Marion's sister, Agnes, five years older than herself, after being distinguished as the best musician, best sketcher, best linguist, best everything, at Mrs. Penfold's, had left school with no real knowledge, except of the most frivolous kind, accidentally gathered in conversation, and repeated again in society like a parrot. Formed to excite the most rapturous admiration, by the gorgeous magnificence of her almost regal beauty, art had acted the part of the Fairy Bountiful in forming Agnes, while nature had showered her choicest gifts on Marion.
Agnes was brilliant without being interesting, and dazzling without being attractive, for her mind seemed irremediably and incorrigibly vulgar, selfish, and vain. A good actress, an inimitable mimic, and incomparable in a tableau, she assumed generally a queen-like dignity of manner, "stalking through life," as Sir Arthur said, "with an assured and stately step, as if practising for her appearance as a Duchess at the next coronation."
Admiration seemed to Agnes the only pleasure of life, and amusement its only business; while, if ever she had possessed any sensibility, it was frittered away on the fictitious sorrows of the Adelines and Julias in the volumes which she read with surpassing diligence from a circulating library; though, in all other respects, Agnes wasted her time amidst such listless idleness, that she might have let her nails grow, like those of a Chinese mandarin, to testify how literally she did nothing.
No one, certainly, could excel Agnes in turning up her hands and eyes at the faults of others; but those who trace nothing except evil in their companions, have seldom much good in themselves. Marion found it one of the most important and pleasing studies in the world, to comprehend the character and temper of her friends and connexions, besides her own, with a wish to render herself suitable to them, as her mind, pliable without weakness, was bent on constantly yielding her own wishes to those she loved; but this unobtrusive generosity was only a subject of satirical remark to her sister, who could neither understand nor believe in Marion's utter singleness of heart and disinterestedness; her own sole aim being selfish indulgence, and her sole rule to obtain it in the easiest possible way.
Self-love was the ruling passion of Agnes; love of others the quickening principle, or rather impulse with Marion, who would have zealously planted flowers for even strangers to enjoy; but Agnes would have plucked all those of her friends, and scarcely taken the trouble to rear any even for her own use. Agnes, cold, vain, heartless, and self-sufficient, thought she was made only for this world, and this world for her, and for such as herself, young, gay, rich, and lovely, while all others were mere intruders on the creation. But Marion, on the contrary, followed the dictates of her own heart, in wishing to do good of every kind to every person, while still she had learned to aim above nature, to that high standard of Christian perfection, so exalted, that those who have gained the most elevated human attainment in virtue and excellence, must still consider the structure of their minds, however beautifully decorated with generous sympathies and kind emotions, as being only begun, while they perseveringly aspire upwards, even to the measurement of that Divine Being who left us an example that we should follow his steps.
Agnes had now been, for three seasons, the reigning beauty of Edinburgh! There it is the privilege of every tolerable-looking girl to be considered in her own set pre-eminent, during the first winter after she is introduced; but though the public eye usually grows weary of the same features, however perfect, during a second campaign, Agnes had apparently taken out a diploma of beauty, the reputation for which seemed confirmed to others by her own thorough conviction of being completely unrivalled, and by the exulting consciousness she displayed of her own supreme loveliness. Three seasons of tumultuous joy, triumph, and conquest, had already succeeded each other, during which Agnes was, to use her own expression, "fiercely gay," yet still no younger rival had appeared to eclipse the dazzling array of her charms; and not a whisper was heard that the freshness of her Raphael-like beauty was at all impaired; nor were any ladies ever heard to "wonder" what gentlemen could possibly see to admire in Agnes Dunbar, as not a dissenting voice had yet ventured to make itself audible on that subject.
Agnes began life with that perfect confidence in her own knowledge of the world, universally felt by young ladies under twenty, especially when they have seen very little of it, and with a thousand schemes and projects of perfect happiness. Though one after another her castles of cards fell to the ground, still, in the exercise of persevering energy, she rebuilt the edifice again with new materials, and on what she imagined a better construction, but still in every instance, to her own unutterable astonishment, she found that most unaccountably, "hope told a flattering tale!"
Considering every officer she danced with as a hero, and every gentleman who paid her a compliment as a lover, Agnes wasted her first season, as most young ladies do, in flirting with scarlet uniforms, the inhabitants of which were generally so much alike in ideas and conversation, that if blindfolded, she might have found it difficult or impossible to distinguish which of her countless red and gold admirers happened at the moment to be "doing the agreeable."
All her military victims were dying to know what Agnes thought of their brother officers; whether she intended to adorn the next ball by her presence, or the next concert; how she liked their military band; if she proposed patronising their night at the theatre; whether she preferred agalopefast or slow; how she thought the colonel's daughter looked on horseback; whether she did not think it barbarously tyrannical of the commander-in-chief to insist on their all wearing uniforms; how she liked the new regulation jacket; and above all, whether she thought the order for their wearing mustachios an improvement or not!
To all these subjects, and many more of similar import, Agnes lent her very profound attention, not only during the discussion, but in many a solitary hour, while her whole head, heart, and understanding were crowded with the recollection of epaulettes, mustachios, spurs, and gold lace, and she privately believed that the supreme felicity of earth,—all the most refined sensibilities of life, and all its brightest joys, were to be found at Piershill Barracks.
Sir Patrick laughingly alleged that Agnes had rehearsed a set of prepared conversations suited to every different occasion,—a musical conversation for amateurs, full of crotchets and quavers—a hunting conversation about foxes, dogs, and steeple-chases,—a Court of Session conversation for the lawyers,—and a dragoon conversation, discussing at great length whether officers should dance with spurs or without them, and in which she had been known to enumerate correctly, the facings of every regiment in Her Majesty's service.
Her brother often and loudly declared that nothing is more perfectly hopeless, than for any young lady to expect a serious attachment from an officer actually quartered with his regiment, as it was against all rule, and contrary to all nature or custom, for Cupid to attack the army. The mess-table, he assured her, invariably sets its face against matrimony, and the mess-table conversation was an ordeal, through which he protested that few young ladies could wish their names to pass; but nevertheless, Agnes, full of groundless expectations and lively vanity, continued to endure a succession of heart-rending and unaccountable disappointments, from very promising military admirers, who had stolen her bouquets, listened to her music, and drunk Sir Patrick's claret month after month; but no sooner did marching orders come for Dublin, Leeds, or Canada, than these interesting affairs came to an untimely end with a P.P.C. card, or a sort of never-expect-to-meet-again bow, and Agnes was left with the army-list in her hand, wondering what regiment would come next, and whether there were many unmarried officers in it.
