Lady Pelham was not disappointed in her expectation of seeing Colonel
Hargrave on the following day. He called at Walbourne while her Ladyship
was still at her toilette; and was shown into the drawing-room, where
Laura had already taken her station. She rose to receive him, with an
air which shewed that his visit gave her neither surprise nor pleasure;
and, motioning him to a distant seat, quietly resumed her occupation.
Hargrave was a little disconcerted. He expected that Laura would shun
him, with marks of strong resentment, or perhaps with the agitation of
offended love; and he was prepared for nothing but to entreat the
audience which she now seemed inclined to offer him.
Lovers are so accustomed to accuse ladies of cruelty, and to find ladies
take pleasure in being so accused, that unlooked-for kindness
discomposes them; and a favour unhoped is generally a favour undesired.
The consciousness of ill desert, the frozen serenity of Laura's manner,
deprived Hargrave of courage to use the opportunity which she seemed
voluntarily to throw in his way. He hesitated, he faltered; while, all
unlike her former self, Laura appeared determined that he should make
love, for she would not aid his dilemma even by a comment on the
weather. All the timidity which formerly marked her demeanour, was now
transferred to his; and, arranging her work with stoical composure, she
raised her head to listen, as Hargrave approaching her stammered out an
incoherent sentence expressive of his unalterable love, and his fears
that he had offended almost beyond forgiveness.
Laura suffered him to conclude without interruption; then answered, in a
voice mild but determined, 'I had some hopes, Sir, from your knowledge
of my character and sentiments, that, after what has passed, you could
have entertained no doubts on this subject.--Yet, lest even a shadow of
suspense should rest on your mind, I have remained here this morning on
purpose to end it. I sincerely grieve to hear that you still retain the
partiality you have been pleased to express, since it is now beyond my
power to make even the least return.'
The utmost bitterness of reproach would not have struck so chilly on the
heart of Hargrave as these words, and the manner in which they were
uttered. From the principles of Laura he had indeed dreaded much; but he
had feared nothing from her indifference. He had feared that duty might
obtain a partial victory; but he had never doubted that inclination
would survive the struggle. With a mixture of doubt, surprise, and
anguish, he continued to gaze upon her after she was silent; then
starting, he exclaimed--'I will not believe it; it is impossible. Oh,
Laura, choose some other way to stab, for I cannot bear this!'--'It
pains me,' said Laura, in a voice of undissembled concern, 'to add
disappointment to the pangs which you cannot but feel; yet it were most
blameable now to cherish in you the faintest expectation.'--'Stop,'
cried Hargrave, vehemently, 'if you would not have me utterly undone. I
have never known peace or innocence but in the hope of your love; leave
me a dawning of that hope, however distant. Nay, do not look as if it
were impossible. When you thought me a libertine, a seducer--all that
you can now think me, you suffered me to hope. Let me but begin my trial
now, and all woman-kind shall not lure me from you.'
'Ah,' said Laura, 'when I dreamt of the success of that trial, a strange
infatuation hung over me. Now it has passed away for ever. Sincerely do
I wish and pray for your repentance, but I can no longer offer to reward
it. My desire for your reformation will henceforth be as disinterested
as sincere.'
Half distracted with the cutting calmness of her manner, so changed
since the time when every feature spoke the struggles of the heart, when
the mind's whole strength seemed collected to resist its tenderness,
Hargrave again vehemently refused to believe in her indifference. ''Tis
but a few short months,' he cried, grasping her hand with a violence
that made her turn pale; ''tis but a few short months since you loved me
with your whole soul, since you said that your peace depended upon my
return to virtue. And dare you answer it to yourself to cast away the
influence, the only influence that can secure me?'
'If I have any influence with you,' returned Laura, with a look and an
attitude of earnest entreaty, 'let it but this once prevail, and then be
laid aside for ever. Let me persuade you to the review of your conduct;
to the consideration of your prospects as an accountable being, of the
vengeance that awaits the impenitent, of the escape offered in the
gospel. As you value your happiness, let me thus far prevail. Or if it
will move you more,' continued she, the tears gushing from her eyes, 'I
will beseech you to grant this, my only request; in memory of a love
that mourned your unworthiness almost unto death.'
