“Yes,” said Phœbe.
“I knew you were. Well, Phœbe, that belongs to the past; Lionel Hammerton belongs to the past—to my past; he has no place in my future.”
Amy said this solemnly, and with a fierce kind of firmness in her manner, which told Phœbe how much revengeful feeling there was in the change that had come over the new mistress of Barton Hall.
“But, Amy——”
Amy interrupted her.
“There is no ‘but’ in the case, love; he shall have indifference for indifference, scorn for scorn, and I will trample upon all his worldly hopes as the Countess of Verner, as he trampled upon mine as the Honourable Lionel Hammerton.”
Amy rose from her seat when she said this, and planted her pretty feet upon the ground with calm determination.
“You loved beneath your station, as some would hold, my dear,” said Amy. “I loved above mine: it is the way of the world: the highest may stoop to the lowest, or trifle with the love that is offered. Fate or Providence, as you would say, has wrought a wonderful change in our lots, has reversed our positions, and just at the proper moment. By placing you a little lower, as far as worldly considerations are concerned, Fate has brought you nearer to him you love, and brought hopes of future happiness. My exaltation has given me the power for self-assertion, for blotting out a silly passion, granting me, almost at the moment when I prayed for it, the dearest wish of my heart. That carriage with the coronet in the panel, whirling along through the autumn leaves, was the omen—the sign which Fate flung before me. I accepted it, and I shall not turn back; no, I shall not turn back.”
Phœbe blushed at the mention of her own love, and pitied Amy, knowing how she too had loved in those past days; but she could give Amy no soothing tidings of Lionel; she could not deny that his conduct had been unmanly, and somewhat dishonourable. Yet Arthur Phillips had not told her of those last words of Lionel’s, nor had he shown her a letter since received from him, in which Mr. Hammerton said “that stupid bit of flirtation in Avonworth Valley” he hoped was forgotten by the bailiff’s pretty daughter, “who had played her part so well and very nearly with success.” Phœbe could not help feeling that some misunderstanding, some mistake or other, had come between the loves of these two, and she would fain have pointed this out to Amy.
“Who knows but some dreadful misunderstanding may have——”