Sense and Sensibility by Sarah Price

Author:Sarah Price
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Charisma House
Published: 2016-01-19T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

FOR THE NEXT few days Eleanor remained extra pensive, trying to focus on the chores around the house and the sewing for their growing client base so that she could forget the feeling of distress that filled her chest. She often found herself washing already clean dishes or resewing a tear she had already repaired, forcing her to take out precious stitches and redo her work.

At night she read the Bible, her eyes often scanning the same line over and over again without comprehending the verse she read. And after she blew out the small kerosene lantern on her nightstand, she lay on the bed, staring into the darkness, her mind racing and her heart beating. With sleep eluding her, she arose feeling wearier than when she retired the evening before. And each day repeated the cycle.

After the shock of hearing Lydia’s confession, Eleanor found that she could think of nothing else. Her mind replayed the joyful manner with which Lydia had shared her secret. How unjust when one person’s joy creates painful angst in another!

Try as she might, Eleanor could not make sense of Edwin and his behavior. She also found it difficult to think of him as a man without scruples, for only a dishonorable man would lead a woman to think he favored her company over others. That was when she began to wonder if she had been wrong. Could it be that she had misread Edwin’s conversations and glances, his smiles and attention, and that he had only been pleasant and polite? Or had Mary Ann been right in claiming that she should have expressed herself more openly in case Edwin was interested in her but doubted her feelings for him? What if he didn’t know how she felt? And if he had known, would he have called off his engagement to Lydia? Still, knowing now that he had been engaged to Lydia that entire time brought Eleanor full circle, as she returned to the question of whether she had misread Edwin’s feelings.

At those moments, when the disappointment in Edwin rose deep within her broken heart, Eleanor doubted her own ability to judge the character of others. Perhaps people she thought were good, truly righteous, and honorable were not. She knew everyone had sin, for only Jesus was perfect, but for her entire life, Eleanor had believed that, for the most part, people were good at their core.

Now, after all that had happened in such a short period of time, she wasn’t so sure.

She wondered about Christian Bechtler, who had yet to return after his abrupt departure from his own picnic. No one seemed to know where he was, or perhaps it was that no one seemed to care. He was a man everyone was so glad to see yet no one seemed to talk about. Of course Eleanor remembered that Widow Jennings had confided in her that Christian had a sullied past involving a young woman. Yet, in the short time she’d known him, Eleanor sensed that he was righteous and good-hearted, a man of God and not the world.

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