The sight of her emotions revived Hargrave's hopes; and, casting himself
at her feet, he passionately declared, while she shuddered at the
impious sentiment, that he asked no heaven but her love, and cared not
what were his fate if she were lost. 'Ah, Sir,' said she, with pious
solemnity, 'believe me, the time is not distant when the disappointment
of this passion will seem to you a sorrow light as the baffled sports of
childhood. Believe the testimony of one who but lately drew near to the
gates of the grave. On a death-bed, guilt appears the only real misery;
and lesser evils are lost amidst its horror like shadows in a
midnight-gloom.'
The ideas which Laura was labouring to introduce into the mind of
Hargrave were such as he had of late too successfully endeavoured to
exclude. They had intruded like importunate creditors; till, oft refused
admittance, they had ceased to return. The same arts which he had used
to disguise from himself the extent of his criminality, he now naturally
employed to extenuate it in the sight of Laura. He assured her that he
was less guilty than she supposed; that she could form no idea of the
force of the temptation which had overcome him; that Lady Bellamer was
less the victim of his passions than of her own; he vehemently protested
that he despised and abhorred the wanton who had undone him; and that,
even in the midst of a folly for which he now execrated himself, his
affections had never wandered from their first object. While he spoke,
Laura in confusion cast down her eyes, and offended modesty suffused her
face and neck with crimson. She could indeed form no idea of a heart
which, attached to one woman, could find any temptation in the
allurements of another. But when he ended, virtuous indignation flashing
in her countenance, 'For shame, Sir!' said she. 'If any thing could
degrade you in my eyes it were this mean attempt to screen yourself
behind the partner of your wickedness. Does it lessen your guilt that it
had not even the poor excuse of passion; or think you that, even in the
hours of a weakness for which you have given me such just reason to
despise myself, I could have prized the affections of a heart so
depraved? You say you detest your crime; I fear you only detest its
punishment; for, were you really repentant, my opinion, the opinion of
the whole world, would seem to you a trifle unworthy of regard, and the
utmost bitterness of censure be but an echo to your own
self-upbraidings.'
Hargrave had no inclination to discuss the nature of repentance. His
sole desire was to wrest from Laura some token, however slight, of
returning tenderness. For this purpose he employed all the eloquence
which he had often found successful in similar attempts. But no two
things can be more different in their effects, than the language of
passion poured into the sympathizing bosom of mutual love, or addressed
to the dull ear of indifference. The expressions which Laura once
thought capable of warming the coldest heart seemed now the mere ravings
of insanity; the lamentations which she once thought might have softened
rocks, now appeared the weak complainings of a child for his lost toy.
With a mixture of pity and disgust she listened and replied; till the
entrance of Lady Pelham put a period to the dialogue, and Laura
immediately quitted the room.
Lady Pelham easily perceived that the conversation had been particular;
and Hargrave did not long leave her in doubt as to the subject. He
acquainted her with his pretensions to Laura, and begged her sanction to
his addresses; assuring her that his intercourse with Lady Bellamer was
entirely broken off, and that his marriage would secure his permanent
reformation. He complimented Lady Pelham upon her liberality of
sentiment and knowledge of the world; from both of which he had hopes,
he said, that she would not consider one error as sufficient to blast
his character. Lady Pelham made a little decent hesitation on the score
of Lady Bellamer's prior claims; but was assured that no engagement had
ever subsisted there. 'She hoped Lord Lincourt would not be averse.' She
was told that Lord Lincourt anxiously desired to see his nephew settled.
'She hoped Colonel Hargrave was resolved that his married life should be
irreproachable. Laura had a great deal of sensibility, it would break
her heart to be neglected; and Lady Pelham was sure, that in that case
the thought of having consented to the dear child's misery would be more
than she could support!' Her Ladyship was vanquished by an assurance,
that for Laura to be neglected by her happy husband was utterly
impossible.
