‘Nor would I,’ replied her brother; ‘no Selina, there is not in the world any sacrifice I would not make to both or either of my parents, except that of my affections for Monimia.’ He then, though both urged him to put an end to this interview, which seemed indeed only productive of needless pain, insisted upon their sitting down by him; and, holding their hands, which he kissed as he united them, he besought them to love each other when he was gone, and to consider each other as more than sisters! He told Monimia, it was in cover of his letters to Selina he proposed to write to her, and not by the means of the under game-keeper, as he had once proposed; and he then enquired if they could not appoint some one day in the week when they might meet in that spot: ‘I shall then be present with you,’ said he, mournfully, ‘at least in imagination – yes, however distant my person shall be, my soul will be here! I shall, in fancy at least, enjoy the delight of seeing together the two beings whom I most fondly love, and of knowing they are occupied with the thoughts of their poor Orlando! There is a story in one of the popular periodical publications, I believe in the Spectator, of two lovers, who agreed at a certain hour to retire, each from their respective engagements, to look at the moon; the romantic satisfaction they enjoyed in knowing that the eyes of the person beloved were, at the moment they were gazing on it, fixed on the same planet, will by this means be doubled to me; for I shall know that at such an hour on such a morning my Monimia and my Selina will be just in this place; I shall see them – I shall see the eagerness with which Monimia will ask for news of me – the pleasure with which Selina will give it. – Every object round this spot will be present to me; and wherever I may be, however occupied in my duty, my soul will at that moment be particularly here.’
Selina, not less anxious to gratify him in this romantic fancy than Monimia herself, now named Monday, as the morning when this innocent assignation should be made; and gave as her reason for it, that on that day her mother was less likely to miss her, from her being then particularly engaged in settling her domestic concerns; and that as they did not always certainly receive letters from the neighbouring post town, except on Sundays, the morning of the following day of the week would be that in which it would be most likely she should have those that were to be sent her for Monimia.
Poor Monimia, with a deep sigh, reflected, that if all this was necessary to soften a separation of only three weeks (for Orlando had again assured her it would not be more), a longer would be quite insupportable to them both. The deep sound of the great clock at the Hall tolling six, sullenly conveyed towards them by the water, roused her from her momentary dread of future sorrow to a perfect sense of that for which was immediately before her. It was necessary to hasten this dreadful parting; there was not a moment to lose; for at a quarter past six she was to be in the parlour to make the tea for Mrs Rayland and her aunt, and the nearest way was near a mile to the house. – Falteringly she spoke to Orlando of the danger of her stay – he heard her, but he could not answer. – Selina, who was almost as fearful of being missed as she was, repeated it. – ‘Come then,’ cried Orlando, dejectedly, ‘since it must be so, let us go.’ – He took one under each arm, and was moving towards Rayland Hall, when Selina cried, ‘Dear brother! You will not go to the Hall?’ – ‘No,’ answered he; ‘but I will not suffer Monimia to go so far alone; therefore we will see her safe in sight of the house, and then return.’ – ‘We must be very quick then,’ said Selina. – ‘As quick as you can walk, my sister,’ answered he, still in extreme agitation: ‘for I care not how soon the pain I endure at this moment is at an end – I suffer the tortures of the damned!’ The poor girls, terrified at the vehemence with which he spoke, and the wild way in which he hurried on, made no reply, and only exerted themselves to keep up with him. In silence they ascended an high stile, which in one place separated the park; and in silence ascended the hill which arose behind the north front of the house. – Monimia then desired him to stop – ‘We are now,’ said she, ‘within sight of the house, and there can be no danger for me.’ – ‘Within sight!’ said Orlando: ‘How is that, my Monimia, when it is so dark that we are hardly within sight of each other?’ – ‘No,’ replied she; ‘but what I mean is, that there is nothing to fear in my crossing the park alone.’ – ‘I shall go with you, however,’ said Orlando, ‘to the old thorn in the dell below.’ – ‘At the hazard,’ said Monimia, trembling, ‘of our being met by some of the servants at the Hall, or people going home from their Sunday’s visits to them?’ – ‘At the hazard,’ added Selina, ‘of terrifying and displeasing my father and mother?’ – ‘At the hazard of every thing!’ replied Orlando, with a degree of impetuosity which neither of them had courage farther to oppose. They again became silent; and as they continued to walk very fast, or rather to run, they presently reached the place which Orlando had himself named for their parting; where Monimia again stopped, and disengaging her arm from his before he could prevent her, she said, faintly, ‘And now, Orlando, God bless you! – dear, dear Selina!’ She was quite unable to finish the sentence, but, turning, would have left them, when Orlando, throwing his arms round her, wildly pressed her to his bosom. – ‘Be not so much concerned,’ said she, trying gently to disengage herself; ‘remember you have told me we shall meet soon – very soon again: Orlando! if you really love me – if you pity me, do not, I implore you, detain me now.’ – ‘I will not,’ said he: ‘God forbid that I should injure you, dearest, loveliest – !’ She was gone! – he stood a moment like a statue, while her white cloaths made her distinguishable through the gloom. – Selina then entreated him to hasten home – ‘No!’ he said, dejectedly; ‘No, I must stay here till I hear the door, by which I know she will enter the house, shut after her; and then I shall be sure she is safe.’ Selina could not oppose this; it could indeed take up but a moment – ‘Hush!’ cried Orlando, ‘do not speak; let us listen – ha! The doors shuts! – Well, Selina, I will now go back with you; and a thousand and a thousand times I thank you, my best Selina, for your indulgence to me.’
They then hurried back the way they came, and with as much haste as the darkness of the night would permit: it was above three miles by the nearest path; and Orlando, occupied solely by the anguish of having parted with Monimia, uttered not a syllable; while Selina, excessively alarmed lest her mother should have missed her, felt her heart beat so much with apprehension, that it was with the utmost difficulty she could keep pace with him.
CHAPTER V
ON their arrival, however, at the house, Selina was agreeably surprised to find, from little Emma, who was reading in the room they shared above stairs, that she had never been enquired for; that the General had arrived just before to tea, which was, on his account, ordered later than usual; and that Isabella, who had been below ever since dinner, with her father and mother, was now, she believed, alone with the General, to whom she was to give her answer.
The palpitating heart of Selina then became quieter: she took off her hat and cloak, adjusted her hair, and prepared for the summons she expected to have to make the tea. Orlando a moment afterwards glided up to them: he said there had been no enquiries for Selina, and all was right. – ‘I went,’ said he, ‘as is my general custom when I come home, into my father’s study, but I found nobody; and, from what I can gather from the servants, this important answer has been given, and our old brother is with his papa and mamma, and with his future bride; they are all settling the ceremony together.’
‘How can you laugh, Orlando,’ said Selina, ‘at anything so serious?’
‘Nay,’ replied he, assuming a levity he was far from feeling, ‘you would not have me cry, Selina! If Isabella is happy in this match, surely her family have reason to be glad of it; but one cannot help thinking of January and May!’ Selina had read but little, and knew not to what he alluded; nor had she time to reply, for at that moment Mrs Somerive looked in upon them; she smiled, as it seemed, through tears. – ‘Orlando,’ said she, ‘I am glad you are returned – Why did you leave us so abruptl
y after dinner? But come, my children, we wait for you below.’ – ‘And are we to find there a new relation, Madam?’ said Orlando. ‘Is the General to compose hereafter a part of our family?’ – ‘Your sister has decided that it shall be so,’ replied Mrs Somerive, stifling a sigh; ‘and you, Orlando, will be pleased to see how much pleasure this alliance (notwithstanding there is certainly a too great disparity of years) gives to your dear father. The difference of age is indeed the only objection: in every other respect General Tracy is a match infinitely superior to what any of my daughters could have pretensions to.’ Mrs Somerive then led the way down stairs, and her children followed her.
