Complete Poetical Works of Charlotte Smith

by Charlotte Smith

  But it was hardly less necessary to own to him part of the truth, than to conceal the rest. Should he suspect that Godolphin was his rival, and a rival fondly favoured, she knew that his pride, his jealousy, his resentment, would hurry him into excesses more dreadful, than any that had yet followed his impetuous love or his unbridled passions.

  The apprehensions that he must, if they were long together, discover it, were more severely distressing than any she had yet felt; and she resolved, both now and when they reached Besançon, to keep the strictest guard on her words and looks; and to prevent if possible her real sentiments being known to Delamere, to Lady Westhaven, and to Godolphin himself.

  So painful and so difficult appeared the dissimulation necessary for that end; and so contrary did she feel it to her nature, that she was withheld only by her love to Lady Westhaven from flying to England with Mrs. Stafford; and should she be restored to her estate, she thought that the only chance she had of tranquillity would be to hide herself from Delamere, whom she at once pitied and dreaded, and from Godolphin, whom she tenderly loved, in the silence and seclusion of Mowbray Castle.

  Her embarrassment and uneasiness were encreased, when, on her joining Lord and Lady Westhaven, whose carriages and baggage were now ready, she found that the Chevalier de Bellozane had insisted on escorting them; an offer which they had no pretence to refuse. On her taking leave of the Baron, he very warmly and openly recommended his son to her favour; and Mrs. St. Alpin, who was very fond of her, repeated her wishes that she would listen to her nephew; and both with unfeigned concern saw their English visitors depart. Captain Godolphin had a place in his brother’s chaise; Madelon occupied that which on the former journey was filled by Bellozane in the coach, the Chevalier now proceeding on horseback.

  During the journey, Emmeline was low and dejected; from which she was sometimes roused by impatient enquiries and fearful apprehensions which darted into her mind, of what was to happen at the end of it. Every thing he observed, confirmed Godolphin in his persuasion that her heart was wholly Delamere’s: her behaviour to himself was civil, but even studiously distant; while the unreserved and ardent addresses of Bellozane, who made no mystery of his pretensions, she repulsed with yet more coldness and severity: and tho’ towards Lord and Lady Westhaven the sweetness of her manners was yet preserved, she seemed overwhelmed with sadness, and her vivacity was quite lost.

  As soon as they reached Besançon, Lord Westhaven directed the carriages to stop at another hotel, while he went with his brother to that where Lord Delamere was. At the door, they met Millefleur; who, overjoyed to see them, related, that since Mr. Godolphin left his master the violence of his impatience had occasioned a severe relapse, in which, according to the orders Mr. Godolphin had given, the surgeons had bled and blistered him; that he was now again better, but very weak; yet so extremely ungovernable and self-willed, that the French people who attended him could do nothing with him, and that his English footmen, and Millefleur himself, were forced to be constantly in his room to prevent his leaving it or committing some other excess that might again irritate the fever and bring on alarming symptoms. They hastened to him; and found not only that his fever still hung on him, tho’ with less violence, but that he was also extremely emaciated; and that only his youth had supported him thro’ so severe an illness, or could now enable him to struggle with it’s effects.

  The moment they entered the room, he enquired after his sister and Emmeline; and hearing the latter was actually come, he protested he would instantly go to her.

  Lord Westhaven and Godolphin resolutely opposed so indiscreet a plan: the former, by his undeviating rectitude of mind and excellent sense, had acquired a greater ascendant over Delamere than any of his family had before possessed; and to the latter he thought himself so much obliged, that he could not refuse to attend to him. He consented therefore at length to remain where he was; and Lord Westhaven hastened back to his wife, whom he led immediately to her brother.

  She embraced him with many tears; and was at first greatly shocked at his altered countenance and reduced figure. But as Lord Westhaven and Godolphin both assured her there was no longer any danger if he would consent to be governed, she was soothed into hope of his speedy recovery and soon became tolerably composed.

