“Yes,” replied Mrs. Mortimer; “and I have a person with me who must accompany me. But listen to something that I have to urge upon you. You will conduct us both, as a matter of course, into the same room: but when your master is ready to receive me, take care that I obtain an interview alone with him in the first instance. It is of the highest consequence that these instructions should be fully attended to.”
“You shall be obeyed, madam,” said the servant.
Mrs. Mortimer now fetched Agnes from the vehicle, which she ordered to be kept waiting for herself; and the two females were conducted by the domestic into a handsome apartment, where, having lighted the wax-candles, he left them.
CHAPTER CLXXX.
AGNES AND TREVELYAN.
In spite of her anxiety to place confidence in Mrs. Mortimer—in spite of the deep obligation under which she believed herself to be lying towards her, Agnes could not subdue a partial feeling of uneasiness when she found that she was in a strange house, evidently the abode of a rich person.
She gazed round the walls covered with splendid pictures—on the chandelier suspended to the ceiling—on the elegant and costly furniture—the superb mantel-ornaments—and down upon the luxurious carpet, so thick that her tiny feet were almost imbedded in it, as if she were walking in snow.
Whose dwelling could it be? Assuredly not Mrs. Mortimer’s—for she was only treated as a visitress. At length, after the lapse of a few minutes, the young maiden ventured to ask, “Who are the friends, madam, with whom you propose to leave me?”
“Does not that very question, Agnes, imply a suspicion injurious to me?” said Mrs. Mortimer, evasively.
“Oh! no—no!” exclaimed Miss Vernon, in a melting tone of the profoundest sincerity. “But may I not ask so simple a question without being liable to such a distressing imputation?”
“Can you not leave yourself in the hands of one who has saved your life and who wishes you well?” said the old woman, speaking in a voice of mingled reproach and conciliation.