Leonard walked aside with the parson, and in a few sentences gave vent to his swelling heart.
The parson shared in Leonard’s resentment; and having soon drawn from him all that had passed in his memorable interview with Helen, exclaimed,—
“Enough! Do not yet seek Lord L’Estrange yourself; I am going to see him,—I am here at his request. His summons, indeed, was for to-morrow; but the squire having written me a hurried line, requesting me to meet him at Lansmere tomorrow and proceed with him afterwards in search of poor Frank, I thought I might have little time for communications with Lord L’Estrange, unless I forestalled his invitation and came to-day. Well that I did so! I only arrived an hour since, found he was gone to the town-hall, and joined the young ladies in the Park. Miss Digby, thinking it natural that I might wish to say something in private to my old young friend Violante, walked a few paces in advance. Thus, fortunately, I chanced to be here, to receive your account, and I trust to remove misunderstanding. Lord L’Estrange must now be returned. I will go back to the house. You, meanwhile, return to the town, I beseech you. I will come to you afterwards at your inn. Your very appearance in these grounds, even the brief words that have passed between Helen and you, might only widen the breach between yourself and your benefactor. I cannot bear to anticipate this. Go back, I entreat you. I will explain all, and Lord L’Estrange shall right you! That is,—that must be his intention!”
“IS—must be his intention—when he has just so wronged me!”
“Yes, yes,” faltered the poor parson, mindful of his promise to L’Estrange not to reveal his own interview with that nobleman, and yet not knowing otherwise how to explain or to soothe; but still believing Leonard to be Harley’s son, and remembering all that Harley had so pointedly said of atonement, in apparent remorse for crime, Mr. Dale was wholly at a loss himself to understand why Harley should have thus prefaced atonement by an insult. Anxious, however, to prevent a meeting between Harley and Leonard while both were under the influence of such feelings towards each other, he made an effort over himself, and so well argued in favour of his own diplomacy, that Leonard reluctantly consented to wait for Mr. Dale’s report.
“As to reparation or excuse,” said he, proudly, “it must rest with Lord L’Estrange. I ask it not. Tell him only this,—that if the instant I heard that she whom I loved and held sacred for so many years was affianced to him, I resigned even the very wish to call her mine—if that were desertion of man’s duties, I am guilty. If to have prayed night and day that she who would have blessed my lonely and toilsome life may give some charm to his, not bestowed by his wealth and his greatness—if that were ingratitude, I am ungrateful; let him still condemn me. I pass out of his sphere,—a thing that has crossed it a moment, and is gone. But Helen he must not blame, suspect; even by a thought. One word more. In this election, this strife for objects wholly foreign to all my habits, unsuited to my poverty, at war with aspirations so long devoted to fairer goals, though by obscurer paths, I obeyed but his will or whim,—at a moment too when my whole soul sickened for repose and solitude. I had forced myself at last to take interest in what I had before loathed. But in every hope for the future, every stimulant to ambition, Lord L’Estrange’s esteem still stood before me. Now, what do I here longer? All of his conduct, save his contempt for myself, is an enigma. And sinless he repeat a wish, which I would fain still regard as a law, I retire from the contest he has embittered; I renounce the ambition he has poisoned; and, mindful of those humble duties which he implies that I disdain, I return to my own home.”
The parson nodded assent to each of these sentences; and Leonard, passing by Violante and Helen, with a salutation equally distant to both, retraced his steps towards the town.
Meanwhile Violante and Helen had also been in close conference, and that conference had suddenly endeared each to the other; for Helen, taken by surprise, agitated, overpowered, had revealed to Violante that confession of another attachment, which she had made to Lord L’Estrange, the rupture of her engagement with the latter. Violante saw that Harley was free. Harley, too, had promised to free herself. By a sudden flash of conviction, recalling his words, looks, she felt that she was beloved,—deemed that honour alone (while either was yet shackled) had forbidden him to own that love. Violante stood a being transformed, “blushing celestial rosy red,” heaven at her heart, joy in her eyes,—she loved so well, and she trusted so implicitly! Then from out the overflow of her own hope and bliss she poured forth such sweet comfort to Helen, that Helen’s arm stole around her; cheek touched cheek,—they were as sisters.
At another moment, Mr. Dale might have felt some amazement at the sudden affection which had sprung up between these young persons; for in his previous conversation with Violante, he had, as he thought, very artfully, and in a pleasant vein, sounded the young Italian as to her opinion of her fair friend’s various good qualities, and Violante had rather shrunk from the title of “friend;” and though she had the magnanimity to speak with great praise of Helen, the praise did not sound cordial. But the good man was at this moment occupied in preparing his thoughts for his interview with Harley; he joined the two girls in silence, and, linking an arm of each within his own, walked slowly towards the house. As he approached the terrace he observed Riccabocca and Randal pacing the gravel walk side by side.
Violante, pressing his arm, whispered, “Let us go round the other way; I would speak with you a few minutes undisturbed.”