He stopped, from inability to proceed—Emmeline, in tears, continued silent.
Struggling to conquer his emotion and recover his voice, Fitz-Edward at length continued—
'While I was suffering all the misery which my apprehension for her fate inflicted, her younger brother, William Godolphin, returned from the West Indies, where he has been three years stationed. I was the first person he visited in town; but I was not at my lodgings there. Before I returned from Tylehurst, he had informed himself of all the circumstances of Trelawny's embarrassments, and his sister's absence. He found letters from Lord Westhaven, and from my brother, Lord Clancarryl; who knowing he would about that time return to England, conjured him to assist in the attempt of discovering Lady Adelina; of whose motives for concealing herself from her family they were entirely ignorant, while it filled them with uneasiness and astonishment. As soon as I went back to London, Godolphin, of whose arrival I was ignorant, came to me. He embraced me, and thanked me for my friendship and attention to his unfortunate Adelina—I think if he had held his sword to my heart it would have hurt me less!
'He implored me to help his search after his lost sister, and again said how greatly he was obliged to me—while I, conscious how little I deserved his gratitude, felt like a coward and an assassin, and shrunk from the manly confidence of my friend.
'Since our first meeting, I have seen him several times, and ever with new anguish. I have loved Godolphin from my earliest remembrance; and have known him from a boy to have the best heart and the noblest spirit under heaven. Equally incapable of deserving or bearing dishonour, Godolphin will behold me with contempt; which tho' I deserve, I cannot endure. He must call me to an account; and the hope of perishing by his hand is the only one I now cherish. Yet unable to shock him by divulging the fatal secret, I have hitherto concealed it, and my concealment he must impute to motives base, infamous, and pusillanimous. I can bear such reflections no longer—I will go to town to-morrow, explain his sister's situation to him, and let him take the only reparation I can now make him.'
Emmeline, shuddering at this resolution, could not conceal how greatly it affected her.
'Generous and lovely Miss Mowbray! pardon me for having thus moved your gentle nature; and allow me, since I see you pity me, to request of you and Mrs. Stafford a favour which will probably be the last trouble the unhappy Fitz-Edward will give you.
'It may happen that Lady Adelina may hereafter be discovered—tho' I know not how to hope it. But if your generous pity should interest you in the fate of that unhappy, forlorn young woman, your's and Mrs. Stafford's protection might yet perhaps save her; and such interposition would be worthy of hearts like yours. As the event of a meeting between me and Godolphin is uncertain, shall I entreat you, my lovely friend, to take charge of this paper. It contains a will, by which the child of Lady Adelina will be entitled to all I die possessed of. It is enough, if the unfortunate infant survives, to place it above indigence. Lord Clancarryl will not dispute the disposition of my fortune; and to your care, and that of Mrs. Stafford, I have left it in trust, and I have entreated you to befriend the poor little one, who will probably be an orphan—but desolate and abandoned it will not be, if it's innocence and unhappiness interest you to grant my request. Delamere will not object to your goodness being so exerted; and you will not teach it, generous, gentle as you are! to hold in abhorrence the memory of it's father. This is all I can now do. Farewell! dearest Miss Mowbray!—Heaven give you happiness, ma douce amie! Farewell!'
These last words, in which Fitz-Edward repeated the name by which he was accustomed to address Emmeline, quite overcame her. He was hastening away, while, hardly able to speak, she yet made an effort to stop him. The interview he was about to seek was what Lady Adelina so greatly dreaded. Yet Emmeline dared not urge to him how fatal it would be to her; she knew not what to say, least he should discover the secret with which she was entrusted; but in breathless agitation caught his hand as he turned to leave her, crying—