“Harriet, poor Harriet!”—Those
were the words; in them lay the tormenting ideas which
Emma could not get rid of, and which constituted the
real misery of the business to her. Frank Churchill
had behaved very ill by herself—very ill
in many ways,—but it was not so much his
behaviour as her own, which made her so angry
with him. It was the scrape which he had drawn
her into on Harriet’s account, that gave the
deepest hue to his offence.—Poor Harriet!
to be a second time the dupe of her misconceptions
and flattery. Mr.
Knightley had spoken prophetically,
when he once said, “Emma, you have been no friend
to Harriet Smith.”—She was afraid
she had done her nothing but disservice.—It
was true that she had not to charge herself, in this
instance as in the former, with being the sole and
original author of the mischief; with having suggested
such feelings as might otherwise never have entered
Harriet’s imagination; for Harriet had acknowledged
her admiration and preference of Frank Churchill before
she had ever given her a hint on the subject; but she
felt completely guilty of having encouraged what she
might have repressed. She might have prevented
the indulgence and increase of such sentiments.
Her influence would have been enough. And now
she was very conscious that she ought to have prevented
them.—She felt that she had been risking
her friend’s happiness on most insufficient grounds.
Common sense would have directed her to tell Harriet,
that she must not allow herself to think of him, and
that there were five hundred chances to one against
his ever caring for her.—“But, with
common sense,” she added, “I am afraid
I have had little to do.”
She was extremely angry with herself. If she
could not have been angry with Frank Churchill too,
it would have been dreadful.— As for Jane
Fairfax, she might at least relieve her feelings from
any present solicitude on her account. Harriet
would be anxiety enough; she need no longer be unhappy
about Jane, whose troubles and whose ill-health having,
of course, the same origin, must be equally under
cure.—Her days of insignificance and evil
were over.—She would soon be well, and happy,
and prosperous.— Emma could now imagine
why her own attentions had been slighted. This
discovery laid many smaller matters open. No
doubt it had been from jealousy.—In Jane’s
eyes she had been a rival; and well might any thing
she could offer of assistance or regard be repulsed.
An airing in the Hartfield carriage would have been
the rack, and arrowroot from the Hartfield storeroom
must have been poison. She understood it all;
and as far as her mind could disengage itself from
the injustice and selfishness of angry feelings, she
acknowledged that Jane Fairfax would have neither
elevation nor happiness beyond her desert. But
poor Harriet was such an engrossing charge! There
was little sympathy to be spared for any body else.