During supper the General assumed, as well as he could, the triumphant air of a successful lover. Isabella was silent, and affected resignation to the will of her parents; while her father looked at her with eyes in which doubt and concern were mingled with hope and satisfaction. It seemed as if he at once rejoiced in having his daughter so well established, and yet feared that to the dazzling advantages of rank and fortune she might sacrifice her happiness. None of the party seemed much disposed for conversation, and as the General and Orlando were to depart early the next morning, they separated sooner than usual: Mrs Somerive in better spirits than she would have been, if the General had not assured her that he would himself bring Orlando down with him, when he returned to claim the happiness of becoming allied to her, and might call himself the most fortunate of men.
Calmed by these promises, of which she saw nothing that should impede the execution, she beheld her son depart on the following morning, without any of those paroxysms of grief which Orlando had so much dreaded, and which he was so ill able to bear. Before the travellers got into the chaise, in which they were to go post to London, the General demanded an audience of his future bride; and Orlando was at the same time closeted by his father, who enjoined him to preserve his morals, to attend to the cultivation of that good opinion with which the General honoured him (points which a little experience proved to be incompatible), and lastly, to endeavour by every possible means to persuade him to return home.
Orlando promised to obey all these injunctions, to the utmost of his power; and glad to escape hearing any other charges, which he might have found it impossible to obey, he received the summons now sent to him to attend the General with pleasure; for nothing is more painful than the sensations which arise at the moment of separation from such friends, even though the absence be but transient. The General had paid his compliments all round, and Orlando now embraced his family with tears in his eyes. His father wrung his hand, and once more gave him his blessing. – His mother could not utter the last adieu! but went back into the parlour with her daughters; while Orlando, seated by his military patron, left his paternal mansion as fast as four post-horses could carry him.
He was not disposed to talk; but as the distance increased between him and Monimia – between him and his family, all he held dear in the world! the depression of his spirits increased also; while his companion, as he approached the scene of his former habits, and thought of the raillery he should encounter upon his new system of reformation, became more silent and contemplative: the clamours of his mistresses, of whom he had now three upon his hands, and the ridicule of his friends, arose to his imagination in a very formidable light; but then the beauty, youth and vivacity of Isabella Somerive seemed excuses for a much greater folly than he was about to commit. He recollected many of his acquaintance, whom he was willing to suppose much older than himself, who had married young women without half her attractions. He fancied, that he was weary of the dissipated life he had hitherto led; that as he would soon be no longer a young man, but be declining towards middle age, it was time to have somebody who should be truly attached to him; while his being married did not at all preclude him from gallantries, which he saw every body else pursue whether they were married or not. The greatest inconvenience he foresaw, was what arose from the precipitate affection he had shewn towards his nephew, Captain Warwick, the orphan son of his sister, whom he had taught to consider himself as heir to his fortune, who would be much mortified at the disappointment. However, he reconciled himself to this objection, by reflecting that it would be very hard indeed if his kindness to his nephew should prevent his gratifying himself; and by resolving to make young Warwick an immediate present of a thousand pounds, and to settle a very handsome income upon him after his death, that he might not be quite thrown out of those expectations to which he had been brought up, when the General should have a family of his own.
Nothing was farther from the General’s intentions than to marry Isabella Somerive, even when he had first changed his battery, and pretended to her honourable love; but he found so little prospect of succeeding with her, even if all was to happen in her family as he had foreseen, and he felt it so impossible to live without her, that what he had begun with the most insidious designs, concluded at last in an honest, though an absurd one: and having once taken the resolution to commit matrimony, he endeavoured to reason himself out of every objection that pride, libertinism, or the fear of ridicule, continually raised against it. Isabella, whose heart was perfectly free from every impression in favour of any other man, had so behaved as to make the enamoured General believe, that only her charming reserve, owing to her rustic education, prevented her avowing her attachment to his person; though, on a thousand occasions previous to his serious declarations, she had placed his vanity and affection of youth in the most ridiculous point of view, and had shewn him that she did not care a straw for him.
