And yet, Fanny derived much innocent audience enjoyment from the play. Henry Crawford acted well, and it was a pleasure to her to creep into the theatre, and attend the rehearsal of the first act, in spite of the feelings it excited in some speeches for Maria. Maria, she also thought, acted well, too well. And after the first rehearsal or two, Fanny began to be their only audience—sometimes as prompter, sometimes as spectator—and often very useful.

As far as she could judge, Mr. Crawford was considerably the best actor of all. He had more confidence than Edmund, more judgment than Tom, more talent and taste than Mr. Yates, and less spittle than Mr. Rushworth. She did not like him as a man, but she must admit him to be the best actor, and on this point there were not many who differed from her. Mr. Yates, for one, missed the subtlety and exclaimed against his tameness and insipidity. And the day came at last, when Mr. Rushworth turned to her with a black look, and said, “Do you think there is anything so very fine in all this? For the life and soul of me, I cannot admire him. And, between ourselves, to see such an undersized, little, mean-looking man—I could just tear him with my teeth, the pip-squeak that he is—Ahem!—set up for a fine actor, is very ridiculous in my opinion. Arrrggarrh!”

From this moment there was a return of his former jealousy, which Maria was at little pains to remove. And the chances of Mr. Rushworth’s ever attaining to the knowledge of his two-and-forty speeches became much less. Fanny, in her pity and kindheartedness, was at great pains to teach him how to memorize, giving him all the help in her power, learning every word of his lines herself, but without any progress on his part.

Many uncomfortable, anxious, apprehensive feelings Fanny certainly had; but the gloom of her first theatrical worries was proved to have been unfounded.

A far more dire concern was instead before her. Every now and then, Fanny considered if she might attempt to speak to Edmund on the secret subject between them, and to divulge to him the violent confrontation on the stairs and her role in possibly killing someone—whether a man or a creature of the Curse, she was unsure. Neither was she sure of Baddeley’s effectiveness in his search of the premises, nor whether the danger was still present.

The servants and staff continued behaving strangely, unnoticed by all, and this time Fanny paid more attention to their comings and goings, and also, to the odd manner with which many of them seemed to react to Lord Eastwind.

They obeyed him—indeed, rather subtly, and almost instinctively. They moved like theatre puppets to each tiny lift of his finger, or his turn of head or an intense look of his exotic eye.