“The Duke asked her if she had heard from him, and she gave him Edmund’s letter. My uncle read it calmly, and when he had finished desired her to attend him to his library.”
“I confess this does not look well,” said Marianne, and another long pause ensued, which was broken by the sound of rapid footsteps, and in an instant Elvira rushed into the apartment with a face radiant with joy.
“Oh, my dear cousin,” cried she, “my father is so kind! so good! I have told him everything, and he is not in the least angry. He has given his consent, and all is settled. I am to marry Edmund, and you Edric, and—”
“I marry Edric!” exclaimed Rosabella, the crimson flush of anger darkening over her fine features, and proud scorn curling her beautiful lips; “I marry that feeble inanimate wretch! When we meet, and he offers his hand to greet me, his very touch seems to freeze my veins. Cold, prudent, and calculating, he has all the vices of age without its excuses. And shall I marry such a being? No, if all other resources fail, death shall free me before the hated moment arrives!” and starting from her couch, she paced the room in violent agitation.
“My dear Rosabella,” said Elvira following, and trying to soothe her, “do pray compose yourself. Consider my father—how angry he would be if he were to hear you! He is so positive he might—” Here Elvira stopped, her delicacy making her averse to remind her cousin how completely she was in the Duke’s power.
“Go on,” cried Rosabella, tauntingly; “I know what you would say. Upbraid me with my meanness—trample upon me—spurn me—do not even spare the memory of my poor dear father;—I am prepared for everything; I know the worst; I know that my uncle is positive, and that I am a poor dependant, subsisting upon his bounty, and that it is in his power to turn me this instant from his door, without a shilling to procure me food or shelter. But not even this shall control my will. Poor and dependant as I am, I am free; and I would sooner labour in the meanest servitude, beg my bread, or even perish for want, than reside in a palace surrounded by crowds of adoring slaves, if the price were that I must call Edric husband.”
“My dear mistress,” exclaimed Marianne, soothingly, “you are too violent.”
“I am very much hurt, Rosabella,” said Elvira, “to find you think me capable of saying anything intentionally to wound your feelings. As to your unhappy father, you must be aware I know his history only vaguely, as it is a subject to which the Duke never suffers anyone to allude; and I assure you he was not even in my thoughts when I spoke—”
“Oh!” cried Rosabella, clasping her hands together energetically as she spoke; “Oh! that it were but permitted to me to clear my father’s name from the shade that hangs over it. I know, I feel, that he cannot have been guilty! He must have been the victim of slander; of vile contrivance or malice of plots raised against him by those who envied his fair fame. Oh, that I knew the facts, and could clear him from all blame! By heaven! neither the gratification of my love, nor any revenge, could afford me half the pleasure!”
“You use strange language, Rosabella,” said Elvira, blushing at her cousin’s warmth; “I own I cannot comprehend such violent feelings. Thank God! nature formed mine in a more temperate mould.”
“Your feelings!” cried Rosabella, scornfully; “you have none—you cannot even fancy them—you are incapable of love!”
“There you do me injustice,” replied Elvira; “such passions as yours I am indeed incapable of feeling—but love; real, pure, undefiled love; that absorbing affection which prefers another’s happiness to its own; that devotion which would sink unknown to the grave, to procure another’s happiness; that seeks not its own gratification, but would sacrifice all the world can give, to promote the welfare of another; that can taste of no pleasure and partake of no delight, unless it be participated by the beloved object, and even then, joys in his satisfaction more than in its own; this I can feel; my heart tells me that I can, and this, I hope, I shall in time feel for Edmund.”
“Then you own you do not love him yet?” asked Rosabella, with a bitter smile.
“I fear I do not,” returned Elvira, sighing, “at least not as he should be loved. But,” continued she, after a short pause, “perhaps my ideas of love are foolish and romantic, and I shall in time become more reasonable.”
A smile of contempt was Rosabella’s only answer, when their conference was interrupted by a summons for them both to attend the Duke. They obeyed in silence, and found him sitting in his library, with Father Morris standing beside his chair.
“Of course, Elvira has told you what I mean to do for you?” said the Duke, addressing Rosabella.
“Yes! my lord, she has,” returned Rosabella with dignity.
“Well, and what do you say to it?”
“I thought your Grace did not intend either my cousin, or myself to marry, till we were past the age fixed by the late Queen?”
“Pooh! nonsense; you neither of you have the least chance of ascending the throne. Claudia is not thirty: and she is likely to live these fifty years.”
Rosabella did not speak, but the colour fled from her cheeks, and her eyes were cast upon the ground, whilst her strongly compressed lips showed that it was with infinite difficulty that she controlled her feelings sufficiently to hear her uncle with patience.
“In short,” continued the Duke, “I have made up my mind that you shall both marry; and as Edmund it seems has fixed upon Elvira, I think I cannot do better than to give you to his younger brother.”
“And do you know of whom you are disposing so unceremoniously?” asked Rosabella,
