Murder at Mansfield Park

charging him board and lodging.’
    ‘I do not recommend it!’ laughed Mary. ‘I am sure our table is better stocked than Mr McGregor’s, so he will very likely take you at your word, and then where will you
be?’
    Mrs Grant smiled, despite herself. ‘With an unwanted lodger taking up the only spare room, that’s where I would be. How do you go on with your book?’
    Mary smiled. ‘Not well. It is very entertaining—the author blends a great deal of sense with the lighter matter of the piece, and holds up an excellent lesson as to the dangers of
too great a sensibility, but I fear my spirits are not yet equal to the playfulness of the style.’
    ‘Well, if you do not wish to read, perhaps you have energy enough for conversation? Shall I fetch Mr Maddox? He says there is some thing he wishes to discuss with you. I’ll wager
it’s about what is to be done with Mrs Norris—there have been messages going to and fro between him and the magistrate for the best part of a week. Mrs Baddeley told me she is to be
shut up in a private establishment in another part of the country—some where remote and private, by all accounts, and with her own mad-doctor in constant attendance. If you ask me, she should
have paid the price for what she did, but it appears she has quite lost her reason, and become quite raving, and Dr Grant says that even if there were a possibility of her ever standing trial, the
jury would be forced to acquit her by reason of insanity. As you might imagine, Sir Thomas will not hear of a public asylum.’
    ‘I am not surprised at that. I have acquaintances in London who have visited Bedlam, and I would not wish even Mrs Norris incarcerated in such a terrible place. People make visits there as
if it were some sort of human menagerie—they even take long sticks with them, so that they can provoke the poor mad inmates, purely for the sake of entertainment. It is unforgiveable. Sir
Thomas would never permit such inhumane treatment, even for the murderess of his own daughter.’
    Mrs Grant stood up and touched her sister on the shoulder. ‘ You have become quite the daughter to him, these last few days.’
    Mary blushed. ‘I think he wished, in the beginning, to thank me for what I have tried to do for the family, and especially for Julia. But since then we have spent more time in
conversation, and have found we enjoy one another’s company.’
    ‘I am sure that you are more than half the reason why he seems to be becoming reconciled to Henry as a nephew.’
    Mary shook her head. ‘I have scrupled to plead Henry’s cause directly—that is not my place. Sir Thomas knows I do not approve of what my brother has done, but I do believe
Henry to be sincerely desirous of being really received into the Bertram family, and very much disposed to look up to Sir Thomas, and be guided by him. For his part, Sir Thomas has acknowledged to
me that he feels he should bear some part of the blame for what happened—for the elopement, at least. He feels that he ought never to have agreed to the engagement with Edmund in the first
place, and that in so doing he allowed himself to be governed by mercenary and worldly motives. He is too judicious to say so, and too mindful of the respect owing to the dead, but I think he had
very little knowledge of the weak side of Fanny’s character, or the consequences that might ensue from the excessive indulgence and constant flattery she received from Mrs Norris. As for
Henry, if he knew Sir Thomas as I now do, he would value him as a friend, as well as someone who might supply the place of the father we lost so long ago. Sir Thomas and I have talked together on
many subjects, and he has always paid me the compliment of considering my opinions seriously, while correcting me most graciously where I have been mistaken. I admire him immensely.’
    ‘As he does you, no doubt. And as Mr Maddox does also,’ said Mrs Grant with a knowing look. ‘Good heavens! That gentleman will be wondering where I have got to! I will
shew him into the garden, and fetch you some thing to drink from the kitchen. And then I must return to unpacking the new Wedgwood-ware. The pattern is pretty enough, in its way, but I think they
might have allowed us rather larger leaves—one is almost forced to conclude that the woods about Birmingham must be blighted.’
    Despite all her other cares, Mary could not but laugh at this, and she was still smiling a few minutes later when Maddox