Before Marion could finish her sentence, the supposed servant had violently seized Miss Smythe by the arms, and was about forcibly to drag her towards the carriage, when the loud cries of Marion brought assistance. The almost fainting girl was rescued, and the post-chaise secured; but not a trace could be seen of the madman, who instantly vanished; and the post-boy could give no intelligence respecting him, except that he had been ordered out at an inn close by, in urgent haste, that evening, with a promise of double payment if he implicitly obeyed the gentleman, who seemed highly irritable, and swore at him in a most fearful manner, if he made the slightest delay, or so much as asked a direction which way to turn.
The most diligent search was made, but made in vain, by the officers of police, to find out the lunatic's retreat, which eluded their utmost research; and as Caroline Smythe was privately removed soon afterwards from school, where the subject was forbidden ever to be mentioned, the whole story seemed almost buried in oblivion, and Marion herself felt at last as if the entire adventure had been an agitating dream, remembered by no one but herself.
CHAPTER VII.
Marion's sister, Agnes, five years older than herself, after being distinguished as the best musician, best sketcher, best linguist, best everything, at Mrs. Penfold's, had left school with no real knowledge, except of the most frivolous kind, accidentally gathered in conversation, and repeated again in society like a parrot. Formed to excite the most rapturous admiration, by the gorgeous magnificence of her almost regal beauty, art had acted the part of the Fairy Bountiful in forming Agnes, while nature had showered her choicest gifts on Marion.
Agnes was brilliant without being interesting, and dazzling without being attractive, for her mind seemed irremediably and incorrigibly vulgar, selfish, and vain. A good actress, an inimitable mimic, and incomparable in a tableau, she assumed generally a queen-like dignity of manner, "stalking through life," as Sir Arthur said, "with an assured and stately step, as if practising for her appearance as a Duchess at the next coronation."
Admiration seemed to Agnes the only pleasure of life, and amusement its only business; while, if ever she had possessed any sensibility, it was frittered away on the fictitious sorrows of the Adelines and Julias in the volumes which she read with surpassing diligence from a circulating library; though, in all other respects, Agnes wasted her time amidst such listless idleness, that she might have let her nails grow, like those of a Chinese mandarin, to testify how literally she did nothing.
No one, certainly, could excel Agnes in turning up her hands and eyes at the faults of others; but those who trace nothing except evil in their companions, have seldom much good in themselves. Marion found it one of the most important and pleasing studies in the world, to comprehend the character and temper of her friends and connexions, besides her own, with a wish to render herself suitable to them, as her mind, pliable without weakness, was bent on constantly yielding her own wishes to those she loved; but this unobtrusive generosity was only a subject of satirical remark to her sister, who could neither understand nor believe in Marion's utter singleness of heart and disinterestedness; her own sole aim being selfish indulgence, and her sole rule to obtain it in the easiest possible way.
Self-love was the ruling passion of Agnes; love of others the quickening principle, or rather impulse with Marion, who would have zealously planted flowers for even strangers to enjoy; but Agnes would have plucked all those of her friends, and scarcely taken the trouble to rear any even for her own use. Agnes, cold, vain, heartless, and self-sufficient, thought she was made only for this world, and this world for her, and for such as herself, young, gay, rich, and lovely, while all others were mere intruders on the creation. But Marion, on the contrary, followed the dictates of her own heart, in wishing to do good of every kind to every person, while still she had learned to aim above nature, to that high standard of Christian perfection, so exalted, that those who have gained the most elevated human attainment in virtue and excellence, must still consider the structure of their minds, however beautifully decorated with generous sympathies and kind emotions, as being only begun, while they perseveringly aspire upwards, even to the measurement of that Divine Being who left us an example that we should follow his steps.
Agnes had now been, for three seasons, the reigning beauty of Edinburgh! There it is the privilege of every tolerable-looking girl to be considered in her own set pre-eminent, during the first winter after she is introduced; but though the public eye usually grows weary of the same features, however perfect, during a second campaign, Agnes had apparently taken out a diploma of beauty, the reputation for which seemed confirmed to others by her own thorough conviction of being completely unrivalled, and by the exulting consciousness she displayed of her own supreme loveliness. Three seasons of tumultuous joy, triumph, and conquest, had already succeeded each other, during which Agnes was, to use her own expression, "fiercely gay," yet still no younger rival had appeared to eclipse the dazzling array of her charms; and not a whisper was heard that the freshness of her Raphael-like beauty was at all impaired; nor were any ladies ever heard to "wonder" what gentlemen could possibly see to admire in Agnes Dunbar, as not a dissenting voice had yet ventured to make itself audible on that subject.
Agnes began life with that perfect confidence in her own knowledge of the world, universally felt by young ladies under twenty, especially when they have seen very little of it, and with a thousand schemes and projects of perfect happiness. Though one after another her castles of cards fell to the ground, still, in the exercise of persevering energy, she rebuilt the edifice again with new materials, and on what she imagined a better construction, but still in every instance, to her own unutterable astonishment, she found that most unaccountably, "hope told a flattering tale!"