She ran up the stairs and without waiting to change her riding habit, sat down by the window to repair the rent caused by Jacko’s fury. She was a deft needlewoman and had mended half the tear with her tiny stitches when Cecilia came to her room. Cecilia was strongly of the opinion that Hubert might have found someone else to do his mending and begged her to put it aside. This, however, Sophy refused to do, merely saying, “I can listen to you while I work, you know. What a goose you were last night, Cecy!”
This brought Cecilia’s chin up. She enunciated with great clarity, “I am betrothed to Augustus, and if I may not marry him I will marry no one!”
“I daresay, but to make such an announcement in the middle of a ball!”
“Sophy, I thought you would feel for me!”
It occurred to Sophy suddenly that the fewer people to sympathize with Cecilia the better it would be, so she kept her head bent over her work, and said lightly, “Well, and so I do, but I still think it was a ridiculous moment to choose for making such an announcement!”
Cecilia began to tell her again what provocation had been supplied by Charles; she agreed, but absently, and appeared to be more exercised with the set of Hubert’s coat than with Cecilia’s wrongs. She shook it out, smoothed the darn she had made, and, when Hubert came knocking at the door, cut Cecilia short to jump up and restore the garment to him. The end of all this was that when, at four o’clock, Lord Charlbury sent up his card, with a request to see Miss Rivenhall, Cecilia, almost forced to accede to his wishes, found in him her only sympathizer. One glance at her pale face and tragic mien banished from his mind all notion of duplicity. He stepped quickly forward, took the hand so shrinkingly held out to I and said in a deeply concerned voice. “Do not look so happy! Indeed, I have not come to distress you!”
Her eyes filled with tears; her hand slightly returned the pressure of his before it was withdrawn; and she managed to say something, in a suffocated voice, about his kindness,’ and her own regret. He obliged her to be seated, himself took a chair near to hers, and said, “My sentiments have undergone no change; indeed, I believe it to be impossible that they should! But I have been told — I have understood — that yours were never engaged. Believe me, if you cannot return my regard, I honor you for having the courage to say so. That; you should be constrained to accept my suit, when your heart is given to another, is a thought wholly repugnant to me! Forgive me! I think you have had to bear a great deal on this head which I never intended, or indeed, dreamed — But I have said enough! Only let me assure you that I will do all that lies in my power to put an end to such intolerable promptings!”
“You are all consideration — all goodness!” Cecilia uttered. “I am so sorry that — that expectations which it is not in my power to fulfill should have been raised! If my gratitude for a sensibility which permits you to feel for me in my present predicament, for a chivalry which — ” Her voice became wholly suspended by tears; she could only turn away her face and make a gesture imploring his understanding.
He took her hand and kissed it. “Say no more! I always thought the prize beyond my reach. Though you deny me that nearer relationship which I so ardently desire, we may continue friends? If there is any way in which I can serve you, will you tell me of it? That would be a happiness indeed!”
“Oh, do not say so! You are too good!”