“The man who takes me down will over-eat himself dreadfully,” she remarked, as the carriage pulled up.
“I don't think there is any danger,” replied her aunt, who was a woman of experience.
And she was justified; for the girl's youth asserted itself, and as the meal progressed the headache was forgotten and Ella enjoyed herself thoroughly.
“I rather think your partner will want some supper, poor man,” said Lady Milmo, on the homeward journey.
“It's his own fault; he would talk,” said Ella, laughing.
Lady Milmo patted her niece's knee affectionately.
“I love to see you getting all that enjoyment out of life, my dear. You seem to take it out in great chunks, like my neighbour this evening helping himself to iced pudding.”
Ella thought of her enjoyment with a whimsical feeling of shame, a touch of disappointment at not being as jaded as she had expected. But with the quiet darkness of the night her conflict of doubts returned. After all, what trivial topics she had discussed, what inanities she had laughed at, what spiteful little shafts of malice she had flung. If she had enjoyed it, so much the worse spiritually and morally for herself. Oh, the past year! It had corrupted her. She looked back wistfully upon the girl whom Sylvester had kissed at Woodlands. That fresh, shy, sweet something she had given him then was hers no longer to give to any man. What she could give to Roderick Usher, if she yielded to him, she did not know; certainly, not that.
She was very young, very much unversed in the dark and crooked ways of life, in spite of her experience of men and things; intensely eager to keep herself pure and proud, to love the highest when she saw it. It is not to be set down to weakness, therefore, if she grew very sorry for the girl whom Sylvester had kissed, and cried herself miserably to sleep.