LADY Isabella, for the first two or three miles, left Camilla uninterruptedly to her own thoughts; she then endeavoured to engage her in some discourse, but was soon forced to desist. Her misery exceeded all measure of restraint, all power of effort. Her Father in prison! and for her own debts! The picture was too horrible for her view, yet too adhesive to all her thoughts, all her feelings, all her faculties, to be removed from them a moment. Penetrated by what she owed to Lady Isabella, she frequently took her hand, pressed it between her own, pressed it to her lips; but could shew her no other gratitude, and force herself to no other exertion.
It was still early, they travelled post, and with four horses, and arrived at Winchester before eight o’clock.
Shaking, she entered the town, half fainting, half dead. Lady Isabella would have driven straight on to Etherington, which was but a stage further; but to enter the rectory, whence the Rector himself was torn– ‘No!’ cried she, ‘no! there where abides my Father, there alone will I abide! No roof shall cover my head, but that which covers his! I have no wish but to sink at his feet-to crawl in the dust-to confine myself to the hardest labour for the remnant of my miserable existence, so it might expiate but this guilty outrage!’
Lady Isabella took not any advantage of the anguish that was thus bursting forth with secret history; she was too delicate and too good to seize such a moment for surprising confidence, and only enquired if she had any friend in the town, who could direct her whither to go, and accompany as well as direct.
She knew no one with sufficient intimacy to endure presenting herself to them upon such an occasion; and preferred proceeding alone to the sad and cruel interview. Lady Isabella ordered the chaise to an hotel, where she was shewn into a room upstairs, whence she sent one of her own servants to enquire out where debtors were confined, and if Mr. Tyrold were in custody: charging him not to name, from whom or why he came, and begging Camilla to get ready a note to prepare her Father for the meeting, and prevent any affecting surprise. She then went to chuse herself a chamber, determined not to quit her voluntary charge, till she saw her in the hands of her own friends.
Camilla could not write: to kneel, to weep, to sue, was all she could bear to plan; to present to him the sight of her hand writing she had not courage.
Presently she heard a chaise drive rapidly through the inn gate: it might be him, perhaps released; she flew down the stairs with that wild hope; but no sooner had descended them, than a dread of his view took its place, and she ran back: she stopt, however, in the landing place, to hear who entered.
Suddenly a voice struck her ear that made her start; that vibrated quick to her heart, and there seemed to arrest the springs of life; she thought it the voice of her Mother–
It ceased to speak; and she dropt on one knee, inwardly, but fervently praying her senses might deceive her.
Again, however, and more distinctly, it reached her; doubt then ceased, and terrour next to horrour took its place. What was said she knew not, her trepidation was too great to take in more than the sound.
Prostrate she fell on the floor; but hearing a waiter say, ‘Up stairs, madam, you may have a room to yourself.’ She started, rose, and rushing violently back to the apartment she had quitted, bolted herself in; exclaiming, ‘I am not worthy to see you, my Mother! I have cast my Father into prison-and I know you will abhor me!’
She then sat down against the door, to listen if she were pursued; she heard a footstep, a female step; she concluded it that of her Mother; ‘She can come,’ cried she, ‘but to give me her malediction!’ And flew frantic about the room, looking for any means of escape, yet perceiving only the window, whence she must be dashed to destruction.
She now heard a hand upon the lock of the door. ‘O that I could die! that I could die!’ she cried, madly advancing to the window, and throwing up the sash, yet with quick instinctive repentance pulling it down, shuddering and exclaiming: ‘Is there no death for me but murder-no murder but suicide?’
A voice now found its way through her cries to her ear, that said, ‘It is me, my dear Miss Tyrold; will you not admit me?’
It was Lady Isabella; but her Mother might be with her: she could not, however, refuse to open the door, though desperately she said to herself: If she is there, I will pass her, and rush into the streets!
Seeing, however, Lady Isabella alone, she dropt on her knees, ejaculating ‘Thank Heaven! thank Heaven! one moment yet I am spared!’
‘What is it, my dear Miss Tyrold,’ said Lady Isabella, ‘that causes you this sudden agony? what can it be that thus dreadfully disorders you?’
‘Is she with you?’ cried she, in a voice scarce audible, ‘does she follow me? does she demand my Father?’
