“The same sort of things that those heroes I read of say to their mistresses.”
“And do you never, in your dreams, hear Mr. Hervey say this sort of things?”
“No.”
“And do you never see Mr. Hervey in these dreams?”
“Sometimes; but he does not speak to me; he does not look at me with the same sort of tenderness, and he does not throw himself at my feet.”
“No; because he has never done all this in reality.”
“No; and I wonder how I come to dream of such things.”
“So do I; but you have read and thought of them, it is plain. Now go to sleep, there’s my good girl; that is the best thing you can do at present—go to sleep.”
It was not long after this conversation that Sir Philip Baddely and Mr. Rochfort scaled the garden wall, to obtain a sight of Clarence Hervey’s mistress. Virginia was astonished, terrified, and disgusted, by their appearance; they seemed to her a species of animals for which she had no name, and of which she had no prototype in her imagination. That they were men she saw; but they were clearly not Clarence Herveys: they bore still less resemblance to the courteous knights of chivalry. Their language was so different from any of the books she had read, and any of the conversations she had heard, that they were scarcely intelligible. After they had forced themselves into her presence, they did not scruple to address her in the most unceremonious manner. Amongst other rude things, they said, “Damme, my pretty dear, you cannot love the man that keeps you prisoner in this manner, hey? Damme, you’d better come and live with one of us. You can’t love this tyrant of a fellow.”
“He is not a tyrant—I do love him as much as I detest you,” cried Virginia, shrinking from him with looks of horror.