'Laura's inclinations then must be consulted; every thing depended upon
her concurrence, for the sweet girl had really so wound herself round
Lady Pelham's heart, that positively her Ladyship could not bear to give
her a moment's uneasiness, or to press her upon a subject to which she
was at all averse.' And, strange as it may seem, Lady Pelham at that
moment believed herself incapable of distressing the person whom, in
fact, she tormented with ceaseless ingenuity! Hargrave answered by
confessing his fears that he was for the present less in favour than he
had once been; but he disclosed Laura's former confessions of
partiality, and insinuated his conviction that it was smothered rather
than extinguished.
Lady Pelham could now account for Laura's long illness and low spirits;
and she listened with eager curiosity to the solution of the enigma,
which had so long perplexed her. She considered whether she should
relate to the lover the sorrows he had caused. She judged (for Lady
Pelham often _judged_ properly) that it would be indelicate thus to
proclaim to him the extent of his power; but, with the usual
inconsistency between her judgment and her practice, in half an hour she
had informed him of all that she had observed, and hinted all that she
suspected. Hargrave listened, was convinced, and avowed his conviction
that Lady Pelham's influence was alone necessary to secure his success.
Her Ladyship said, 'that she should feel some delicacy in using any
strong influence with her niece, as the amiable orphan had no friend but
herself, had owed somewhat to her kindness, and might be biassed by
gratitude against her own inclination. The fortune which she meant to
bequeath to Laura might by some be thought to confer a right to advise;
but, for her part, she thought her little all was no more than due to
the person whose tender assiduities filled the blank which had been left
in her Ladyship's maternal heart by the ingratitude and disobedience of
her child.' This sentiment was pronounced in a tone so pathetic, and in
language so harmonious, that, though it did not for a moment impose upon
her hearer, it deceived Lady Pelham herself; and she shed tears, which
she actually imagined to be forced from her by the mingled emotions of
gratitude and of disappointed tenderness.
Lady Pelham had now entered on a subject inexhaustible; her own
feelings, her own misfortunes, her own dear self. Hargrave, who in his
hours of tolerable composure was the most polite of men, listened, or
appeared to listen, with unconquerable patience, till he fortunately
recollected an appointment which his interest in her Ladyship's
conversation had before banished from his mind; when he took his leave,
bearing with him a very gracious invitation to repeat his visit.
With him departed Lady Pelham's fit of sentimentality; and, in five
minutes, she had dried her eyes, composed the paragraph which was to
announce the marriage of Lord Lincourt (for she killed off the old peer
without ceremony) to the lovely heiress of the amiable Lady Pelham;
taken possession of her niece's barouche and four, and heard herself
announced as the benefactress of this new wonder of the world of
fashion. She would cut off her rebellious daughter with a shilling; give
her up to the beggary and obscurity which she had chosen, and leave her
whole fortune to Lady Lincourt; for so, in the fulness of her content,
she called Laura. After some time enjoying her niece's prospects, or to
speak more justly her own, she began to think of discovering how near
they might be to their accomplishment; and, for this purpose, she
summoned Laura to a conference.
Lady Pelham loved nothing on earth but herself; yet vanity, gratified
curiosity, and, above all, the detection of a mere human weakness
reducing Laura somewhat more to her own level awakened in her breast an
emotion resembling affection; as, throwing her arms round her niece,
she, in language half sportive, half tender, declared her knowledge of
Laura's secret, and reproached her with having concealed it so well.
