I have had the honour of my charmer’s company for two complete hours.
We met before six in Mrs. Moore’s garden. A walk on the Heath refused
me.
The sedateness of her aspect and her kind compliance in this meeting
gave me hopes. And all that either the Captain and I had urged
yesterday to obtain a full and free pardon, that re-urged I; and I told
her, besides, that Captain Tomlinson was gone down with hopes to
prevail upon her uncle Harlowe to come up in person, in order to
present to me the greatest blessing that man ever received.
But the utmost I could obtain was, that she would take no resolution in
my favour till she received Miss Howe’s next letter.
I will not repeat the arguments I used; but I will give thee the
substance of what she said in answer to them.
She had considered of every thing, she told me. My whole conduct was
before her. The house I carried her to must be a vile house. The people
early showed what they were capable of, in the earnest attempt made to
fasten Miss Partington upon her; as she doubted not, with my
approbation. [Surely, thought I, she has not received a duplicate of
Miss Howe’s letter of detection!] They heard her cries. My insult was
undoubtedly premeditated. By my whole recollected behaviour to her,
previous to it, it must be so. I had the vilest of views, no question.
And my treatment of her put it out of all doubt.
Soul over all, Belford! She seems sensible of liberties that my passion
made me insensible of having taken, or she could not so deeply resent.
She besought me to give over all thoughts of her. Sometimes, she said,
she thought herself cruelly treated by her nearest and dearest
relations; at such times, a spirit of repining and even of resentment
took place; and the reconciliation, at other times so desirable, was
not then so much the favourite wish of her heart, as was the scheme she
had formerly planned—of taking her good Norton for her directress and
guide, and living upon her own estate in the manner her grandfather had
intended she should live.
This scheme she doubted not that her cousin Morden, who was one of her
trustees for that estate, would enable her, (and that, as she hoped,
without litigation,) to pursue. And if he can, and does, what, Sir, let
me ask you, said she, have I seen in your conduct, that should make me
prefer to it an union of interest, where there is such a disunion in
minds?
So thou seest, Jack, there is reason, as well as resentment, in the
preference she makes against me!—Thou seest, that she presumes to think
that she can be happy without me; and that she must be unhappy with me!
I had besought her, in the conclusion of my re-urged arguments, to
write to Miss Howe before Miss Howe’s answer could come, in order to
lay before her the present state of things; and if she would pay a
deference to her judgment, to let her have an opportunity to give it,
on the full knowledge of the case—
So I would, Mr. Lovelace, was the answer, if I were in doubt myself,
which I would prefer—marriage, or the scheme I have mentioned. You
cannot think, Sir, but the latter must be my choice. I wish to part
with you with temper—don’t put me upon repeating—
Part with me, Madam! interrupted I—I cannot bear those words!—But let
me beseech you, however, to write to Miss Howe. I hope, if Miss Howe is
not my enemy—
She is not the enemy of your person, Sir;—as you would be convinced, if
you saw her last letter* to me. But were she not an enemy to your
actions, she would not be my friend, nor the friend of virtue. Why will
you provoke from me, Mr. Lovelace, the harshness of expression, which,
however, which, however deserved by you, I am unwilling just now to
use, having suffered enough in the two past days from my own vehemence?
* The lady innocently means Mr. Lovelace’s forged one. See Vol. V.
Letter XXX.