  As Lord Westhaven and Godolphin soon left them alone, he began to talk to his sister of Emmeline. He told her, that when he had been undeceived by Mr. Godolphin, and the scandalous artifices discovered which had raised in his mind such injurious suspicions, he had declared to Lord and Lady Montreville his resolution to proceed no farther in the treaty which they had hurried on with Miss Otley, and had solicited their consent, to his renewing and fulfilling that, which he had before entered into with Miss Mowbray; but that his mother, with more anger and acrimony than ever, had strongly opposed his wishes; and that his father had forbidden him, on pain of his everlasting displeasure, ever again to think of Emmeline.

  After having for some time, he said, combated their inveterate prejudice, he had left them abruptly, and set out with his three servants for St. Alpin, (where Godolphin informed him Emmeline was to be;) when a fever, owing to heat and fatigue, seized and confined him where he now was.

  ‘Ah, tell me, my sister, what hopes are there that Emmeline will pardon me? May I dare enquire whether she is yet to be moved in my favour?’

  Lady Westhaven, who during their journey could perceive no symptoms that her resolution was likely to give way, dared not feed him with false hopes; yet unwilling to depress him by saying all she feared, she told him that Emmeline was greatly and with justice offended; but that all he could at present do, was to take care of his health. She entreated him to consider the consequence of another relapse, which might be brought on by his eagerness and emotion; and then conjuring him to keep all he knew of Lady Adelina a secret from Lord Westhaven (the necessity of which he already had heard from Godolphin) she left him and returned to Emmeline.

  To avoid the importunity of Bellozane, and the melancholy looks of Godolphin, which affected her with the tenderest sorrow, she had retired to a bed chamber, where she waited the return of Lady Westhaven with impatience.

  Her solicitude for Delamere was very great; and her heart greatly lightened when she found that even his tender and apprehensive sister did not think him in any immediate danger, and believed that a few days would put him out of hazard even of a relapse.

  She now again thought, that since Lady Westhaven had nothing to fear for his life, her presence would be less necessary; and her mind, the longer it thought of Mowbray Castle, adhering with more fondness to her plan of flying thither, she considered how she might obtain in a few days Lady Westhaven’s consent to the preliminary measure of quitting Besançon.

  CHAPTER VI

  While the heiress of Mowbray Castle meditated how to escape thither from the embarrassed and uneasy situation in which she now was; and while she fancied that in retirement she might conceal, if she could not conquer, her affection for Godolphin, (tho’ in fact she only languished for an opportunity of thinking of him perpetually without observation), Lady Westhaven laid in wait for an occasion to try whether the ruined health and altered looks of her brother, would not move, in his favour, her tender and sensible friend.

  While Delamere kept his chamber, Emmeline easily evaded an interview; but when, after three or four days, he was well enough to leave it, it was no longer possible for her to escape seeing him. However Godolphin thought himself obliged to bury in silence his unfortunate passion, he could not divest himself of that painful curiosity which urged him to observe the behaviour of Emmeline on their first meeting. Bellozane had discovered on what footing Lord Delamere had formerly been; and he dreaded a renewal of that preference she had given her lover, to which his proud heart could ill bear to submit, tho’ he could himself make no progress in her favour. Tho’ Lady Westhaven had entreated her to see Delamere alone, she had refused; assigning as a reason that as he could never again be to her any other than
a friend, nothing could possibly pass which her other friends might not hear. Delamere was obliged therefore to brook the hard conditions of seeing her as an indifferent person, or not seeing her at all. But tho’ she was immoveably determined against receiving him again as a lover, she had not been able to steel her heart against his melancholy appearance; his palid countenance, his emaciated form, extremely affected her. And when he approached her, bowed with a dejected air, and offered to take her hand — her haughtiness, her resentment forsook her — she trembling gave it, expressed in incoherent words her satisfaction at seeing him better, and betrayed so much emotion, that Godolphin, who with a beating heart narrowly observed her, saw, as he believed, undoubted proof of her love; and symptoms of her approaching forgiveness.

