"Is it already time to get up?" she said languidly, and only half unclosing her eyes; "I feel as if I had not slept at all. Am I dreaming?" she added, starting up, "or have I slept in one place, and awoke in another? Am I at Oakwood?"
"No, dearest Eleanor; will you not welcome me to Malvern House?"
The voice, the look, seemed to thrill through her; her temples were throbbing, her heart weighed down, as it always was when she first awoke, with an undefinable sense of guilt and pain; she tried to be cold, proud, reserved, but it would not do, and she suddenly flung her arms round her sister's neck, and burst into agonized tears.
It was a most unexpected greeting, and Mrs. Hamilton argued hopefully from it. Alas! the unwonted softening only lasted one brief half hour. She left her at Eleanor's entreaty while dressing, and when she returned, though the reckless girl told her with a half smile that she was ready for her lecture, for she could only have come from Oakwood to give her one; and that however severe her words might be, she could not alter her tone, that must be kind, in spite of herself. Yet Emmeline could not succeed in convincing her how wrongly, how cruelly she had acted. Eleanor would persist that she was not in the least to blame, and that poor Fitzclair's fearful end was only owing to his own violent passions; in fact, that he must have been out of his mind, and that, though it was certainly very dreadful, she had perhaps escaped a very terrible doom; but speak as she might, Emmeline was not deceived as to the agony she was actually enduring. Finding, however, that all her gentle efforts were useless, that even the perusal of Fitzclair's brief lines to her husband—which Eleanor insisted on seeing, and in which he deplored his madness in not having followed his advice, and flown from her presence, and bade him take his forgiveness to her, and say, that the means he had adopted would, he trusted, dissolve their engagement to her satisfaction—had no effect, save in causing her to turn so deadly pale, that her sister was convinced nothing but an almost supernatural effort of pride preserved her from fainting. She desisted; hoping against hope that Eleanor would yet repent and become a different being. She knew harshness would only harden, and so she tried to prevail on her father to treat her as usual, but this Lord Delmont could not do. It is strange how often we find those parents who have been over-indulgent to childhood, unusually harsh to the faults of youth. Weak characters, also, when driven to anger, are always more violent than firmer ones; and, certainly, Eleanor's continued haughtiness and coldness, as if she were the injured one, did not tend to calm him.
And his angry feelings were unfortunately but too soon aggravated by a proposal in form from Captain Fortescue for the hand of Eleanor. Without a moment's delay he dispatched a decided and almost insulting refusal to the young soldier, and then sought his daughter, and vented on her the anger and vexation which overpowered him, upbraiding her not only with the death of Fitzclair, but for having dared so to encourage young Fortescue as to give him courage for his audacious proposal. To his astonishment, he was heard without any attempt at reply; but he would have been startled, could he have seen the pallid cheek, compressed lip, and clenched hand with which, when he had left her, Eleanor muttered—
"Father, if it be sin to leave you, be it on your own head. I would have wedded with your consent, had you permitted it; but now my destiny is fixed. There is no peace in England: at least let me be spared the agony of breaking another loving heart."
Nearly three weeks rolled on, and Eleanor's extraordinary submission, and even in some degree withdrawal from society (for which Mrs. Hamilton's arrival was a good excuse), caused her father's irritation against her almost entirely to subside. That she passed several hours each day apart from her sister, excited no surprise. Emmeline was thankful even for her change of deportment, but nothing confidential ever again passed between them. That reports were floating about, connecting the names of Miss Manvers and the late Lord Fitzclair, seemed little heeded by Eleanor, though they caused natural vexation to her family. About this time an invitation arrived for Eleanor from a lady of rank, slightly known to her father, and living ten miles from Cheltenham in a beautiful villa, at which she expected a select party of fashionables to ruralize for a week or two. There was nothing in the note to excite the dread that weighed on Mrs. Hamilton's spirits, as Eleanor carelessly threw it to her for her perusal, but she would not express it, as Lord Delmont seemed inclined that Eleanor should accept it, knowing that the lady was much too exclusive for Captain Fortescue to join her guests, and believing that Eleanor's apparent indifference to the visit originated from that cause. Telling her he was so gratified by her having devoted so many evenings to her sister, he added, she had his full consent to go if she liked, as he could better spare her than when Emmeline returned to Oakwood. She quietly thanked him, but evinced no particular pleasure.
The day before her intended departure, the sisters were sitting together, and little Percy, who now ran firmly without any falls, was playing about the room. He had already displayed a high spirit and passionate temper, with their general accompaniment, self-will, even in trifles, that Mrs. Hamilton felt would render her task a trying one; but she was as firm as she was gentle, and faced the pain of contradicting her darling bravely:—
"Do not touch that, Percy, love," she said, as her little boy stretched out his hand toward a beautiful but fragile toy, that stood with other nick-nacks on a low table. The child looked laughingly and archly toward her, and withdrew his hand, but did not move from the table.
"Come here, Percy, you have not played with these pretty things for a long time;" and she took from her work-box some gayly colored ivory balls, which had been his favorite playthings, but just at present they had lost their charm, and the young gentleman did not move.