Affrighted by this so open relation, drawn forth involuntarily from the nobly ingenuous Gabriella, in the persuasion that Sir Jaspar was already a confidential, and might become a useful friend; Juliet, in the first moment, was advancing to stop it; but her heart, yet more than her ear, was so fascinated by the generous eulogy of her virtuous, though lowly mother, from the offspring of a house whose height, and natal prejudices, might have palliated, upon this subject, the language even of disdain; that she could not prevail with herself to break into what she considered as sacred praise.
''Tis even so, then!' cried Sir Jaspar, with smiling delight; 'this forlorn, but most beautiful Wanderer,—this so long concealed, and mysterious, but most lovely incognita, is the daughter of the late Lord Granville, and the grand-daughter of the late Earl of Melbury!'
Utterly confounded, to hear the secret history of her birth and family thus casually, yet irretrievably discovered, Juliet, trembling, again shrunk back; yet would not, now, and unavailingly, check the ardent zeal of her high-minded friend, since without any added danger, it might procure some useful intelligence.
The willing Baronet, whose sole desire was to keep up the conversation, wanted no urging to relate all that he had gathered from the loquacious Selina. Lord Denmeath, upon the sudden disappearance of Miss Ellis, had been surprised into confessing, that he had a faint notion that he knew something of that young person; that there had been, once, an odd story,—a report—that a young woman was existing in France, who was some way belonging to the late Lord Granville, his sister's husband; though without ever having been acknowledged by the family. He let fall, also, sundry obscure hints of information, of the most serious import, which he had recently received, relating to this young woman; but which he would not divulge, till he had investigated; as he began to surmise, that it had been conveyed to him for some fraudulent and mercenary purpose. Mrs Ireton, to all this, had answered, that she had suspected, from the beginning, that the creature was an adventurer; and that she was now fully convinced that they had been played upon by a supposititious person. Lord Denmeath, though he forbore confirming this assertion, listened to it with a smile of concurrence.
Juliet here felt shocked and confounded; but Gabriella, animated by generous resentment, warmly repeated her asseverations, of the validity of the marriage of Lord Granville with Miss Powel, her friend's mother; though an excess of fear of the inflexible character of the old Earl Melbury had prevented its early avowal; and the death of the concealed wife, while Juliet was yet in arms, had afterwards decided the young widower to guard the secret, till his child should be grown up; or till he should become his own master.
'But where, during this interval,' said Sir Jaspar, 'where,—and what was the hiding-place of that seraphic offspring?'
Till her seventh year, Gabriella answered, she had been consigned to the care of Mrs Powel, her maternal grandmother; who, satisfied of the legality, had herself aided the secresy of the marriage. They had dwelt, during that period, in the same picturesque, but no longer loved retreat, upon the banks of the Tyne, in which Lady Granville, under a feigned name, had been concealed, for the short space of time between her marriage and her death.
Juliet, whose intention had been to gather, not to bestow intelligence, now came forward, and made signs to Gabriella to drop the subject. But this was no longer practicable. Urged by the idea of doing honour to her friend, and incited by adroit interrogatories, or piquant observations, from Sir Jaspar, Gabriella, having insensibly begun the tale, felt irresistibly impelled to make clear the birth and family of Juliet, beyond all doubt or cavil. She continued, therefore, the narration; and Juliet, much agitated, retreated wholly to the inner room.
Under pretence of change of air for his health, Lord Granville, to hide his grief from his father and friends, spent the first year of his widowhood at Montpellier; then the residence of the Bishop of ——, the maternal uncle of Gabriella; with whom he formed a friendship that neither time nor absence, not even death itself, had had power to dissolve; and to whom he confided the history and punishment of his clandestine juvenile engagement. Called home, the following year, by the Earl, his father, he had been prevailed upon to marry a lady of quality and large fortune. But, previous to these new nuptials, to secure justice to his eldest born, though he had not the courage to own her; as well as to tranquillize Mrs Powel; he deposited in the hands of that worthy old lady, the certificate of his first marriage; to which he added a deed, that he called the codicil to whatever will he might have made, or might hereafter make; and in which he declared Juliet Granville, born near ——, in Yorkshire, to be his lawful daughter, by his first marriage, with Juliet Powel, in Flanders; and, as such, he bequeathed to her the same portion, at his death, that should be settled upon any other daughter, or daughters, that he might have, hereafter, by any subsequent marriage.
The impossibility of obtaining, in the Yorkshire retirement, such means of improvement, as were suitable to the future expectations and lot in life of his little girl, determined Lord Granville to have her conveyed to France for her education. Mrs Powel, who had no other remaining tie upon earth, but a son who was settled in the East Indies, preferred accompanying her little darling to a separation; the fear of which, with the possession of the marriage certificate, and the codicil to the will, had always counteracted her impatience for the discovery ultimately promised. The uncle of Gabriella, the Bishop, consented to take the child under his immediate care; and to place her in the convent in which his sister, the Marchioness of ——, had placed his niece. And here the children had been brought up together, with the same opportunities of improvement; except that the little Juliet had the advantage of speaking English with her grandmother; who knew no other language; and who entered the convent as a pensioner. By this means, and by books, Juliet had perfectly retained her native tongue, though she had acquired something of a foreign accent. She was known only as a young English lady of fortune, for whom no expence was to be spared; and the remittances for her board and education were constant, and even splendid. She had been called simply by the name of Mademoiselle Juliette, which had generally been supposed to be the name of her family. Here, from the facility with which she caught instruction, and the ability with which she appropriated its result, she became the most accomplished pupil of the convent and was not more generally, from her appearance, called la belle, than from her acquirements and conduct la sage petite Anglaise. And here, still more united by the same sentiments than by the same studies, Gabriella had formed with her the tender, confiding and unalterable friendship, that had bound them to each other with an even sisterly love.