Mrs Delvile then seated herself next her, and gravely continued her discourse.
“Miss Beverley, however little acquainted with the state of our family affairs, can scarcely have been uninformed that a fortune such as hers seems almost all that family can desire; nor can she have failed to observe, that her merit and accomplishments have no where been more felt and admired: the choice therefore of Mortimer she could not doubt would have our sanction, and when she honoured his proposals with her favour, she might naturally conclude she gave happiness and pleasure to all his friends.”
Cecilia, superior to accepting a palliation of which she felt herself undeserving, now lifted up her head, and forcing herself to speak, said “No, madam, I will not deceive you, for I have never been deceived myself: I presumed not to expect your approbation,—though in missing it I have for ever lost my own!”
“Has Mortimer, then,” cried she with eagerness, “been strictly honourable? has he neither beguiled nor betrayed you?”
“No, madam,” said she, blushing, “I have nothing to reproach him with.”
“Then he is indeed my son!” cried Mrs Delvile, with emotion; “had he been treacherous to you, while disobedient to us, I had indisputably renounced him.”
Cecilia, who now seemed the only culprit, felt herself in a state of humiliation not to be borne; she collected, therefore, all her courage, and said, “I have cleared Mr Delvile; permit me, madam, now, to say something for myself.”
“Certainly; you cannot oblige me more than by speaking without disguise.”
“It is not in the hope of regaining your good opinion,—that, I see, is lost!—but merely—”
“No, not lost,” said Mrs Delvile, “but if once it was yet higher, the fault was my own, in indulging an expectation of perfection to which human nature is perhaps unequal.”