“Do you, then, bid me depart?”
“I do not bid you; but we cannot meet again.”
“If so, it would be useless to stay. But you will think differently when you become calmer.”
“You mistake,” she said. “I was never calmer than now. Had I not felt so, I would not have seen you. But the parting moment is come. Again, farewell!”
And with a look that remained for ever graven on his memory, she disappeared.
Bewildered as if he had been in a troubled dream, Lord Courland remained for some time in the cabinet, seriously reproaching himself with having caused the mental malady with which he thought Teresa had become suddenly afflicted.
He then went down-stairs, intending to consult Lady Thicknesse, but found she had gone to Brackley Hall with Sir Bridgnorth Charlton, who had driven her thither in his phaeton.
However, as his lordship could not rest in his present anxious and excited state, he determined to follow her; and, explaining his difficulty to Scrope, though without entering into particulars, the latter offered to accompany him, and they went at once to the stables to procure horses.