Marriott in vain represented that she ought not to hurry herself in her present weak state. Intent upon her own thoughts, she listened to nothing that was said, but frequently urged Marriott to be expeditious. She put on an unusual quantity of rouge: then looking at herself in the glass, she said, with a forced smile, “Marriott, I look so charmingly, that Miss Portman, perhaps, will be of Lord Delacour’s opinion, and think that nothing is the matter with me. Ah! no; she has been behind the scenes—she knows the truth too well!—Marriott, pray did she ask you many questions about me?—Was not she very sorry to leave Oakly-park?—Were not they all extremely concerned to part with her?—Did she ask after Helena?—Did you tell her that I insisted upon my lord’s parting with Champfort?”
At the word Champfort, Marriott’s mouth opened eagerly, and she began to answer with her usual volubility. Lady Delacour waited not for any reply to the various questions which, in the hurry of her mind, she had asked; but, passing swiftly by Marriott, she threw open the door of her dressing-room. At the sight of Belinda she stopped short; and, totally overpowered, she would have sunk upon the floor, had not Miss Portman caught her in her arms, and supported her to a sofa. When she came to herself, and heard the soothing tone of Belinda’s voice, she looked up timidly in her face for a few moments without being able to speak.
“And are you really here once more, my dear Belinda?” cried she at last; “and may I still call you my friend?—and do you forgive me?—Yes, I see you do—and from you I can endure the humiliation of being forgiven. Enjoy the noble sense of your own superiority.”
“My dear Lady Delacour,” said Belinda, “you see all this in too strong a light: you have done me no injury—I have nothing to forgive.”
“I cannot see it in too strong a light.—Nothing to forgive!—Yes, you have; that which it is the most difficult to forgive—injustice. Oh, how you must have despised me for the folly, the meanness of my suspicions! Of all tempers that which appears to me, and I am sure to you, the most despicable, the most intolerable, is a suspicious temper. Mine was once open, generous as your own—you see how the best dispositions may be depraved—what am I now? Fit only
‘To point a moral, or adorn a tale’—
a mismatched, misplaced, miserable, perverted being.”
“And now you have abused yourself till you are breathless, I may have some chance,” said Belinda, “of being heard in your defence. I perfectly agree with you in thinking that a suspicious temper is despicable and intolerable; but there is a vast difference between an acute fit of jealousy, as our friend Dr. X—— would say, and a chronic habit of suspicion. The noblest natures may be worked up to suspicion by designing villany; and then a handkerchief, or a hammercloth, ‘trifles as light as air’—”
“Oh, my dear, you are too good. But my folly admits of no excuse, no palliation,” interrupted Lady Delacour; “mine was jealousy without love.”
“That indeed would admit of no excuse,” said Belinda; “therefore you will pardon me if I think it incredible—especially as I have detected you in feeling something like affection for your little daughter, after you had done your best, I mean your worst, to make me believe that you were a monster of a mother.”