Insulted, wronged, and forsaken by Hargrave, Laura had kept his secret
inviolable, for she had no right to disclose it; but she scorned, by any
evasion, to preserve her own. Glowing with shame and mortification, she
stood silently shrinking from Lady Pelham's looks; till, a little
recovering herself, she said, 'I deserve to be thus humbled for my folly
in founding my regards, not on the worth of their object, but on my own
imagination; and more, if it be possible, do I deserve, for exposing my
weakness to one who has been so ungenerous as to boast of it. But it is
some compensation to my pride,' continued she, raising her eyes, 'that
my disorder is cured beyond the possibility of relapse.' Lady Pelham
smiled at Laura's security, which she did not consider as an infallible
sign of safety. It was in vain that Laura proceeded solemnly to protest
her indifference. Lady Pelham could allow for self-deceit in another's
case, though she never suspected it in her own. Vain were Laura's
comments upon Hargrave's character; they were but the fond revilings of
offended love. Laura did not deny her former preference; she even owed
that it was the sudden intelligence of Hargrave's crimes which had
reduced her to the brink of the grave; therefore Lady Pelham was
convinced that a little perseverance would fan the smothered flame; and
perseverance, she hoped, would not be wanting. Nevertheless, as her
Ladyship balanced her fondness for contradicting by her aversion to
being contradicted, and as Laura was too much in earnest to study the
qualifying tone, the conference concluded rather less amicably than it
began; though it ended by Lady Pelham's saying, not very consistently
with her sentiments an hour before, that she would never cease to urge
so advantageous a match, conceiving that she had a right to influence
the choice of one whom she would make the heiress of forty thousand
pounds. Laura was going to insist that all influence would be
ineffectual, but her aunt quitted her without suffering her to reply.
She would have followed to represent the injustice of depriving Mrs
Herbert of her natural rights; but she desisted on recollecting that
Lady Pelham's purposes were like wedges, never fixed but by resistance.
The time had been when Lady Pelham's fortune would have seemed to
Hargrave as dust in the balance, joined with the possession of Laura. He
had gamed, had felt the want of money; and money was no longer
indifferent to him. But Laura's dower was still light in his estimation,
compared with its weight in that of Lambert, to whom he accidentally
mentioned Lady Pelham's intention. That prudent person calculated that
£40,000 would form a very handsome addition to a fund upon which he
intended to draw pretty freely. He had little doubt of Hargrave's
success; he had never known any woman with whom such a lover could fail.
He thought he could lead his friend to bargain for immediate possession
of part of his bride's portion, and, for certainty of the rest in
reversion, before parting with his liberty. He allowed two, or perhaps
even three months for the duration of Laura's influence; during which
time he feared he should have little of her husband's company at the
gaming-table; but from thenceforth, he judged that the day would be his
own, and that he should soon possess himself of Hargrave's property, so
far as it was alienable. He considered that, in the meantime, Laura
would furnish attraction sufficient to secure Hargrave's stay at --, and
he trusted to his own dexterity for improving that circumstance to the
best advantage. He failed not, therefore, to encourage the lover's
hopes, and bestowed no small ridicule on the idea that a girl of
nineteen should desert a favourite on account of his gallantry.
Cool cunning would engage with fearful odds against imprudence, if it
could set bounds to the passions, as well as direct their course. But it
is often deceived in estimating the force of feelings which it knows
only by their effects. Lambert soon found that he had opened the passage
to a torrent which bore all before it. The favourite stimulus found, its
temporary substitute was almost disregarded; and Hargrave, intoxicated
with his passion, tasted sparingly of the poisoned cup which his friend
designed for him. His time and thoughts were again devoted to Laura, and
gaming was only sought as a relief from the disappointment and vexation
which generally attended his pursuit. The irritation of his mind,
however, made amends for the lessened number of opportunities for
plundering him, by rendering it easier to take advantage of those which
remained.
The insinuating manners and elegant person of Hargrave gained daily on
the favour of Lady Pelham; for the great as well as the little vulgar
are the slaves of mere externals. She permitted his visits at home and
his attendance abroad, expatiating frequently on the liberality of
sentiment which she thus displayed. At first these encomiums on her own
conduct were used only to disguise from herself and others her
consciousness of its impropriety; but she repeated them till she
actually believed them just, and considered herself as extending a
charitable hand to rescue an erring brother from the implacable
malignity of the world.