‘Rise, dear madam, and compose yourself. If you mean a Lady whom this minute I have passed, and whose countenance so much resembles yours, that I thought her at once some near relation, she is just gone from this house.’
‘Thank Heaven! thank Heaven!’ again ejaculated the prostrate Camilla; ‘My Mother is spared a little longer the dreadful sight of all she must now most abominate upon earth!’
She then begged Lady Isabella instantly to order the chaise, and return to town.
‘On the contrary,’ answered her Ladyship, extremely surprised at so wild a request, ‘Let me rather, myself, carry you to your family.’
‘O no, Lady Isabella, no!’ cried Camilla, speaking with frightful rapidity, and shaking in every limb, ‘all now is changed. I came to wait upon my Father-to humble myself at his feet-not to obtrude myself upon my Mother!–O Lady Isabella!-l shall have broken her heart-and I dare not offend her with my sight!’
Lady Isabella, with the most judicious gentleness, endeavoured to render her more reasonable.
‘I pretend not,’ she said, ‘to decide upon your situation, though I comprehend its general affliction: yet still, and at all events, its termination must be a meeting. Suffer me, therefore, rather to hasten than retard so right a measure. Allow of my mediation, and give me the infinite pleasure of leaving you in the hands of your friends.’
Camilla, though scarcely able to articulate her words, declared again the motive to her journey was at an end; that her Father had now one to watch, soothe, and attend him, who had none of her dreadful drawbacks to consoling powers; and that she would remain at Mrs. Berlinton’s till summoned home by their immediate commands.
Lady Isabella began pleading their own rights to decide if or not the meeting should be deferred: but wildly interrupting her, ‘You know not,’ she cried, ‘what it is you ask. I have not nerves, I have not hardiness to force myself into such a presence. An injured Father... an offended Mother... O Lady Isabella! if you knew how I adore-and how I have ruined them!... ’
‘Let me go to them from you, myself; let me represent your situation. They are now probably together. That Lady whom I saw but from the stairs, though her countenance so much struck me, and whom I now conclude to be Mrs. Tyrold, said, as she passed, ‘I shall walk; I only want a guide;’–
‘They had not, then, even met!’ cried Camilla, starting up with fresh horrour; ‘she is but just arrived-has but just been at Etherington-and there heard-that her husband was in prison-and in prison for the debts of her daughter! her guilty-perhaps reprobated daughter!’–
Again, wringing her hands, half distracted, ‘O, that the earth,’ she cried, ‘had received me, ere I quitted the parental roof! Innocent I had then died, beloved, regretted,-no shame would have embittered my Father’s sorrow-no wrath my Mother’s -no culpable misconduct would have blighted with disgrace their so long-long wished-for meeting!’
The compassionating, yet judicious Lady Isabella, willing to shorten the sufferings she pitied, made yet another effort to prevent this unadvised return, by proposing they should both sleep this night at Winchester, that Camilla might gather some particulars of her family, and some composure for herself, to better judge what step to pursue. But all desire of meeting was now converted into horrour; she was too much known in the neighbourhood to escape being recognized if she stayed till the morning, and her shattered intellects, she declared, could not bear passing a whole night in expectation of a discovery through some accident. ‘Have I not already,’ cried she, ‘heard her voice and fled its sound? judge then, Lady Isabella, if I can present myself before her! No, I must write, first. I have a long and dreadful history to relate-and then, when she has heard it-and when the rectory has again its reverend master-and when they find some little palliation, where now they can see only guilt-and when all is committed without disguise to their goodness-their mercy-they may say to me perhaps themselves: Unhappy Camilla! thou hast paid thy just penalty; come home, then, to thy parents’ roof, thou penitent child!’
Lady Isabella knew too little of the characters with which she had to deal, to judge if it would be right to insist any further: she ordered, therefore, fresh horses to her chaise, and as soon as her footman came back, who brought the now useless direction where Mr. Tyrold was to be found, they galloped out of Winchester.
At Alton they stopt to sleep; and, her immediate terrour removed, she became more sensible of what she owed to Lady Isabella, to whom, in the course of the evening, she recounted frankly the whole history of her debts, except what related to Lionel.
