Work Text:
Anne was in the drawing room, at her piano-forte, when Lady Russell entered. She rose, carefully, and was about to make her way over to embrace Lady Russell.
“My dear, you must not stand on my account,” Lady Russell said, coming to her side and offering her arm to Anne, which Anne accepted with good grace.
“Let us sit,” Anne said, leading them over to the sofa. Once they were seated, she called for her maid and called for some tea.
“You should not trouble yourself,” Lady Russell said, gently, arranging herself carefully beside Anne. When the maid returned with the tea, Lady Russell reached for the pot and poured them both cups.
Anne accepted her cup, smiling. “I hardly think that pouring tea is exertion enough to do me harm, even in my condition.”
“No need to borrow trouble,” Lady Russell said, gently. “When your mother,” she paused, collected herself, even now the old grief encroaching, “when your mother was pregnant with your older sister, nothing would do for her but to go on long walks, or take rides in the carriage. But her pregnancy with you was not easy, and the doctors your father brought from London thought a lengthy confinement best.”
Anne sighed the sigh of one returning to a familiar argument. “Lady Russell, there is no need for you to send for a doctor from London. Doctor Davies here in Lyme serves me perfectly well.”
“But your sister Mary -”
“Lady Russell, please,” Anne said, laughing a little, “it is true Mary was not well for much of her pregnancies but she seems to have made as perfect a recovery as we could hope.”
Lady Russell smiled at that as well. “Of course. I just wish you were not here all by yourself. Perhaps you could come back with me to Bath?”
Anne set down her tea cup, deliberately. “I am hardly by myself. I have Sarah, and cook, and Captain and Mrs. Harville and Captain and Mrs. Benwick are not far. And Frederick will be back soon.”
“I know, my dear, of course I know. But I worry. Especially with Captain Wentworth gone.” Lady Russell bit her lips to keep herself from saying more. In the years since Anne and the Captain’s marriage, Lady Russell learned to love the Captain nearly as much as her dear friend. She exalted in his triumphs, sharing them with her friends in Bath in breathless detail, she poured over the broadsheets filled with anxiety when he was on long voyages. But now that Anne was pregnant, she could not quite understand that the Captain was not at liberty, as a gentleman is, to step away from his duties and attend to his wife for six months. She wished, very much, for his speedy return.
“You worry too much,” Anne said. “It is a simple trip to Gibraltar, I understand. He will be back within a fortnight.” Still though, her face was tight. Lady Russell leaned forward to refresh Anne’s tea, and moved the conversation delicately.
“I suppose I should be glad you did not sail with him,” Lady Russell said.
Anne laughed, as Lady Russell desired. “You should be. Though I am a poor sailor I fear. Two days on a ship and I turn into Mary. I despaired when I told Mrs. Croft, but she told me that some women are taken that way, and was not, I hope, too ashamed.”
“I am the same,” Lady Russell said. “Even on a lake that is as calm as anything, I am afraid I begin to feel ill.”
“There is nothing much that can be done about it, Frederick says, but to work until the feeling passes, and I am afraid that the navy would never let me scrub decks.” Anne smiled, but it did not reach her eyes, and she rested one hand on her stomach.
“My dear,” Lady Russell said, “you do not need to scrub decks here either, or walk across half the countryside.”
“I cannot sit idle,” Anne began, her voice harsher for only a moment, “surely, you understand -”
“Of course, of course. But maybe we could find a gentler source of amusement? You could practice the piano-forte for Captain Wentworth’s return, or perhaps help me embroider a pillow for the baby?” Anne’s face was still, her unhappiness visible in her tight control, as it has been for the years before he marriage.
Lady Russell reached out, resting her hand on Anne’s arm, lightly. “Or I could walk with you, down to the beach, if would like. We could look at the ships that pass by.”
Anne smiled again. “They will not be Frederick's, you know.”
“I know that very well,” Lady Russell said, smiling back, “I may be a old lady, but I understand the shipping lanes well enough.”
“You are not an old lady, you are my dear friend,” Anne said. “And I will get my coat, then.”
She looked over at Lady Russell, whose lips were pursed, and laughed. “Or I will call for the maid to do it, although really, if I am walking to the beach soon, going to find my coat hardly signifies.”
“Well, when she is here, I can have her send a message back to Kellynch Lodge that I will be joining you in Lyme, only until the Captain returns.” She glanced over at Anne. “With your permission of course, I will stay here, although I do recall a very charming inn; their fish porridge is -”
Anne broke into laughter. “Of course you shall stay here, dear Lady Russell. Nothing would please me more.”
“Very good,” Lady Russell said, rising and pressing a kiss to her dear friend’s forehead. “I will go find the maid, you finish your tea.”
“Of course,” Anne said. When Lady Russell left the room she stood and walked to the window, looking out towards the sea. There were a few fishing barks there offshore, nothing else. A good breeze was blowing, and she could read a puff coming in across the water. She looked down at her wedding band, twisting it once, twice around her finger.
Lady Russell joined her at the window shortly afterwards, draping Anne’s coat across her shoulders.
“He will be back soon,” Lady Russell said, “with all jewels and spices of Spain.”
“I am not sure that Spain has many jewels or spices to spare,” Anne said, moving towards the door. “In any case, he is enough.”