Our guests left us. My uncle went up to town. He told me he hoped I would accompany him there as soon as Lady Hythe returned to chaperon me. But I was more averse than ever to visiting London. Bound to Vernon by my promises, and wishing to keep my faith with him, I did not like to expose myself to the temptation of seeing others I should like better. Besides, the memory of my father was still unfaded, and I resolved not to appear in public till the year of mourning was expired. Vernon accompanied his father to town, but returned again to us almost immediately. We appeared to revert to our former mode of life; but the essence of it was changed. He was moody—I anxious. I almost ventured to accuse him of ill-temper and tyranny, till, reading in my own heart its indifference, I was inclined to consider myself the cause of his discontent. I tried to restore his complacency by kindness, and in some degree succeeded.
One day Sir Richard suddenly appeared at Beech Grove. He seemed surprised to find Vernon, and care and even anxiety clouded his usual hilarity. He told us that he expected Clinton daily, and should immediately on his arrival bring him down to Hampshire.
“To celebrate my birthday?” asked Vernon, with a sardonic smile; “I am of age on Friday.”
“No,” said his father; “he will not be here so soon.”
“Nor I so honoured,” said Vernon; “Clinton’s coming of age was celebrated by tumultuous rejoicings; but he is the Elder Son.”
Sir Richard gave Vernon, who spoke sneeringly, a quick glance—an indescribable expression of pain crossed his countenance.
“Have you been staying here since Christmas?” he asked at last. Vernon would have replied evasively, but Marianne said—
“Oh yes! he is always here now.”
“You appear to have become very fond of Beech Grove of a sudden,” continued his father. I felt that Sir Richard’s eye was fixed on me as he spoke, and I was conscious that not only my cheeks, but my temples and neck were crimsoned with blushes. Some time after I saw my uncle in the shrubbery; he was alone, and the want of society was always so painful to him, that I thought it but a mark of duteous kindness to join him. I wondered, as I approached, to see every token of haggard care on a face usually so smiling. He saw me, and smoothed his brow; he began talking of London, of my elder cousin, of his desire that I should conquer my timidity, and consent to be presented this spring. At length he suddenly stopped short, and scrutinizing me as he spoke, said—
“Pardon me, dear Ellen, if I annoy you; but I am your guardian, your second father—am I not? Do not be angry, therefore, if I ask you, are you attached to my son Vernon?”
My natural frankness prompted one reply, but a thousand feelings, inexplicable but powerful, hung on my tongue. I answered, stammering: “No—I believe so—I like him.”
“But you do not love him?”
“What a question, dear uncle!” I replied, covered with confusion.
“Is it even so?” cried Sir Richard; “and is he to succeed in all?”
“You mistake,” I said; for I had a horror of confessing an attachment which, after all, I did not feel, and so of making our engagement more binding. But I blushed deeply as I spoke, and my uncle looked incredulous, and said—
“Yet it would make you very unhappy if he married another.”
“Oh no!” I cried, “he has my free leave. I should wish him joy with all my heart.”
The idea—the hope that he was playing me false, and might release me from my trammels, darted through my mind with a quick thrill of delight. Sir Richard saw that I was in earnest, and his countenance cleared.
“What a strange thing is maiden coyness,” he observed; “you blushed so prettily, Ellen, that I could have sworn you had given your heart to Vernon. But I see I was mistaken; I am glad of it, for he would not suit you.”
No more was said, but I felt conscience-stricken and miserable. I had deceived my uncle, and yet I had not. I had declared that I did not love him to whom I had pledged my hand; and the whole was a mystery and an entanglement that degraded me in my own eyes. I longed to make a full confession; yet then all would be over—we should both be inextricably bound. As it was, some caprice might cause Vernon to transfer his affection to another, and I could give him entire freedom, without any human being knowing how foolishly I had acted.
We had no guests at dinner; Sir Richard was to leave us early the next morning. After dinner I speedily retired to the drawing-room, leaving father and son together; they remained two hours. I was on the point of withdrawing to my own room, to avoid a meeting which alarmed me, I knew not why, when they entered. It seemed as if, in the interval of my absence, they had received sudden intelligence of a dear friend’s death; and yet not quite so, for though Vernon looked absorbed in thought,
