Chapter VIII: Will Norah and Alfred Meet?

We spent all that Autumn and Winter with Dorina at the Castle Hall, and had the pleasure of seeing her gradually recover her health and spirits. She often heard from Count Rossi, and although she would not consent to the marriage until his year of widowhood was passed, yet she acceded to his request to be allowed to visit us all in the Spring.

She took the greatest interest in my concerns, and eagerly watched for the letters I received from Carlo, telling of his adventures in search of the pretended wife of my uncle, who was said to be still alive, but no one could tell what had become of her.

Both Aunt Jane and Dorina seemed to have more confidence in his ultimate success than I had; but the fact, I believe, was, that I was still so unsettled in my religious belief, that I had not the heart to put faith in any good; and I am ashamed to say that I often found myself mistrusting the disinterested purity of his motives; and, if my father’s character could have been quite vindicated without attaining my property again, it would have made me more confident in Carlo.

Yet, how fondly I loved the old Priory, from the hallowed associations that connected it with my father, cannot be described. The love for that old place had been my strongest and best feeling, and Aunt Jane used sometimes laughingly to say, that I had never been really in love except with Langdale Priory--and to think that it had passed into the hands of such a man as the present possessor! The poor utterly neglected, and an example of every vice given by the inhabitants of the dear old house!

Norah accompanied her father and family to Italy, and I was glad to find they were going to pass some months not far from my mother at Sorrento; but Sir Alfred was still in the East, so we feared that they would not be likely to meet.

My plan, after my engagement to Carlo, had been to go and live with my mother during the two years of his probation; but Aunt Jane persuaded me that I should be of more use at Castle Hall with Dorina; also that as the Chandos family and Norah were going to Italy, and probably to Sorrento, it was better that I should not be there, in case Sir Alfred should resolve to seek an interview with Norah. But I believe her chief reason was that she dreaded the deteriorating influence of the set among which my mother lived, that the society of the frivolous and idle persons round her would retard the progress of my mind, which was only now beginning to think; and she felt sure that my father would have said she was right.

In fact it was his dying wish that I should go to England, and I knew he intended to have taken me to the Priory when I became of age. So I was persuaded to remain with Dorina, and Aunt Jane, who, now being at liberty to be wherever she felt she was of most use since her favourite niece was satisfactorily settled, had also consented to remain at Castle Hall.