"How amusing it is," said Agnes, in a confidential mood, one day to Clara and Caroline, "when I walk about with Captain De Crespigny at the promenades or balls, and see all the other beaux looking angry or disappointed!"
"Nothing on earth is so charming, I suppose, as to be a beauty!" exclaimed Caroline, with a good-humored sigh, and a look of comic humility, "I would sacrifice ten years of my life to be admired for one! To hear people saying, 'Have you seen the lovely Miss Smythe? Is Miss Smythe to show herself at Lady Towercliffe's party?' and then, like you, Agnes, to have all the beaux dying for me!"
"I would rather be married for any attraction in the world, than mere beauty," said Clara, earnestly; "even money is a more tolerable motive. How insufferable it would be to live with a person whose affection depended on whether your hair were well dressed, or your shoes well made!"
"That is the very thing I should like!" exclaimed Agnes, "to see it considered of the greatest consequence whether I wore pink or blue, and whether it were one of my well-looking days or not!"
"But then, Agnes, your well-looking days would occur seldomer and seldomer, while during the very periods of illness and depression, when attention and kindness are most needed, a fastidious husband would feel injured if your complexion were not at its best," replied Clara, laughing. "No! no! give me the happiness that will, as my milliner says, 'wash and wear well!'—good fire-side domestic comfort."
"Comfort! I hate comfort!" said Agnes, indignantly, "a stupid, detestable word, as opposite to real happiness as night is to day! I shall be satisfied with nothing short of felicity."
"But felicity can last only a day, while peace and comfort may be enjoyed for life," replied Clara. "In talking of marriage, you seem to think of nothing beyond the honey-moon, and to forget the hours, days, and years of actual life that must follow!"
"It is absolute nonsense looking so far out to sea as you do, Clara," said Agnes, impatiently. "How I shall enjoy, next winter, perhaps, chaperoning you both to parties if I can find any fascinating victim, tall, thin, and handsome enough to please me."
"But surely you would not, for any consideration, marry yet!" exclaimed Caroline. "Lady Towercliffe says that the holiday of a girl's life is from the time she leaves school till the day she marries, and you should enjoy ten years at least, Agnes, before you are tempted to begin the cares of life."
"Cares!" exclaimed Agnes, with a contemptuous laugh, "I do not mean ever to take any cares upon myself! but, as Captain De Crespigny very sensibly observed yesterday, the husband worthy of me should be made on purpose. In the first place, he must be rich, for I have a scruple of conscience in ever witnessing a poor marriage, where, after the wedding-cake has been eaten, there is nothing else left. In everything,—even in the mere choice of a ribbon,—I am fastidious, and would rather not have a thing at all, than dispense with getting precisely what I like. My intended, then, must have been educated at Eton, for I do think the ugliest bit of human nature on earth is a Scotch school-boy of about fourteen. He must have such a foot! so small! oh! no foot at all. He must employ Buckmaster the tailor, get his shoes from Paris, and never wear the same gloves twice. He must——"
"My dear Agnes! this should be all put into the contract!" said Clara, laughing. "It perfectly ruins me to hear you talk so extravagantly; and, besides, pray be warned in time of your own probable fate, that the beauty of a family, or the beauty of a winter, is said always to make a poor marriage. I never could understand the reason of that; but Lady Towercliffe says, men are perverse beings, who like to criticise and undervalue a professed beauty, while, in the mean time, they are taken by surprise, and fall in love unexpectedly with some obscure girl, whose charms they discover, or fancy for themselves, and whom, probably, not another man living ever thought tolerable."
"For my part," said Caroline, "I shall wait till a person can be found as handsome as Sir Patrick, as agreeable as you tell me Captain De Crespigny is, as clever as Mr. Granville, as merry as young De Lancey——"
"And as rich as Lord Doncaster!" interrupted Agnes.
"No! no!—, a hundred times no!" replied Caroline, coloring, speaking in a singular tone of asperity, "I hate and abhor money as a consideration in marrying! I wish money had never been invented! It becomes a misery for those who have too much, as well as for those who have too little."
"Well! give me money," said Agnes, laughing. "And let me tell you, Caroline, that even if you have eight or ten thousand pounds, which is probably the utmost, you will find it no great inconvenience during the long run of life. Money has its merits, and I should be afraid to marry any man, even the most romantic of my lovers, if it involved the necessity for his sacrificing one of his usual comforts;—if it obliged him to drink his bottle of sherry instead of claret every day, I am not quite sure that he would never begin to grumble! They tell me it should be considered a man does not wish himself twice every day unmarried again. No, no money, is no bad thing, and if you have any to spare, pray let me have the surplus."
"Who, and what are Mrs. and Miss Smythe?" was a frequent question of Agnes to herself, never apparently to obtain a satisfactory answer. On Caroline leaving school, her aunt had taken a villa at Portobello, where the two English strangers excited extreme attention, more from their evident desire to avoid it, than from any thing very remarkable in their appearance or manner, though Mrs. Smythe was certainly of thatgenusold maid so common in England, with a handsome independence, a suite of servants, a pony-carriage, most splendid dress, and some pretensions still to youth and beauty, as any fragment of good looks that yet remained she most liberally displayed; while her manner had a flirting tone of coquetry most unsuitable to her apparent age, forming a singular contrast to the quaker-like simplicity of Caroline's dress.
There was a singular contrast between the gravity of costume affected by Miss Smythe, and the keen festivity of spirit with which she entered into every scheme of amusement, or even, it might be said, of mischief. Her vivacity was occasionally almost overpowering, her fancy lively beyond example, while with her brilliant, yet interesting animation, there was mingled a rare acuteness of mind, a swift comprehension, and an innate passion for all that was amiable and beautiful, which gave liveliness and vigor to what she said, though the rapidity of her mind sometimes led Caroline to a false estimate of persons and circumstances, as she always judged or acted from instantaneous impulse; yet there was a generous frankness in her disposition, which captivated those who knew her, and a graceful simplicity in all she did, which gave it interest; for, without intention, there was something in all her thoughts and actions striking and peculiar.
Her features, though irregular, attracted and enchained the eye, from the magical variety of their expression, and though an amateur of mere beauty might have been surprised and perplexed to divine why her light grey eyes, pale cheeks, and chestnut hair could beguile his attention away from the more perfect contour of others, the amateur of physiognomy was delighted to find there an ever-varying source of interest in watching the bright emanations of thought, feeling, and vivacity, which glittered or sparkled in her eye, or played about her mouth.
