…that also means he thought Emma knew Jane wasn’t in love with Mr. Dixon…
…and that changes a lot. (I think.)
“Whether Miss Woodhouse began really to understand me before the expiration of that fortnight, I cannot say;—when I called to take leave of her, I remember that I was within a moment of confessing the truth, and I then fancied she was not without suspicion; but I have no doubt of her having since detected me, at least in some degree.—She may not have surmised the whole, but her quickness must have penetrated a part. I cannot doubt it. You will find, whenever the subject becomes freed from its present restraints, that it did not take her wholly by surprize. She frequently gave me hints of it.”
“Emma,” Chapter 50 ❦ Frank’s letter to Mrs. Weston
I came here to finish a thought experiment about Frank Churchill, but all my first words were about Jane. So before I have to pull myself out of Jane’s point of view and crawl into Frank’s—knowing his POV will come into direct opposition with hers, and that he will be wrong—I needed a Jane moment.
Jane’s the whole reason I’m here, after all.
I just looked back at the first thing I ever wrote about Jane Austen. It was a journal entry, but I titled it: “Being Jane Fairfax.” I wrote it on November 6th, and other than Tweets—which perfectly fit my skillset and attention span—it was the first thing I’d written in a while. (RIP you perfect bird app.)
‘I am sure, grandmama, you must have had very strong eyes to see as you do—and so much fine work as you have done too!—I only wish my eyes may last me as well.’
“Emma,” Chapter 19 ❦ (“Jane often says—” Courtesy, Miss Bates)
I had not read it since writing it. Didn’t want to. For some reason I had wanted to try to look through Jane’s eyes at Box Hill, but as I was writing I kept accidentally changing the tense from third person to first person, and on going back to change another “I” to “she” I stopped suddenly and asked myself what in the world I was doing. I felt incredibly foolish and figured everything I’d written was as ridiculous as I felt in that moment. So I put it away. I had no idea then that I would soon be writing tens of thousands of words on Jane Austen. And almost all of them on Jane Fairfax.
I finally reread it today. Just now. Maybe it was just admiration that made me start writing about this character I’d been chasing for a few weeks. She’s a badass in the Box Hill scene. It’s like she’s wielding a scalpel. She says everything she wants to say, and he understands her. She is so calm. So steely. A little cold, but in the best way. I do not see Jane normally as the least bit cold. I see her as incredibly sweet and soft and sensitive. She is just more comfortable expressing herself through music, and can’t break through Miss Bates’ monologues. (Which, neither can anyone else, with the exception of Mr. Knightley.) Otherwise, she is just gentle and quiet.
“This is most kind, indeed!—Miss Woodhouse, it is impossible for me to express—I hope you will believe—Excuse me for being so entirely without words.”
Jane ❦ ”Emma,” Chapter 52
I say it a lot, but “quit listening to Emma!” We all think we don’t believe her, but there is more than one way to believe. We adopt Emma’s attitude. And in the end, who else have we got? It just happens. Reading a book is a state where one drops all their defenses, and even if we don’t believe Emma, she is the one carrying us on this ride. Except for Chapter 41, where Mr. Knightley is our guide, we must allow ourselves to mostly trust to Emma. And it is her emotions that are hardest to shed. It takes a conscious override for me, still, to listen to Miss Bates’ happily going on about Jane. Even once I became hyper-focused on every word she said, the moment she started saying something about Jane’s handwriting or “Jane always says” came out of her mouth, my mind did what I’d taught it to do and threw up an eye-roll reply before my frontal lobe knew anything about it.
Jane is quiet, but open. She’s open in all the moments we actually see her. And for all she’s suffered, I was very happy to see her take Frank to pieces and land every punch. He’s still crying about it later in his letter to Mrs. Weston. Jane calmly tells Frank that the second she decides he isn’t worth it—doesn’t deserve her—she’s gone. She doesn’t need to wait around Highbury for him. She can go to Ireland tomorrow and pretend he never happened. She tells him that she will not suffer an unfortunate acquaintance to be an inconvenience or an oppression… forever.
Right there in front of God and everybody.
I fucking love her.
Just once, I had to say it that, that way. That is my truth. I am not a fangirl at heart. Never have been. But I am president of the Jane Fairfax fan club. I love that woman.
I am going to just post the notes that I wrote going through everything from the time Frank Churchill left Highbury right before the ball was supposed to happen, through what letters might say after Emma’s dinner party. Trying to think it all through from the point of view of Frank suspecting that Emma has figured him out. He’s not sure, but he suspects. And when I’ve come to the end of those notes, I’ll just keep going until we get through the ABC Game. After that, Frank’s on his own.
I am going to give the game away before you read any more: I only lightly touched on Chapter 41; the ABC Game. It’s good up until that and I do believe it is how Jane Austen wanted us to see things on a second read.
