While time was yet a stranger to regulation, and ere the dial shewed its passage; when it had no computation but by our feelings, our weariness, our occupations, or our passions; the sun which arose splendid upon felicity, must have excited, by its quick parting rays, a surprise nearly incredulous; while that which gave light but to sorrow, may have appeared, at its evening setting, to have revolved the whole year. This period, so long past, seemed now present to Lady Aurora and to Juliet; so uncounted flew the minutes; so unconscious were they that they had more than met, more than embraced, more than reciprocated their joy in acknowledged kindred; that each felt amazed as well as shocked, when a summons from Mrs Howel to Lady Aurora, told them that the day was fast wearing, away.

Lady Aurora reluctantly obeyed the call; and in thanksgiving, pious and delighted, Juliet spent the interval of her absence.

It was not long; she returned precipitately; but colourless, trembling, and altered, though making an effort to smile: but the struggle against her feelings ended in a burst of tears; and, again falling upon the neck of Juliet; ‘Oh my sweet sister!’ she cried, ‘is your persecution never to end?’

Juliet, though quickly alarmed, fondly answered, ‘It is over already! While that precious appellation comes from your lips,—sweet title of tenderness and affection!—I feel above every danger!’

Lady Aurora, bitterly weeping, was compelled, then, to acknowledge that she had been hurried away by Mrs Howel, to be told that a foreigner, ill dressed, and just arrived from the Continent, was demanding, in broken English, of every one that he met, some news of a young person called Miss Ellis.

The exaltation of Juliet was instantly at an end; and, in an accent of despair, she uttered, ‘Is it so soon, then, over!—my transient felicity!’

Whether this foreigner were her persecutor himself, escaped and disguised; or some emissary employed to claim or to entrap her, was all of doubt by which she was momentarily supported; for she felt as determined to resist an agent, as she thought herself incapable to withstand the principal.

Mrs Howel, who had heard of the search, represented to Lady Aurora, the extreme impropriety of her ladyship’s intercourse with a person thus suspiciously pursued; at least till the opinion of Lord Denmeath could be known. But Lady Aurora, fully satisfied that this helpless fugitive was her half-sister, was now as firm as she had hitherto been facile; and declared that, though her personal inclinations should still yield to her respect for her uncle, her sense of filial duty to the memory of her father, must bind her, openly and unreservedly, to sustain his undoubted daughter.

A waiter now interrupted them, to demand admission to Miss Ellis for a foreigner.

‘She is not here!—There is no Miss Ellis here! No such person!’—precipitately cried Lady Aurora; but the foreigner himself, who stood behind the waiter, glided into the room.

Lady Aurora nearly fainted; Juliet screamed and hid her face; the foreigner called out, ‘Ah Mademoiselle Juliette! c’est, donc, vous! et vous ne me reconnoissez pas?’1

‘Ah heaven!’ cried Juliet, uncovering her face; ‘Ambroise! my good, my excellent Ambroise! is it you?—and you only?’—Turning then, enraptured, to Lady Aurora, ‘Kindest,’ she cried, ‘and tenderest of human beings! condescend to receive, and to aid me to thank, the valuable person to whom I owe my first deliverance!’

Lady Aurora, revived and charmed, poured forth the warmest praises; while Juliet, eagerly demanding news of the Marchioness; and whether he could give any intelligence of the Bishop; saw his head droop, and seized with terrour, exclaimed, ‘Oh Ambroise! am I miserable for ever!’

He hastened to assure her that they were both alive, and well; and, in the ecstacy of her gratitude, upon the cessation of her first direful surmise, she promised to receive all other information with courage.

He shook his head, with an air the most sorrowful; and then related that the Bishop, after delays, dangers, fruitless journies, and disasters innumerable, which had detained him many months in the interiour, had, at last, and most unfortunately, reached a port, whence he was privately to embark for joining his niece, just as the commissary, upon returning from his abortive expedition, was re-landed. By some cruel accident, the voice of the prelate reached his ear: immediate imprisonment, accompanied by treatment the most ignominious, ensued. Ambroise, who, for the satisfaction of the Marchioness, had attended the Bishop to the coast, was seized also; and both would inevitably have been executed, had not a project occurred to the commissary, of employing Ambroise to demand and recover his prey, and her dowry.

Ambroise stopt and wept.

Bloodless now became the face of Juliet, though with forced, yet decided courage, ‘I understand you!’ she cried, ‘and Oh! if I can save him,—by any sacrifice, any devotion,—I am contented! and I ought to be happy!’

‘Ah, cruel sister!’ cried Lady Aurora; ‘would you kill me?’—

Juliet, shedding a torrent of tears, tenderly embraced her.

‘The Bishop,’ Ambroise continued, ‘no sooner comprehended than he forbade the attempt; but he was consigned, unheard, to a loathsome cell; and Ambroise was almost instantly embarked; with peremptory orders to acquaint la citoyenne Julie that unless she returned immediately to her husband, in order to sign and seal, by his side, and as his wife, their joint claim to her portion, upon the terms that Lord Denmeath had dictated; the most tremendous vengeance should fall upon the hypocritical old priest, by every means the most terrible that could be devised.’

‘I am ready! quite ready!’ cried the pale Juliet, with energy; ‘I do not sacrifice, I save myself by preserving my honoured guardian!’

This eagerness to rescue her revered benefactor, which made her feel gloriously, though transiently, the exaltation of willing martyrdom, soon subsided into the deepest grief, upon seeing Lady Aurora, shivering, speechless, and nearly lifeless, sink despondingly upon the ground.

Juliet, kneeling by her side, and pressing her nearly cold face to her bosom, bathed her cheeks, throat, and shoulders with fast falling tears; but felt incapable of changing her plan. Yet all her own anguish was almost intolerably embittered, by thus proving the fervour of an affection, in which almost all her wishes might have been concentrated, but that honour, conscience, and religion united to snatch her from its enjoyment.

The news that Lady Aurora was taken ill, spread quickly to Mrs Howel; and brought that lady to the apartment of Juliet in person. Lady Aurora was already recovered, and seated in the folding arms of Juliet, with whom her tears were bitterly, but silently mingling.

Mrs Howel, shocked and alarmed, summoned the female attendants to conduct her ladyship to her own apartment.

Lady Aurora would accept no aid save from Juliet; fondly leaning upon whose arm she reached a sofa in her bed-chamber; where she assumed, though with cruel struggles against her yielding nature, voice and courage to pronounce, ‘My dear Mrs Howel, you have always been so singularly good to me,—you have always done me so much honour, that you must not, will not refuse to be kinder to me ............