The sisters set out at a pace, slow as the feebleness of Marianne in an exercise hitherto untried since her illness required; and they had advanced only so far beyond the house as to admit a full view of the hill, the important hill behind, when pausing with her eyes turned towards it, Marianne calmly said—
“There, exactly there,” pointing with one hand, “on that projecting mound, there I fell; and there I first saw Willoughby.”
Her voice sunk with the word, but presently reviving she added—
“I am thankful to find that I can look with so little pain on the spot! Shall we ever talk on that subject, Elinor?” hesitatingly it was said. “Or will it be wrong? I can talk of it now, I hope, as I ought to do.”
Elinor tenderly invited her to be open.
“As for regret,” said Marianne, “I have done with that, as far as he is concerned. I do not mean to talk to you of what my feelings have been for him, but what they are now . At present, if I could be satisfied on one point, if I could be allowed to think that he was not always acting a part, not always deceiving me; but above all, if I could be assured that he never was so very wicked as my fears have sometimes fancied him, since the story of that unfortunate girl—”
She stopped. Elinor joyfully treasured her words as she answered—
“If you could be assured of that, you think you should be easy.”
“Yes. My peace of mind is doubly involved in it; for not only is it horrible to suspect a person, who has been what he has been to me , of such designs—but what must it make me appear to myself? What in a situation like mine, but a most shamefully unguarded affection could expose me to—”
“How then,” asked her sister, “would you account for his behaviour?”