“But Mr. Turner suffered the most. He is, you know, a very jocular man, and cannot bear to lose his laugh and his bon mot. Yet he durst not venture at either; though he is so accustomed to indulge in both, and very successfully, in the country, that he seemed in blank dismay at finding himself kept in such complete subordination by the fearful magnitude of Mr. Bruce, joined to the terror of his looks.
“Mrs. Turner, still less at her ease, because still less used to the company of strangers, attempted not to obtain any sort of notice. Yet, being gay in her nature, she, too, did not much like being placed so totally in the back ground. But she was so much impressed by the stateliness of this renowned traveller, that I really believe she sat saying her prayers half the evening, that she might get away from the apartment without some affront.
“Pray have you happened to read a paragraph in the newspapers, importing that Mr. Bruce was dying, or dead? My father, who had seen him alive and well the day before it appeared, cut it out, and wafered it upon a sheet of paper, and sent it to him without comment.
“My mother now inquired of Mr. Bruce whether he had seen it?
“‘Yes,’ answered he, coolly; ‘but they are welcome to say what they please of me. I read my death with great composure.’ Then, condescending to turn to me,—though only, I doubt not, to turn away from my elders,—he added: ‘Were you not sorry, Miss Burney, to hear that I was dead?’
“Finding him thus address himself, and rather courteously, for he really smiled, to so small a personage as your very obedient servant, Mr. Turner, reviving, gathered courage to open his mouth, and, with a put-on air of easy jocularity, ventured to exclaim, with a laugh, ‘Well, sir, as times go, I think, when they killed you, it is very well they said no harm of you.’
“‘I know of no reason they had!’ replied Mr. Bruce, in so loud a tone, and with an air of such infinite haughtiness, that poor Mr. Turner, thus repulsed in his first attempt, never dared to again open his lips.
“Soon afterwards, a servant came into the room, with General Melville’s compliments, and he begged to know of Mrs. Strange whether it was true that Mr. Bruce was so dangerously ill.
“‘Yes!’ cried he, bluffly; ‘tell the General I am dead.’
“‘Ay, poor soul! poor mon!’ cried Mrs. Strange, ‘I dare say he has been vexed enough to hear such a thing! Poor honest mon! I dare be sworn he never wronged or deceived a human being in all his life.’