The girl flung herself out of bed, ran across the room, a little white ghost in the faint dawn, and threw her arms round her aunt's neck. She had no mother, poor little thing, to tell her troubles to; and she wanted a mother now.
"Oh, dear Aunt Elizabeth," she sobbed passionately, "do help me—I am so miserable! I don't want to marry Mr. Kingston! I don't love him—I have made a mistake! I didn't think enough about it, and now I know we should never suit each other. Won't you tell him I was too young, and that I made a mistake? Won't you—oh, please do!—help me to break it off?"
On what a mere chance does destiny depend.
If Mrs. Hardy's evening had been triumphant and prosperous—if she had not torn her best lace, and torn it in consequence of Rachel's carelessness—she would probably have received the girl's touching confidence as a tender mother should. As it was, she felt that after all her fatigues and worries, this was really too much.
"What nonsense are you talking, child?" she exclaimed angrily. "Is it any fault of Mr. Kingston's if Miss Hale behaves like an idiot? She is nothing but a vulgar flirt, and he knows it as well as you do—only it is his way to be attentive to all women."
"Miss Hale!" repeated Rachel vaguely; "I'm not thinking of Miss Hale. I am not blaming anybody—only myself. I was very wrong to accept Mr. Kingston at the first—oh, aunt, you know we are not suited to each other! He ought to marry somebody older and grander, and I—I thought I should like to be rich, and to live in that house—and I thought I should come to love him in time; but now I know it was all a mistake. Do—do let me break it off before it goes any further! Let me stay with you—I shall be quite happy to stay with you and Uncle Hardy, if you'll only let me!"
"You are dreaming," replied her aunt, giving her a slight shake in the extremity of her dismay and mortification; "you talk like a baby. Do you think a man is to be taken up one day and thrown away the next? And it is worse than that to jilt a man—and Mr. Kingston of all people—after being engaged to him for months, as you have been, and after leading him into all sorts of preparations and expense. The bare idea is monstrous! And all for nothing at all, but some ridiculous sudden fancy! You may have seen things of that sort done amongst the people you have been brought up with, but no lady would think of disgracing herself and her family by such conduct."
"Oh, aunt!" moaned Rachel piteously, as if she had had an unexpected blow.
"I don't like to speak harshly to you, my dear," Mrs. Hardy proceeded, in a rather more gentle, but still irritated tone. "Only you must not vex me with such absurd and childish notions. I know it is only a passing whim—you are over-tired, and you are hurt because Mr. Kingston paid Miss Hale so much attention, though it is only what he does to all women, without meaning anything whatever; but still it is a serious and horrible thing—breaking an engagement, a really happy engagement, as yours is—jilting a kind, good man, after giving him every encouragement—even to think of! Don't let me hear you mention it again, unless you want to break my heart altogether. And after all I have done for you—I don't want to boast, but I have been a good aunt to you, Rachel, and you would have been in a poor place but for me—the least you can do is to respect my wishes, especially as you know I wish nothing but what is for your real good and welfare."
Rachel wandered back to her bed, laid her head gently on the pillow, and closed her eyes. Mrs. Hardy in the dead silence that presently ensued, was relieved to think that she had "settled off" at last; but it was not sleep that kept her so quiet—it was the calmness of defeat and despair.