‘Your Ladyship hears me,’ said she, in conclusion, ‘with the patience of benevolence, though I fear, with the censure of all judgment. What evils have accrued from want of consideration and foresight! My errours have all been doubled by concealment-every mischief has been augmented by delay. O, Lady Isabella! how sad an example shall I add to your powers of benign instruction!–From day to day, from hour to hour, I planned expedients, where I ought to have made confessions! To avoid one dreadful-but direct evil, what I have suffered has been nearly intolerable-what I have inflicted, unpardonable!’
Lady Isabella, much touched by her openness and confidence, repaid them by all that compassion could suggest, or that a sincere disposition towards esteem could anticipate of kindness. She gathered the amount of the sum for which Mr. Tyrold was confined, and besought Camilla to let it less weigh upon her spirits, as she could herself undertake that Lord O’Lerney would accommodate him with it immediately, and wait his perfect leisure for re-payment. ‘I have known him,’ said she, ‘from a child, and have always seen, with respect and admiration, the prompt pleasure with which he rather seizes than accepts every opportunity to do good.’
Camilla returned the most grateful thanks; but acknowledged she had no apprehension but that the writ would immediately be withdrawn, as the county was almost filled with friends to her Father, who would come forward upon such an occasion. ‘What rests thus upon my mind,’ said she, ‘and what upon his-and upon my Mother’s will rest-is the disgrace-and the cause! the one so public, the other so clandestine! And besides, though this debt will be easily discharged, its payment by a loan is but incurring another: and how that is to be paid, I know not indeed. Alas! Lady Isabella!-the Father I have thus dreadfully involved, has hitherto, throughout his exemplary life, held it a sacred duty to adapt his expences to his income!’
Again Lady Isabella gave what consolation she could bestow; and in return for her trust, said she would speak to her with sincerity upon a point of much delicacy. It was of her friend, Mrs. Berlinton; ‘who now,’ said she, ‘you are not, perhaps, aware, is become a general topic of discourse. To the platonics, with which she set out in life, she has, of late, joined coquetry; nor even there stops the ardour with which she seeks to animate her existence; to two characters, hitherto thought the most contradictory, the sentimental and the flirting, she unites yet a third, till now believed incompatible with the pleasures and pursuits of either; this, I need not tell you, is that of a gamestress. And when to three such attributes is added an open aversion to her husband, a professed, an even boasted hatred of his person, his name, his very being-what hope can be entertained, be her heart, her intentions what they may, that the various dangers she sets at defiance, will not ultimately take their revenge, and surprise her in their trammels?’
Edgar himself seemed, to Camilla, to be speaking in this representation; and that idea made it catch her attention, in the midst of her utmost misery. She urged, however, all she knew, and could suggest, in favour of Mrs. Berlinton; and Lady Isabella expressed much concern in occasioning her any painful sensations. ‘But who,’ said she, ‘can see you thus nearly, and not be interested in your happiness? And I have known, alas!-though I am still under thirty, instances innumerable of self-deluded young women, who trusting to their own pure intentions, have neither feared nor heeded the dangers which encircled them, till imperceptibly, from the insidious influence of levity, they have pursued the very course they began with disclaiming, and followed the very steps from which at first they unaffectedly recoiled.’
Instructed and grateful, though incapable of being tranquillised, Camilla the next day reached Grosvenor Square long before her fair friend had left her downy pillow. Lady Isabella exacted a promise to be informed of her proceedings, and, loaded with merited acknowledgments, returned to her own mansion.
Camilla took possession of the first room in which she found a pen and ink, and wrote instantly to Lavinia a short, rapid, and incoherent letter, upon the distraction of her mind at the dreadful calamity she had occasioned her Father, and the accumulated horrours to which her Mother had returned. She durst not present herself before them uncalled, not even by letter; but she would live in the strictest retirement and penance till they ordered her home, for which epoch, not more longed than dreaded, she besought her sister’s mediation.
This sent off, she forced herself to wait upon Miss Margland, who had received an answer from Cleves to continue in town till Indiana wrote or re-appeared. She was put immediately into uncommon good-humour, by the ill success at the journey of Camilla, which she protested was exactly what she expected.
Camilla then strove to recollect all she had been told by Lord O’Lerney of Mr. Macdersey, and to relate it to Miss Margland, who, pleased and surprised, undertook to write it to Sir Hugh.
To three days of dreadful suspense she now saw herself inevitably condemned, in waiting an answer from Lavinia: but as her eyes were opene............