She was indefatigable in her attempts to promote his success with Laura.
She lost no opportunity of pressing the subject. She obstinately refused
to be convinced of the possibility of overcoming a strong prepossession.
Laura, in an evil hour for herself, thoughtlessly replied, that
affection was founded on the belief of excellence, and must of course
give way when the foundation was removed. This observation had just
fallacy sufficient for Lady Pelham's purpose. She took it for her text,
and harangued upon it with all the zeal and perseverance of disputation.
She called it Laura's theory; and insisted that, like other theorists,
she would shut her eyes against the plainest facts, nay, stifle the
feelings of her own mind, rather than admit what might controvert her
opinion. She cited all the instances which her memory could furnish of
agricultural, and chemical, and metaphysical theorism; and, with
astonishing ingenuity, contrived to draw a parallel between each of them
and Laura's case. It was in vain that Laura qualified, almost retracted
her unlucky observation. Her adversary would not suffer her to desert
the untenable ground. Delighted with her victory, she returned again
and again to the attack, after the vanquished had appealed to her mercy;
and much more than 'thrice she slew the slain.'
Sick of arguing about the possibility of her indifference, Laura at
length confined herself to simple assertions of the fact. Lady Pelham at
first merely refused her belief; and, with provoking pity, rallied her
niece upon her self-deceit; but, finding that she corroborated her words
by a corresponding behaviour to Hargrave, her Ladyship's temper betrayed
its accustomed infirmity. She peevishly reproached Laura with taking a
coquettish delight in giving pain; insisted that her conduct was a
tissue of cruelty and affectation; and upbraided her with
disingenuousness in pretending an indifference which she could not feel.
'And does your Ladyship communicate this opinion to Colonel Hargrave?'
said Laura, one day, fretted almost beyond her patience by a
remonstrance of two hours continuance. 'To be sure I do,' returned Lady
Pelham. 'In common humanity I will not allow him to suffer more from
your perverseness than I can avoid.' 'Well, Madam,' said Laura, with a
sigh and a shrug of impatient resignation, 'nothing remains but that I
shew a consistency, which, at least is not common to affectation.'
Lady Pelham's representations had their effect upon Hargrave. They
brought balm to his wounded pride, and he easily suffered them to
counteract the effect of Laura's calm and uniform assurances of her
indifference. While he listened to these, her apparent candour and
simplicity, the regret she expressed at the necessity of giving pain,
brought temporary conviction to his mind; and, with transports of
alternate rage and grief, he now execrated her inconstancy, then his own
unworthiness; now abjured her, then the vices which had deprived him of
her affection. But the joint efforts of Lady Pelham and Lambert always
revived hopes sufficient to make him continue a pursuit which he had not
indeed the fortitude to relinquish.
His love (if we must give that name to a selfish desire, mingled at
times with every ungentle feeling), had never been so ardent. The
well-known principle of our nature which adds charms to what is
unattainable, lent new attractions to Laura's really improved
loveliness. The smile which was reserved for others seemed but the more
enchanting; the hand which he was forbidden to touch seemed but the more
soft and snowy; the form which was kept sacred from his approach,
bewitched him with more resistless graces. Hargrave had been little
accustomed to suppress any of his feelings, and he gave vent to this
with an entire neglect of the visible uneasiness which it occasioned to
its subject. He employed the private interviews, which Lady Pelham
contrived to extort for him, in the utmost vehemence of complaint,
protestation, and entreaty. He laboured to awaken the pity of Laura; he
even condescended to appeal to her ambition; and persevered, in spite of
unequivocal denials, till Laura, disgusted, positively refused ever
again to admit him without witnesses.
His public attentions were, if possible, still more distressing to her.
