"'Where can she be gone?' I faintly exclaimed, when recollection had regained sufficient power.
"'She cannot be gone far,' sobbed Mary. 'Perhaps, sir, you yet may overtake her.'
"The idea served effectually to rouse me: I commenced my search, and soon gained intelligence: a carriage, answerable to that I described, with a lady and her attendant in it, had been seen on the London road. To London I immediately directed my course; and at last descried a carriage, my sanguine hopes led me to think was that containing the sum of my earthly happiness: I instantly spurred my horse, when, owing to the badness of the road, or some other cause, he stumbled—fell, and threw me with violence over his head. I was stunned by the fall, found by some travellers, and, in a state of insensibility, conveyed to the nearest inn.
"The hurts I received were not very material; but the agitation of my mind at being thus prevented from pursuing Ellenor, brought on a fever which confined me to my apartment for nearly a fortnight. As soon as I was in a state to travel, I again pursued my way toward London, though with very little hope, after the time which had elapsed, of discovering her.
"For weeks after my arrival at the metropolis, I wandered about in the faint hope fortune might direct my steps to the place where she was secreted; when, one evening, returning to my lodging, I was surprised by the appearance of Deborah's equipage, who had likewise been seeking for, and at last traced me to London. She saw me ere I could enter the house, when, more than ever detesting the idea of an interview, I immediately removed to another part of the town.
"The next day I passed as usual in wandering about, and returned in the evening dejected and fatigued, when, taking up a book belonging to the hostess, a paper fell from it; it was a sonnet to Hope: but, good Heavens, think of my astonishment when I found it was the writing of my Ellenor! At first I discredited the evidence of my senses, till reiterated examinations convinced me I was not mistaken. I flew to the mistress of the house, and, in answer to my incoherent inquiries, gained intelligence, that she had left those apartments but a few days before I took them; that she had there been delivered of a son, and was then gone to reside in Caermarthen, her native county; though to what part, the hostess could not tell. To Caermarthen I determined to go, and accordingly the next morning commenced my journey; but all my search was indeed fruitless!
"At last, overcome by fatigue, preyed on by a fever occasioned by my repeated disappointments, and, to own the truth, not having money to prosecute my search, having expended that left me by my father, I was necessitated to retire to my habitation at Brighthelmstone, where Deborah again obtained information of me, and again laid me under the lash of her malignant power. Willingly would I have sought relief in a formal separation; but that she refused with the most contemptuous disdain, telling me I should never enjoy a portion of her wealth without her. I would then have resigned all pretensions to her fortune; but she started into phrensy, vowed she would follow me to the utmost extremity of the globe, and sooner deprive herself of every comfort in life, than leave me at liberty to renew an acquaintance with a woman I preferred to herself. Finding it in vain to gain her accordance to my proposal, I desisted from the attempt, and again commenced a search after Ellenor; Deborah, like my evil genius, still following me from place to place, till wearied, regardless of existence, and as the only means of escaping from her, I again went to sea. The interest of my friends gained me promotion; and fortune, by an influx of wealth during seventeen years, has been willing, as far as her power extends, to make me amends for the misery she has occasioned me in the loss of Ellenor, the continued torments I endure from Deborah, and the unkind neglect of my brother, whom I have seen but once since the death of my father.
"And here, Talton, I must apologize for my neglect to you. Your first letter, informing me you had regained your property, I received a few days preceding the discovery of my marriage with Deborah; but the distraction of my mind at that time prevented me from answering it. When I had in some degree regained my tranquillity, I wrote; but the person to whose charge I intrusted my packet, nearly two years after returned it, with the account that you were either dead, or had left the island; and as during that time, nor since, I never heard from you, I was induced to believe the former part of his intelligence.
"The pleasure I yesterday experienced on beholding you, for the time banished every other reflection; but no sooner did I quit you, than remembrance, with the keenest powers, revived every former scene, and added not only to my compunction for my injuries to—, but to my sorrow, for the irretrievable loss of my beloved Ellenor."