“It is true—she is a very strange girl.”
“Yes, strangely excellent: her idle words and idle ways do veil a character of rare and precious worth.”
“I would fain think so, lady; but I do sometimes fear that she is of a nature too open and too free for this hollow world. Already, to my thought, she is unhappy from this very cause: whatever may be her sorrow, I wish she would confide it to you.”
“I have discovered it.”
“Can it be possible? If so, I am truly happy to think that she will have a friend, whose maidenly reserve and heavenly wisdom may guide her through all dangers and difficulties in safety.”
“Ah! there’s the pang; ’twas I betrayed her to them.”
“You wrong yourself, lady,—I am convinced you do. I am afraid that I can make a better guess at what causes the melancholy of Jane Lambert than you can; however, I do not feel at liberty to speak more plainly.”
“I tell you it was I who placed her in the painful perplexity in which you once surprised her. The gentleman from whom you saw her part was an unhappy relative of mine: mine was the errand she was doing; mine was the secret that she kept with so noble a constancy:—that gentleman was nought to her.”
“Indeed! was he not her lover?”