“Mr. Brown,” said the Cooleen Bawn, looking at him significantly, “I wish that our interview should be private.”
“Certainly, my dear Miss Folliard, and so it shall be. Pray, who is this lady?”
“I am forced, sir, to call her my maid.”
Mr. Brown was startled a good deal, not only at the words, but the tone in which they were uttered.
“Madam,” said he, “you will please to remain here until your mistress shall return to you, or, if you wish, you can amuse yourself by reading the inscriptions on the tombstones.”
“Oh, but I have been ordered,” replied Miss Herbert, “by her father and another gentleman, not to let her out of my sight.”
Mr. Brown, understanding that something was wrong, now looked at her more closely, after which, with a withering frown, he said,
“I think I know you, madam, and I am very sorry to hear that you are an attendant upon this amiable lady. Remain where you are, and don't attempt to intrude yourself as an ear-witness to any communication Miss Folliard may have to make to me.”
The profligate creature and unprincipled spy bridled, looked disdain and bitterness at the amiable clergyman, who, accompanied by our heroine, retired to the vestry. It is unnecessary to detail their conversation, which was sustained by the Cooleen Bawn with bitter tears. It is enough to say that the good and pious minister, though not aware until then that Miss Herbert had, by the scoundrel baronet, been intruded into Squire Folliard's family, was yet acquainted, from peculiar sources, with the nature of the immoral relation in which she stood to that hypocrite. He felt shocked beyond belief, and assured the weeping girl that he would call the next day and disclose the treacherous design to her father, who, he said, could not possibly have been aware of the wretch's character when he admitted her into his family. They then parted, and our heroine was obliged to take this vile creature into the carriage with her home. On their return, Miss Herbert began to display at once the malignity of her disposition, and the volubility of her tongue, in a fierce attack upon, what she termed, the ungentlemanly conduct of Mr. Brown. To all she said, however, Helen uttered not one syllable of reply. She neither looked at her nor noticed her, but sat in profound silence, not, however, without a distracted mind and breaking heart.
On the next day the squire took a fancy to look at the state of his garden, and, having got his hat and cane, he sallied out to observe how matters were going on, now that Mr. Malcomson had got an assistant, whom, by the way, he had not yet seen.