Chapter XXIII

But to return to Colonel Mordaunt. Though Adeline had said that he must discontinue his visits, he resolved to disobey her; and the next morning, as soon as he thought she had breakfasted, he repaired to her lodgings; where he heard, with mixed sorrow and indignation, that she had set off in a post-chaise at six o'clock, and was gone no one knew whither.

'But, surely she has left some note or message for me!' exclaimed Colonel Mordaunt.

'Neither the one nor the other,' was the answer; and he returned home in no very enviable state of mind.

Various, indeed, and contradictory were his feelings: yet still affection was uppermost; and he could not but respect in Adeline the conduct which drove him to despair. Nor was self-love backward to suggest to him, that had not Adeline felt his presence and attentions to be dangerous, she would not so suddenly have withdrawn from them; and this idea was the only one on which he could at all bear to dwell: for, when he reflected that day after day might pass without his either seeing or hearing from her, existence seemed to become suddenly a burthen, and he wandered from place to place with joyless and unceasing restlessness.

At one time he resolved to pursue her; but the next, piqued at not having received from her even a note of farewell, he determined to endeavour to forget her: and this was certainly the wiser plan of the two: but the succeeding moment he determined to let a week pass, in hopes of receiving a letter from her, and, in case he did not, to set off in search of her, being assured of succeeding in his search of her, because the singularity of Savanna's appearance, and the traces of the small-pox visible in the face of Adeline, made them liable to be observed, and easy for him to describe.

But before the week elapsed, from agitation of mind, and from having exposed himself unnecessarily to cold, by lying on damp grass at midnight, after having heated himself by immoderate walking, Colonel Mordaunt became ill of a fever; and when, after a confinement of several weeks, he was restored to health, he despaired of being able to learn tidings of the fugitives; and disappointed and dejected, he sought in the gayest scenes of the metropolis and its environs to drown the remembrances, from which in solitude he had vainly endeavoured to fly. At this time a faded but attractive woman of quality, with whom he had formerly been intimate, returned from abroad, and, meeting Colonel Mordaunt at the house of a mutual friend, endeavoured to revive in him his former attachment: but it was a difficult task for a woman, who had never been able to touch the heart, to excite an attachment in a man already sentimentally devoted to another.

Her advances, however, flattered Colonel Mordaunt, and her society amused him, till, at length, their intimacy was renewed on its former footing: but soon tired of his mistress, and displeased with himself, he took an abrupt leave of her, and throwing himself into his post-chaise, retired to the seat of a relation in Herefordshire.

Near this gentleman's house lived Mr Maynard and his two sisters, who had taken up their abode there immediately on their return from Portugal. Major Douglas, his wife, and Emma Douglas, were then on a visit to them. Mordaunt had known Major Douglas in early life; and as soon as he found that he was in the neighbourhood, he rode over to renew his acquaintance with him; and received so cordial a welcome, not only from the major, but the master of the house and his sisters, that he was strongly induced to repeat his visits, and not a day passed in which he was not, during some part of it, a guest at Mr Maynard's.

Mrs Wallington and Miss Maynard, indeed, received him with such pointed marks of distinction and preference, as to make it visible to every observer that it was not as a friend only they were desirous of considering Colonel Mordaunt; while, by spiteful looks and acrimonious remarks directed to each other, the sisters expressed the jealousy which rankled in their hearts, whenever he seemed by design or inadvertency to make one of them the particular object of his attention.

Of Emma Douglas's chance for his favour, they were not at all fearful:--they thought her too plain, and too unattractive, to be capable of rivalling them; especially in the favour of an officer, a man of fashion; and therefore they beheld without emotion the attention which Colonel Mordaunt paid to her whenever she spoke, and the deference which he evidently felt for her opinion, as her remarks on whatever subject she conversed were formed always to interest, and often to instruct.

One evening, while Major Douglas was amusing himself in looking over some magazines which had lately been bound up together, and had not yet been deposited in Mr Maynard's library, he suddenly started, laid down the book, and turning to the window, with an exclamation of--'Poor fellow!'--passed his hand across his eyes, as if meaning to disperse an involuntary tear.