But such power has vanity in obscuring the best understandings, that her ancient lover really supposed he could inspire her with sincere affection for him. Still, however, he felt an awkward kind of sensation, when he thought of the numberless gay young men with whom his blooming Isabella would be surrounded when she was his wife. Above all, he reflected with disquiet on his nephew, who was reckoned one of the handsomest men of the times – he was three-and-twenty; and the General felt no satisfaction in being called uncle – uncle! it sounded so antique. Warwick, indeed, was never admitted to live with him; and he now repented that he had procured leave for him to come home from America, in consequence of a wound he received there, and heartily wished him back again; but his return thither was not, according the General’s own account, very likely to happen. If the presence of Warwick at his own house in Grosvenor Place was not agreeable to him, that of Orlando was as little so; and, though not for quite the same reason, for another very similar. Before the last conquest made by Isabella Somerive over the susceptible heart of General Tracy, at least a third of it had been possessed by a young woman, whom he had purchased of her mother, and whose assumed virtue and great attractions had induced him to admit her into his house, where she had reigned ever since very despotically. As he had not yet settled whether he should part with her or not, or acquired courage to tell her his intentions, she must, till he could make up his mind on this point, remain where she was; and, whatever might be his future resolution, he did not greatly like that the handsome, young Orlando should be introduced to her acquaintance. As he could not give this reason to Mr Somerive for not asking Orlando to take up his abode in his house, he had sedulously avoided mentioning it at all. Orlando had never thought about it; but, occupied solely by what he had left, he considered not a matter so inconsequential as whither he was to go when he got to town. Tracy had once or twice led the conversation to topics which he thought would engage Orlando to say what he intended in this respect; but Orlando took no notice of it, till, at length, just as they crossed Fulham Bridge, Tracy said, ‘Mr Somerive, shall my chaise and horses put you down in London? – You know I stop on this side the turnpike, at Hyde-Park Corner; but the chaise shall go with you wherever you please.’
‘I am much obliged to you, Sir,’ answered Orlando, who never till that moment recollected that the General had not invited him to his house – ‘but there is no sort of occasion to take your carriage. – I shall go,’ added he,
‘this evening to Mr Woodford’s.’
That was a plan that the General did not quite approve of: he knew that, if his intended marriage was once known at that house, it would be instantly spread among his friends by means of the communication Woodford had with many of their families, which was a circumstance he was not yet prepared for. The ambition of Woodford himself, and the malice and disappointment of the two young ladies, would busy them all in circulating the report; and the General, in love as he was, and determined to marry, had not yet prepared himself to stand the ironical congratulations of his male and female friends, but particularly the latter, on his resolution of uniting himself in holy matrimony to the niece of his wine merchant. These thoughts made Orlando’s intentions of going to Woodford’s, which however he might easily have foreseen, very unpleasing to him; and he remained silent some time, considering how he might guard against the inconveniences he apprehended.
His reasons for not giving him an apartment in his own house kept their ground; but he would very fain have prevented his going to Woodford’s, at least till he had himself taken some means to parry the first burst of the ridicule he so much dreaded. He could not take one very obvious means to prevent the circulation of the news of his intended marriage, by requesting Orlando not to speak of it; for he had often remarked that he was quick-spirited, not without a considerable share of pride, and affectionate solicitude for the honour of his sisters: to affect, therefore, making a secret in London of what he had so openly avowed in the country, could hardly fail of awakening the high-spirited Orlando to some degree of resentment, if not of doubt in regard of the reality of his intentions. After a long debate on the subject, the General at last recollected that it was impossible to suppose Somerive himself would not write to a brother-in-law, whom he was so much accustomed to consult, on a subject so interesting and important; and that, therefore, any precautions he might take in regard to Orlando would be useless. It is true that his being by his intended marriage allied to his own wine merchant, had before given him many severe squalms, which a glance from the arch and bright eyes of Isabella had at once dissipated: but now, as he approached his town-house, and saw those bright eyes no longer, these fits of half repentance, originating in pride and prejudice, recurred with more force; and when he arrived at his own door, he stared from one of the reveries thus brought on, and again said to Orlando, ‘Shall my servants get you a hackney coach?’
Charlotte Smith- Collected Poetical Works Page 126
