Alone with Helen, Laura gave an account of the scene, and gave up her friend henceforth. "O mamma," she said, "you were right; Blanche, who seems so soft and so kind, is, as you have said, selfish and cruel. She who is always speaking of her affections can have no heart. No honest girl would afflict a mother so, or torture a dependent; and—and, I give her up from this day, and I will have no other friend but you."
On this the two ladies went through the osculatory ceremony which they were in the habit of performing, and Mrs. Pendennis got a great secret comfort from the little quarrel—for Laura's confession seemed to say, "That girl can never be a wife for Pen, for she is light-minded and heartless, and quite unworthy of our noble hero. He will be sure to find out her unworthiness for his own part, and then he will be saved from this flighty creature, and awake out of his delusion."
But Miss Laura did not tell Mrs. Pendennis, perhaps did not acknowledge to herself, what had been the real cause of the day's quarrel. Being in a very wicked mood, and bent upon mischief every where, the little wicked muse of a Blanche had very soon begun her tricks. Her darling Laura had come to pass a long day; and as they were sitting in her own room together, had chosen to bring the conversation round to the subject of Mr. Pen.
"I am afraid he is sadly fickle," Miss Blanche observed; "Mrs. Pybus, and many more Clavering people, have told us all about the actress."
"I was quite a child when it happened, and I don't know any thing about it," Laura answered, blushing very much.
"He used her very ill," Blanche said, wagging her little head. "He was false to her."
"I am sure he was not," Laura cried out; "he acted most generously by her: he wanted to give up every thing to marry her. It was she that was false to him. He nearly broke his heart about it: he—"
"I thought you didn't know any thing about the story, dearest," interposed Miss Blanche.
"Mamma has said so," said Laura.
"Well, he is very clever," continued the other little dear. "What a sweet poet he is! Have you ever read his poems?"