The Children of the Abbey: A Tale

by Regina Maria Roche

She continued near an hour in this situation, when the voice of Mortimer struck her ear. She started up, and, standing in the centre of the room, saw him walking down the lawn with her father, who left him when he had reached the gate, where his servants and horses were. The chill of disappointment pervaded the heart of Amanda, and a shower of tears fell from her. Ellen, who had remained in the room, was almost as much disappointed as her mistress. She muttered something about the inconstancy of men. They were all, for her part, she believed, alike; all like Mr. Chip—captious on every occasion. The dinner-bell now summoned Amanda. She dried her eyes, and tied on a little straw hat to conceal their redness. With much confusion she appeared before her father. His penetrating eye was instantly struck with her agitation and pallid looks, and he conjectured she knew of the visit he had received. On receiving that visit, he wondered not at the strength of her attachment. The noble and ingenuous air of Lord Mortimer had immediately prepossessed Fitzalan in his favor. He saw him adorned with all those perfections which are calculated to make a strong and permanent impression on a heart of sensibility, and he gave a sigh to the cruel necessity which compelled him to separate two beings of such congenial loveliness; but as that necessity neither was or could be overcome, he rejoiced that Lord Mortimer, instead of visiting him on account of his daughter, had merely come on affairs relative to the castle, and had inquired for her with a coolness which seemed to declare his love totally subdued. Not the smallest hint relative to the letter in which he had proposed for her dropped from him, and Fitzalan concluded his affections were transferred to some object more the favorite of fortune than his portionless Amanda.

This object, he was inclined to believe, was Lady Euphrasia Sutherland, from what Lord Cherbury had said concerning the splendid alliance he had in view for his son, and from Lord Mortimer’s accompanying the Roslin family to Ireland.

He felt he had not fortitude to mention those conjectures to Amanda. He rather wished she should imbibe them from her own observation; and pride, he then trusted, would come to her aid, and stimulate her to overcome her attachment. Dinner passed in silence. When the servant was withdrawn, he resolved to relieve the anxiety which her looks informed him pressed upon her heart, by mentioning the visit of Lord Mortimer. He came, he told her, merely to see the state the castle was in, and thus proceeded: “Lord Mortimer is, indeed, an elegant and sensible young man, and will do honor to the house from which he is descended. He had long wished, he told me, to visit this estate, which was endeared to him by the remembrance of his juvenile days, but particularly by its being the place of his mother’s nativity, and her favorite residence; and the opportunity of travelling with an agreeable party, had determined him no longer to defer gratifying this wish.

“He mentioned his mother in terms of the truest respect and tenderness; and his softened voice, his tearful eye, proclaimed his heart the mansion of sensibility. His virtues, like his praises, will do honor to her memory. He had been told the castle was in a very ruinous state, and was agreeably surprised to find it in as good order as could be expected from its ancient date. He desired to see the garden, which had been laid out under the direction of his mother. He expected not to have found a vestige of her taste remaining, and was consequently charmed to find himself mistaken. Every spot appeared to remind him of some happy hour, especially the gothic temple. ‘How many happy minutes have I passed in this place,’ said his lordship, after a silence for some time, ‘with the best of women.’—Upon my word, Amanda,” continued Fitzalan, “you have ornamented it in a very fanciful manner. I really thought his lordship would have stolen some of your lilies or roses, he examined them so accurately.” Amanda blushed, and her father still perceiving expectation in her eyes, thus went on: “His lordship looked at some of the adjacent grounds; and as he has mentioned what improvements he thought necessary to be made in them, I fancy he will not repeat his visit, or stay much longer in the kingdom.”

In a few minutes after this conversation Fitzalan repaired to his library, and Amanda to the garden. She hastened to the temple. Never had she before thought it so picturesque, or such an addition to the landscape. The silence of Lord Mortimer on entering it, she did not, like her father, believe proceeded altogether from retracing scenes of former happiness with his mother. “No,” said she, “in this spot he also, perhaps, thought of Amanda.”

True, he had mentioned her with indifference to her father, but that might (and she would flatter herself it did) proceed from resentment, excited by her precipitate flight from Wales, at a period when his received addresses gave him a right to information about all her actions, and by her total neglect of him since. Their first interview, she trusted, would effect a reconciliation, by producing an explanation. Her father then, she flattered herself, tender as he was, depending on her for happiness, and prepossessed in Lord Mortimer’s favor, would no longer oppose their attachment, but allow Lord Cherbury to be informed of it, who she doubted not, would, in this as well as every other instance, prove himself truly feeling and disinterested.

Thus did Amanda, by encouraging ideas agreeable to her wishes, try to soften the disappointment she had experienced in the morning. Fitzalan, on meeting his daughter at tea, was not surprised to hear she had been in the gothic temple, but he was to see her wear so cheerful an appearance. He was no stranger to the human heart, and he was convinced some flattering illusion could alone have enabled her to shake off the sadness with which, but an hour before, she had been oppressed. The sooner such an illusion was removed, the better; and to allow her to see Lord Mortimer, he imagined would be the most effectual measure for such a purpose.

The more he reflected on that young nobleman’s manner, and what he himself had heard from Lord Cherbury, the more he was convinced Lady Euphrasia Sutherland was not only the object destined for Lord Mortimer, but the one who now possessed his affections; and believed his visit to Castle Carberry had been purposely made, to announce the alteration of his sentiments by the coldness of his conduct, and check any hopes which his appearance in the neighborhood might have created.

He had hesitated about Amanda’s accepting the invitation to the Kilcorban’s ball; but he now determined she should go, impressed with the idea of her being there convinced of the change in Lord Mortimer’s sentiments—a conviction he deemed necessary to produce one in her own.