Still, if Frank believed Emma knew, then yes, it does change the ABC Game, but if it is better for Jane to think that Emma and Frank are laughing like schoolgirls at her for the nasty things Emma once thought about her instead of the nasty things Emma presently thinks about her, it can only be marginally better. I still think it’s an interesting thought experiment and gives what goes on at Emma’s dinner party a whole new aspect that feels satisfying in the places it felt a bit strange before, but no matter what kind of bad it is, “Dixon” is still awful and I’m only making myself angry at Frank.
When I asked myself, “What did the Campbells know?” I discovered a little story implanted beneath the scattered facts that Jane Austen had left for us. It was like discovering buried treasure that Austen had led me to herself. And because Austen is very clear—she reminds us twice at the end of the book—that Frank believed Emma knew his and Jane’s secret, I became convinced that she must have laid out the story so that it worked that way, too. That there was a way to see things from Chapter 30 on, differently.
And Frank’s own letter might be helpful in starting that endeavor. He says he behaved shamefully at Box Hill, and that’s good because I refuse to look at that through his point of view. I don’t want to know it. But he doesn’t say anything about the ABC Game. About “Dixon.” At least not directly. Still…
It may not need stating, but I’m going to state it because it helps me:
If Emma knew that Jane was engaged to Frank, that would preclude the possibility of Emma believing that Jane was in love with Mr. Dixon.
And so, what? It’s a mortifying thing for Emma to remember? Mortifying to be reminded of all those ridiculous and discreditable things that she said about Jane to Jane’s own fiance?
Yes! Exactly. Exactly how Emma did feel when she found out about the engagement is how she would have felt, only sooner.
And Frank wants to tease her and Jane about it together? Kind of get past it? A way of sharing? Another BLUNDER? Let’s all just laugh and pretend I didn’t just say the stupid thing I said that I’m sure everyone noticed? Ugh, Frank.
I can’t know yet. I’m not there.
I have to start right when Frank is called home before the ball. Upset. He’s just left Jane. He had time alone with her before her aunt returned. She probably cried. Not boo-hooed, but tears. She tears up pretty easily, as we see when she talks to Mr. John Knightley.
Then Emma says, “Too bad you didn’t have time to see your old friend Miss Bates—”
“Not five minutes to spare even for your friends Miss Fairfax and Miss Bates? How unlucky! Miss Bates’s powerful, argumentative mind might have strengthened yours.”
“Yes—I have called there; passing the door, I thought it better. It was a right thing to do. I went in for three minutes, and was detained by Miss Bates’s being absent. She was out; and I felt it impossible not to wait till she came in. She is a woman that one may, that one must laugh at; but that one would not wish to slight. It was better to pay my visit, then”—
He hesitated, got up, walked to a window.
“In short,” said he, “perhaps, Miss Woodhouse—I think you can hardly be quite without suspicion”—
Chapter 30
So the last thing that happens before Frank returns to Enscombe, leaving his heart behind, is that he almost confesses to Emma. He is dying to tell her the truth. He is too like his father, and keeping secrets is like torture for them. Frank wants Emma to know. He wants to believe that he doesn’t have to really lie to her anymore. That he can give her ridiculous tall tales that no one could believe, and that they both understand what those silly stories mean. But Emma is secondary to him right now. He is thinking about his Jane. So he returns home, takes up a new correspondence with Mrs. Weston, and like always, he writes to his Jane. Probably close to daily. Frank is a monster letter writer. He likes writing, and he especially likes writing letters. He likes receiving letters, and to receive, you have to give. He may not be walking to the post office in the rain himself, but he is as anxious for the mail as Jane is.
What do they have to talk about? No, better question: what are the things people write in letters? Every minute detail that goes on, apparently.
Everything. They write to each other about everything. Every. Little. Thing. They write about Mr. Perry’s wife believing for three days that her husband was going to get his carriage.
They are deep in each other’s pockets. As deep as they can be for as far apart as they are.
So, Mrs. Elton arrives, and there are parties all the time, but we don’t know where Jane is for any of them. Until Chapter 34. Emma does not want to be the last to throw Mrs. Elton a party, and she wants it to be a good one. So, very soon after Frank Churchill returns home, under the desire-tinged suspicion that Emma knows he’s engaged to Jane—or something like it—Jane receives an invitation she didn’t expect from the person she least expected any invitation from.
And Jane writes to Frank to tell him that Emma has invited her—without her aunt—to a dinner party?
Yes. Whenever the invitation arrived, even if it was the day before, Jane would tell Frank. A letter telling him that she had been invited went out by the day of the party, but probably before that.
Frank will also hear of it innocently from Mrs. Weston, who is his faithful Highbury correspondent.
“Oh! the blessing of a female correspondent, when one is really interested in the absent!”
Chapter 30
Who is at the pre-dinner party? Mrs. Weston and Mr. Woodhouse, the two Knightleys, the Eltons, and Jane. That’s it.
Mrs. Weston will write about the party, with special attention on Emma, but she will mention everyone who was invited. Tell Frank what everyone wore. She will write how beautiful they all looked. She will tell him that Mr. Weston arrived late and was happy about the letter from him with news of the Churchills relocating to nearby London.
