an
effort, the restless, unquiet thoughtfulness in which she had been for
some time previously sitting, her rising colour, as she spoke, and her
unsteady voice, plainly showed.

"I wish to assure you both," said she, "that I see every thing--as you
can desire me to do."

Mrs. Dashwood would have interrupted her instantly with soothing
tenderness, had not Elinor, who really wished to hear her sister's
unbiased opinion, by an eager sign, engaged her silence. Marianne
slowly continued--

"It is a great relief to me--what Elinor told me this morning--I have
now heard exactly what I wished to hear."--For some moments her voice
was lost; but recovering herself, she added, and with greater calmness
than before--"I am now perfectly satisfied, I wish for no change. I
never could have been happy with him, after knowing, as sooner or
later I must have known, all this. I should have had no confidence, no
esteem. Nothing could have done it away to my feelings."

"I know it--I know it," cried her mother. "Happy with a man of
libertine practices!--With one who so injured the peace of the dearest
of our friends, and the best of men!--No--my Marianne has not a heart
to be made happy with such a man!--Her conscience, her sensitive
conscience, would have felt all that the conscience of her husband
ought to have felt."

Marianne sighed, and repeated, "I wish for no change."

"You consider the matter," said Elinor, "exactly as a good mind and a
sound understanding must consider it; and I dare say you perceive, as
well as myself, not only in this, but in many other circumstances,
reason enough to be convinced that your marriage must have involved
you in many certain troubles and disappointments, in which you would
have been poorly supported by an affection, on his side, much less
certain. Had you married, you must have been always poor. His
expensiveness is acknowledged even by himself, and his whole conduct
declares that self-denial is a word hardly understood by him. His
demands and your inexperience together, on a small, very small income,
must have brought on distresses which would not be the _less_ grievous
to you, from having been entirely unknown and unthought of before.
_Your_ sense of honour and honesty would have led you, I know, when
aware of your situation, to attempt all the economy that would appear
to you possible: and, perhaps, as long as your frugality retrenched
only on your own comfort, you might have been suffered