"I am hesitating between the two arguments," answered the old man: "I know not whether to encourage the hope to which you cling—or to suffer myself to be persuaded by the reasoning of Ellen."
At this moment Whittingham returned to the parlour.
"The enwoy-plentipotent-and-hairy is gone," said Whittingham; "and, although he didn't show his credentials, my firm compression is that he was raly the representation of the court he said he come from."
"You questioned him closely?" asked Markham.
"You know, Master Richard, I can put a poser or two now and then; and if this man had been a compostor, I should have circumwented him pretty soon, I can assure you."
"He answered your questions in a straightforward manner, then?" persisted Richard.
"He couldn't have been more straightfor'ard," replied Whittingham. "I'm sure he's a honest, simple-hearted, well-meaning man."
"Then it is decided!" ejaculated Richard: "I will go to this appointment. Who knows in what peril my poor brother may be? who can say from what dangers I may save him? who can explain what powerful motives he may have for the nature of the appointment he has made, and the caution he has adopted in making it? I should be wrong to allow a suspicion to interfere with a duty. Were any thing serious to happen to Eugene, through the want of a friend at this moment, how should I ever after reproach myself? I will not incur such a chance: I will go to-morrow evening to the spot named, and to the hour appointed!"
Whittingham withdrew; and Ellen once more endeavoured to deter Richard from his resolution.
"In the name of God, reflect," she exclaimed, with an earnestness which, had he not been otherwise preoccupied, would have struck him by its peculiarity, for it seemed rather the impassioned expression of a conviction based on indisputable grounds, than a doubt which might be based on truth or error;—"in the name of God, reflect, Richard, ere you endanger your life, perhaps, by going at a auspicious hour to a lonely place. Remember, you have enemies: recollect how nearly you met your death at the hands of one villain in the neighbourhood of Bird-Cage Walk—the narrative of which occurrence and your miraculous escape you have so often related to us;—reflect that that was not the only occasion on which the same miscreant has sought to injure you—"