  Delamere, who, whenever he was near her, ceased to remember that any other being existed; would, notwithstanding the presence of so many witnesses, have implored her pardon and her pity; but the moment he began to speak on that subject, she told him, with as much resolution as she could command, that the subject was to her so very disagreeable, as would oblige her to withdraw if he persisted in introducing it.

  While his looks expressed how greatly he was hurt by her coldness, those of Godolphin testified equal dejection. For however she might repress the hopes of his rival by words of refusal and resentment, he thought her countenance gave more unequivocal intelligence of the real state of her heart. Bellozane, as proud, as little used to controul and disappointment, and with more personal vanity than Lord Delamere, beheld with anger and mortification the pity and regard which Emmeline shewed for her cousin; and ceasing to be jealous of Godolphin, he saw every thing to apprehend from the rank, the fortune, the figure of Delamere — from family connection, which would engage her to listen to him — from ambition, which his title would gratify — from her tenderness to Lady Westhaven, and from the return of that affection which she had, as he supposed, once felt for Lord Delamere himself.

  But the more invincible the obstacles which he saw rising, appeared, the more satisfaction he thought there would be in conquering them. And to yield up his pretensions, on the first appearance of a formidable rival, was contrary to his enterprising spirit and his ideas of that glory, which he equally coveted in the service of the fair and of the French King.

  With these sentiments of each other, the restraint and mistrust of every party impeded general or chearful conversation. Godolphin soon left the room, to commune with his own uneasy thoughts in a solitary walk; Lord Westhaven would then have taken out Bellozane, in order to give Lord Delamere an opportunity of being alone with his sister and Emmeline. But he was determined not to understand hints on that subject; and when his Lordship asked him to take an afternoon’s walk, found means to refuse it. Afraid of leaving two such combustible spirits together, Lord Westhaven, to the great relief of Emmeline, staid with them till Delamere retired for the night.

  But the behaviour of Bellozane to Emmeline, which was very particular, as if he wished it to be noticed, had extremely alarmed Delamere; and whenever they afterwards met, they surveyed each other with such haughty reserve, and their conversation bordered so nearly on hostility and defiance, that Emmeline, who expected every hour to see their animosity blaze out in a challenge, could support her uneasiness about it no longer; and sending early to speak to Lord Westhaven on the beginning of the second week of their stay, she represented to him her fears, and entreated him to prevail on the Chevalier to leave them and return to St. Alpin.

  ‘I have attempted it already,’ said he; ‘but with so little success, that if I press it any farther I must quarrel with him myself. I know perfectly well that your fears have too much foundation; and that if we can neither separate or tranquillise these unquiet spirits, we shall have some disagreeable affair happen between them. I know nothing that can be done but your accepting at once your penitent cousin.’

  ‘No, my Lord,’ answered she, with an air of chagrin, ‘that I will not do! I most ardently wish Lord Delamere well, and would do any thing to make him happy — except sacrificing my own happiness, and acting in opposition to my conscience.’

  ‘Why, my dear Emmeline, how is this? You had once, surely, an affection for Delamere; and his offence against you, however great, admits of considerable alleviation. Consider all the pains that were taken to disunite you, and the importunity he suffered from his family. Surely, when you are convinced of his repentance you should restore him to your favour; and however you may be superior to considerations of fortune and rank, yet when they unite in a man otherwise unexceptionable they should have some weight.’

  ‘They have none with me, upon my honour, my Lord. And since we have got upon this topic, I will be very explicit — I am determined on no account to marry Lord Delamere. But that I may give no room to charge me with caprice or coquetry (since your Lordship believes I once had so great a regard for him), or with that unforgiving temper which I see you are disposed to accuse me of, it is my fixed intention, if I obtain, by your Lordship’s generous interposition, the Mowbray estate, to retire to Mowbray Castle, and never to marry at all.’

  Lord Westhaven, at the solemnity and gravity with which she pronounced these words, began to laugh so immoderately, and to treat her resolution with ridicule so pointed, that he first made her almost angry, and then obliged her to laugh too. At length, however, she prevailed on him again to listen to her apprehensions about Delamere and Bellozane.

