Not a word escaped from the wretched girl. Rose wiped away her sister's fast falling tears, and then wiped her own eyes, and kissed and entreated, but no answer could she get, beyond a sob, a moan, or a violent pressure of the hand.
In this way they rode on for some miles.
Exhausted with weeping, Violet closed her eyes, and dozed awhile upon her sister's shoulder. When she awoke she was calm again. A deep, unutterable sadness, sharpened her pallid features; and, in a low voice, she said,—
"Dear Rose, let me beg of you to ask me no questions respecting my grief: it is irreparable, and it cannot be mentioned. I shall have strength to bear it, at least I hope so—but not strength to talk of it. Leave me to my own reflections and to time. Let them know at Fanny's that I have been ill, and am not yet recovered; but give no hint of any cause for sorrow."
CHAPTER V.
VACILLATION.
Lady Plyant. O consider it, what you would have to answer for, if you should provoke me to frailty. Alas! humanity is feeble, and unable to support itself.
WYCHERLEY.—The Double Dealer.
When Marmaduke called, he found Mrs. Vyner as polite and as distant as before, with something in her manner which looked like timidity. He had anticipated a very different reception. After the implicit avowal, contained in the passage of Petrarch, he anticipated that all coquetry, all reserve, would be cast aside, and that she would throw herself into his arms. How little he understood her!
Irritated by this resumption of her former manner, he at last said,—