When Mrs. Smythe first settled at Portobello, scarcely a week of gossiping, wonder, and conjecture had elapsed, in the little community around, when she requested to have an interview with Sir Arthur alone, which took place immediately, and must have excited much interest in his mind, as the Admiral remained silent and abstracted during the whole subsequent evening, while he strolled slowly up and down the drawing-room, "pacing the quarter-deck," as he called it, for a length of time; and, after being closeted some hours the following day with Mrs. Smythe and his confidential agent, they proceeded to a magistrate's house together, with whom they requested a private conference, the purport of which did not transpire.
From that day, an intimacy, amounting to friendship, was established between Sir Arthur and the two ladies, who seemed on all occasions to look to him for advice and protection, and in whose house they spent a part of every day, to the unspeakable delight of Henry De Lancey, who was charmed, on his return from college, to find so agreeable an addition to the small circle at Seabeach Cottage.
"Years rush by us like the wind;" and how rapid seems the transition from boyhood to mature years! Henry had early attained an extraordinary development of mind and appearance, a strength of intellect and a decision of purpose which seemed to Sir Arthur almost precocious, while every day discovered some new talent, or enlarged those he already possessed, for his mind seemed ever on the wing and full of energy. "Either he is nobly born, or nature has a nobility of her own," thought the Admiral, when viewing the character of his young protege, as it gradually arose to personal and intellectual supremacy. His mind was ardent, courageous, and deeply contemplative, full of generous impulses, but apt to view all that happened to himself through an exaggerated medium. His mysterious history, and the fascination of his manner and appearance cast a spell over the interest and affections of all who beheld his countenance, or heard the sound of his harmonious voice. With a strikingly handsome person, he had already acquired a decided air of fashion and refinement, while a bright vein of almost chivalrous romance which enlivened his mind was subdued by a poetical temperament, inclining him to dwell much on melancholy musings, relating to the strange circumstances of his own early history. Keenly sensitive to kindness or neglect, his love and gratitude to Sir Arthur were without bounds, and his brotherly affection for Marion was tinged with the natural enthusiasm of his disposition, but before long the warmest and deepest feelings of his nature were secretly concentrated on the gay, giddy, and fascinating Caroline Smythe. Every scrap of paper that came in his way became covered with sketches of her buoyant figure and graceful profile, in a variety of animated attitudes; or, on other occasions, verses in Latin or English, little better certainly than the nonsense verses at school, immortalised her charms.
Young as he was, however, Henry's spirit recoiled already from the danger of loving too well, or being beloved by any, when he was taught, in hours of solitary reflection, to remember that principle and honor must forbid him to seek a mutual attachment, while his name and station remained unknown, and, perhaps, disgraceful. There was a bewildering power in Caroline's society, which chained him to her side wherever they met, while, contrary to his resolutions and wishes, his every look, smile, word, and action became steeped in love. Often and severely did he upbraid himself for this vain and dangerous indulgence, but he seemed spell-bound and unable to remember, in her presence, any thing but the delight of listening to her gay sallies and her delicious laugh; though the mirth of her young eyes became veiled often by a look of care as sudden as it was to him unaccountable, being so foreign to the sparkling, almost mischievous gaiety of her nature.
Henry's devoted, and nearly boyish attachment, raised in his heart many a high aspiration after future distinction, many a bright hope of honor, promotion, and usefulness. The model for his imitation in every thing noble and distinguished was Sir Arthur, and he resolved to sacrifice love itself, till he had attained, like him, a name and a station for himself. The very sound of Sir Arthur's step, the very tones of his voice, were dear to him; and, casting aside every softer emotion connected with his romantic reveries respecting Caroline, he became impatient to face the bitter blasts of the world's trials, taking his beloved benefactor for his example, and the Holy Scriptures as his guide.
"Perhaps," thought he, allowing his young mind to wander away from the dull inexorable realities of life, while a rapturous smile of anticipated joy lighted up his countenance. "Perhaps, when honor and distinction have at last crowned my efforts, I may yet be acknowledged in the face of the world, by those connexions who have now so mysteriously cast me off. Perhaps Caroline herself may at last be proud to return that fervent attachment, of which she has not yet even a suspicion! The old proverb says, 'all men know what they are, but none know what they shall be!' I know neither the one nor the other; but I must not be satisfied with vaguely coveting learning, honor, or usefulness hereafter, contemplating like a mere child the end without the way, but seek them energetically. Nothing is impossible to those who persevere! This may and must be a rough world of difficulty to me, but amidst a thousand buffetings and humiliations to come, I feel an undying hope of success, while even in this scene of hard and trying discipline, my best comfort and encouragement shall ever be drawn from the august truths of religion, in all their awfulness and solemn obligations."
Knowledge is power, and knowledge of character is the greatest power of all; but Henry, in general very penetrating, was perplexed by the flirting, light-headed manner of Mrs. Smythe, whenever she was in the society of gentlemen her own contemporaries in age, and the grave, deferential manner she adopted towards her young companion, whom she seemed to treat almost inadvertently as her superior, though the slightest indication of her doing so usually brought the color of Caroline in vivid flashes to her cheek, and caused an appearance of mutual embarrassment between the aunt and niece, which surprised and puzzled him. Their extraordinary munificence to the poor and public charities also astonished him, as that appeared so widely disproportioned to their visible means and usual expenditure, though it seemed only to please without surprising Sir Arthur, who was accustomed to give so liberally himself, that Henry sometimes feared he encouraged his newly-found friends in a degree of lavish extravagance inconsistent with the ordinary means of single ladies; yet all was given with a graceful negligent indifference to the vulgar subject of pounds, shillings, and pence, quite unprecedented. Subscriptions to church extension, missionaries, schools, Bibles, blankets, food, clothing, coals, money, and medicine, were scattered around them with unsparing profusion, though it appeared to Henry, that, in the case of Mrs. Smythe herself, whose name always appeared ostensibly on the list as the larger contributor, there was less alacrity in giving, than in Caroline, who seemed to be purse-bearer for both, and always defrayed the whole amount.
Among the many things which surprised Henry in Mrs. and Miss Smythe, nothing had that effect more than the keen, intense, and rather satirical interest with which both ladies gathered up every particular relating to the manners, flirtations and adventures of Captain De Crespigny, though it was evident, that while both ladies could relate every particular of his former history and character, neither knew him by sight. Mrs. Smythe mentioned rather contemptuously some vague recollections of him formerly, as a pert, awkward school-boy, while, to Henry's increasing perplexity, the young lady's color visibly rose to carnation whenever he was unexpectedly named, and her eyes usually glittered with a suppressed smile, if any anecdote or description in Sir Arthur's conversation related to him, till at length the curiosity which had so long been evidently fermenting in the minds of Mrs. and Miss Smythe, exploded one day in the form of an eager request, that Sir Arthur would invite Captain De Crespigny to meet them at dinner.
Marion and Henry were amused at the laughing alacrity with which Sir Arthur at once consented, and they observed, after the note was despatched, that many a whispered consultation took place, and many a lively jest passed among the lively trio, to which they were not made a party; while the two ladies appeared evidently in extacies of amusement at their anticipated introduction. Marion would have given worlds to witness the scene; but her furlough from Mrs. Penfold's had expired on the very day of Sir Arthur's party, and she was most unwillingly deposited in a carriage with her baggage, at the moment when Captain De Crespigny alighted, in full huzzar uniform, out of the minibus which had conveyed him from Piershill.
The Admiral's party was exceedingly small and select; but the guests appeared all in gay, buoyant spirits; while Captain De Crespigny, seeing but one young lady in the room, looked upon himself as her natural property, and handed her to dinner, though no formal presentation had taken place.
With Caroline he was, before long, flirting to the top of his bent, while she assumed a charming look of consciousness when he addressed her, receiving the whole artillery of his small talk and civilities with the most interesting expression of naivete, though once Henry observed in her smile so odd a mixture of mirth and malice, while, at the same time, a look of covert humor lurked in her eye, and quivered on her lip, that he could not but wonder at the grave, demure look which she affected.
Nothing was ever more enchanting to Captain De Crespigny than the blushing, averted looks with which Caroline listened to all his insinuated admiration; while now and then she nodded and smiled with the prettiest air of incredulity imaginable, if he professed it more openly. Occasionally, however, Captain De Crespigny was almost put out of countenance by her unexpected replies, or very mal-apropos questions, which gradually led him on, he scarcely knew how, into flirting perfectlya'loutrance, while opportunities seemed purposely afforded him with a degree of tact perfectly incredible in one so young, and apparently unsophisticated, to say even more than he ever said before. With a gay, laughing animation, almost amounting to silliness, the young lady archly doubted his sincerity, admired his wit, and slyly misunderstood all his compliments, till he was obliged to repeat his meaning and explain his insinuations, making his professions and speeches all so exceedingly plain and undisguised, that, to his own astonishment, he found himself positively making love, on a very few hours' acquaintance, with a degree of explicitness which had never occurred to him in the whole course of his practice before.
In the evening, Caroline was, after many entreaties, prevailed on to favor Captain De Crespigny with a song; and never had he been so completely perplexed as by those with which the young lady, preserving a look of most imperturbable gravity, proceeded to favor him. She seemed to have a dozen different voices, and half-a-dozen different styles of performance, but had evidently been well taught, and displayed occasionally some beautiful notes. At first her tones were clear and sharp, accompanied by the strangest flourishes and cadences that Captain De Crespigny had ever heard or imagined. In the next song, her voice was low and husky, while her eyes were most sentimentally elevated to the ceiling, with a sort of St. Cecilia expression, rather partaking, however, of the ludicrous, and in her voice another like a mouse in a cupboard. At one time her tone reminded him of a well-known singer at Vauxhall; at another, he felt persuaded she was taking off Clara Novello; occasionally there was so considerable a tinge of the brogue, that he became convinced she must be Irish, and she ended by singing "The Dog's Meat Man," in a tone out-screaming a peacock, but adopting the air and attitude of a Catalani, and concluded with looking exultingly round in expectation of rapturous applause, which Sir Arthur bestowed in abundance, and Captain De Crespigny in comparative moderation, being, for the first time in his life, at a loss to know whether he were treated on this occasion in jest or in earnest.
Repeated subsequent visits at Seabeach Cottage continued the intimacy which Captain De Crespigny had so oddly begun, and his curiosity became more and more piqued by the singularity of Miss Smythe's manner and conversation. She displayed, along with a most extravagant love of amusement, a genius for satire and mimicry quite unprecedented, and in which she most freely indulged. Many a scene was acted over by her, and supported by Henry, with astonishing talent and vivacity; for both seemed to have a similar propensity, being able, after an hour's intercourse with any individual, to imitate his whole peculiarities with almost magical precision—to follow, in an imaginary conversation, the very train of his ideas, and to represent every little trick or habitual expression, every turn of the head, and every tone of the voice, with a gay look of mockery which would have made their fortunes on the stage.
One evening, Sir Arthur having delivered up to his young friends the key of an old chest, filled with velvet coats and brocaded silk dresses, formerly worn by his bye-gone ancestors, Caroline, Henry, and Captain De Crespigny amused themselves by grouping some beautiful tableaux, and by acting charades. At one time, both the gentlemen appeared in similar costumes, as Shakespeare's two Dominos in the Comedy of Errors, when Sir Arthur suddenly exclaimed, as if he had made some great discovery, "How very strange that I never before observed the likeness between you two good-looking young fellows! I declare it is quite remarkable! If you were brothers in reality as well as in pretence, it could scarcely be more striking! Do pray Captain De Crespigny, turn your profile more towards Mrs. Smythe, that she may see what I mean!"
Henry laughingly received these remarks as an undoubted compliment, and bowed with good-humored grace to Sir Arthur, who observed with astonishment that Captain De Crespigny's color rushed to his very temples, and receded again, leaving his countenance pale and almost ghastly, while he suddenly broke off the entertainment, and strode up to the fire-place, where for some minutes he stood, with his back to the company, in evident agitation, while a dead silence ensued.
"Well!" whispered Sir Arthur to Caroline, "I have often been told that people are never pleased with a likeness, but certainly Louis De Crespigny is the most conceited of men to feel so intolerably angry at being compared to my young friend here. There are certainly worse-looking people in the world than Henry!" added the Admiral, with a look of partial affection. "And it was no such insult as De Crespigny seems to think, when I paid him the compliment, to say that he resembled my boy, who is in every respect the pride of my heart."
"I wish the Captain may never meet with a greater mortification," replied Caroline, laughing; "and I am sure he would be much the better of a few pretty severe ones to keep him in his senses!"
Henry meantime had observed with good-humored surprise, and no small degree of perplexity, the excitement, so disproportioned to the occasion, into which Captain De Crespigny had been thrown by Sir Arthur's remark, but with boyish frankness he instantly went up to him, saying, in a lively and rallying tone,
"I am sure Sir Arthur did not mean anything personal, Captain De Crespigny; but his remark only proves my uncommon skill in assuming a likeness to any one I please. My success in disguising myself at college, was often beyond my intentions or utmost hopes. You would not know me yourself, if I represented an old man, or a French hair-dresser, as I have sometimes done!"
"Indeed!" replied Captain De Crespigny, trying to recover himself, "I should think there was not the dress upon earth in which I would not know you again!"
"Well! some day perhaps, as a beggar, I may, with your leave, beguile you of half-a-crown."
"It would be a clever beggar who succeeded in that! but I defy you there. Half-a-crown! why! I have only as much as that to keep me till midsummer! You have my free leave to try me at any time, or in any way you please, and my pardon for all your success!"
"I can only say," interposed Sir Arthur, "that the impudent rascal brought real tears into my eyes, not long ago, by a story he trumped up at my door, which would have deceived the whole Medicity Society. He can make himself appear as old as myself,—and I declare one day he looked not very unlike your uncle, Lord Doncaster!"
A vivid flush passed over the whole forehead and features of Captain De Crespigny at these words; but assuming a sudden tone of liveliness and vivacity, he summoned Henry to continue their entertainments for the evening, which were to be concluded by acting a proverb of which Sir Arthur and his guests were to discover the design. Miss Smythe, dressed in cottage costume, seated herself pensively on a stool, after which Captain De Crespigny, equipped with a bow in his hand, and carrying on his back a quiver filled with all the old pens in the house, to represent arrows, entered in the character of Love, and was about to aim his darts at the peasant girl, when Henry, disguised in a tattered old cloak, to personate Poverty, limped slowly into the room. On seeing this beggarly apparition, Cupid, pushing his hair up till it stood on end, assumed an expression of comic horror, and with a shriek of dismay, rushed to the window, as if about to jump out.
The whole party laughed heartily, and declared that thedenouementof this piece contained a most salutary lesson against a mere love-match; and Sir Arthur said, for his own part he would attend to the warning,—that all portionless young ladies might consider the case hopeless with him, and he trusted every one present intended to be equally prudent!
"Yes! most assuredly!" exclaimed Captain De Crespigny, "I am almost tempted how to take my uncle's advice, and propose to my cousin, Miss Howard, the heiress, though love flies out of the window whenever I think of her. She was a little, pert, red-fingered, flaxen-haired child, when we parted last! The memory of that girl often haunts me like a night-mare since; for my poor mother, on her death-bed, got a promise made about our being married, or something of that kind. I never heard the particulars; but I believe we were to be made acquainted, and refuse one another, before either of us could accept any one else; but I should think there could be little chance of anything that depended on my being refused."
Captain De Crespigny was bowing himself off late in the evening, and taking a very particular leave of Miss Smythe, having called up all his most fascinating graces for the occasion, while he felt inwardly gratified by the pleasing conviction that another had been added to the list of young ladies whom he had made miserable for life, when he was surprised to observe her mouth perfectly quivering with suppressed laughter, and an arch, satirical gleam in her eye for which he could not account, though it made him feel somewhat uncomfortable and dissatisfied. If it were possible that any one could be laughing at him, she certainly was! A world of most intolerable ridicule appeared in her expression—an air almost of contempt! and he turned to leave the room with a feeling of mortification and anger which he was ashamed to allow even to himself.
When Captain De Crespigny hurriedly opened the drawing-room door, near which he and Caroline had been standing, he was surprised to see a person lurking close behind it, who darted instantly away, and disappeared; but before the intruder was out of sight, an exclamation of terror and dismay escaped from the lips of Caroline, who rushed towards Sir Arthur, exclaiming, in accents of almost frantic alarm, "He is there! he is there! Oh! save me, Sir Arthur! he is there! That horrid, dreadful man! he is there! Stop him! stop him!"
Captain De Crespigny instinctively ran in pursuit of the retreating figure, and eagerly attempted to seize him; but the fugitive instantaneously opened the house door, and escaped in the darkness, while, apparently to intimidate his pursuer, he fired a pistol in the air, and waved another above his head with frantic gestures of rage and violence.
"It is beyond all measure extraordinary how he got into the house!" exclaimed Sir Arthur, in discussing the event with an aspect of grave perplexity. "My doors are most systematically locked after dusk, and not a window is unbarred, yet the locks are unbroken and the bars untouched!"
"There is something next to supernatural in the way he invariably finds us out, and gets access everywhere," said Mrs. Smythe, in almost breathless agitation. "One would imagine he had some unearthly accomplice to discover where we are concealed, and to assist him in escaping the vigilance of the police. Night and day we have been liable to his incursions. In town or country—in the drawing-room, or beside our carriage—in church, or going to a party—there he is, lurking secretly near us, or terrifying Caroline by his sudden disappearance, and gliding away like a shadow. He baffles every attempt to overtake or arrest him, but seems for ever on the watch! Sometimes he used to make his presence known by throwing a stone at our windows; often at midnight, by singing hoarsely beneath them, and even occasionally by firing a pistol in the air; but I did hope in this remote corner we might have enjoyed peace and safety. How are we ever to venture home?"
"I shall escort you with the whole party in close phalanx," replied Sir Arthur, trying to assume a rallying tone. "Old Martin and myself are quite invulnerable, and I only wish my secretary were here also, as he would be a host in himself; but he is absent on a month's leave, and for the first time in my life I miss him."
The night being impenetrably dark, and not a sound to be heard but the echo of their footsteps on the gravel, when Mrs. Smythe alighted from the carriage to walk across the garden leading towards her house. Sir Arthur immediately desired the servants to bring out lights, when one of the candles having flared up suddenly near Caroline, she thought she perceived the madman close beside her, lurking behind the stem of a large tree. The dark shadows concealed all but his face, in which there gleamed a look of maniacal triumph and malignity, while rushing close up to Captain De Crespigny, he said, in a threatening tone, low and distinct, "He who crosses my path shall die!" and instantly disappeared through the hedge. When Miss Smythe, on hearing his voice, with a stifled scream of terror fled into the house, again that loud and fiendish laugh, which she had already heard once, arose behind her, and rung through the night air in tones of high delirium, causing a cold shudder to thrill through the hearts of even the boldest among her companions, while they hastily followed her, and having placed the trembling girl in apparent safety, soon after took leave, charging the servants to chain and double-lock the door.
It was some hours before Caroline could sufficiently compose her mind to retire; but after the house was sufficiently quiet, and the servants in bed, she sat up reading, with the hope that her nerves might become less painfully agitated. The slightest noise caused her heart to beat almost audibly, and she was conscious that a mouse rattling in the wainscot would have caused her to faint. Mrs. Smythe could scarcely be prevailed upon to leave her alone; but as they both slept on the drawing-room floor, only divided by a thin partition, Caroline induced her, at a late hour, to withdraw, while not a sound now disturbed the deep repose of nature, but "the wailing sorrows of some midnight bird."
The moon had arisen, shining with softened radiance into her apartment, when Miss Smythe arose from her devotions, and she could not but think at the moment what a bright emblem of her divine Saviour that glorious luminary presented to the mind, not glowing, like the sun, with a radiance which no human eye can gaze upon, but reflecting upon the darkened earth a mild, subdued refulgence, perfectly suited for the steady contemplation of those whom it had arisen to benefit and cheer.
Nature was hush'd, as if her works ador'dThe night-felt presence of creation's Lord.
Nature was hush'd, as if her works ador'dThe night-felt presence of creation's Lord.
Nature was hush'd, as if her works ador'd
The night-felt presence of creation's Lord.
Pleased with such thoughts, a gradual composure stole over her senses, and Caroline, at length, seeing her candle nearly burned out, consequently determined to retire for the night. Not a sound was to be heard in the house, but her own light step, as she moved about the room,—the very opening of a drawer, or the shutting of her book, sounded unnaturally loud, jarring upon her nerves with a startling effect,—the shadows in the more distant part of the room looked darker than usual, and the least moan of the wind increased the painful tension of her nerves to agony. Scarcely had she begun to undress, when a sudden noise not far off caused her to start with convulsive terror; her heart became chilled with apprehension, the candlestick which she carried in her hand fell to the ground, the light was extinguished, and she stood trembling and alone in total, impenetrable darkness.
Caroline tried to persuade herself that the sound must have been produced by her own fancy,—she looked around, and all was quiet,—she listened, and all was perfectly still,—she reasoned with herself, and became resolute to try whether sleep might not plunge her into forgetfulness and peace, when her attention was accidentally attracted towards one of the windows, where the bright moonbeams rested on an object which seemed to blast her eyes with horror, and paralyzed her at once in a speechless agony of fear. The top of a ladder rested on the window-sill, upon the summit of which stood the dark figure of a man, his face plastered so close upon the glass, that his nose was perfectly flattened against it, and his hands raised in a menacing attitude towards her. The instant he saw, by Caroline's look of frantic alarm, that she had seen him, he dashed in the window-frame by a single stroke of his powerful arm, and seemed about to make a forcible entrance, when Miss Smythe, with the energy of despair, threw open the door, and fled, calling aloud, in the sharp, shrill accents of desperation, for help.
The servants were speedily assembled around her, and the instant she felt herself in comparative safety, nature could sustain no more, but, convulsed in every nerve, and throwing herself into the arms of Mrs. Smythe, with a cry of thankfulness and agitation, she fainted.
An instant alarm was given in the neighborhood, a diligent search was made, and the police for several days exerted their utmost activity to detect the miscreant, but in vain. Not a trace remained to convince Caroline that the whole had not been a hideous dream, except that the ladder had been left standing at her window, and turned out to have been stolen from a neighboring garden. The window-frame exhibited a frightful picture of devastation, being literally broken to fragments, and at some distance in the garden a loaded pistol was discovered, perfectly new, which it was hoped might lead to a discovery, by the police tracing out the maker and purchaser, seeing that it had been so recently obtained.
Several meetings now took place at Sir Arthur's for the purpose of considering what plans would be best adapted to secure the safety of Mrs. and Miss Smythe, till the dangerous madman who persecuted them could be secured and confined, on all which occasions Captain De Crespigny attended, as he rather enjoyed the excitement and interest with which the story filled up his vacant hours, and, careless of the impression he believed himself to be making on the affections of Miss Smythe, he felt some solicitude respecting her safety, while he expressed ten times more than he felt, and observed, in his usual off-handed style, that this was not the only man whose head she would probably turn; but in his own case, though she had almost put him out of his senses already, yet he would rather make an end of himself than of her.
Caroline drily thanked him for his obliging intentions on her behalf, and after a lively dialogue, in which the gay huzzar actually excelled himself, in his fervent expressions of admiration and regard, he took leave, rather wondering to think how he had been led on in professing so much, and giving himself a lecture as he rode home, on the propriety of beginning to "back out," seeing that he was getting rather beyond his depth. Still there were several of the reasons for meeting next day, usual with those who have a natural desire to improve an agreeable intimacy, a song to be practised, a drawing to be admired; and Miss Smythe having made a sort of promise to let Captain De Crespigny sit to her for his picture in the character of Dromio, as she was an admirable artist, the offer became irresistible. He had never yet entered their own house, as meetings were always hitherto arranged at Sir Arthur's; and a slight feeling of curiosity likewise helped him to the agreeable conclusion, that he must for once, and only once, call on the "Smythes," were it only to ascertain what sort of establishment they had.
Punctual to the appointed hour, Captain De Crespigny's groom rang a consequential peal for his master at the gate of Rosemount Villa, such as had not been heard there since bells were invented, and after a considerable delay, the door was opened by a shabby awkward-looking Irish girl, speaking with a powerful brogue, who curtsied with an appearance of most preposterous respect to Captain De Crespigny as he alighted, and pointed up stairs, begging him to walk in, but without having an idea apparently that she ought herself to usher him into the drawing-room.
Being always pretty confident of making himself welcome, Captain De Crespigny advanced, and in his usual gay, humorous tone, announced his own name at the drawing-room door, while he threw it open and entered. To his surprise, he now found himself in a small, not very splendidly furnished apartment, stretched on the only sofa belonging to which, there lounged, in solitary indolence, with a quite-at-home look, a young man whom he had never seen before. His aspect and dress were equally singular, presenting that happy mixture of the ruffian and gentleman, not very uncommon in Ireland. Attired in a military great-coat, he wore a most preposterous pair of whiskers and mustachios, long, coarse, and dirty, which looked as if they had been curled over knitting wires. Taking the last remnant of a cigar out of his mouth when the visitor entered, and showing not the smallest surprise, with a smile which betrayed a set of dingy, decayed teeth, and a very disfiguring squint, he watched the approaching step of Captain De Crespigny with adegagelook of indifference, saying, in a tone of easy familiarity,
"Och! sure! I always knew a milithary man, for he enters with his lift foot first! Many deserters who would may-be have escaped, but the thrick betrayed 'em. A curious fact! Will ye be pleased to sit on your four quarthers, Captain?"
A smile of contempt and ridicule curled on the haughty lip of Captain De Crespigny, while he proudly drew back, saying, in a tone of great reserve, and with the very slightest possiblesoupconof a bow, "Excuse me, sir, I must have mistaken the house!"
"Arrah! not at all! not in the very laste. Sure! I'm here for the purpose!" exclaimed the stranger, starting up from his recumbent position with astonishing agility, and closing the door. "Isn't it relations we shall be before long, and why should we meet as strangers?"
"Relations! what do you mean, sir? Here is some ridiculous blunder!" replied Captain De Crespigny, turning contemptuously on his heel. "Allow me to pass! Good morning!"
"Well! relations or connexions, it's all one," continued the Irishman, with a look of easy good humor. "My aunt, Mrs. Smythe, dropped me a line to say I would be wanted about the settlement, though, for the matter of that, there is not much, I fancy, on either of your parts to settle. More gold on the outside of the pocket than the inside, Captain! Hey! excuse me! but as my aunt says, in the matther of money, we take the will for the deed!"
"You must be slightly deranged, sir," interrupted Captain De Crespigny, in a tone of angry perplexity; "I have heard that a madman is loose about this neighborhood, and I need not go far, I see, to find him."
"What! Hey! Sure you're not going to forswear all, or say thing you have said to my pretty cousin, Caroline. We do make short work of our courtships in Dublin, sure enough; but when my aunt told me this morning how soon you had come to the point with Caroline, and nothing left but to fix the day, I laughed ready to kill myself, and says I, 'you beat all Ireland to sticks!'"
"No more of this folly, sir!" exclaimed Captain De Crespigny, with rising irritation, and in his most peremptory tone. "Detain me here one moment longer, and I shall send you a shorter way down stairs than you ever tried before!"
"Och, murder! you'll excuse me, sir, but I've not been dipped in the Shannon for nothing! This must all be settled as gintlemen usually settle these affairs in our counthry! Sure you met my cousin at Sir Arthur's many a time, and you'll not be afther denying that she convarsed with you every day for a matther of four hours!"
"Perhaps she had that honor, but what then?"
"Why thin, sir! such things as you said, from such a gintleman, are not easily to be forgotten!"
"You are pleased to be complimentary!" replied Captain De Crespigny, turning round his magnificent head with an air of bitter contempt; "but what of that?"
"I heartily wish," continued the Irishman, with a still stronger brogue than before, "that every young lady who meets with a gintleman such as you, had a cousin like Paddy Smythe to take up her cause, and I am as little to be thrifled with as any man in Ireland! The tongue that deceives me or mine shall never spake again. I have exchanged shots before now on a slighter occasion!"
A momentary pause ensued, during which Captain De Crespigny frowned and bit his lip, in angry embarrassment, while, with a look of unutterable contempt and disgust, he eyed his companion, who thrust his hands into his ample pockets, and paced up and down the room with rapid strides and determined emphasis. At length, stopping opposite to his irritated companion, he eyed him for some moments with a look of stern reproach, saying, in a stronger Irish brogue than ever, and with a torrent of indignation, which gave almost the dignity of eloquence to what he uttered,
"You think there are no feelings in the world to be consulted but your own! perhaps we may prove this a slight mistake! I have married seven of my cousins already to officers quarthered in our neighborhood at Limerick, and Caroline is the last! Captain Mortimer was introduced to Mary at the top of a country dance, and engaged her for life before he reached the bottom. Lieutenant Murray gave his arm to Bessy for the first time going down to dinner at Mrs. Fitz-Patrick's, and offered her his hand before the fish was off the table! We understand these things very soon in Ireland! and I would shed every drop of my blood before Caroline shall be disappointed!"
Captain De Crespigny began now to feel seriously annoyed at his own position! Not having lately been quartered in Ireland, he had forgotten how such affairs are managed there, but at this moment a thousand recollections crowded upon him, of warnings he had received from his brother officers respecting the prudence and circumspection to be exercised beside the Shannon, though most of what they said, had been listened to with the same incredulous attention usually bestowed upon stories of ghosts and witchcraft. Here he was, however, snared like a fly in a spider's web, though without a single doubt of his own powers to escape, and with no stronger objection to call out this insolent ruffian beside him, than the publicity and ridicule he must inevitably incur, if involved in a vulgar every-day duel with a hot-headed Irishman.
Seeing that the affair was likely to take a graver turn than he had imagined, Captain De Crespigny now slowly and resolutely strode towards the hearth-rug, and turning his back to the fire, in that attitude peculiar to Englishmen, calmly and sternly looked in the face of his insolent companion, whose lip became compressed with an air of fierce determination, while his dark eye glittered with a triumphant smile, and in an attitude of perfectnonchalance, he returned Captain De Crespigny gaze for gaze, while leisurely resuming his lounging attitude on the sofa. Neither gentleman seemed at all inclined to recommence the discussion immediately, and both looked equally angry, till the Irishman at length opened a pocket-book, to which, he frequently afterwards referred, with a business-like air, and in a tone of conscious triumph, saying,
"Will you be afther denying all you said to my cousin only last night?"
"I deny nothing, Sir, except the right you or any human being can have, with what I choose to say, five minutes after it has been uttered!" replied Captain De Crespigny, almost delirious with rage, and drawing in his breath between his clenched teeth, while the Irishman eyed him with provoking coolness, and merely muttered in reply, while still referring to the pocket-book,
"That is not our way in Limerick! Scarcely one of my cousins had a case like this! Breach of promise! Sure it would fetch a verdict to-morrow; but the shortest way is the best! Why, Sir! you told my cousin, poor girl! that you wished there were not another man on the earth, in case she might prefer him to you!"
"But luckily there are many, or she would have little chance of a husband!" replied Captain De Crespigny, almost beside himself with rage. "I have said the same thing a thousand times, to a thousand different young ladies, without expecting them ever to think of it more!"
The Irishman looked away for a moment, as if some irresistible feeling had come over him, which he could scarcely suppress, and with a slight quiver in his voice, as if on the very eve of laughter, though Captain De Crespigny was too angry to notice it, he sang, while looking out of the window, these words, with a very marked emphasis,—
"Erin, oh! Erin's the land of delight, Where the women all love, and the men they all fight."
At length, Captain De Crespigny, losing all patience, followed his antagonist to the window, and said, in a tone of angry command,
"Let there be a truce to this most contemptible farce! If you are a gentleman, which I very much doubt, send any respectable friend—a man of honor, if you happen by chance to know such a person—to my barracks, and before to-morrow I shall find, if possible, some blundering Irishman who can understand you, to settle this absurd affair."
"That may soon be done," replied Mr. Smythe, "if I am not satisfied with your intentions."
"Intentions!" re-echoed Captain De Crespigny, in a frenzy of contempt. "My intentions were merely to amuse myself for an hour or two with a rather pleasing young lady, and——"
"Rather pleasing!! you may be proud of your gallantry!" replied the Irishman, with more real indignation in his voice, than it had yet exhibited. "Perhaps, Sir, being the lady's cousin——"
"It is no matter who you are! I am not here to be questioned like a member before his constituents. I did not know the young lady had a relation on earth."
"The more shame to you, Sir, for meaning to deceive her!" replied the Irishman in a tone of stern reproach. "If I were to get all Ireland for holding my tongue, you should hear the truth. But maybe you would be after giving me satisfaction in another way. I'm not such a wild beast as to thirst for blood, it can be done with pen and ink!"
Captain De Crespigny fixed his eyes with stern contempt upon his free and easy companion, who passed his fingers through his long bushy wig, stretched his legs upon the sofa, and spoke with a yawning voice, while he added in a careless off-hand way, "If my cousin could only be persuaded you meant nothing from first to last, there's an ensign in the 42d, with very good prospects, she might have for the asking! Here is a paper. I prepared it in case you might object to the match; and if you'll only sign this assurance that you meant nothing, for the lady's own satisfaction, you are a free man. It will save us both a deal of bother and fighting. A man who has fought a dozen times like me, may go out once too often; and my pistols are all at Dublin!"
Captain De Crespigny paused a moment, irresolute what to do. It was a condescension quite intolerable to have another moment's intercourse with such a man, and to sign any paper at his request, seemed almost a degradation; but then he saw before him a long vista of vulgar annoyance from this forward Irishman. He was aware that hundreds of gentlemen would laugh if the story got any publicity, and that dozens of young ladies would feel themselves aggrieved if it became circulated that his attentions had been so very marked to an obscure Miss Smythe.
The tea-tables, the newspapers, the club, and the mess, were all to be dreaded; and seeing that the Irishman had, with an air of perfectnonchalance, buried himself behind a double number of the "Times," which he seemed to be attentively reading, Captain De Crespigny glanced his eye over the paper, and finding that it contained only a short and simple declaration that he never had intended to marry the young lady introduced to him by Sir Charles Dunbar, he hastily signed his name, tossed the paper contemptuously across the table, and with infinite dignity, strode out of the house.
Great was his surprise, when descending the staircase, to hear, in the room he had so recently left a simultaneous burst of smothered laughter from several persons. He could not be mistaken! It seemed even as if there were female voices in the number; but almost bewildered with anger, and happy also to escape, he hastened onwards, threw himself on horseback, and galloped for three hours before he had regained any portion of his usual equanimity.
Had Captain De Crespigny followed his first impulse, on hearing the laughter behind him, it would have been to retrace his steps and re-enter the drawing-room of Mrs. Smythe, when his astonishment would certainly not have been small to see Henry De Lancey laughingly disencumbering himself of his whiskers, wig, and mustachios, while Mrs. Smith exclaimed, in accents of almost convulsive risibility,
"Well done, my adopted nephew! You deserve to be my heir! I have often heard that my old aversion Louis De Crespigny's exploits were inimitable in his line; but we needed such a specimen as this. I bestow the fright upon him with all the pleasure in life!"
"I only hope, if we ever, in the course of years, meet again, that my cousin will not recognise me," added Caroline, smiling. "It was not particularly flattering to see Louis in so much alarm! Yesterday, however, when he saw me last, I was certainly looking my very worst."
"Your worst is better than the best of anybody else," exclaimed Henry, in a tone so exactly resembling that of Captain De Crespigny, that Mrs. Smythe started, and looked round with alarm; while Caroline and young De Lancey burst into a simultaneous laugh of frolicsome glee, and continued the dialogue during several minutes, with great spirit and vivacity, till Henry suddenly became conscious, that in imagining the words of another, he was gradually betrayed into expressing his own real feelings, and that, too, with a depth and fervor which sincerity alone could have dictated.
Checking himself in a moment, while the color rushed to his face, dyeing it red to the very roots of his hair, and instantly receded again, he took a hurried leave of Mrs. Smythe, and turning to Caroline with a quivering lip, he said, in a voice which none but herself could hear, "I must not say in jest what I feel in earnest! Farewell! There are wishes known only to my own heart, and never to be realized, which I must try to forget. You go to-morrow, and we shall probably meet no more! Forgive me, then, if I say, that so long as I live you shall be first in my most respectful and devoted affections; and death only can ever make me forget you."
Before Henry left the ante-room, being in search of his hat, he found it laid beside an open portfolio on the table, which, having, in his haste, accidentally thrown down, he began hastily collecting its contents, when his surprise was great, on turning up one sheet of the drawing paper, to find there a finely-executed sketch, done with all the skill and spirit of an accomplished artist, representing the venerable head of Sir Arthur; and on the same paper—could it be possible!—an almost living representation of himself. The likeness very much flattered, he thought—exceedingly flattered; but still it could be no other; and the picture dropped from his hand in the transport of his delight.
Henry again returned to the portfolio, hurriedly turning the leaves over; and amidst a variety of superbly-finished miniatures, he found his own countenance over and over again grouped in animated contrast with that of Sir Arthur. His heart throbbed with joy, when, after hastily turning to the title-page, he discovered, according to his hopes and wishes, the name of Caroline Smythe; and he leaned his head on his hand, contemplating that name in silent ecstacy, while indulging for one moment the pleasing, but perhaps presumptuous hope, that he had been remembered with unacknowledged partiality, and that the secret was here portrayed with her own pencil.
He was about then to withdraw, when suddenly the raised and irritated tones of Mrs. Smythe became unavoidably audible to him, from the room he had so recently left, saying, in accents of angry remonstrance,
"That look of girlish joy when he comes, and the sadness of your eye when he departs, might betray it to any one less interested than myself; but he has met few ladies hitherto, and on his part it is a mere boyish fancy, which, if properly discouraged, will of itself wear out."
Henry had fled to avoid hearing what was not intended for him, before Caroline replied, in a low, agitated voice,
"I think and hope you are mistaken; but his constancy and disinterestedness shall be tried and proved. I would rather any man should cut my throat for money, than marry me for it. A girl of fortune, like Midas, turns all who look on her into gold; and I am not a gem to attract many lovers, without a very brilliant setting. I have a romantic desire to be chosen for myself alone—a vain dream perhaps never to be realized, unless young De Lancey prove constant. If not, I mean to declare war upon all mankind—to be a perfect Captain De Crespigny for flirtations!—to talk to gentlemen, ridicule, mortify, and humble them!—to do everything, in short, but love or marry any one of them!"
Though Caroline spoke these words in a tone of livelybadinage, there was a tremulous bitterness in her manner, as she turned away, and contemptuously threw upon the table a massive gold chain which she usually wore, saying, "Lovers! I'll get fifty, and break the heart of every one of them!"
When Captain De Crespigny next visited Portobello, during a review of his regiment, he was surprised to see the well-remembered windows of Rosemount Villa closed, and a ticket suspended over the door, intimating that it was "to be sold or let, furnished or unfurnished; entrance immediately; rent moderate!" and with a feeling of relief he dismissed the whole affair from his thoughts, and the whole family of Smythes from his memory for ever, while humming one of his favorite airs,