“You are returned from your campaign, sir?”
“Yes, madam, and not only in safety but in triumph,—thanks, as I can’t doubt, to your kind prayers on my behalf.” Oh, Amelia, if you could have seen the horrid smile on the wretch’s lips as he said this! “Or rather, permit me to say, ’twas the beneficent influence of my goddess herself that accompanied me in the fight, and preserved me from harm. Clarissa will deign to accept my poor thanks?”
I was almost choked by the wretch’s assurance, but struggled on.
“You found the time pass agreeably, sir, I trust?”
“Agreeably enough, madam, but prodigious slowly. The charmer who knows where I had left my heart won’t ask me why the days seemed so long. And now may I put the same question to Clarissa? Whatever answer she may please to make will content me, for though she be cruel enough to find the time of her adorer’s absence pass quickly, yet she will but be recognising his devices for her entertainment.”
“The time is always long, sir, when one is parted from one’s friends.” I said this with great seriousness, designing him to receive it as a rebuke for detaining me from my friends so long, but what was my horror and disgust when he bowed with his hand on his heart, crying—
“Oh, madam, you overwhelm me! A thousand thanks for your charming condescension! That Clarissa should miss her slave is indeed the height of bliss for him.”
I clasped my throat with my hand, my dear, or I should have cried out, to see this wretch sitting there complacently to torment me. But I felt assured that he was endeavouring to drive me to some hysterical outburst that might display his power over me, and I resolved to disappoint him if I died for it. While he continued romancing for a moment or two, uttering all the extravagancies he could think of to rob me of my self-command, I recovered myself a little.
“You was so obliging as to furnish me with writing implements, sir, before you left,” I said when he ceased, “and I must be permitted to show you that I have made no use of ’em such as you would disapprove. There were thirty sheets of paper in all, I believe. Here’s the thirty still, though in part used,” and I counted ’em over to him.
“Oh, sweet innocence!” he cried, “that combines the sprightly simplicity of Pamela with the majesty of the divine Clarissa! Sure my charmer never thought so meanly of her Sinzaun as to imagine he would call her to account for the indulgences he was allowed to furnish her? Thirty sheets that have been touched by Clarissa’s fingers! Fifteen or so that bear the impress of her hand! Give me, madam, at least those blank sheets, that I may wear ’em next the heart where your image dwells. I would ask for one of those that are wrote on, but that I know they’re too precious to be parted with, and I would not put my Clarissa’s tender heart to the pain of refusing her adorer. But the blank sheets I must have.”