Chapter Twenty #5
In the upper gallery, Fanny Dashwood and Miss Steele had begun to rail at one another, and their argument only grew more heated as John and Edward attempted to calm them. To this Cousin Julia began to add her own protestations, and soon she had drawn Sir Thomas into the fray.
“You are nobody and nothing,” Fanny shouted at Miss Steele. “How dare you despoil my brother’s honor! You are Mrs. Rushworth’s creature, I know it.” Fanny rounded on Prudence. “This is part of your plan to ruin us, you vile, hateful monster!”
Prudence looked terribly bored by the whole fracas. “I wonder what you mean.” Miss Steele echoed the same sentiment, in rather harsher language.
“You think to destroy me, to destroy John and his father, and take the house for the girls,” Fanny wailed.
Miss Steele, Julia, Edward, and John were all shouting now, and Marianne attempted to intervene. “Fanny, what is this all about? You must calm yourself.”
“Shut up, you wretched girl! Do not think to play innocent at such a time, when I am onto you all. You have been scheming along with the rest of them to take Norland from John, and Sir Thomas will not take any pains to protect John, to protect his son!”
A collective gasp rippled through the crowd, and Fanny instantly saw what she had done—what she had admitted, but Marianne was too flabbergasted to understand.
She took a few steps toward Fanny, really beginning to pity her for the embarrassment she was causing herself, but the feeling did not last long, for Fanny shoved Marianne, and Willoughby was instantly at Marianne’s side to steady her.
Now Prudence moved forward, a predatory look about her; she began to clap her hands. “Well, done, Fanny, you have truly bested me, in depriving me the honor of thrilling the world that John is Sir Thomas Bertram’s bastard. what a comfort that must be for you.”
Fanny shrieked again, pacing like a caged beast. Marianne beheld her with shock, and looked to her great aunt. “Is this true?”
Nobody appeared to hear her. Aunt Prudence was still staring down the manic Fanny Dashwood, while Edward continued to quarrel with John, Julia, and Miss Steele.
Beyond them, amongst the onlookers, Maria was holding Mr. Crawford’s hand and laughing hysterically, while not too far from them Edmund and Elinor cling to one another, they looked very grim, but they did not appear surprised at the revelation that had Marianne reeling backward into Willoughby’s arms. “Is it true,” she cried again.
“Do not pretend you did not know of it, did not assiduously scheme and plot my downfall,” Fanny cried, shaking her finger at Marianne.”
Marianne flinched and recoiled, but her mother emerged from the growing crowd and positioned herself between Marianne and Fanny. “More people seem to be aware of the facts than I had realized—but this is not the place to discuss it, Fanny. You are not well, my dear—let us go and speak privately.”
“My dear? My dear? How dare you address me with such false arts, while you usurp what ought to have remained mine! And you!” Fanny rounded on Miss Steele, whose lamentations to Edward had only grown louder; she grabbed the girl by the hair and pulled at her until Miss Steele gave a great scream of pain and tumbled to the ground.
“Is there no shutting you up, you wretched whore? How can you think you matter to anyone, at such a moment? Can you not see we are in enough distress?”
Miss Steele staggered back to her feet, and covered her face as she wept. But Fanny was not yet satisfied, and continued to rail at the girl, despite John and Sir Thomas’s endeavors to restrain her. She broke away from them and charged at Miss Steele.
What followed next would be forever burned on Marianne’s memory.
The altercation had gradually edge closer to the stairs that led down into the ballroom, and Fanny’s frenzied attack took her too near the top step.
Miss Steele tripped first, and as she lost her balance, she instinctively reached out for something to stay her.
Edward rushed toward her, but he was not fast enough, and Miss Steele instead latched onto Fanny Dashwood, who was so unstable herself that the two women tumbled down the stairs together.
It seemed as though everybody had been shouting all at once, but as Fanny and Miss Steele hit the stairs, a hush fell over everybody, until the only sounds were the two women who cried out in pain, their bodies grappling against the stairs, until they were out of sight. And then there was just silence.
After a moment that felt like an eternity, Mrs. Ferrars pushed her way through the great throng of people, calling out to her daughter from the top of the stairs.
Another frenzy of activity followed. John and Edward rushed past her, down the staircase, while Julia began to weep and lash out at Sir Thomas, and Cousin Maria continued to laugh into Mr. Crawford’s chest as he held her in a shameless embrace.
Marianne latched onto Willoughby, who had not left her side. She moved closer to Elinor. “Is it true?”
Elinor nodded, her expression grim.“It is,” she said softly. “John is not father’s son, and his claim to Norland had been disputed—thrown over entirely, I believe. Our father left a secret addendum to his will, stating that Norland must pass to a child of his blood.”
“Good God,” Marianne gasped. “So you….”
“No, not me, I do not want it,” Elinor said, barely audible over the chaos around them. She was trembling now; she looked up at Edmund for reassurance, and then back to Marianne. “You.”
Marianne had no chance to reply, for there was shouting now from the bottom of the stairs—John’s voice rang out with chilling clarity. “My God, she is dead!” Marianne staggered backward against Willoughby, and a moment later the chaos faded to black.
Marianne woke in a fog, and it was some time before she was cognizant enough to determine what was passing in the drawing room.
Willoughby, Elinor, and Edmund were seated across the room in close conference with her mother and Aunt Prudence, while Lady Bertram appeared to be dozing on a sofa nearby.
Mary peered over at her, and smiled when she saw that Marianne had woken.
“I hope I do not give you a fright—I have volunteered to watch over you, as your family has been occupied in a great many matters these last hours.”
Mary paused to yawn, and Marianne finally willed herself to sit up on the sofa. She looked over at the window, and saw that it was still dark outside. “Have I been asleep long?”
“No—well, yes and no. You fainted at first—you have roused several times, for a few minutes at each interval, determined to participate in the discussion, but you have not stayed awake long enough to do so.”
Marianne nodded, feeling very muddled still. “So I did not dream it?”
“No, you did not dream it,” Mary replied, offering Marianne her hand in comfort. “What an awful ordeal.”
Colonel Brandon came into the room. He offered her a sad smile before bending over to whisper something in Mary’s ear.
Mary looked distraught. “How very awful,” she muttered, and reached out for the colonel, who had begun to turn away.
“No, Daniel—stay. I am grown tired, but I do not wish to sleep yet, if I might be useful to anybody. Stay, and talk some sense into Mr. Bertram and Mr. Willoughby, for I think they are being far too generous to one another, and the discussion goes nowhere at all.”
Mary yawned again and leaned back against Colonel Brandon.
She reached up and began to pull the pins out of her elaborate hairstyle, and the colonel looked down at her and began to assist in pulling the pins loose.
He ran his hands through Mary’s hair as it came loose; recollecting Marianne, he nodded awkwardly and moved away to speak to Willoughby, Edmund, and Elinor.