“They come on the Admiral’s account.  He is thought to be gouty.”

“Gout and decrepitude!” said Sir Walter.  “Poor old gentleman.”

“Have they any acquaintance here?” asked Elizabeth.

“I do not know; but I can hardly suppose that, at Admiral Croft’s time of life, and in his profession, he should not have many acquaintance in such a place as this.”

“I suspect,” said Sir Walter coolly, “that Admiral Croft will be best known in Bath as the renter of Kellynch Hall.  Elizabeth, may we venture to present him and his wife in Laura Place?”

“Oh, no!  I think not.  Situated as we are with Lady Dalrymple, cousins, we ought to be very careful not to embarrass her with acquaintance she might not approve.  If we were not related, it would not signify; but as cousins, she would feel scrupulous as to any proposal of ours.  We had better leave the Crofts to find their own level.  There are several odd-looking men walking about here, who, I am told, are sailors.  The Crofts will associate with them.”

This was Sir Walter and Elizabeth’s share of interest in the letter; when Mrs Clay had paid her tribute of more decent attention, in an enquiry after Mrs Charles Musgrove, and her fine little boys, Anne was at liberty.

In her own room, she tried to comprehend it.  Well might Charles wonder how Captain Wentworth would feel!  Perhaps he had quitted the field, had given Louisa up, had ceased to love, had found he did not love her.  She could not endure the idea of treachery or levity, or anything akin to ill usage between him and his friend.  She could not endure that such a friendship as theirs should be severed unfairly.

Captain Benwick and Louisa Musgrove!  The high-spirited, joyous-talking Louisa Musgrove, and the dejected, thinking, feeling, reading, Captain Benwick, seemed each of them everything that would not suit the other.  Their minds most dissimilar!  Where could have been the attraction?  The answer soon presented itself.  It had been in situation.  They had been thrown together several weeks; they had been living in the same small family party:  since Henrietta’s coming away, they must have been depending almost entirely on each other, and Louisa, just recovering from illness, had been in an interesting state, and Captain Benwick was not inconsolable.  That was a point which Anne had not been able to avoid suspecting before; and instead of drawing the same conclusion as Mary, from the present course of events, they served only to confirm the idea of his having felt some dawning of tenderness toward herself.  She did not mean, however, to derive much more from it to gratify her vanity, than Mary might have allowed.  She was persuaded that any tolerably pleasing young woman who had listened and seemed to feel for him would have received the same compliment.  He had an affectionate heart.  He must love somebody.