This state of suspense, however, did not last long; for, at least one hour before it was possible that a letter could arrive, Charles Mowbray in a chaise with four foaming post-horses rattled up to the door.
Rosalind descried him from her window before he reached the house; and her first feeling was certainly one of embarrassment, as she remembered that it was her summons which had brought him there. But a moment's reflection not only recalled her motives, but the additional reasons she now had for believing she had acted wisely; so, arming herself with the consciousness of being right, she hastened down stairs to meet him, in preference to receiving a message through a servant, requesting to see her.
She found him, as she expected, in a state of considerable agitation and alarm; and feeling most truly anxious to remove whatever portion of this was unnecessary, she greeted him with the most cheerful aspect she could assume, saying, "I fear my letter has terrified you, Mr. Mowbray, more than I wished it to do. But be quite sure that now you are here every thing will go on as it ought to do; and of course, when your mother returns, we can neither of us have any farther cause of anxiety about Fanny."
"And what is your cause of anxiety about her at present, Miss Torrington? For Heaven's sake explain yourself fully; you know not how I have been tormenting myself by fearing I know not what."
"I am bound to explain myself fully," said Rosalind gravely; "but it is not easy, I assure you."
"Only tell me at once what it is you fear. Do you imagine Mr. Cartwright hopes to persuade Fanny to marry him?"
"I certainly did think so," said Rosalind; "but I believe now that I was mistaken."
"Thank Heaven!" cried the young man fervently. "This is a great relief, Rosalind, I assure you. I believe now I can pretty well guess what it is you do fear; and though it is provoking enough, it cannot greatly signify. We shall soon cure her of any fit of evangelicalism with which the vicar is likely to infect her."
"Heaven grant it!" exclaimed Rosalind, uttering a fervent ejaculation in her turn.
"Never doubt it, Miss Torrington. I have heard a great deal about this Cartwright at Oxford. He is a Cambridge man, by the way, and there are lots of men there who think him quite an apostle. But the thing does not take at Oxford, and I assure you he is famously quizzed. But the best of the joke is, that his son was within an ace of being expelled for performing more outrageous feats in the larking line than any man in the university; and in fact he must have been rusticated, had not his pious father taken him home before the business got wind, to prepare him privately for his degree. They say he is the greatest Pickle in Oxford; and that, spite of the new light, his father is such an ass as to believe that all this is ordained only to make his election more glorious."