Where I am, what is to become of me, or whether I am ever to see my Louisa more, are things of which I am utterly ignorant. I write not with an expectation that my friend should read, but to memorandum events of which perhaps the world will never hear; and which, should this paper by any accident be preserved, it will scarcely believe.
This vile Clifton—[Surely I ought never again to call him my Louisa's brother]—This perverse man has grown desperate in error! The worst of my forebodings have not equalled his intents! His plan has long been mischief! Hypocrisy, violence, rape, no means are too foul!—Such things are incomprehensible!
I am confined in a lone house, somewhere behind Knightsbridge. I was seized I know not how by a band of ruffians, and conveyed hither. Every kind of despicable deceit appears to have been practised. Frank was decoyed from me. He flew once again to save the life, as he thought, of this base minded man. I know not what is become of him, but have no doubt that he like me is somewhere suffering imprisonment, if he be permitted yet to live.
No thoughts are so tragical, no suspicions so horrid as not to be justified, by deductions and appearances which are but too probable. Yet I will not sink under difficulties, nor be appalled at the sight of danger; be it death, or what else it may. That I am in a state of jeopardy my seizure and imprisonment prove. That Frank is still in greater peril, if still in existence, I have just cause to conclude. There were pistols fired, and one after he leaped the hedge; I know not at whom directed, nor what its fate!—I would if possible ward off apprehension. I know it to be folly, and I will endeavour to steel my heart against this as well as other mistakes. If he be dead, or if he be to die, grief will not revive or make him invulnerable. His own virtue must preserve him, or nothing can; and in that I will confide.
That evil is meant to me it would be absurd to doubt; but of what nature, where it is to begin, or where end, that time must disclose. For I will not permit myself to imagine the trifling indignities, or violence I have hitherto encountered, an evil worthy of complaint.
'Tis true my arms are bruised, and I was rudely dealt with by the vile men who seized me: and that there should be such men is an evil. But to me it is none; or not worth a thought. If I would firmly meet what is to come, I must not weakly bewail what is past.
I am not immortal, neither is my strength infinite; but the powers I have I will use. We are oftener vanquished because we are fearful than because we are feeble. Our debility takes birth in our cowardice, and true fortitude is not to be abashed by trifling dangers.
I meant to write a narrative, but these reflections are forced upon me by my situation. I will proceed.
I was brought here, on Friday—, by several men of vulgar but ferocious countenances; and my maid Laura with me. I made all the resistance in my power; and the men, without any regard to what I suffered in body or mind, twisted my arms behind me, so that I imagined one of them had been dislocated, and forced a handkerchief into my mouth; handling, tossing, and gripping me, without any respect whatever to decency or pain, till they had conveyed me from the fields, in which I was walking with Frank Henley, to the place where I am.
I scarcely can guess at the distance; but they hurried me away with great violence, crossing several gates, and forcing apertures through hedges, for the space I believe of not more than half an hour: it might be much less.