When they came up he was on one knee, with her head leaning on the other, and gazing with horror on her pale face. The pallid hue of his own, told all that he feared, to the Duke and Sir Anthony. But the ladies found the case not so desperate; and by the help of essences soon restored the fair sufferer to animation.
Sir Anthony proposed her being taken into the house. But on attempting to rise, she sunk back, almost fainting a second time from the excessive pain of a sprained ancle. Wharton called for a sofa, which being brought, the invalid was carefully placed in it on cushions; and the gentlemen present, insisted on being its bearers into the castle. As the sofa was raised from the ground, Violante turned to Louis with a languid smile; "you will not leave me, Mr. de Montemar?" said she, and stretched out her hand to him, with a look more persuasive than her words.
To disappoint the wish and expectation these words and action implied, he found impossible.—He had no suspicion that she was running to intercept him, when the accident happened; and now, turning with a respectful bow to her summons, he silently followed the sofa into the breakfast-room. Her gallant bearers placed it by the fire, at a small distance from the table. The Duke offered his services to the reclining beauty; but she would accept of no hand to bring her coffee and toast, but that of Louis: saying, that he who wounded, was in duty bound to administer the restoratives. Recovered from his dismay at what might have been the fatal effect of the accident he had so unintentionally occasioned, he gladly took the opportunity to make the amende honourable, and express his concern at what had happened.
Time rolled away, and he heard no tidings of the boat. It was an unusual inattention in his uncle's servants, who always vied with each other who should be most prompt in obeying every wish of their beloved Mr. de Montemar. But Wharton had contrived to have the little vessel countermanded, without appearing in the orders. Ignorant of this, Louis seized the first moment the invalid addressed herself to another person; and in a low voice asked the butler whether the boat were in waiting. The man, not aware of the commands which had been given one way or the other, simply answered the tide had been at ebb two hours. Stung with vexation, Louis started from his chair. Violante observed his disorder, and softly enquired the cause.—It was no sooner explained, than casting on him a reproachful look, she burst into tears and turned her head silently away. Louis felt himself in a very embarrassing situation; and almost unconsciously resuming his seat beside her, he drew a vexatious sigh as he said to himself,—"I am caught, and coiled in spite of myself!"
Violante mistook its meaning; and withdrawing her hand from her eyes, gave him a glance that mantled his face with crimson. Though apparently engaged in gay badinage with the other ladies, Wharton did not lose an expression of his friend's countenance, as the alluring Frenchwoman continued to converse with him in a tone of mingled tenderness and raillery. "If he stand this," thought the Duke, "he has even more ice, of a certain kind, in his composition, than he forced me this morning to believe!"
Sir Anthony entered from the hall, calling aloud, "Who rides this morning? I have ordered horses round to the court."
"De Montemar, what are you for?" said the Duke, "I see victory is in the hands where I would always have it; but as the ladies may not wish to have their captive in their way all day;—are you inclined for a steeple-hunt this morning?"
Louis eagerly embraced the proposal.—Violante coloured, touched his arm; and pressing it with strong emotion, whispered something in his ear. Wharton laughed, and turned on his heel. Louis believed himself turned idiot. Abandoned of his usual presence of mind, he knew not what to say, or how to look; though he felt perfectly resolved not to sleep another night in the castle, while it contained its present extraordinary inmates. The seductive scenes of the preceding night, seemed disenchanted before him; men and women, all were divested of their magic garments, excepting Wharton, and he still wore the vesture of light.
"Why will he mingle his noble nature with creatures base as these?" again he said to himself; "are they his toys? his tools?—To what purpose?"
He was gazing on the Duke, as these thoughts occurred to him, and deepened his reflections. Wharton caught the look; its expression went through him: but waving his hand, as if that would glance it aside, he shook his head sportively and exclaimed; "You want me to pledge my guarantee to Violante, that there shall be no more desertions!—Believe me, pretty one! For the bright Pleiades are not more inseparable above, than are your swain and humble servant below."