She threw the covering from her face, and with uplifted hands, exclaimed; 'O Edgar! could you see me thus ... and leave me?'—Yet eagerly seizing the letter, called for a candle, and strove to read it. But the characters seemed double to her weak and dazzled eyes, and she was forced to relinquish the attempt. She pressed it to her bosom, and again covered herself up.
Something, nevertheless, like internal revival, once more, to her own unspeakable amazement, began fluttering at her breast. She had seen the beloved of her heart—dearer to her far than the life she thought herself resigning; seen him penetrated to anguish by her situation, awakened to the tenderest recollections, and upon her hand had dropt a testimony of his sensibility, that, dead as she had thought herself to the world, its views, its hopes, its cares, passed straight to her heart—that wonderful repository of successive emotions, whence the expulsion of one species of interest but makes way for the entrance of another; and which vainly, while yet in mortal life, builds, even from hour to hour, upon any chasm of mortal solicitude.
While wrapt up in this reverie, poignantly agitating, yet undefinably soothing, upon the return of Edgar to England, and his astonishing appearance in her room, her attention was again aroused by another gentle tap at the door.
Peggy opened it, and left the room; but soon came back, to beg an answer to the note, for which the gentleman was waiting upon the stairs.
'Waiting?' she repeated, in extreme trepidation, 'is he not then gone?'
'No ma'am, only out of the room; he can't go away without the answer, he says.'
A sensation of pleasure was now so new to Camilla, as almost to be too potent either for her strength or her intellects. She doubted all around her, doubted what she heard, doubted even her existence. Edgar, could it be Edgar who was waiting for an answer?... who was under the same roof—who had been in the same room—who was now separated from her but by a thin wainscot?—'O no, no, no!' she cried, 'my senses all delude me! one vision after another beguiles my deranged imagination!' Yet she called Peggy to her again, again asked her if it were indeed true; and, bidding her once more bring the candle, the new spirit with which she was invigorated, enabled her to persevere in her efforts, till she made out the following lines; which were sealed, but not directed.
'The sorrow, the tumult of my soul, I attempt not to paint.—Forgive, O Camilla! an intrusion which circumstances made resistless. Deign to bury in kind oblivion all remembrance but of our early friendship—our intuitive attachment, our confidence, esteem, and happy juvenile intercourse; and under such auspices—animated as they are innocent—permit me to hasten Mrs. Tyrold to this spot, or trust me—I conjure—with the mystery of this dreadful desolation—O Camilla!—by all the scenes that have passed between us—by the impression indelible they have engraved upon my heart, wound not the most faithful of your friends by rejecting his services!
E. M.'
Dissolved in tears of tenderness, relieving, nay delightful, she immediately sent him word that she accepted his kind office, and should feel eternal gratitude if he would acquaint her friends with her situation.
Peggy soon informed her the gentleman was gone; and she then inquired why he had been brought to her as a clergyman.