Camilla or A Picture of Youth Part 29

It is thus alone you can secure your own contentment; for it is thus alone your reflecting mind can s.n.a.t.c.h from the time to come the dangerous surmises of a dubious retrospection.

Remember, you can always advance; you can never, in honour, go back; and believe me when I tell you, that the mere simple avowal of preference, which only ultimately binds the man, is frequently what first captivates the woman. If her mind is not previously occupied, it operates with such seductive sway, it so soothes, so flatters, so bewitches her self-complacency, that while she listens, she imperceptibly fancies she partic.i.p.ates in sentiments, which, but the minute before, occurred not even to her imagination; and while her hand is the recompence of her own eulogy, she is not herself aware if she has bestowed it where her esteem and regard, unbia.s.sed by the eloquence of acknowledged admiration, would have wished it sought, or if it has simply been the boon of her own gratified vanity.

I now no longer urge your acquiescence, my dear friend; I merely entreat you twice to peruse what I have written, and then leave you to act by the result of such perusal.

I remain Your truly faithful and obliged GABRIEL MARCHMONT.

Edgar ran through this letter with an impatience wholly foreign to his general character. 'Why,' cried he, 'will he thus obtrude upon me these fastidious doubts and causeless difficulties? I begged but the rest.i.tution of my promise, and he gives it me in words that nearly annihilate my power of using it.'

Disappointed and displeased, he hastily put it into his pocket-book, resolving to seek Camilla, and commit the consequences of an interview to the impulses it might awaken.

He was half way down stairs, when the sentence finis.h.i.+ng with, 'you cannot excite, you cannot bestow happiness,' confusedly recurred to him: 'If in that,' thought he, 'I fail, I am a stranger to it myself, and a stranger for ever;' and, returning to his room, he re-opened the letter to look for the pa.s.sage.

The sentence lost nothing by being read a second time; he paused upon it dejectedly, and presently re-read the whole epistle.

'He is not quite wrong!' cried he, pensively; 'there is nothing very unreasonable in what he urges: true, indeed, it is, that I can never be happy myself, if her happiness is not entwined around my own.'

The first blight thus borne to that ardent glee with which the imagination rewards its own elevated speculations, he yet a third time read the letter.

'He is right!' he then cried; 'I will investigate her sentiments, and know what are my chances for her regard; what I owe to real approbation; and what merely to intimacy of situation. I will postpone all explanation till my visit here expires, and devote the probationary interval, to an examination which shall obviate all danger of either deceiving my own reason, or of beguiling her inconsiderate acceptance.'

This settled, he rejoiced in a mastery over his eagerness, which he considered as complete, since it would defer for no less than a week the declaration of his pa.s.sion.

CHAPTER III

_An Author's Notion of Travelling_

The next morning Camilla, sad and unwilling to appear, was the last who entered the breakfast-parlour. Edgar instantly discerned the continued unhappiness, which an a.s.sumed smile concealed from the unsuspicious Sir Hugh, and the week of delay before him seemed an outrage to all his wishes.

While she was drinking her first cup of tea, a servant came in, and told her the carriage was ready.

She coloured, but n.o.body spoke, and the servant retired. Edgar was going to ask the design for the morning, when Miss Margland said--'Miss Camilla, as the horses have got to go and return, you had better not keep them waiting.'

Colouring still more deeply, she was going to disclaim having ordered them, though well aware for what purpose they were come, when Sir Hugh said--'I think, my dear, you had best take Eugenia with you, which may serve you as a companion to talk to, in case you want to say anything by the way, which I take for granted; young people not much liking to hold their tongues for a long while together, which is very natural, having so little to think of.'

'Miss Eugenia, then,' cried Miss Margland, before Camilla could reply, 'run for your cloak as soon as you have finished your breakfast.'

Eugenia, hoping to aid her sister in performing a task, which she considered as a peace-offering to Indiana, said, she had already done.

Camilla now lost all courage for resistance; but feeling her chagrin almost intolerable, quitted the room with her tea undrunk, and without making known if she should return or not.

Eugenia followed, and Edgar, much amazed, said, he had forgotten to order his horse for his morning's ride, and hastily made off: determined to be ready to hand the sisters to the carriage, and learn whither it was to drive.

Camilla, who, in flying to her room, thought of nothing less than preparing for an excursion which she now detested, was again surprised in tears by Eugenia.

'What, my dearest Camilla,' she cried, 'can thus continually affect you?

you cannot be so unhappy without some cause!--why will you not trust your Eugenia?'

'I cannot talk,' she answered, ashamed to repeat reasons which she knew Eugenia held to be inadequate to her concern--'If there is no resource against this persecution--if I must render myself hateful to give them satisfaction, let us, at least, be gone immediately, and let me be spared seeing the person I so ungratefully offend.'

She then hurried down stairs; but finding Edgar in waiting, still more quickly hurried back, and in an agony, for which she attempted not to account, cast herself into a chair, and told Eugenia, that if Miss Margland did not contrive to call Edgar away, the universe could not prevail with her to pa.s.s him in such defiance.

