Chapter 7: What the Portrait Gallery Confirms

The carriage made the journey back from Thornfield Abbey in forty minutes, which was thirty-nine minutes longer than Cecilia required to arrive at her conclusions and one minute less than she needed to decide what to do about them.

She sat with her hands folded in her lap and watched the hedgerows pass in the darkness and did not say anything, which was itself unusual enough that Lydia, beside her, said nothing either. Mrs. Hartwell occupied the opposite seat and filled the silence with a comprehensive review of the evening's material successes — the quality of the negus, the superior arrangement of the supper, the very fine conduct of the Count in receiving his guests, and the great probability that Cecilia had made a particular impression, which Mrs. Hartwell attributed to the green dress and considered entirely to her own credit. Mr. Hartwell, wedged into the corner, appeared to be asleep, though Cecilia was not deceived. Her father's sleeping face and his thinking face had long since diverged past any possibility of confusion, at least for her.

She looked at him once in the thin lamplight. He did not open his eyes. But his hands, resting on his coat, were quite still in the specific way that meant he was listening to every word.