Was ever transparency so threadbare? Cecilia shrank from herself in contemplating it when she was alone; and Colonel Halkett put the question to Mr. Austin, saying to him privately, with no further reserve: “It’s that fellow Beauchamp in the neighbourhood; I’m not so blind. He’ll be knocking at my door, and I can’t lock him out. Austin, would you guess it was my girl speaking? I never in my life had such an example of intoxication before me. I’m perfectly miserable at the sight. You know her; she was the proudest girl living. Her ideas were orderly and sound; she had a good intellect. Now she more than half defends him—a naval officer! good Lord!—for getting up in a public room to announce that he’s a Republican, and writing heaps of mad letters to justify himself. He’s ruined in his profession: hopeless! He can never get a ship: his career’s cut short, he’s a rudderless boat. A gentleman drifting to Bedlam, his uncle calls him. I call his treatment of Grancey Lespel anything but gentlemanly. This is the sort of fellow my girl worships! What can I do? I can’t interdict the house to him: it would only make matters worse. Thank God, the fellow hangs fire somehow, and doesn’t come to me. I expect it every day, either in a letter or the man in person. And I declare to heaven I’d rather be threading a Khyber Pass with my poor old friend who fell to a shot there.”
“She certainly has another voice,” Mr. Austin assented gravely.
He did not look on Beauchamp as the best of possible husbands for Cecilia.
“Let her see that you’re anxious, Austin,” said the colonel. “I’m her old opponent in this affair. She loves me, but she’s accustomed to think me prejudiced: you she won’t. You may have a good effect.”
“Not by speaking.”
“No, no; no assault: not a word, and not a word against him. Lay the wind to catch a gossamer. I’ve had my experience of blowing cold, and trying to run her down. He’s at Shrapnel’s. He’ll be up here to-day, and I have an engagement in the town. Don’t quit her side. Let her fancy you are interested in some discussion—Radicalism, if you like.”
Mr. Austin readily undertook to mount guard over her while her father rode into Bevisham on business.
The enemy appeared.
Cecilia saw him, and could not step to meet him for trouble of heart. It was bliss to know that he lived and was near.
A transient coldness following the fit of ecstasy enabled her to swim through the terrible first minutes face to face with him.