Eugenia strictly obeyed: in sparing Lionel she spared also her father, whom his highly unfeeling behaviour with regard to Sir Sedley would yet further have incensed and grieved; and, in doing justice to Edgar, she flattered herself she prevented an alienation from one yet destined to be nearly allied to him, since time, she still hoped, would effect the reconciliation of Camilla with the youth whom—next to Melmond—she thought the most amiable upon earth.
Mr. Tyrold, by this means, gathered no further intelligence than that they had parted upon some mutual, though slight dissatisfaction. He hoped, therefore, with Eugenia, they might soon meet again; and resolved, till he could better judge what might prove the event, to keep this distress from Sir Hugh.
He then met Camilla with the most consolatory kindness; yet would not trust her ardent mind with the hopes he cherished himself, dreading infinitely more to give than to receive disappointment. He blamed her for admitting any doubts of the true regard of Edgar, in whom promise was always short of performance, and whom he conceived displeased by unjust suspicions, or offended by undue expectations of professions, which the very sincerity of his rational and manly character prevented him from making.
Camilla heard in silence suggestions she could not answer, without relating the history of Sir Sedley: 'No, Lionel, no!' she said to herself, 'I will not now betray you! I have lost all!—and now the loss to me is irreparable, shall I blast you yet further to my poor father, whose deepest sigh is already for your misconduct?'
The story of Eugenia herself he learnt with true admiration, and gave to her magnanimity its dearest mede, in her mother's promised, and his own immediate approbation.
But Sir Hugh, notwithstanding all Eugenia could urge in favour of Melmond, had heard her account with grief and resentment. All, however, being actually ready for the double wedding, he could not, he said, answer to his conscience doing so much for the rest, and refusing the same for Indiana, whom he called upon to accept or reject the preparations made for her cousin.
Indiana stood fluttering for a few minutes between the exultation of being the first bride, and the mortification of marrying a man without fortune or title. But the observation of Sir Hugh, upon the oddity of her marrying the last, she was piqued with a most earnest ambition to reverse. Nor did Melmond himself go for nothing in this affair, as all she had of heart he had been the first to touch.
She retired for a short conference with Miss Margland, who was nearly in an equal dilemma, from unwillingness to dispose of her beautiful pupil without a title, and from eagerness to quit Cleves, which she thought a convent for dullness, and a prison for confinement. Melmond had strongly in his favour the received maxim amongst match-makers, that a young lady without fortune has a less and less chance of getting off upon every public appearance, which they call a public failure: their joint deliberations were, however, interrupted by an abrupt intrusion of Molly Mill, who announced she had just heard that Miss Dennel was going to be married.
This information ended the discussion. The disgrace of a bridal appearance anticipated in the neighbourhood by such a chit, made Indiana hastily run down stairs, and tell her uncle that the merit of Melmond determined her to refuse every body for his sake.
A man and horse, therefore, at break of day the next morning, was sent off by Eugenia to Southampton with these words: