LADY TINEMOUTH'S BOUDOIR.
Thaddeus spent nearly a fortnight in the constant exercise of his
occupations. In the forepart of each day, until two, he prepared
those drawings by the sale of which he was empowered every week to
pay the good Mrs. Robson for her care of his friend. And he hoped,
when the ladies in Harley Street should think it time to defray any
part of their now large debt to him, he might be enabled to liquidate
the very long bill of his friend's apothecary. But the Misses Dundas
possessed too much money to think of its utility; they used it as
counters; for they had no conception that to other people it might be
the purchaser of almost every comfort. Their comforts came so
certainly, they supposed they grew of necessity out of their
situation, and their great wealth owned no other commission than to
give splendid parties and buy fine things. Their golden shower being
exhaled by the same vanity by which it had been shed, they as little
regarded its dispersion as they had marked its descent.
Hence, these amiable ladies never once recollected that their master
ought to receive some weightier remuneration for his visits than the
honor of paying them; and as poets say the highest honors are
achieved by suffering, so these two sisters, though in different
ways, seemed resolved that Thaddeus should purchase his distinction
with adequate pains.
Notwithstanding that Miss Dundas continued very remiss in her
lessons, she unrelentingly required the count's attendance, and
sometimes, not in the most gentle language, reproached him for a
backwardness in learning she owed entirely to her own inattention and
stupidity. The fair Diana would have been the most erudite woman in
the world could she have found any fine-lady path to the temple of
science; but the goddess who presides there being only to be won by
arduous climbing, poor Miss Dundas, like the indolent monarch who
made the same demand of the philosophers, was obliged to lay the
fault of her own slippery feet on the weakness of her conductors.
As Thaddeus despised her most heartily, he bore ill-humor from that
quarter with unshaken equanimity. But the pretty Euphemia was not so
easily managed. She had now completely given up her fanciful soul to
this prince in disguise, and already began to act a thousand
extravagances. Without suspecting the object, Diana soon discovered
that her sister was in one of her love fits. Indeed she cared nothing
about it; and leaving her to pursue the passion as she liked, poor
Euphemia, according to her custom when laboring under this whimsical
malady, addicted herself to solitude. This romantic taste she
generally indulged by taking her footman to the gate of the green in
Cavendish Square, where he stood until she had performed a pensive
saunter up and down the walk. After this she returned home, adjusted
her hair in the Madonna fashion, (because Thaddeus had one day
admired the female head in a Holy Family, by Guido, over the chimney-
piece,) and then seating herself in some becoming attitude, usually
waited, with her eyes constantly turning to the door, until the
object of these devices presented himself. She impatiently watched
all his motions and looks whilst he attended to her sister; and the
moment that was done, she ran over her own lessons with great
volubility, but little attention. Her task finished, she shut the
books, and employed the remainder of the time in translating a number
of little mottoes into German, which she had composed for boxes,
baskets, and other frippery.
One day, when her young teacher was, as usual, tired almost beyond
endurance with making common sense out of so much nonsense, Euphemia
observed that Diana had removed to the other end of the room with the
Honorable Mr. Lascelles. To give an _éclat_ to her new studies,
Miss Dundas had lately opened her library door to morning visitors;
and seeing her sister thus engaged, Euphemia thought she might do
what she wished without detection. Hastily drawing a folded paper
from her pocket, she desired Thaddeus to take it home, and translate
it into the language he liked best.
Surprised at her manner, he held it in his hand.
"Put it in your pocket," added she, in a hurrying voice, "else my
sister may see it, and ask what it is!"
Full of wonder, he obeyed her; and the little beauty, having executed
her scheme, seemed quite intoxicated with delight. When he was
preparing to withdraw, she called to him, and asked when he should
visit Lady Tinemouth.
"This evening, madam."
"Then," returned she, "tell her ladyship I shall come and sit half-
an-hour with her to-night; and here," added she, running up to him,
"present her that rose, with my love." Whilst she put it into his
hand, she whispered in a low voice, "and you will tell me what you
think of the verses I have given you."
Thaddeus colored and bowed. He hurried out of the house into the
street, as if by that haste he could have gotten out of a dilemma to
which he feared all this foolish mystery might be only the
introduction.
Though of all men in the world he was perhaps the least inclined to
vanity, yet he must have been one of the most stupid had he not been
convinced by this time of the dangerous attachment of Lady Sara.
Added to that painful certainty he now more than dreaded a similar
though a slighter folly in Miss Euphemia.
Can a man see himself the daily object of a pair of melting eyes,
hear everlasting sighs at his entrance and departure, day after day
receive tender though covert addresses about disinterested love, can
he witness all this, and be sincere when he affirms it is the
language of indifference? If that be possible, the Count Sobieski has
no pretensions of modesty. He comprehended the "discoursing" of Miss
Euphemia's "eye;" also the tendency of the love-sick mottoes which,
under various excuses, she put into his hand; and with many a pitying
smile of contempt he contemplated her childish absurdity.
A few days prior to that in which she made this appointment with
Thaddeus, she had presented to him another of her posies, which ran
thus: "Frighted love, like a wild beast, shakes the wood in which it
hides."
Thaddeus almost laughed at the oddity of the conceit.
"Do, dear Mr. Constantine," cried she, "translate it into the
sweetest French you can; for I mean to have it put into a medallion,
and to give it to the person whom I most value on earth!"
There was something so truly ridiculous in the sentence, that,
reluctant to allow even Miss Euphemia to expose herself so far, he
considered a moment how he should make anything so bad better, and
then said, "I am afraid I cannot translate it literally; but surely,
madam, you can do it yourself!"
"Yes; but I like your French better than mine; so pray oblige me."
He had done the same kind of thing a hundred times for her, and,
without further discussion, wrote as follows:--
"L'amour tel qu'une biche blessée, se trahit lui-même par sa crainte,
qui fait remuer le feuillage qui le couvre."
"Bless me, how pretty!" cried she, and immediately put it into her
bosom.
To this unlucky addition of the words _se trahit lui-meme_
Thaddeus was indebted for the present of the folded paper. The ever-
working imagination of Euphemia had seized the inverted thought as a
delicate avowal that he was the wounded deer he had substituted in
place of the wild beast; and as soon is he arrived at home, he found
the fruits of her mistake in the packet she had given with so much
secrecy.
When he broke the seal, something dropped out and fell on the carpet.
He took it up, and blushed for her on finding a gold medallion, with
the words he had altered for Miss Euphemia engraved on blue enamel.
With a vexed haste he next looked at the envelope; it contained a
copy of verses, with this line written at the top:
"To him who will apply them."
On perusing them, he found them to be Mrs. Phillips's beautiful
translation of that ode of Sappho which runs--
"Blest as the immortal gods is he,
The friend who fondly sits by thee,
And hears and sees thee all the while
Softly speak and sweetly smile!
"'Twas this deprived my soul of rest,
And rais'd such tumults in my breast:
For while I gazed, in transport tost,
My breath was gone, my voice was lost.
"My bosom glow'd; the subtle flame
Ran quick through all my vital frame;
O'er my dim eyes a darkness hung;
My ears with hollow murmurs rung.
"In dewy damps my limbs were chill'd;
My blood with gentle horrors thrill'd:
My feeble pulse forgot to play;
I fainted, sunk and died away!
"EUPHEMIA."
Thaddeus threw the verses and the medallion together on the table,
and sat for a few minutes considering how he could extricate himself
from an affair so truly farcical in itself, but which might be
productive of a very distressing consequence to him.
He was thinking of at once giving up the task of attending either of
the sisters, when his eyes falling on the uncomplaining but
melancholy features of his poor friend, he exclaimed, "No; for thy
sake, gallant Butzou, I will brave every scene, however abhorrent to
my heart."
Well aware, from observation on Miss Euphemia, that this seeming
tenderness which prompted an act so wild and unbecoming originated in
mere caprice, ha did not hesitate in determining to return the things
in as handsome a manner as possible and by so doing, at once crush
the whole affair. He felt no pain in forming those resolves, because
he saw that not one impulse of her conduct sprung from her heart. It
was a whim raised by him to-day, which might be superseded by another
to-morrow.
But how different was the case with regard to Lady Sara! Her
uncontrolled nature could not long brook the restraints of
friendship. Every attention he gave to Lady Tinemouth, every civility
he paid to Miss Egerton, or to any other lady whom he met at the
countess's, went like a dagger to her soul; and whenever she could
gain his ear in private, she generally made him sensible of her
misery, and his own unhappiness in being its cause, by reproaches
which too unequivocally proclaimed their source.
He now saw that she had given way to a reprehensible and headstrong
passion; and, allowing for the politeness which is due to the sex, he
tried, by an appearance of the most stubborn coldness, and an
obstinate perversity in shutting his apprehension against all her
speeches and actions, to stem a tide that threatened her with ruin.
Lady Tinemouth at least began to open her eyes to the perilous
situation of both her friends. Highly as she esteemed Thaddeus, she
knew not the extent of his integrity. She had lived too long near the
circle of the heir apparent, and had seen too many men from the
courts of the continent, to place much reliance on the firmness of a
single and unattached young man when assailed by rank, beauty and
love.
Alarmed at what might be the result of her observations, and fearing
to lose any time, she had that very evening in winch she expected
Thaddeus to supper drawn out of Lady Sara the unhappy state of her
heart.
The dreadful confession was made by her ladyship, with repeated
showers of tears, and in paroxysms of agony which pierced the
countess to the soul.
"My dear Lady Sara," cried she, "for heaven's sake, remember your
duty to Captain Ross!"
"I shall never forget it," exclaimed her ladyship, shaking her head
mournfully, and striking her breast with her clenched hand, "I never
look on the face of Constantine that I do not execrate from my heart
the vows which I have sworn to Ross, but I have bound myself his
property, and though I hate him, whatever it may cost me, I will
never forget that my faith and honor are my husband's."
With a countenance bathed in tears, Lady Tinemouth put her arms round
the waist of Lady Sara, who now sat motionless, with her eyes fixed
on the fire.
"Dear Lady Sara! that was spoken like yourself. Do more; abstain from
seeing Mr. Constantine."
"Don't require of me that?" cried she; "I could easier rid myself of
existence. He is the very essence of my happiness. It is only in his
company that I forget that I am a wretch."
"This is obstinacy, my dear Lady Sara! This is courting danger."
"Lady Tinemouth, urge me no more. Is it not enough?" continued she,
sullenly, "that I am miserable? Would you drive me to desperation? If
there be danger; you brought me into it."
"I! Lady Sara?"
"Yes, you, Lady Tinemouth; you introduced him to me."
"But you are married! Singularly attractive and amiable as indeed he
is, could I suppose--"
"Nonsense!" cried her ladyship, interrupting her; "you know that I am
married to a mere sailor, more in love with his ugly ship than with
me! But it is not because Constantine is so handsome that I like him.
No; though no human form can come nearer to perfection, yet it was
not that: it was you. You and Sophia Egerton were always telling me
of his bravery; what wealth and honors he had sacrificed in the
service of his country; how nobly he succored the distresses of
others; how heedless he was of his own. This fired my imagination and
won my heart. No; it was not his personal attractions: I am not so
despicable!"
"Dear Lady Sara, be calm!" entreated the countess, completely at a
loss how to manage a spirit of such violence. "Think, my dear friend,
what horrors you would experience if Mr. Constantine were to discover
this predilection, and presume upon it! You know where even the best
men are vulnerable."
The eyes of Lady Sara sparkled with pleasure.
"Why, surely, Lady Sara!" exclaimed Lady Tinemouth, doubtingly.
"Don't fear me, Lady Tinemouth; I know my own dignity too well to do
anything disgraceful; yet I would acquire the knowledge that he loves
me at almost any price. But he is cold," added she: "he is a piece of
obstinate petrefaction, which Heaven itself could not melt!"
Lady Tinemouth was glad to hear this account of Thaddeus; but ere she
could reply, the drawing-room door opened, and Miss Euphemia Dundas
was announced.
When the little beauty expressed her amazement at not seeing Mr.
Constantine, Lady Sara gave her such a withering look, that had her
ladyship's eyes been Medusan, poor Euphemia would have stood there
forever after, a stone statue of disappointment.