'My dear Camilla,' said Eugenia, surprized, yet compa.s.sionately, 'if this visit is become so painful to you, relinquish it at once.'

'Ah, no! for that cruel Miss Margland will then accuse me of staying away only to follow the counsel of Edgar.'

She stopt; for the countenance of Eugenia said--'_And is that not your motive?_' A sudden consciousness took place of her distress; she hid her face, in the hope of concealing her emotion, and with as calm a voice as she could attain, said, the moment they could pa.s.s un.o.bserved she would set off.

Eugenia went downstairs.

'Alas! alas!' she then cried, 'into what misery has this barbarous Miss Margland thrown me! Eugenia herself seems now to suspect something wrong; and so, I suppose, will my uncle; and I can only convince them of my innocence by acting towards Edgar as a monster.--Ah! I would sooner a thousand times let them all think me guilty!'

Eugenia had met Miss Margland in the hall, who, impatient for their departure, pa.s.sed her, and ascended the stairs.

At the sound of her footsteps, the horror of her reproaches and insinuations conquered every other feeling, and Camilla, starting up, rushed forward, and saying 'Good morning!' ran off.

Edgar was still at the door, and came forward to offer her his hand.

'Pray take care of Eugenia,' she cried, abruptly pa.s.sing him, and darting, unaided, into the chaise. Edgar, astonished, obeyed, and gave his more welcome a.s.sistance to Eugenia; but when both were seated, said--'Where shall I tell the postillion to drive?'

Camilla, who was pulling one of the green blinds up, and again letting it down, twenty times in a minute, affected not to hear him; but Eugenia answered, 'to the Grove, to Mrs. Arlbery's.'

The postillion had already received his orders from Miss Margland, and drove off; leaving Edgar mute with surprise, disappointment and mortification.

Miss Margland was just behind him, and conceived this the fortunate instant for eradicating from his mind every favourable pre-possession for Camilla; a.s.suming, therefore, an air of concern, she said--'So, you have found Miss Camilla out, in spite of all her precautions! she would fain not have had you know her frolic.'

'Not know it! has there, then, been any plan? did Miss Camilla intend----'

'O, she intends nothing in the world for two minutes together! only she did not like you should find out her fickleness. You know, I told you, before, she was all whim; and so you will find. You may always take my opinion, be a.s.sured. Miss Lynmere is the only one among them that is always the same, always good, always amiable.'

'And is not Miss----' he was going to say Camilla, but checking himself, finished with--'Miss Eugenia, at least, always equal, always consistent?'

'Why, she is better than Miss Camilla; but not one among them has any steadiness, or real sweetness, but Miss Lynmere. As to Miss Camilla, if she has not her own way, there's no enduring her, she frets, and is so cross. When you put her off, in that friendly manner, from gadding after a new acquaintance so improper for her, you set her into such an ill humour, that she has done nothing but cry, as you may have seen by her eyes, and worry herself and all of us round, except you, ever since; but she was afraid of you, for fear you should take her to task, which she hates of all things.'

Half incredulous, yet half shocked, Edgar turned from this harangue in silent disgust. He knew the splenetic nature of Miss Margland, and trusted she might be wrong; but he knew, too, her opportunities for observation, and dreaded lest she might be right. Camilla had been certainly low spirited, weeping, and restless; was it possible it could be for so slight, so unmeaning a cause? His wish was to follow her on horseback; but this, unauthorized, might betray too much anxiety: he tried not to think of what had been said by Dr. Marchmont, while this cloud hung over her disposition and sincerity; for whatever might be the malignity of Miss Margland, the breach of a promise, of which the voluntary sweetness had so lately proved his final captivation, could not be doubted, and called aloud for explanation.

He mounted, however, his horse, to make his promised enquiries of Mrs.

Needham; for though the time was already past for impeding the acquaintance from taking place, its progress might yet be stopt, should it be found incompatible with propriety.

The young ladies had scarce left the Park, when Sir Hugh, recollecting a promise he had made to Mr. and Mrs. Tyrold, of never suffering Eugenia to go abroad unattended by some gentleman, while Bellamy remained in the country, sent hastily to beg that Edgar would follow the carriage.

Edgar was out of sight, and there was no chance of overtaking him.

'Lack-a-day!' said Sir Hugh, 'those young folks can never walk a horse but full gallop!' He then resolved to ask Dr. Orkborne to go after his pupil, and ride by the side of the chaise. He ordered a horse to be saddled; and, to lose no time by messages, the tardiness of which he had already experienced with this gentleman, he went himself to his apartment, and after several vain rappings at his door, entered the room unbid, saying--'Good Dr. Orkborne, unless you are dead, which G.o.d forbid! I think it's something uncomfortable that you can't speak to a person waiting at your door; not that I pretend to doubt but you may have your proper reasons, being what I can't judge.'

He then begged he would get booted and spurred instantly, and follow his two nieces to Mrs. Arlbery's, in order to take care of Eugenia; adding, 'though I'm afraid, Doctor, by your look, you don't much listen to me, which I am sorry for; my not being able to speak like Horace and Virgil being no fault of mine, but of my poor capacity, which no man can be said to be answerable for.'