He approached. It so happened that though the apartment was without lights, a stray beam from a lamp at the distance of the little lawn gate, was caught and reflected, as Louisa moved her arm, by the bright jewels of the luckless bracelet.
Henry seized the arm with the fierceness of a highwayman, wrenched the snap, and flung the bracelet to the further end of the room; then suddenly calmed by a sense of shame and contrition at his own brutal violence, stood petrified without attempting to utter a syllable. Louisa rose proudly. "By what authority, Mr. Lyndsey," she exclaimed, "have you dared to offer me this insult?" While speaking she was crossing the room to ring the bell and order the intruder to be shown out. Guessing her intention, he started from his state of stupor, flew to intercept her, flung himself at her feet, seized both her hands, and leaning his face against them, sobbed violently.
"Hear me!" he exclaimed in broken accents. "My ruffianly, my wholly unjustifiable conduct, was at least unpremeditated; I had no thought of even uttering a reproach. I entered here but to bid you an eternal farewell! Louisa, I am a miserable, a desperate man——I am about to quit England for ever."
Louisa, who was speaking at the same time, was commanding him to quit her presence instantly, or suffer her to reach the bell; but when he mentioned quitting England for ever, her voice became less firm. Yet she persisted in telling him that he must be gone—that she must not incur the unjust suspicion of having remained at home to receive his highly improper visit. How soon such commands were obeyed is not precisely known; when the party however returned from the walks Louisa was alone, though in manner strange and abstracted, and in a state of agitation so great, that when requested, as the only one who had not a bonnet to remove, to make tea, the small bunch of keys fell twice from her trembling fingers ere she could contrive to open the caddy; while every other part of the simple ceremony was performed in an equally bungling and insufficient manner: from all which it seems scarcely more than fair to infer, that whether the scene concluded in a reconciliation or a last farewell, the lady had had but little time to compose her nerves between the departure of her lover and the entrance of her friends.
CHAPTER XI.
Aunt Dorothea had fixed her ball for the evening of the day of Jane's marriage, that it might be a kind of wedding party; and such had been the mighty preparations for a day, thus doubly momentous, that what with selecting and displaying wedding finery—finding out where to hire cheapest coloured lamps, waiters, and forms—hurrying milliners, and seeing packing-cases carefully opened—hunting up newly-arrived beaux, begging evergreens, admiring jewels and new carriages, ordering ices and rout cake, bargaining with confectioners about a standing supper, and ordering in some wine; for, as a single lady, she had of course no cellar; then planning where the said wine had best stand, that it might not be drank by the waiters instead of the company; and, lastly, considering where to put the music, that it might be heard by the dancers, without taking up room; that, as Sarah said, when dressing her mistress for the great occasion, "It was surprising that she had a foot to stand on at last." The feet were a little swollen, it must be confessed, which obliged her, so Sarah, in support of her assertion to that effect told Mrs. Johnson, to snip the binding of her new white satin shoes.
She had got on wonderfully however; had gone to church with the wedding party—been of great assistance to Lady Arden in getting through the public breakfast; seen the happy couple off; helped to send away packages of cake and gloves; refused to dine at her sister-in-law's, on the plea of all she had to do at home; eat a mutton chop in her bed-room, the dining-room being already occupied by the standing supper, the drawing-room by a great step-ladder, and two workmen hanging a hired lamp from the centre of the ceiling; the spare bed-room with card tables, the bed being taken down; and lastly, the dressing-room being fitted up with the already mentioned evergreens, as a grotto for the refreshments. The mode in which they were here arranged was Mrs. Dorothea's happiest invention, and one on which she greatly prided herself.
At the upper end of the grotto was erected a pile of real ornamental rock-work, which had been brought in on purpose from the garden. Between the crevices of the rocks were stuck all manner of flowers and flowering shrubs; at the top of the heap, on a large space purposely made level, were placed a well-known common kind of dessert dishes, of green china, in the shape of large leaves, and on those dishes moulds turned out of different coloured ices, resembling so many painted specimens of variegated spars and marbles; while among and around all were scattered rout cakes in abundance, which formed a very tolerable imitation of pebbles, shells, and mosses. The grotto was furnished with rustic seats and a rustic table, also borrowed from the garden; and on the table lay a supply of the small leaves, or small plates, of the said green china dessert set, with spoons, of course; so that, as Aunt Dorothea said, the gentlemen must be very stupid if they could not take the hint, and help their partners to a spoonful of marble or spar, and a few pebbles or shells, as taste should direct. There was very little fear, however, of mistake or oversight; for the grotto was Mrs. Dorothea's hobby, so that she not only showed almost every couple the way to it herself, but favoured each with geological lectures on the virtues and properties of all its natural productions. That all might be in perfect keeping, the only light admitted to this favoured spot, proceeded from a single ground-glass lamp, of the size and shape of the moon, and so ingeniously placed among the evergreens, as to bear a respectable resemblance to the queen of night, rising to view from behind a forest.
Mrs. Dorothea, by another excellent contrivance, added much to the effect of her drawing-rooms, which, like those of most watering-place villas, were on the ground floor, and had French windows. The end one of these looked directly up one of the public walks, which the proprietors were in the habit of illuminating on occasion, and which was therefore provided with lamps. These Mrs. Dorothea had obtained permission to have lighted, so that the long vista from her open French window, looked very beautiful; particularly as some of the least prudent of the company thought fit, between the dancing, to step out and walk up and down.