No sort of answer was offered by Ellis. She stood motionless, her eyes fixed, and her air seeming to announce her almost incredulous of what she heard.
'Do you give me,' said Mrs Howel, 'this promise? Will you bind yourself to it in writing?'
Ellis still was silent, and looked incapable of speaking.
'Young woman,' said Mrs Howel, with increased austerity, 'I am not to be trifled with. Will you bind yourself to this agreement, or will you not?'
'What agreement, Madam?' she now faintly asked.
'Not to seek, and even to refuse, any sort of intercourse with Lady Aurora Granville, or with her brother, either by word of mouth, or letter, or messenger? Will you, I say, bind yourself, upon your oath, to this?'
'No, Madam!' answered Ellis, with returning recollection and courage; 'no peril can be so tremendous as such a sacrifice!'
Mrs Howel, rising, said, 'Enough! abide by the consequence.'
She was leaving the room; but Ellis, affrighted, exclaimed, 'Ah, Madam, before you adopt any violent measures against me, deign to reflect that I may be innocent, and not merit them!'
'Innocent?' repeated Mrs Howel, with an air of inexorable ire; 'without a name, without a home, without a friend?—Innocent? presenting yourself under false appearances to one family, and under false pretences to another? No, I am not such a dupe. And if your bold resistance make it necessary, for the safety of my young friends, that I should lodge an information against you, you will find, that people who enter houses by names not their own, and who have no ostensible means of existence; will be considered only as swindlers; and as swindlers be disposed of as they deserve.'