Having taken such instruments as they could find, for the purpose of forcing the door, they followed Hargrave up stairs, and prepared to begin their work. At this near prospect of the success of all his schemes, Hargrave's rage began to cool; and a gleam of tenderness and humanity reviving in his heart, he shrunk from witnessing the anguish which he was about to inflict. 'Stop,' said he to his people, who were approaching the door; 'stay a few moments;' and, putting his hand to his forehead, he walked about, not wavering in his purpose, but endeavouring to excuse it to himself. 'It is all the consequence of her own obstinancy,' said he, suddenly stopping. 'You may go on—No; stay, let me first get out of this house. Her cries would drive me mad.—Make haste—lose no time after I am gone. It is better over.'
Besides the motive which he owned, Hargrave was impelled to depart by the dread of meeting Laura's upbraiding eye, and by the shame of appearing even to the servants, who were so soon to know his baseness, an inactive spectator of Laura's distress. He hastened from the house, and the men proceeded in their work. With dread and horror did Laura listen to their attempts. Pale, breathless, her hands clenched in terror, she fixed her strained eyes upon the door, which every moment seemed yielding; then flying to the window, surveyed in despair the height, which made escape an act of suicide; then again turning to the door, tried with her feeble strength to aid its resistance. In vain! It yielded, and the shock threw Laura upon the ground. The ruffians raised her, more dead then alive, and were seizing her lily arms to lead her away; but, with all her native majesty, she motioned them from her. 'You need not touch me,' said she, 'you see I can resist no further.' With the composure of despair, she followed them to the hall, where, her strength failing, she sunk upon a seat. The servants now in pity and amazement approaching her, she addressed herself to one of them. 'Will you go with me, my good friend,' said she, 'that you may return and tell Lady Pelham where to find her niece's corpse!' The girl consented with tears in her eyes; but one of the fellows cried, 'No; no; she may run after the coach if she likes, but she don't go within side.' 'Why not?' said the other, with a brutal leer. 'They may both get home again together. They'll be free enough soon.' Laura shuddered. 'Where wandered my senses,' said she, 'when I thought of subjecting any creature to the chance of a fate like mine! Stay here, my dear, and tell Lady Pelham, that I charge her, by all her hopes here and hereafter, to seek me before she sleeps. Let her seek me wherever there is wickedness and wo—and there, living or dead, I shall be found.' 'Let's have done with all this nonsense,' said one of the men. 'John, make the coach draw up close to the door.' The fellow went to do as he was desired; while the other with a handkerchief prepared to stifle the cries of Laura, in case she should attempt to move the pity of passengers in the street. Laura heard the carriage stop, she heard the step let down, and the sound was like her death knell.
The man hurried her through the hall. He opened the street door—and Catherine entered with Mr Derwent. Laura, raising her bowed-down head, uttered a cry of joy. 'I am safe!' she cried, and sunk into the arms of Catherine.
Mr Derwent immediately directed his servants to seize the fellow who had held Laura, the other having made his escape upon seeing the arrival of her deliverers. Laura, soon recovering, told her tale to Mr Derwent, who ordering the man to be searched, examined the warrant, and declared it to be false. The danger attending forgery, however, had been avoided, for there was no magistrate of the same name with that which appeared in the signature. Hargrave's villany thus fully detected, Laura wished to dismiss his agent; but Mr Derwent would not permit such atrocity to go unpunished, and gave up the wretch to the arm of law. He then quitted Laura, leaving his servant to attend her till Lady Pelham's return and, worn out with the emotion she had undergone, she threw herself on a bed to seek some rest.
Early in the evening Lady Pelham returned, and immediately inquired for her niece. The servants, always attentive and often uncharitable spectators of the actions of their superiors, had before observed the encouragement which their mistress gave to Hargrave, and less unwilling to suspect than Laura, were convinced of Lady Pelham's connivance in his purpose. None of them therefore choosing to announce the failure of a scheme in which they believed her so deeply implicated, her questions produced no information except that Miss Montreville was gone indisposed to bed. The habitual awe with which the good sense and discernment of Laura had inspired Lady Pelham, was at present augmented almost to fear by the consciousness of duplicity. She shrunk from encountering the glance of quiet scrutiny, the plain direct question which left no room for prevarication, no choice between simple truth and absolute falsehood. But curiosity to know the success of the plot, and still more a desire to discover how far she was suspected of abetting it, prevailed over her fears; and having before studied the part she was to play, she entered Laura's apartment.