Encouraged by Lady Pelham, he, notwithstanding the almost repulsive
coldness of Laura's manner, became her constant attendant. He pursued
her wherever she went; placed himself, in defiance of propriety, so as
to monopolize her conversation; and seemed to have laid aside all his
distinguishing politeness, while he neglected every other woman to
devote his assiduities to her alone. He claimed the station by her side
till Laura had the mortification to observe that others resigned it at
his approach; he snatched every opportunity of whispering his adulations
in her ear; and, far from affecting any concealment in his preference,
seemed to claim the character of her acknowledged adorer. It is
impossible to express the vexation with which Laura endured this
indelicate pre-eminence. Had Hargrave been the most irreproachable of
mankind, she would have shrunk from such obtrusive marks of his
partiality; but her sense of propriety was no less wounded by the
attendance of such a companion, than her modesty was shocked by her
being thus dragged into the notice, and committed to the mercy of the
public. The exclusive attentions of the handsome Colonel Hargrave, the
mirror of gallantry, the future Lord Lincourt, were not, however
undesired, to be possessed unenvied. Those who unsuccessfully angled for
his notice, avenged themselves on her to whom they imputed their
failure, by looks of scorn, and by sarcastic remarks, which they
sometimes contrived should reach the ear of the innocent object of their
malice. Laura, unspeakably averse to being the subject of even laudatory
observation, could sometimes scarcely restrain the tears of shame and
mortification that were wrung from her by attacks which she could
neither resent nor escape. In spite of the natural sweetness of her
temper, she was sometimes tempted to retort upon Colonel Hargrave the
vexation which he caused to her: and his officiousness almost compelled
her to forsake the civility within the bounds of which she had
determined to confine her coldness.
He complained bitterly of this treatment, and reproached her with taking
ungenerous advantage of his passion. 'Why then,' said she, 'will you
force me into the insolence of power. If you will suffer me to consider
you as a common acquaintance, I shall never claim a right to avenge on
you the wrongs of society; but approach no nearer.--I am unwilling to
express a sentiment less respectful than dislike.' The proud spirit of
Hargrave, however, could ill brook the repulses which he constantly
provoked; and often in transports of rage he would break from Laura,
swearing that he would no more submit to be thus made the sport of an
insensible tyrannical woman.
At first she submitted with patience to his injurious language, in the
hope that he would keep his oaths; but she soon found that he only
repaid her endurance of his anger by making her submit to what was yet
more painful, a renewal of his abject supplications. All her caution
could not prevent the private interviews which she granted so
unwillingly. He haunted her walks, stole upon her unannounced, detained
her almost by force at these accidental meetings, or at those which he
obtained by the favour of Lady Pelham. His whole conduct conspired to
make him an object of real dread to Laura, though her watchful
self-command and habitual benevolence preserved him from her aversion.
Sometimes she could not help wondering at the obstinacy of her
persecutor. 'Surely,' said she to him, 'after all I have said, after the
manner in which I have said it, you cannot expect any fruit from all
these rhapsodies; you must surely think your honour bound to keep them
up, at whatever hazard to the credit of your understanding.' Laura had
never herself submitted to be driven into a course of actions contrary
to reason, and it never occurred to her that her lover had no reason for
his conduct, except that he was not sufficiently master of himself to
desist from his pursuit.
From the importunities of Hargrave, however, Laura could sometimes
escape. Though they were frequent, they were of necessity intermitting.
He could not always be at Walbourne; he could not intrude into her
apartment. She visited sometimes where he was not admitted, or she could
decline the invitation which she knew extended to him. But her
persecutions by Lady Pelham had no intermission; from them she had no
retreat. Her chamber was no sanctuary from so familiar a friend; and the
presence of strangers only served to exercise her Ladyship in that
ingenious species of conversation which addresses to the _sense_ of one
of the company what it conveys to the _ear_ of the rest.