'What makes you exclaim "Poor fellow?"' asked his lovely wife: 'have you met with an affecting story in those magazines?'

'No, Louisa,' replied he, 'but I met in the obituary with a confirmation of the death of an old friend, which I suspected must have happened by this time, though I never knew it before; I see by this magazine that poor Glenmurray died a very few months after we saw him at Perpignan.'

'Poor fellow!' exclaimed Mrs Douglas.

'I wish I knew what is become of his interesting companion, Miss Mowbray,' said Emma Douglas.

'I wish I did too,' secretly sighed Colonel Mordaunt: but his heart palpitated so violently at this unexpected mention of the woman for whom he still pined in secret, that he had not resolution to say that he knew her.

'Become of her!' cried Miss Maynard sneeringly: 'you need not wonder, I think, what her fate is: no doubt Mr Glenmurray's _interesting companion_ has not lost her companionable qualities, and is a companion still.'

'Yes,' observed Mrs Wallington; 'or, rather, I dare say that angel of purity is gone upon the town.'

It was the dark hour, else Colonel Mordaunt's agitation, on hearing these gross and unjust remarks, must have betrayed his secret to every eye; while indignation now impeded his utterance as much as confusion had done before.

'Surely, surely,' cried the kind and candid Emma Douglas, 'I must grossly have mistaken Miss Mowbray's character, if she was capable of the conduct which you attribute to her!'

'My dear creature!' replied Mrs Wallington, 'how should you know any thing of her character, when it was gone long before you knew her?--_Character_, indeed! you remind me of my brother--Mr Davenport,' continued she to a gentleman present, 'did you ever hear the story of my brother and an angel of purity whom he met with abroad?'

'No--never.'

'Be quiet,' said Maynard; 'I will not be laughed at.'

However, Mrs Wallington and Miss Maynard, who had not yet forgiven the deep impression which Adeline's graces had made on their brother, insisted on telling the story; to which Colonel Mordaunt listened with eager and anxious curiosity. It received all the embellishments which female malice could give it; and if it amused any one, certainly that person was neither Mordaunt, nor Emma Douglas, nor her gentle sister.

'But how fortunate it was,' added Miss Maynard, 'that we were not with my brother! as we should unavoidably have walked and talked with this angel.'

Mordaunt longed to say, 'I think the good fortune was all on Miss Mowbray's side.'

But Adeline and her cause were in good hands: Emma Douglas stood forth as her champion.--'We feel very differently on that subject,' she replied. 'I shall ever regret, not that I saw and conversed with Miss Mowbray, but that I did not see and converse with her again and again.'

At this moment Emma was standing by Colonel Mordaunt, who involuntarily caught her hand and pressed it eagerly; but tried to disguise his motives by suddenly seating her in a chair behind her, saying, 'You had better sit down; I am sure you must be tired with standing so long.'

'No; really, Emma,' cried Major Douglas, 'you go too far there; though to be sure, if by seeing and conversing with Miss Mowbray you could have convinced her of her errors, I should not have objected to your seeing her once more or so.'

'Surely,' said Mrs Douglas timidly, 'we ought, my love, to have repeated our visits till we had made a convert of her.'

'A _convert_ of her!' exclaimed Mr Maynard's sisters, 'a convert of a kept mistress!' bursting into a violent laugh, which had a most painful effect on the irritable nerves of Colonel Mordaunt, whose tongue, parched with emotion, cleaved to the roof of his mouth whenever he attempted to speak.

'Pray, to what other circumstance, yet untold, do you allude?' said Mr Davenport.

'Oh, we too had a rencontre with the philosopher and his charming friend,' said Major Douglas, 'and--but, Emma, do you tell the story.--'Sdeath!--Poor fellow!--Well, but we parted good friends,' added the kind-hearted Caledonian, dispersing a tear; while Emma, in simple but impressive language, related all that passed at Perpignan between themselves, Adeline, and Glenmurray; and concluded with saying, that, 'from the almost idolatrous respect with which Glenmurray spoke and apparently thought of Adeline, and from the account of her conduct and its motives, which he so fully detailed, she was convinced that, so far from being influenced by depravity in connecting herself with Glenmurray, Adeline was the victim of a romantic, absurd, and false conception of virtue; and she should have thought it her duty to have endeavoured, assisted by her sister, to have prevailed on her to renounce her opinions, and, by becoming the wife of Glenmurray, to restore to the society of her own sex, a woman formed to be its ornament and its example. 'Poor thing!' she added in a faltering voice, 'would that I knew her fate!'