She found her already risen and prepared to receive her. 'My dear child,' said her Ladyship in one of her kindest tones, 'I am told you have been ill. What is the matter?' 'My illness is nothing, Madam,' answered Laura, 'but I have been alarmed in your absence by the most daring, the most unprincipled outrage!' 'Outrage, my dear!' cried Lady Pelham in a voice of the utmost surprise; 'What outrage?' Laura then, commanding by a powerful effort the imagination which swelled her heart, related her injuries without comment; pausing at times to observe how her aunt was affected by the recital. Lady Pelham was all amazement; which, though chiefly pretended, was partly real. She was surprised at the lengths to which Hargrave had gone, and even suspected his whole design, though she was far from intending to discover her sentiments to her niece. 'This is the most extraordinary thing I ever heard of!' cried she when Laura had ended. 'What can have been the meaning of this trick? What can have incited the people?' 'Colonel Hargrave, Madam,' said Laura without hesitation. 'Impossible, my dear! Hargrave can be no further concerned in it, than so far as taking advantage of the accident to extort the promise of a little kindness from you. He would never have ventured to send the men into my house on such an errand.' 'One of them confessed to Mr Derwent, before the whole family, that Colonel Hargrave was his employer.' 'Astonishing!' cried Lady Pelham. 'And what do you suppose to have been Hargrave's intention?' 'I doubt not, Madam,' returned Laura, commanding her voice, though resentment flashed from her eyes, 'I doubt not that his intentions were yet more base and inhuman than the means he employed. But whatever they were, I am certain he would never have dared to entertain them, had it not been for the encouragement which your Ladyship has thought proper to give him.' 'I, child!' cried Lady Pelham, truth in her colour contradicting the falsehood of her tongue, 'Surely you do not think that I would encourage him in such a plot!' 'No, Madam,' answered Laura, 'I hope and believe that you are incapable of consenting to such wickedness. I allude only to the general countenance which you have always shewn to Colonel Hargrave.' Lady Pelham could implicitly rely upon Laura's word; and finding that she was herself unsuspected, she had leisure to attempt palliating the offence of her protegé. 'That countenance,' returned she, 'shall be completely withdrawn for the future, if Hargrave does not explain this strange frolic to my satisfaction.' 'Frolic, Madam!' cried Laura indignantly. 'If that name belongs to crimes which would disgrace barbarians, then call this a frolic!' 'Come, my dear girl,' said Lady Pelham, coaxingly throwing her arm round Laura, 'you are too much, and I must own, according to present appearances, justly irritated, to talk of this affair coolly tonight. To-morrow we shall converse about it. Now let's go to tea.' 'No, Madam,' said Laura with spirit, for she saw through her aunt's intention of glossing over Hargrave's villany—'I will never again expose myself to the chance of meeting a wretch whose crimes are my abhorrence. I will not leave this room till I quit it for ever. Madam, you have often called me firm. Now I will prove to you that I am so. Give me the means to go hence in a manner becoming your niece, or my own limbs shall bear me to Scotland, and on the charity of my fellow-creatures will I rely for support.' 'I protest, my love,' cried Lady Pelham, 'you are absolutely in a passion, I never saw you so angry till now.' 'Your Ladyship never saw me have such reason for anger,' replied Laura. 'I own I am angry, yet I know that my determination is right, and I assure you it will outlive the heat with which it is expressed.'
Had Laura's purpose been more placidly announced it would have roused Lady Pelham to fury; but even those who have least command over their tempers have generalship enough to perceive the advantage of the attack; and the passion of a virago has commonly a patriarchal submission for its elder-born brother. Lady Pelham saw that Laura was in no humour for trifling; she knew that her resolutions were not easily shaken; and she quitted her upon pretence of fatigue, but in reality that she might consider how to divert her from the purpose which she had announced so peremptorily.
Laura was every day becoming more necessary to her aunt, and to think of parting with her was seriously disagreeable. Besides, Laura's departure would effectually blast the hopes of Hargrave; and what would then become of all Lady Pelham's prospects of borrowing consequence from the lovely young Countess of Lincourt? Never wanting in invention, Lady Pelham thought of a hundred projects for preventing her niece's journey to Scotland. Her choice was fixed by a circumstance which she could not exclude from her consideration. The story of Hargrave's seditious plot was likely soon to be made public. It was known to Mr Derwent, and to all her own household. Her conscience whispered that her connivance would be suspected. Mr Derwent might be discreet; but what was to be expected from the discretion of servants? The story would spread from the footmen to the waiting-maids, and from these to their ladies, till it would meet her at every turn. Nor had her imprudent consent left her the power of disclaiming all concern in it, by forbidding Hargrave her house, since he would probably revenge himself by disclosing her share in the strategem. Lady Pelham saw no better success of palliating these evils, than by dismissing her establishment and returning immediately to Walbourne; and she hoped, at the same time, that it might not be impossible to prevail on Laura to change the direction of her journey. For this purpose she began by beseeching her niece to lay aside thoughts of retiring to Scotland; and was beginning to recount all the disadvantages of such a proceeding; but Laura would listen to no remonstrance on the subject; declaring that, if after what had happened, she remained in a place where she was liable to such outrage, she should be herself accountable for whatever evil might be the consequence. Lady Pelham then proposed an immediate removal to Walbourne, artfully insinuating that, if any cause of complaint should there arise, Laura would be near the advice and assistance of her friends at Norwood, and of Mrs Bolingbroke. Laura was not without some wishes that pointed towards Walbourne; but she remembered the importunities which she had there endured, and she firmly resisted giving occasion to their renewal. Lady Pelham had then recourse to tender upbraidings. 'Was it possible that Laura, the only hope and comfort of her age, would quit her now, when she had so endeared herself to the widowed heart, reft of all other treasure—now when increasing infirmity required her aid—now when the eye which was so soon to close, was fixed on her as on its last earthly treasure! Would Laura thus cruelly punish her for a crime in which she had no share; a crime which she was willing to resent to the utmost of her niece's wishes!' Lady Pelham talked herself into tears, and few hearts of nineteen are hard enough to resist the tears of age. Laura consented to accompany her aunt to Walbourne, provided that she should never be importuned on the subject of Hargrave, nor even obliged to see him. These conditions Lady Pelham solemnly promised to fulfil, and, well pleased, prepared for her journey. Hargrave, however, waited on her before her departure, and excused himself so well on the score of his passion, his despair, and his eager desire to be allied to Lady Pelham, that, after a gentle reprimand, he was again received into favour, informed of the promises which had been made against him, and warned not be discouraged if their performance could not immediately be dispensed with. Of this visit Laura knew nothing; for she adhered to her resolution of keeping her apartment, nor ever crossed its threshold, till, on the third day after her perilous adventure, the carriage was at the door which conveyed her to Walbourne.