For some time she employed all her forces in combating Laura's supposed
affectation; and when, not without extreme difficulty, she was convinced
that she strove against a phantom of her own creation, she next employed
her efforts to alter her niece's determination. She tried to rouse her
ambition; and again and again expatiated on all the real and on all the
imaginary advantages of wealth and title. The theme in her Ladyship's
hands seemed inexhaustible, though Laura repeatedly declared that no
earthly thing could be less in her esteem than distinctions which she
must share with such a person as Hargrave. Every day and all day, the
subject was canvassed, and the oft-confuted argument vamped up anew,
till Laura was thoroughly weary of the very names of rank, and
influence, and coronets, and coaches.
Next, her Ladyship was eloquent upon Laura's implacability. 'Those who
were so very unforgiving,' she supposed, 'were conscious that they had
no need to be forgiven. Such people might pretend to be Christians, but
in her opinion such pretensions were mere hypocrisy.' Laura stood amazed
at the strength of self-deception which could produce this sentiment
from lips which had pronounced inextinguishable resentment against an
only child. Recovering herself, she calmly made the obvious reply, 'that
she entertained no enmity against Hargrave; that on the contrary she
sincerely wished him every blessing, and the best of all blessings, a
renewed mind; but that the Christian precept was never meant to make the
vicious and the impure the denizens of our bosoms.' It might be thought
that such a reply was quite sufficient, but Lady Pelham possessed one
grand qualification for a disputant; she defied conviction. She could
shift, and turn, and bewilder, till she found herself precisely at the
point from whence she set out.
She had a practice, too, of all others the most galling to an ingenuous
and independent spirit--she would invent a set of opinions and
sentiments, and then argue upon them as if they were real. It was in
vain for Laura to disclaim them. Lady Pelham could prove
incontrovertibly that they were Laura's sentiments; or, which was the
same thing, proceeded as if she had proved it. She insisted that Laura
acted on a principle of revenge against Hargrave, for the slight his
inconstancy had put upon her; and argued most convincingly on the folly
and wickedness of a revengeful spirit. Laura in vain protested her
innocence. Lady Pelham was certain of the fact; and she dilated on the
guilt of such a sentiment, and extenuated the temporary recession of
Hargrave, till a bystander must have concluded that Laura was the
delinquent, and he her harmless victim. Her Ladyship declared, that,
'she did not wonder at her niece's obduracy. She had never, in her life,
known a person of cool temper who was capable of forgiving. She had
reason, for her own part, to be thankful that, if she had the failings
of a warm temper, she had its advantages too. She had never, except in
one instance, known what it was to feel permanent displeasure.'
On this topic Lady Pelham had the more room for her eloquence, because
it admitted of no reply; and, perhaps, for this reason it was the sooner
exhausted; for it had not been discussed above half a dozen times,
before she forsook it in order to assert her claims to influence her
niece's decision. And here her Ladyship was suddenly convinced of the
indefensible rights of relationship. 'She stood in the place of Laura's
parents, and in their title might claim authority.' But finding Laura
firmly of opinion that parental authority extended no further than a
negative voice, Lady Pelham laid aside the imperative tone to take up
that of entreaty. 'She would not advance the claim which her tried
friendship might give her to advise; she would only beseech, conjure.
She hoped her importunities would be forgiven, as they could proceed
only from the tenderest regard to her dear girl's wishes. Laura was her
only hope; the sole being on earth to whom her widowed heart clung with
partial affection--and to see her thus throw away her happiness was more
than her Ladyship could bear.' Closely as Laura had studied her aunt's
character, and well as it was now known to her, she was sometimes
overpowered by these expressions of love and sorrow; and wept as she was
compelled to repeat that her happiness and her duty must alike be
sacrificed ere she could yield to the wishes of her friend. But as she
never, even in these moments of softness, betrayed the smallest symptom
of compliance, Lady Pelham had not patience to adhere to the only method
of attack that possessed a chance of success.
Of all her arts of teazing, this was indeed the most distressing to a
person of Laura's sensibility, and she felt not a little relieved when,
exasperated by the failure of all her efforts, Lady Pelham burst into
vehement upbraidings of her niece's hardness of heart. 'She could not
have conceived,' she said, 'such obduracy in one so young; in woman too;
a creature who should be all made up of softness. Laura might pique
herself upon her stoicism, but a Zeno in petticoats was, in her
opinion, a monster. For her part she could never resist entreaty in her
life.'
