, feeling all this to be wrong, could not help making an effort to prevent it.

she cried;

Her cousin was safe on the other side while these words were spoken, and, smiling with all the good-humour of success, she said,

Fanny was again left to her solitude, and with no increase of pleasant feelings, for she was sorry for almost all that she had seen and heard, astonished at Miss Bertram, and angry with Mr. Crawford. By taking a circuitous route, and, as it appeared to her, very unreasonable direction to the knoll, they were soon beyond her eye; and for some minutes longer she remained without sight or sound of any companion. She seemed to have the little wood all to herself. She could almost have thought that Edmund and Miss Crawford had left it, but that it was impossible for Edmund to forget her so entirely.

She was again roused from disagreeable musings by sudden footsteps: somebody was coming at a quick pace down the principal walk. She expected Mr. Rushworth, but it was Julia, who, hot and out of breath, and with a look of disappointment, cried out on seeing her,

Fanny explained.

looking eagerly into the park.