but merely to recover breath not seeming to expect any answer anne listened as if her life depended on the issue of his speech he proceeded with a forced alacrity � the admiral madam was this confidently informed that you were � upon my soul i am quite at a loss ashamed breathing and speaking quickly � the awkwardness of giving information of this kind to one of the parties � you can be at no loss to understand me it was very confidently said that mr � that everything was settled in the family for a union be a of jane mr and yourself it was added that you were to live at � that was to be given up this the admiral knew could not be correct but it occurred to him that it might be the wish of the parties and my commission from him madam is to say that if the family wish is such his lease of shall be and he and my sister will provide themselves with another home without imagining themselves to be doing anything which under similar circumstances would not be done for them this is all madam a very few words in reply from you will be sufficient that i should be the person on this subject is extraordinary and believe me it is no less painful a very few words however will put an end to the awkwardness and distress we may both be feeling anne spoke a word or two but they were unintelligible and before she could command herself he added if you will only tell me that the admiral may address a line to sir walter it will be enough pronounce only the words he may and i shall immediately follow him with your message no sir said anne there is no message you are � the admiral is i do justice to the kindness of his intentions but he is quite mistaken there is no truth in any such report he was a moment silent she turned her eyes towards him for the first time since his re entering the room his color was varying and he was look a of jane ing at her with all the power and which she believed no other eyes than his possessed ko truth in any such report he repeated ko truth in any part of it none he had been standing by a chair enjoying the relief of leaning on it or of playing with it he now sat down drew it a little nearer to her and looked with an expression which had something more than penetration in it � something softer her countenance did not it was a silent but a very powerful dialogue on his on hers acceptance still a little nearer and a hand taken and pressed and anne my own dear anne i bursting forth in all the fulness of exquisite feeling � and all suspense and were over they were they were restored to all that had been lost they were carried back to the past with only an increase of attachment and confidence and only such a flutter of present delight as made them little fit for the interruption of mrs when she joined them not long afterwards she probably in the observations of the next ten minutes saw something to suspect and though it was hardly possible for a woman of her description to wish the maker had imprisoned her longer she might be very likely wishing for some excuse to run about the house some storm to break the windows above or a summons to the admiral s below fortune favored them all however in another way in a gentle steady rain just happily set in as the admiral returned s a of jane and anne rose to go she was earnestly invited to stay dinner a note was despatched to place and she stayed � stayed till ten at night and during that time the husband and wife either by the wife s contrivance or by simply going on in their usual way were frequently out of the room together � gone upstairs to hear a noise or downstairs to settle their accounts or upon the landing to trim the lamp and these precious moments were turned to so good an account that all the most anxious feelings of the past were gone through before they parted at night anne had the felicity of being assured that in the first place so far from being altered for the worse she had gained in personal loveliness and that as to character hers was now fixed on hia mind as perfection itself maintaining the just medium of fortitude and gentleness � that he had never ceased to love and prefer her though it had been only at that he had learnt to do her justice and only at that he had begun to understand his own feelings that at he had received lessons of more than one kind � the passing admiration of mr had at least roused him and the scene on the and at captain s had fixed her superiority li his preceding attempts to attach himself to the attempts of anger and he protested that he had continually felt the impossibility of really caring for though till that day till the leisure for reflection which followed it he had not understood the perfect excellence of the mind with which s could so ill bear a of jane comparison or the perfect the hold it possessed over his own there he had learnt to distinguish between the of principle and the obstinacy of self will between the of and the resolution of a collected mind there he had seen everything to in his estimation the woman he had lost and there had begun to the pride the folly the madness of resentment which had kept him from trying to regain her when thrown in his way from that 