Having prevailed on her to come down stairs, she seated her in a little room behind the bar; and as she saw the violence of her passions threw her into frequent faintings, neglected nothing which she thought might be of service to recover her spirits and compose her mind.
As she was thus charitably employed, a young gentleman who used the house, and was very free with all belonging to it, happened to come it. Miss Flora, besides being handsome, had something extremely agreeable and engaging in her air; and had her heart been possessed of half that innocence her countenance gave the promise of, her character would have been as amiable as it was now the contrary.
There are some eyes which shine through their tears, and are lovely in the midst of anguish; those of Miss Flora had this advantage, and she appeared, in spite of her disorder, so perfectly charming to the stranger, that he could not quit the place without joining his endeavours to those of the good-natured hostess, for her consolation, and had the satisfaction to find them much more effectual for that purpose.
The afflicted fair-one, finding herself somewhat better, thanked the good woman, in the politest terms, for the pains she had been at; but the gentleman would not be denied seeing her safe home in a coach; saying, the air, on a sudden, might have too violent an effect on her so lately recovered spirits; and that it was not fit she should be alone, in case of accidents.
Miss Flora was easily prevailed upon to accept his obliging offer; he attended her home—stayed about half an hour with her—and entreated she would give him permission to come the next day and enquire after her health.
She knew the world too well, and the disposition of mankind in general, not to see that there was something more than mere compassion in the civilities he had shewn to her: she examined his person—his behaviour—and found nothing in either that was not perfectly agreeable; and though she had really loved Mr. Trueworth to the greatest excess that woman could do, yet, as she knew he was irrecoverably lost, she looked upon a new attachment as the only sure means of putting the past out of her head.
A very few visits served to make an eclaircissement of the thoughts they had mutually entertained of each other; and as he had found by the woman of the tavern, that the distress of this young lady had been occasioned by a love-quarrel with a gentleman who had brought her into that house, he began with expressing the utmost abhorrence of that injustice and ingratitude which some were capable of: 'But,' said he, 'if some of us have neither love nor honour for those that love us, we all certainly love our own happiness; and he must be stupid and insensible, indeed,' added he, embracing her with the warmest transport, 'who could not find it eternally within these arms!'
'You all talk so,' answered she, with the most engaging smile she could put on: 'but as my youth—innocence—and, perhaps, a little mixture of female vanity—have once misled me, it behoves me to be extremely cautious how the tender impulse gets a second time possession of my heart.'
In short, she put him not to a too great expence of vows and protestations before she either was, or pretended to be, convinced of the sincerity of his passion, and also rewarded it in as ample a manner as his soul could wish.