'Then I beseech you Madam,' said Laura, after having patiently submitted
to be baited thus for three full hours, 'do not make mine an exception;
but for pity's sake be prevailed upon to drop this subject. I assure you
it can have no effect but to distress me.'
'You may be determined, Miss Montreville, that all my endeavours shall
be in vain, but I shall certainly never be so far wanting to my duty as
to neglect pressing upon you a match so much for your honour and
advantage.'
'Is it possible,' cried Laura, losing patience at this prospect of the
continuation of her persecutions, 'that your Ladyship can think it for
my "advantage" to marry a man I despise; for my "honour" to share the
infamy of an adulterer!'
'Upon my word, Miss Montreville,' returned Lady Pelham, reddening with
anger, 'I am constrained to admire the delicacy of your language; so
very suitable to the lips of so very delicate a lady.'
A smile, not wholly free from sarcasm, played on Laura's lips. 'If
delicacy,' said she, 'be henceforth to find so strenuous a supporter in
your Ladyship, I shall hope to be exempted in future from all
remonstrance on the subject of this evening's altercation.'
If Laura really entertained the hope she mentioned, she was miserably
disappointed; for Lady Pelham remitted not a jot of her tormentings. Her
remonstrances were administered in every possible form, upon every
possible occasion. They seasoned every tête à tête, were insinuated into
every conversation. Laura's attempts to avoid the subject were
altogether vain. The discourse might begin with the conquests of Gengis
Khan, but it always ended with the advantages of marrying Colonel
Hargrave.
Teazed and persecuted, disturbed in every useful occupation and every
domestic enjoyment, Laura often considered of the possibility of
delivering herself from her indefatigable tormentors, by quitting the
protection of her aunt and taking refuge with Mrs Douglas. But this plan
she had unfortunately deprived herself of the means of executing.
Laura knew that her cousins, the Herberts, were poor. She knew that Mrs
Herbert was in a situation which needs comforts that poverty cannot
command, and it was vain to expect these comforts from the maternal
compassion of Lady Pelham. She therefore determined to supply them, as
far as possible, from her own little fund; and fearing that a gift from
her might revolt the high spirit of Herbert, she inclosed almost all her
half-year's annuity in a blank cover, and conveyed it to her cousin. All
that she retained was a sum far too small to defray the expence of a
journey to Scotland; and several months were to elapse before she could
recruit her fund. Till then, she had no resource but patience; and she
endeavoured to console herself with a hope that in time the perseverance
of her adversaries would fail.
Often did she with a sigh turn her eyes towards Norwood--Norwood, the
seat of all the peaceful domestic virtues; where the voice of contention
was unheard, where courtly politeness, though duly honoured, held the
second place to the courtesy of the heart. But Mrs De Courcy had never
hinted a wish that Laura should be a permanent inmate of her family,
and, even if she had, there would have been a glaring impropriety in
forsaking Lady Pelham's house for one in its immediate neighbourhood. De
Courcy, too, she thought, was not the kind friend he was wont to be. She
had of late seen him seldom, which was probably caused by the marked
coolness of Lady Pelham's reception; but it had happened unfortunately
that he had twice surprised her in the midst of Hargrave's
extravagancies, when she almost feared to speak to him, lest she should
awaken the furious jealousy to which her tormentor was subject, and she
dreaded that her father's friend (for so she loved to call him)
suspected her of encouraging the addresses of such a lover. During these
visits he had looked, she thought, displeased, and had early taken
leave. Was it kind to judge her unheard? Perhaps, if an opportunity had
been given her, she might have assumed courage to exculpate herself;
but, without even calling to ask her commands, De Courcy was gone with
Mr Bolingbroke to London, to make arrangements for Harriet's marriage.