"But indeed Lady Adeline Seymour is so perfect, that it matters very little what she does—every thing she does must be right."—The conversation then took another turn, and they parted.
Lord Albert D'Esterre was not what might be called a jealous man; but no man, no human being can be without the possibility of feeling jealousy—neither was he naturally suspicious, but nothing is more apt to generate a suspicion of the fidelity of another's conduct, than the consciousness of any breach in the integrity of our own. He pressed his hand to his heart—he sat down—rose up—paced his chamber, and still repeated to himself the praises which Mr. Foley had uttered of his Adeline. "My Adeline," he said, and then again stopped; "but is she mine? do I deserve she should still be mine, when I have so neglected her? no!"—His servant came into the room with a note, the well known shape and colour of which he could not mistake. It was placed in his hand—he opened it carelessly and was about to cast it away, when the name of Adeline caught his eye; then he hastily read the following words.
"It is not for myself I mourn—it is not the threatened loss of your society, however much I value it, which has occasioned my being so overpowered—it is the knowledge of a secret which pertains to another, and in which your fate is involved, that has quite mastered me—this much I must tell you. I must see you before you go, I must prepare you for your meeting with Lady Adeline Seymour." Twenty times he read over this note. "What can it mean? can its meaning be that Adeline loves Mr. Foley, at least that he thinks so? and I, what have I been doing? into what a sea of troubles have I plunged for the enjoyment of the society of a person that in fact affords me none—for the empty speculation of recalling the chaotic mind of one (comparatively a stranger to me) to a sense of reason and religion, fool that I was for the attempt." Then, after a considerable pause, and after deep reflection, he burst forth:
"Prepare me for a meeting with Adeline!" as his eye caught again the last line of the note. "Prepare me for a meeting with Adeline—I cannot bear the phrase; but I must know what she means—I must drag this secret from her:"—and he rang the bell violently!—"I shall not want my horses till one o'clock instead of seven to-morrow morning."
The night Lord Albert passed was one of feverish anxiety. He sent to inquire for Lady Hamlet Vernon at an early hour the next day; and hearing she was much recovered, he besought her to grant the interview she had done him the favour to offer as soon as she possibly could. She replied, that in that house it would be reckoned a breach of all decorum, if she received him at any undue hour; but that as soon as the earliest part of the company breakfasted, which was about one o'clock, she would be sure, notwithstanding her indisposition, to be in the breakfast-room at that time; when she would avail herself of some opportunity to give him the information which had come to her knowledge. This short delay seemed an age to him. Every one knows, when suspense agitates the mind, what a total anarchy ensues, and the hours which intervened before meeting Lady Hamlet Vernon seemed to Lord Albert interminable. When they did meet, the intervening moments ere an opportunity occurred of Lord Albert's drawing her aside, appeared in their turn so many more ages of suffering.
At last the company rose from the breakfast table, and as Lady Hamlet took Lord Albert's arm, and walked out on the terrace under the window, she said, "This is kind of you to have listened to my request:" and then as they walked from the house, proceeded in a graver tone to add, "I am aware, dear Lord Albert, that my note of last night must have surprised you, and that the subject connected with it, on which I am about to touch, is one of the utmost delicacy, and one which upon the very verge of the attempt I shrink from; but you have evinced so much real interest in the state of my wayward mind, and have said so much to me with a view, I am certain, of placing my happiness on a more secure and steady foundation than I had ever any chance of before, that I should be ungrateful in the extreme, if a corresponding wish for your comfort in life did not in turn actuate me. I cannot be ignorant of the engagement between yourself and Lady Adeline Seymour, the fulfilment of which will not, I presume, be long delayed; unless, indeed—"
Here Lady Hamlet Vernon's voice faltered, and for a moment she paused; but, as if making an effort to subdue her emotion, she added in a lower and firmer tone, and with an expression of something like intreaty in her countenance as she looked up at Lord Albert, "Unless I, dear Lord Albert, shall prove the happy instrument of saving you from too precipitate a step in this matter. May I continue to speak to you thus unreservedly?" Lord Albert made no answer, but bowed his head in token of assent, while he walked by her side like one lost in a perturbed dream. She continued,
"I wished, before you went, for this opportunity, because I was aware that it was the only one left in which what I am about to impart would ever be of use; for, lovely as Lady Adeline is, possessed of charms of person which would indeed draw any heart towards her, of the warmest and most enthusiastic disposition, deeply enamoured of you as well as sacredly alive to her engagement to you (and I know her, from a source which cannot mislead me, in person, in mind, in heart, and in determination, to be all that I describe to you)—how could even your judgment, Lord Albert, which is stronger than many of twice your years, but yield to such united influence, and be tempted to decide at the moment on making so much perfection irrevocably your own. But with all these transcendant charms of person and of character, Lady Adeline, I am grieved to say, and know, has been unhappily betrayed into views of life and of the world, which must unfit her to be the partner of any one who does not think in accordance with her on these subjects. From what cause or under what influence the peculiar turn of mind she has taken has arisen, I know not, but (and again I must repeat, that I know the too-sure truth of all I say) it has been gradually and fearfully on the increase, and is now become a fixed principle with her.
"She loves you, as I have said, and she looks upon the coming union with you as the fulfilment of a sacred engagement, and a duty she has to perform; but with this she views the rank you hold in society, and in which she will be associated, only imposing on herself obligations of a higher and severer order, and calling for a stricter conduct and a greater self-denial on her part. She condemns what she calls the dissipations and wicked employment of time, in the world of fashion; she holds dress, beyond the plainest attire, to be a misapplication of the gifts of fortune; she laments over the worldly career of any one whom she hears talked of with applause, or whose talents raise them to distinction in the public eye: she has even, I understand, wholly abandoned her music and her drawing, as too alluring and dangerous an occupation, wasting the time which ought to be devoted to serious reading, and an acquirement of that spirit which has already cast such a gloom over her existence. The only active employment in which she indulges herself beyond her books, is in making clothes for and visiting the poor in her mother's domain. In short, she is what the world calls a methodist, a saint; I know not exactly what these words mean, but I know they are terms applied by people of sense to an ultraism in religious matters."
Lord Albert shuddered, and a sigh was the only interruption he gave, as Lady Hamlet proceeded.