She seized the letter, and was running away with it, when Mrs. Arlbery slipt out of the room, and Sir Sedley, shutting the door, half archly, half tenderly repeated, from the letter, 'My dear Lady Clarendel!'
In a perfect agony, she hid her face, exclaiming: 'O Lionel! my foolish ... cruel brother!...'
'Not foolish, not cruel, I think him,' cried Sir Sedley, taking her hand, 'but amiable ... he has done honour to my name, and he will use it, I hope, henceforth, as his own.'
'Forget, forget his flippancy,' cried she, withdrawing impatiently her hand; 'and pardon his sister's breach of engagement for this morning. I hope soon, very soon, to repair it, and I hope....'
She did not know what to add; she stopt, stammered, and then endeavoured to make her retreat.
'Do not go,' cried he, gently detaining her; 'incomparable Camilla! I have a thousand things to say to you. Will you not hear them?'
'No!' cried she, disengaging herself; 'no, no, no! I can hear nothing!...'
'Do you fascinate then,' said he, half reproachfully, 'like the rattlesnake, only to destroy?'
Camilla conceived this as alluding to her recent encouragement, and stood trembling with expectation it would be followed by a claim upon her justice.
But Sir Sedley, who was far from any meaning so pointed, lightly added; 'What thus agitates the fairest of creatures? can she fear a poor captive entangled in the witchery of her loveliness, and only the more enslaved the more he struggles to get free?'