  ‘Do not, my Lord, rally me so cruelly; but for Heaven’s sake, before it is too late, prevent any more meetings between these two rash and turbulent young men. Why should the Chevalier de Bellozane stay here?’

  ‘Because it is his pleasure. I do assure you seriously, my dear Miss Mowbray, that I have almost every day since we came hither attempted to send my fiery cousin back to St. Alpin. But my anxiety has only piqued him; and he determines more resolutely to stay because he sees my motive for wishing him gone. He is exactly the character which I have somewhere seen described by a French poet. — A young man who,

  — — ‘leger, impetueux, De soi meme rempli, jaloux, presomptueux, Bouillant dans ses passions; cedant a ses caprices; Pour un peu de valeur, se passoit de tous ses vices.’

  ‘Yet, among all his faults, poor Bellozane has some good qualities; and I am really sorry for this strange perseverance in an hopeless pursuit, because it prevents my asking him to England. I give you my honour, Emmeline,’ continued his Lordship, in a more serious tone, ‘that I have repeatedly represented to him the improbability of his success; but he answers that you have never positively dismissed him by avowing your preference to another; that he knows your engagement with Lord Delamere is dissolved, and that he considers himself at liberty to pursue you till you have decidedly chosen, or even till you are actually married. Nay, I doubt whether your being married would make any difference in the attentions of this eccentric and presuming Frenchman, for I do not consider Bellozane as a Swiss.’

  ‘Well, but my dear Lord, if the Chevalier will persist in staying, I must determine to go. I see not that my remaining here will be attended with any good effects. It may possibly be the cause of infinite uneasiness to Lady Westhaven. Do, therefore, prevail upon her to let me go alone to St. Germains. When I am gone, Lord Delamere will think more of getting well than of forcing me into a new engagement. He will then soon be able to travel; and the Chevalier de Bellozane will return quietly to the Baron.’

  ‘Why to speak ingenuously, Emmeline, it does appear to me that it were on every account more proper for you to be in England. Thither I wish you could hasten, before it will be possible for Lord Delamere, or indeed for my wife, who must travel slowly, to get thither. I do not know whether your travelling with us will be strictly proper, on other accounts; but if it were, it would be rendered uneasy to you by the company of these two mad headed boys; for Bellozane I am sure intends, if you accompany us, to go also.’

  ‘What objection is there then to my setting out immediately for St. Germains, with Le Limosin an
d Madelon, if Lady Westhaven would but consent to it?’

  ‘I can easily convince her of the necessity of it; but I foresee another objection that has escaped you.’

  ‘What is that, my Lord?’

  ‘That Bellozane will follow you.’

  ‘Surely he will not attempt it?’

  ‘Indeed I apprehend he will. I have no manner of influence over him; and he is here connected with a set of military men, who are the likeliest people in the world to encourage such an enterprize — and if at last this Paris should carry off our fair Helen!’ —

  ‘Nay, but my Lord do not ridicule my distress.’

  ‘Well then, I will most seriously and gravely counsel you: and my advice is, that you set out as soon as you can get ready, and that my brother Godolphin escort you.’

  Emmeline was conscious that she too much wished such an escort; yet fearing that her preference of him would engage Godolphin in a quarrel with Bellozane or Lord Delamere, perhaps with both, she answered, while the deepest blush dyed her cheeks —

  ‘No, my Lord, I cannot — I mean not — I should be sorry to give Captain Godolphin the trouble of such a journey — and I beg you not to think of it — .’

  ‘I shall speak to him of it, however.’

  ‘I beg, my Lord — I intreat that you will not.’

  ‘Here he is — and we will discuss the matter with him now.’

  Godolphin at this moment entered the room; and Lord Westhaven relating plainly all Emmeline’s fears, and her wishes to put an end to them by quitting Besançon, added the proposal he had made, that Godolphin should take care of her till she joined Mrs. Stafford.