'I can guess it, I tell you,' said Mrs Wallington.

'We had better drop the subject, madam,' replied Emma Douglas indignantly, 'as it is one that we shall never agree upon. If I supposed Miss Mowbray happy, I should feel for her, and feel interest sufficient in her fate to make me combat your prejudices concerning her; but now that she is perhaps afflicted, poor, friendless, and scorned, though unjustly, by every "virtuous she that knows her story," I cannot command my feelings when she is named with sarcastic respect, nor can I bear to hear an unhappy woman supposed to be plunged in the lowest depths of vice, whom I, on the contrary, believe to be at this moment atoning for the error of her judgment by a life of lonely penitence, or sunk perhaps already in the grave, the victim of a broken heart.'

Colonel Mordaunt, affected and delighted, hung on Emma Douglas's words with breathless attention, resolving when she had ended her narration to begin his, and clear Adeline from the calumnies of Mrs Wallington and Miss Maynard: but after articulating with some difficulty--'Ladies,--I --Miss Douglas,--I--' he found that his feelings would not allow him to proceed: therefore, suddenly raising Emma's hand to his lips, imprinted on it a kiss, at once fervent and respectful, and, making a hasty bow, ran out of the house.

Every one was astonished; but none so much as Emma Douglas.

'Why, Emma!' cried the major, 'who should have thought it? I verily believe you have turned Mordaunt's head;--I protest that he kissed your hand:--I suppose he will be here to-morrow, making proposals in form.'

'I wish he may!' exclaimed Mrs Douglas.

'It is not very likely, I think,' cried Miss Maynard.

Mrs Wallington said nothing; but she fanned herself violently.

'How do you know that?' said Maynard. 'He kissed your hand very tenderly--did he not, Miss Douglas? and took advantage of the dark hour: that looks very lover-like.'

Emma Douglas, who, in spite of her reason, was both embarrassed and flattered by Colonel Mordaunt's unexpected mode of taking leave, said not a word; but Mrs Wallington, in a voice hoarse with angry emotion, cried:

'It was very free in him, I think, and very unlike Colonel Mordaunt; for he was not a sort of man to take liberties but where he met with encouragement.'

'Then I am sure he would be free with you, sister, sometimes,' sarcastically observed Miss Maynard.

'Nay, with both of you, I think,' replied Maynard, who had not forgiven the laugh at his expense which they had tried to excite; on which an angry dialogue took place between the brother and sisters: and the Douglases, disgusted and provoked, retired to their apartment.

'There was something very strange and uncommon,' said Mrs Douglas, detaining Emma in her dressing-room, 'in Colonel Mordaunt's behaviour--Do you not think so, Emma?--If it should have any meaning!'

'Meaning!' cried the major: 'what meaning should it have? Why, my dear, do you think Mordaunt never kissed a woman's hand before?'

'But it was so _particular_.--Well, Emma, if it should lead to consequences!'

'Consequences!' cried the major: 'my dear girl, what can you mean?'

'Why, if he should _really love_ our Emma?'

'Why then I hope our Emma will love him.--What say you, Emma?'

'I say?--I--' she replied: 'really I never thought it possible that Colonel Mordaunt should have any thoughts of me, nor do I now;--but it is very strange that he should kiss my hand!'

The major could not help laughing at the _naivete_ of this reply, and in a mutual whisper they agreed how much they wished to see their sister so happily disposed of; while Emma paced up and down her own apartment some time before she undressed herself; and after seeming to convince herself, by recollecting all Colonel Mordaunt's conduct towards her, that he could not possibly _mean_ any thing by his unusual adieu, she went to sleep, exclaiming, 'But it is very strange that he should kiss my hand!'