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She followed
their steps along the bottom walk, and had just turned
up into another, when the voice and the laugh of Miss
Crawford once more caught her ear; the sound approached,
and a few more windings brought them before her.
They were just returned into the wilderness from the park,
to which a sidegate, not fastened, had tempted them very
soon after their leaving her, and they had been across
a portion of the park into the very avenue which Fanny
had been hoping the whole morning to reach at last,
and had been sitting down under one of the trees.
This was their history. It was evident that they had been
spending their time pleasantly, and were not aware of the
length of their absence. Fanny's best consolation was
in being assured that Edmund had wished for her very much,
and that he should certainly have come back for her,
had she not been tired already; but this was not quite
sufficient to do away with the pain of having been left
a whole hour, when he had talked of only a few minutes,
nor to banish the sort of curiosity she felt to know
what they had been conversing about all that time;
and the result of the whole was to her disappointment
and depression, as they prepared by general agreement to
return to the house.

On reaching the bottom of the steps to the terrace,
Mrs. Rushworth and Mrs. Norris presented themselves
at the top, just ready for the wilderness, at the end
of an hour and a half from their leaving the house.
Mrs. Norris had been too well employed to move faster.
Whatever cross-accidents had occurred to intercept the pleasures
of her nieces, she had found a morning of complete enjoyment;
for the housekeeper, after a great many courtesies on
the subject of pheasants, had taken her to the dairy,
told her all about their cows, and given her the receipt
for a famous cream cheese; and since Julia's leaving them
they had been met by the gardener, with whom she had made
a most satisfactory acquaintance, for she had set him
right as to his grandson's illness, convinced him that it
was an ague, and promised him a charm for it; and he,
in return, had shewn her all his choicest nursery of plants,
and actually presented her with a very curious specimen
of heath.

On this _rencontre_ they all returned to the house together,
there to lounge away the time as they could with sofas,
and chit-chat, and Quarterly Reviews, till the return
of the others, and the arrival of dinner. It was late
before the Miss Bertrams and the two gentlemen came in,
and their ramble did not appear to have been more than
partially agreeable, or at all productive of anything
useful with regard to the object of the day. By their
own accounts they had been all walking after each other,
and the junction which had taken place at last seemed,
to Fanny's observation, to have been as much too late
for re-establishing harmony, as it confessedly had
been for determining on any alteration. She felt,
as she looked at Julia and Mr. Rushworth, that hers
was not the only dissatisfied bosom amongst them:

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