Did his parents approve of it? she again asked, and the flush of excitement faded. Percy was not quite sure; he rather thought by his mother's letters she did not, though Caroline was universally envied as an object of such profound attention from one so courted and admired. Did his sister love him?—the words appeared wrung with a violent effort from Mrs. Amesfort's lips.
He did not fancy she did as yet; but he doubted not the power of Lord Alphingham's many fascinations and exclusive devotion to herself, on one naturally rather susceptible to vanity as was Caroline.
"Oh, if you love your sister, save her ere it be too late, ere her affections are engaged," was Mrs. Amesfort's reply, with a burst of emotion, the more terrible, from its contrast with her general calm and unmoved demeanour. "Expose her not to those fascinations which I know no heart can resist. Let her not associate with him—with my husband; he is not free to love—I am his lawful wife; and the child you saved is his—his own—the offspring of lawfully-hallowed wedlock; though he has cast me off, though his eyes have never gazed upon my child, yet, yet we are his. No cruel words of separation has the law of England spoken. But do not, oh! if you have any regard for me," she continued, wildly seizing both Percy's hands, as she marked the dark blood of passion kindling on the young man's brow, "do not betray him; do not let him know that his wife—his injured wife—has risen to cry shame upon him, and banish him from those circles wherein he is formed to mingle. Promise me faithfully, solemnly, you will not betray my secret more than is necessary to preserve your sister from misery and ruin. I thought even for her I could not have spoken thus, but I gazed on my child, and remembered she too has a mother, whose happiness is centred in her as mine is in my Agnes, and I could hesitate no more. Promise me you will not abuse my confidence, Mr. Hamilton, promise me; let me not have the misery of reproaches from him to whom my fond heart still clings, as it did at first. Yes; though for nine long weary years I have never seen his face nor heard his voice, still he knows not, guesses not how his image dwells within, how faithfully, how fervidly he is still beloved. Promise me my existence shall not be suspected, that neither he nor any one shall know the secret of my existence. It is enough for me he lives, is happy. My child! could I but see her in the station her rank demands,—but, oh, I would not force her on her father."
She would still have spoken, still have entreated, but this unwonted emotion had exhausted her feeble strength. Greatly moved by this extraordinary disclosure, and struck with that deep devotedness, that undying love, Percy solemnly pledged his word to preserve her secret.
"My course will soon be over, my sand run out," she said, after energetically thanking him for his soothing and relieving words, and in a tone of such sad, resigned hopelessness, that, irritated as he felt towards Alphingham, his eye glistened and his lips quivered. "And wherefore should I dash down his present enjoyment by standing forward and proclaiming myself his wife? Why should I expose my secret sorrows, my breaking heart to the inspection of a cold and heartless world, and draw down on my dying moments his wrath, for the poor satisfaction of beholding myself recognised as Viscountess Alphingham? Would worldly honours supply the place of his affection? Oh, no, no! I am better as I am. The tears of maternal and filial love will hallow my grave; and he, too, when he knows for his sake, to save him a pang, I have suffered my heart to break in uncomplaining silence, oh, he too may shed one tear, bestow a thought on one who loved him to the last!"
"But your child!" exclaimed Percy, almost involuntarily.
"Will be happier here, under my mother's care, unconscious of her birth, than mingling in a dangerous world, without a mother to cherish and protect her. Her father might neglect, despise her; she might be a bar to a second and a happier union, and oh, I could not die in peace did I expose her thus."
Percy was silent, and when the interview had closed, he bade that devoted woman farewell, with a saddened and deeply thoughtful brow.
Lord Alphingham had been a student in Dublin, in the environs of which city dwelt Mrs. Morley, a widow, and this her only child. At their cottage he became a constant and devoted guest, and as might have been expected, his impetuous and headstrong nature became desperately enamoured of the beautiful and innocent Agnes, then only seventeen. Spite of his youth, being barely twenty, neither mother nor daughter could withstand his eloquent solicitations, and a private but sacred marriage was performed. He quitted college, but still lingered in Ireland, till a peremptory letter from his father summoned him to England, to celebrate his coming of age. He left his bride, and the anguish of parting was certainly at that time mutual. Some few months Agnes hoped for and looked to his return. Alphingham, then Lord Amesfort, on his part, was restrained only by the fear of the inveteracy of his father's disposition from confessing his marriage, and sending for his wife. Another bride, of rank and wealth, was proposed to him, and then he confessed the truth. The fury of the old man knew no bounds, and he swore to disinherit his son, if he did not promise never to return to his ignoble wife, whom he vowed he never would acknowledge. Amesfort promised submission, fully intending to remain constant till his father's death, which failing health proclaimed was not far distant, and then seek his gentle wife, and introduce her in her proper sphere. He wrote to this effect, and the boding heart of Agnes sunk at once; in vain her mother strove to rouse her energies, by alluding to the strain of his letter, the passionate affection breathing in every line, the sacred nature of his promise. She felt her doom, and ere her child was six months old, her feelings, ominous of evil, were fully verified.
Lord Alphingham lingered some time, and his son found in the society in which the Viscount took good care he should continually mingle, attractions weighty enough to banish from his fickle heart all love, and nearly all recollection of his wife. He found matrimony would be very inconvenient in the gay circle of which he was a member. All the better feelings and qualities of his youth fled; beneath the influence of example and bad companionship his evil ones were called forth and fostered, and speedily he became the heartless libertine we have seen him. His letters to the unfortunate Agnes were less and less frequent, and at length ceased altogether, and the sum transmitted for her use every year was soon the only proof that he still lived. His residence in foreign lands, the various names he assumed, baffled all her efforts at receiving the most distant intelligence concerning him, and Agnes still lingered in hopeless resignation—"The heart will break, but brokenly live on;" and thus it was she lived, existing for her child alone. Nine years they had been parted, and Agnes had ever shrunk in evident pain from quitting her native land, and the cottage which had been the scene of her brief months of happiness; but when change of air was pleaded in behalf of her child, then suffering from lingering fever, when change of climate was strongly recommended by the physicians, in secret for herself equally with that of her little girl, she hesitated no longer, and a throb of mingled pain and pleasure swelled her too fond heart as her foot pressed the native land of her husband. Some friends of her mother, unacquainted with her sad story, resided near Oxford, and thither they bent their steps, and finally fixed their residence, where Mrs. Amesfort soon had the happiness of beholding her child restored to perfect health and radiant in beauty; perhaps the faint hope that Alphingham might one day unconsciously behold his daughter, reconciled her to this residence in England. She was in his own land; she might hear of him, of his happiness; and, deeply injured as she was, that knowledge, to her too warm, too devoted heart was all-sufficient.