“No woman upon earth,” cries Miss Matthews, “can despise want of spirit in a man more than myself; and yet I cannot help thinking you was rather too nice on this occasion.”
“You will allow, madam,” answered Booth, “that whoever offends against the laws of honour in the least instance is treated as the highest delinquent. Here is no excuse, no pardon; and he doth nothing who leaves anything undone. But if the conflict was so terrible with myself alone, what was my situation in the presence of Amelia? how could I support her sighs, her tears, her agonies, her despair? could I bear to think myself the cruel cause of her sufferings? for so I was: could I endure the thought of having it in my power to give her instant relief, for so it was, and refuse it her?
“Miss Betty was now again become my friend. She had scarce been civil to me for a fortnight last past, yet now she commended me to the skies, and as severely blamed her sister, whom she arraigned of the most contemptible weakness in preferring my safety to my honour: she said many ill-natured things on the occasion, which I shall not now repeat.
“In the midst of this hurricane the good doctor came to dine with Mrs. Harris, and at my desire delivered his opinion on the matter.”
Here Mr. Booth was interrupted in his narrative by the arrival of a person whom we shall introduce in the next chapter.
Chapter ix. — Containing a scene of a different kind from any of the preceding.
The gentleman who now arrived was the keeper; or, if you please (for so he pleased to call himself), the governor of the prison.
He used so little ceremony at his approach, that the bolt, which was very slight on the inside, gave way, and the door immediately flew open. He had no sooner entered the room than he acquainted Miss Matthews that he had brought her very good news, for which he demanded a bottle of wine as his due.