Emma had no longer an alarm for Henry; his interest was yet safe; and she led off the dance with genuine spirit and enjoyment.  Not more than five couple could be mustered; but the rarity and the suddenness of it made it very delightful, and she found herself well matched in a partner.  They were a couple worth looking at.

Two dances, unfortunately, were all that could be allowed.  It was growing late, and Miss Bates became anxious to get home, on her mother’s account.  After some attempts, therefore, to be permitted to begin again, they were obliged to thank Mrs. Weston, look sorrowful, and have done.

“Perhaps it is as well,” said Frank Churchill, as he attended Emma to her carriage.  “I must have asked Miss Fairfax, and her languid dancing would not have agreed with me, after your’s.”

CHAPTER IX

Emma did not repent her condescension in going to the Coles.  The visit afforded her many pleasant recollections the next day; and all that she might be supposed to have lost on the side of dignified seclusion, must be amply repaid in the splendour of popularity.  She must have delighted the Coles—­worthy people, who deserved to be made happy!—­And left a name behind her that would not soon die away.

Perfect happiness, even in memory, is not common; and there were two points on which she was not quite easy.  She doubted whether she had not transgressed the duty of woman by woman, in betraying her suspicions of Jane Fairfax’s feelings to Frank Churchill.  It was hardly right; but it had been so strong an idea, that it would escape her, and his submission to all that she told, was a compliment to her penetration, which made it difficult for her to be quite certain that she ought to have held her tongue.

The other circumstance of regret related also to Jane Fairfax; and there she had no doubt.  She did unfeignedly and unequivocally regret the inferiority of her own playing and singing.  She did most heartily grieve over the idleness of her childhood—­and sat down and practised vigorously an hour and a half.

She was then interrupted by Harriet’s coming in; and if Harriet’s praise could have satisfied her, she might soon have been comforted.

“Oh! if I could but play as well as you and Miss Fairfax!”

“Don’t class us together, Harriet.  My playing is no more like her’s, than a lamp is like sunshine.”

“Oh! dear—­I think you play the best of the two.  I think you play quite as well as she does.  I am sure I had much rather hear you.  Every body last night said how well you played.”

“Those who knew any thing about it, must have felt the difference.  The truth is, Harriet, that my playing is just good enough to be praised, but Jane Fairfax’s is much beyond it.”

“Well, I always shall think that you play quite as well as she does, or that if there is any difference nobody would ever find it out.  Mr. Cole said how much taste you had; and Mr. Frank Churchill talked a great deal about your taste, and that he valued taste much more than execution.”