into it, and in another moment she found Charles, placing one knee on the ground, was really and very warmly kissing the hand she had held out, as he pressed it in both of his. She endeavored to draw it away; she tried to express by a glance, that whatever gratitude might inspire, love for him did not exist; but although words may define differences, and draw lines of distinction, it is often difficult for looks to express nice shades of feeling, and to mark accurately all the gazer would wish. At least, she feared her looks were incomprehensible; for though Charles’s tongue was mute, his eyes declared so plainly and unequivocally the ruling passion of his life at that time, that it was perfectly impossible for her actually to misunderstand him. She saw that Victoria was nothing, and that she was all to him.
The color flitted from her cheeks, and they became white, whiter than her illness had left them—deadly pale; her hand turned cold in his grasp, and after feebly trying to draw it away, she sank back against the pillows behind her, and, for the second time in her life, she fainted.
When she recovered, she found herself lying on the sofa; and as sense and perception gradually returned, she discovered that Charles was supporting her head on his arm, while Victoria was plentifully bedewing her face with eau-de-Cologne. She moved her head, and whispered, “I should like to lie down,” which compelled Mr. Huyton to resign her to the pillows, where common sense would have taught him, she had better have been all the time.
“Are you better?” said he, softly and anxiously.
“Yes, thank you; please leave me, and send Sybil;” and she fixed her eyes for one moment on him so decidedly, that disobedience was out of his power. He was forced to withdraw, and went to find Sybil, with no other advantage from his visit, than the idea that if she was so very weak, it would be impossible for her to leave “the Ferns” next day.
But half an hour’s quiet restored her strength; and reflection on what had passed, made Hilary more than ever certain of the
propriety of leaving the house the next day, even should the effort be attended with fatigue to herself. It had been a transitory emotion which had made her faint; she was not at all accustomed to such attacks; but her physical weakness had perhaps made her feelings more than usually acute, and herself less able than in general to govern them. It was the expression of Charles Huyton’s eyes which had overpowered her: she had read, or seemed to read in them, such a world of strong concentrated passion, such selfish self-will, such deep determination to carry out a point which he had never for one moment abandoned; so much of human pride, and of stern resolution not to submit passively or unresistingly to what thwarted his wishes, as opened up to her mind a new view of his character, and made her almost regret that he had not left her to sink under the black waters in that shady pool, rather than live to enter into a contest with one who seemed so well fitted to trample down and overpower her, when their happiness or their desires crossed. Calm reflection recalled her courage and her firmness. Let her but walk straight on, he could not hurt her. The spirit of evil itself was powerless to harm those who trusted in “the shadow of those Almighty wings,” which she believed stretched out over her and hers: and should she then fear one who was but man? No; he might pain, but he could not injure her, unless he enticed her feet from that narrow path of duty, within which she was safe.
And as her evening prayer arose, that she might “have understanding in the way of godliness,” she felt more strongly than ever that that way did not point to becoming Charles Huyton’s wife.
When the family met at breakfast the next morning, Mr. Duncan announced, that Hilary was quite well enough to go home that day, and therefore, if Mr. Huyton would be so kind as to lend them his carriage, he would no longer trespass on his hospitality.
In vain his host and Miss Fielding urged her supposed weakness, and their desires to detain them all, by every argument