“You are too good—I do not deserve that you should be interested in my happiness or unhappiness—I cannot think you impertinent—pray speak freely.”
“And quickly,” she would have added, if she dared. Without abating any of his reserve from this encouragement, he proceeded precisely in the same tone as before, and with the same steady composure.
“An accidental acquaintance with a friend of my Lord Bradstone’s, has put me in possession of what, perhaps, you wish to be a secret, madam, and what I shall inviolably keep as such.”
“I cannot pretend to be ignorant of what you allude to,” said Almeria; “but it is more than probable that you may not have heard the exact state of the business; indeed it is impossible that you should, because no one but myself could fully explain my sentiments. In fact they were undecided; I was this very morning going to consult your sister upon that subject.”
“You will not suppose that I am going to intrude my counsels upon you, Miss Turnbull; nothing can be farther from my intention: I am merely going to mention a fact to you, of which I apprehend you are ignorant, and of which, as you are circumstanced, no one in your present society, perhaps no one in the world but myself, would choose to apprize you. Forgive me, madam, if I try your patience by this preface: I am very desirous not to wound your feelings more than is necessary.”
“Perhaps,” said Almeria, with a doubtful smile, “perhaps you are under a mistake, and imagine my feelings to be much more interested than they really are. If you have any thing to communicate to Lord Bradstone’s disadvantage, you may mention it to me without hesitation, and without fear of injuring my happiness or his; for, to put you at ease at once, I am come to a determination positively to decline his lordship’s addresses.”
“This assurance certainly puts me at ease at once,” said Frederick. But Almeria observed that he neither expressed by his voice nor countenance any of that joy which she had hoped to inspire by the assurance: on the contrary, he heard it as a determination in which he was personally unconcerned, and in which pure benevolence alone could give him an interest. “This relieves me,” continued he, “from all necessity of explaining myself further.”
“Nay,” said Almeria, “but I must beg you will explain yourself. You do not know but it may be necessary for me to have your antidote ready in case of a relapse.”
No change, at least none that betrayed the anxiety of a lover, was visible in Frederick’s countenance at this hint of a relapse; but he gravely answered, that, when so urged, he could not forbear to tell her the exact truth, that Lord Bradstone was a ruined man—ruined by gaming—and that he had been so indelicate as to declare to his friend, that his sole object in marrying was money. Our heroine’s pride was severely hurt by the last part of this information; but even that did not wound her so keenly as the manner in which Frederick behaved. She saw that he had no remains of affection for her lurking in his heart—she saw that he now acted merely as he declared, from a desire to save from misery one who had formerly honoured his family with her friendship. Stiff, cold words—she endeavoured to talk upon indifferent subjects, but could not—she was somewhat relieved when they reached Lady Bradstone’s door, and when Frederick left her. The moment he was gone, however, she ran up stairs to her own apartment, and looked eagerly out of her window to catch the last glimpse of him. Such is the strange caprice of the human heart, that a lover appears the most valuable at the moment he is lost. Our heroine had felt all her affection for Frederick revive with more than its former force within this last hour; and she thought she now loved with a degree of passion of which she had never before found herself capable. Hope is perhaps inseparable from the existence of the passion of love. She passed alternately from despair to the most flattering delusions: she fancied that Frederick’s coldness was affected—that he was acting only from honour—that he wished to leave her at liberty—and that as soon as he knew she was actually disengaged from Lord Bradstone, he would fly to her with all his former eagerness. This notion having once taken possession of her mind, she was impatient in the extreme to settle her affairs with Lord Bradstone. He was not at home—he did not come in till late in the evening. It happened, that the next day Almeria was to be of age; and Lord Bradstone, when he met her in the evening, reminded her of her promise not “to prolong the torments of suspense beyond that period.” She asked whether he had, in compliance with her request, communicated the affair to Lady Bradstone? No; but he would as soon as he had reasonable grounds of hope. Miss Turnbull rejoiced that he had disobeyed her injunctions—she said that Lady Bradstone might now be for ever spared hearing what would have inevitably excited her indignation. His lordship stared, and could not comprehend our heroine’s present meaning. She soon made it intelligible. We forbear to relate all that was said upon the occasion: as it was a disappointment of the purse and not of the heart, his lordship was of course obliged to make a proportional quantity of professions of eternal sorrow and disinterestedness. Almeria, partly to save her own pride the mortification of the repetition, forbore to allude to the confidential speech in which he had explained to a friend his motives for marrying; she hoped that he would soon console himself with some richer heiress, and she rejoiced to be disencumbered of him, and even of his coronet; for in this moment coronets seemed to her but paltry things—so much does the appearance of objects vary according to the medium through which they are viewed!
Better satisfied with herself after this refusal of the earl, and in better spirits than she had been for some months, she flattered herself with the hopes that Frederick would call upon her again before he left Cheltenham; he would then know that Lord Bradstone was no longer her lover.