The child to be born at Randalls must be a tie there even dearer than herself; and Mrs. Weston’s heart and time would be occupied by it.  They should lose her; and, probably, in great measure, her husband also.—­Frank Churchill would return among them no more; and Miss Fairfax, it was reasonable to suppose, would soon cease to belong to Highbury.  They would be married, and settled either at or near Enscombe.  All that were good would be withdrawn; and if to these losses, the loss of Donwell were to be added, what would remain of cheerful or of rational society within their reach?  Mr. Knightley to be no longer coming there for his evening comfort!—­ No longer walking in at all hours, as if ever willing to change his own home for their’s!—­How was it to be endured?  And if he were to be lost to them for Harriet’s sake; if he were to be thought of hereafter, as finding in Harriet’s society all that he wanted; if Harriet were to be the chosen, the first, the dearest, the friend, the wife to whom he looked for all the best blessings of existence; what could be increasing Emma’s wretchedness but the reflection never far distant from her mind, that it had been all her own work?

When it came to such a pitch as this, she was not able to refrain from a start, or a heavy sigh, or even from walking about the room for a few seconds—­and the only source whence any thing like consolation or composure could be drawn, was in the resolution of her own better conduct, and the hope that, however inferior in spirit and gaiety might be the following and every future winter of her life to the past, it would yet find her more rational, more acquainted with herself, and leave her less to regret when it were gone.

CHAPTER XIII

The weather continued much the same all the following morning; and the same loneliness, and the same melancholy, seemed to reign at Hartfield—­but in the afternoon it cleared; the wind changed into a softer quarter; the clouds were carried off; the sun appeared; it was summer again.  With all the eagerness which such a transition gives, Emma resolved to be out of doors as soon as possible.  Never had the exquisite sight, smell, sensation of nature, tranquil, warm, and brilliant after a storm, been more attractive to her.  She longed for the serenity they might gradually introduce; and on Mr. Perry’s coming in soon after dinner, with a disengaged hour to give her father, she lost no time ill hurrying into the shrubbery.—­There, with spirits freshened, and thoughts a little relieved, she had taken a few turns, when she saw Mr. Knightley passing through the garden door, and coming towards her.—­It was the first intimation of his being returned from London.  She had been thinking of him the moment before, as unquestionably sixteen miles distant.—­There was time only for the quickest arrangement of mind.  She must be collected and calm.  In half a minute they were together.  The “How d’ye