I want to back up a little. The invitation alone would surprise Frank. And probably Jane, too. So she might, maybe even would, express it that way. In a, “This will surprise you” way. And it would surprise him. A great deal, I think. So Jane gets a night out with the grownups, goes to Emma’s probably not knowing what to expect at all, and Emma takes her arm and escorts her into the dining room. Mr. Woodhouse takes Mrs. Elton, and the lady of the house, the one who everyone knows is really throwing the party, takes Jane’s arm. Not Mr. Knightley’s or anyone else’s, but Jane’s.
Jane’s.
But something else happened! The post office talk. Part one and part two. Pre- and post-Mrs. Elton.
(I knew there had to be a trail here.)
Jane just turns her back on Mrs. Elton and picks up general post office nonsense to John Knightley, like, “Isn’t it amazing that hardly anything ever gets lost,” and then Mr. Knightley joins in and turns it to talk of handwriting, then Emma goes, “Frank has very nice handwriting…”
“Mr. Frank Churchill writes one of the best gentleman’s hands I ever saw.”
And after all that focus on Jane’s walk to the mailbox, and Mrs. Elton just being successfully thwarted by Jane turning to Mr. John Knightley and pretending she doesn’t exist by talking about how amazing it is that letters so rarely get lost, Emma bringing up Frank’s writing could seem like a sign. A sign of what Frank already suspected. This confirms it. Emma must know.
Then Mr. Woodhouse finds Mrs. Elton and takes her arm—
“Must I go first? I really am ashamed of always leading the way.”
And Emma takes Jane’s arm.
Wait. What’s the last thing said before Emma takes Jane’s arm?
Emma says:
I have a note of his.—Do not you remember, Mrs. Weston, employing him to write for you one day?”
Of course we know that Frank could not write directly to Emma, at least not without breaking a lot of rules, but it being expressly pointed out by Emma feels like an extra cushion keeping this compliment of Frank further away from an intrusion on Jane’s happiness and leaves it much more open to the interpretation that she is speaking in code to Jane. Letting Jane know that she knows. And we will see in a moment that Jane does not seem bothered by it, and in fact has a “glow both of complexion and spirits.”
“He chose to say he was employed”—
“Well, well, I have that note; and can shew it after dinner to convince Mr. Knightley.”
And then the last words spoken before they all walk into dinner are from Mr. Knightley.
“Oh! when a gallant young man, like Mr. Frank Churchill,” said Mr. Knightley dryly, “writes to a fair lady like Miss Woodhouse, he will, of course, put forth his best.”
Dinner was on the table—
And then we get a “ah, so close” moment from Emma’s thoughts.
Jane’s solicitude about fetching her own letters had not escaped Emma. She had heard and seen it all; and felt some curiosity to know whether the wet walk of this morning had produced any. She suspected that it had; that it would not have been so resolutely encountered but in full expectation of hearing from some one very dear, and that it had not been in vain…
It certainly does not seem that Jane felt Emma’s introduction of Frank’s handwriting as any sort of sour note, because according to Emma, she’s so happy she’s glowing.
Picking up right where we left off:
…She thought there was an air of greater happiness than usual—a glow both of complexion and spirits.
…and they followed the other ladies out of the room, arm in arm, with an appearance of good-will highly becoming to the beauty and grace of each.
That’s what Jane tells Frank. That Emma took her arm and escorted her into the dining room. And later Mr. Weston—his dad—came and told everyone Frank was coming, and that literally everyone there but the Eltons were very kind to her, and most of all, that Emma singled her out for this special attention.
I suspect she will tell him all about the post office fracas, too.
But will she tell him about Emma bringing up his handwriting to Mrs. Weston right after they were talking about the letter she got?
Yes!
Maybe not at first, but I say it is inevitable that Frank, the other self-deluding character who desperately wants to think Emma knows, will be certain of it now. He thought it before, but now after he got caught going to Jane’s first and he almost told her, suddenly Emma asks Jane to dinner and after talking about the post office and his handwriting, she takes Jane’s arm and escorts her into the dining room, so Emma must know.
It’s not even unreasonable.
And such a big change in how she is treating Jane. What can it mean? What else could have brought it on?
Frank doesn’t know that Emma just got a guilt trip from Mr. Knightley and Mrs. Weston, and neither Frank nor Jane has any idea about Harriet and Mr. Elton. All they know is that suddenly Emma invited Jane to a small, quiet, but lavish dinner party, without her aunt, and that after much focus on her walking through the rain to get a letter, Emma complimented Frank’s handwriting to Mrs. Weston—Frank’s other correspondent—and then took Jane’s arm with complete goodwill and escorted her to the table.
Yes, I think Frank tells Jane that he believes Emma knows. And if Jane didn’t tell Frank about Emma bringing up his handwriting in the first letter, she’d tell him once he was like, “She must know.”
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