“My Lord, what you have to say farther,” said Miss Woodley, in tears, “defer till the morning—Miss Milner, you see, is not able to bear it now.”
“I have nothing to say further,” replied he coolly—“I have now only to act.”
“Lord Elmwood,” cried Miss Milner, divided between grief and anger, “you think to terrify me by your menaces—but I can part with you—heaven knows I can—your late behaviour has reconciled me to a separation.”
On this he was going out of the room—but Miss Woodley, catching hold of him, cried, “Oh! my Lord, do not leave her in this sorrow—pity her weakness, and forgive it.” She was proceeding; and he seemed as if inclined to listen, when Sandford called out in a tone of voice so harsh,
“Miss Woodley, what do you mean?”—She gave a start, and desisted.
Lord Elmwood then turned to Sandford, and said, “Nay, Mr. Sandford, you need entertain no doubts of me—I have judged, and have deter——”
He was going to say determined; but Miss Milner, who dreaded the word, interrupted the period, and exclaimed, “Oh! could my poor father know the days of sorrow I have experienced since his death, how would he repent his fatal choice of a protector!”
This sentence, in which his friend’s memory was recalled, with an additional allusion to her long and secret love for him, affected Lord Elmwood much—he was moved, but ashamed of being so, and as soon as possible conquered the propensity to forgive. Yet, for a short interval, he did not know whether to go out of the room, or to remain in it; whether to speak, or to be silent. At length he turned towards her, and said,
“Appeal to your father in some other form—in that (pointing at her dress) he will not know you. Reflect upon him, too, in your moments of dissipation, and let his idea controul your indiscretions—not merely in an hour of contradiction call peevishly upon his name, only to wound the dearest friend you have.”
There was a degree of truth, and a degree of passionate feeling, in the conclusion of this speech, that alarmed Sandford—he caught up one of the candles, and, laying hold of his friend’s elbow, drew him out of the room, crying, “Come, my Lord, come to your bed-chamber—it is very late—it is morning—it is time to rise.” And by a continual repetition of these words, in a very loud voice, drowned whatever Lord Elmwood, or any other person might have wished either to have said or to have heard.