with a sensibility amused and
delighted; and just at last, after Harriet's own account had been given, he had
expressed his indignation at the abominable folly of Miss Bickerton in the
warmest terms. Every thing was to take its natural course, however, neither
impelled nor assisted. She would not stir a step, nor drop a hint. No, she had
had enough of interference. There could be no harm in a scheme, a mere passive
scheme. It was no more than a wish. Beyond it she would on no account proceed.
    Emma's first resolution was to keep her father from the knowledge of what
had passed, - aware of the anxiety and alarm it would occasion: but she soon
felt that concealment must be impossible. Within half an hour it was known all
over Highbury. It was the very event to engage those who talk most, the young
and the low; and all the youth and servants in the place were soon in the
happiness of frightful news. The last night's ball seemed lost in the gipsies.
Poor Mr. Woodhouse trembled as he sat, and, as Emma had foreseen, would scarcely
be satisfied without their promising never to go beyond the shrubbery again. It
was some comfort to him that many inquiries after himself and Miss Woodhouse
(for his neighbours knew that he loved to be inquired after), as well as Miss
Smith, were coming in during the rest of the day; and he had the pleasure of
returning for answer, that they were all very indifferent - which, though not
exactly true, for she was perfectly well, and Harriet not much otherwise, Emma
would not interfere with. She had an unhappy state of health in general for the
child of such a man, for she hardly knew what indisposition was; and if he did
not invent illnesses for her, she could make no figure in a message.
    The gipsies did not wait for the operations of justice; they took themselves
off in a hurry. The young ladies of Highbury might have walked again in safety
before their panic began, and the whole history dwindled soon into a matter of
little importance but to Emma and her nephews: - in her imagination it
maintained its ground, and Henry and John were still asking every day for the
story of Harriet and the gipsies, and still tenaciously setting her right if she
varied in the slightest particular from the original recital.
 

                                  Chapter IV.

A very few days had passed after this adventure, when Harriet came one morning
to Emma with a small parcel in her hand, and after sitting down and hesitating,