"You are arguing on utterly false premises,--you are talking worse than nonsense. Between me and the lady to whom you allude there is nothing. You need not smile in that way. I swear it! She is as pure as--"
"Oh, pray spare me! Don't fall into raptures about her purity,--there's a good creature. Dear me, dear me! this must be a very bad case, when a man like Colonel Alsager takes a poetical view of his lady-love, and talks about her purity."
"I came to ask you to abandon this shameless flirtation, Laura Hammond, for the sake of our old friendship,--as an act of kindness to me. Your reply is mockery and ridicule. I may use other means to bring about what I want."
"Ah, you threaten! Then I shall certainly get Mr. Hammond to fight you! He was out once at Nusserabad, or Hylunjee, or some such place, I believe. And we can prop him up on his crutches, and get his man to hold him, and I've no doubt he'd be strong enough to fire a pistol.--No," she added, suddenly changing her tone, "don't threaten, and don't thwart me; else let our innocent young friend look to herself. I'll break her heart, and then I'll spoil her name,--that's all. And now, I really must run away. Sir Charles will have been waiting for me full ten minutes." She touched the brim of her hat, in salute, with the handle of her riding-whip, gathered up her habit with her other hand, and left the room.
"And that is the woman," said Laurence, looking after her, "for whom I nearly broke my heart; whose rejection of my suit caused me to leave England,--intending, hoping, never to return. Great Heavens! once in that state, what idiots we become! Think of this fool flinging away a pearl of price, reputation, decency,--and all for that! Think of that poor child his wife having pinned her faith and her affections on to such a shallow oaf! There can be no doubt about Miss Gillespie's meaning now; no doubt that, partly from innate devilry, partly from pique, Laura Hammond will pursue her scheme to the very end. And I am powerless to interfere."
He went down to the library with the intention of writing a letter to his father announcing his immediate arrival; but as he entered the room, he saw through the deep bay-window fronting him, which looked down upon the terrace, the cavalcade departing down the avenue. At some considerable distance behind the others rode Sir Charles Mitford and Mrs. Hammond; and he was bending towards her, and talking in an apparently impressive manner.
Laurence shrugged his shoulders and turned away in disgust; but he had not reached the writing-table before he heard a deep sigh, succeeded by a passionate sobbing, and turning quickly round, saw Lady Mitford leaning against the window and half-hidden by the heavy curtains,--her face buried in her hands, her whole frame convulsed with the violence of her grief. Laurence would have retreated from the room, but his footsteps had attracted her attention; and as she looked their eyes met. He at once approached her, saying, "You will believe me when I say that it was quite by chance I entered the room, Lady Mitford,--without the least idea that you were here; but I am glad now that I came, for you are, I fear, very unwell; and--"
"It is nothing," she said, with a strong but ineffectual effort to resume her usual calmness; "it is nothing, indeed, Colonel Alsager; a little silly woman's weakness--nothing more. I am over-tired, I think; we have been up later the last few nights, you know, and I am so totally unused to dissipation even of the mildest kind."
"You will be better when you return to London, perhaps," said Laurence; "I have a strong notion that the marsh on this great Redmoor is anything but a sanitary adjunct to the property. I should really advise your getting back to town as soon as possible, now Parliament has met; and soon everybody will be there."
In London, Laurence thought, Mrs. Hammond will at all events be out of the house, and in other gaiety there might be a chance of Mitford's getting rid of his infatuation.