CHAPTER VIII.

Tristes pensamientos, De alegres memorias.

_Spanish Romance._

The prospect of a protracted stay at Calbury gave Colonel Warenne no promise of a return to tranquillity of mind. The apprehension of danger past, the routine of military duties usual in country quarters alone demanding his attention, his thoughts naturally recurred to his blighted hopes, and the distressing situation in which fortune had placed him.

Adelaide was at Epworth—only two short miles separated them. Henry and Frank were living more at Epworth than at Calbury. It was necessary, unless he determined to set at defiance the common rules of civility, that he himself should visit those with whom he had so lately lived in intimacy. He must again undergo the torture of meeting her he loved with the degree of coldness consistent with his ideas of duty, and her father’s more than hinted opinion of his supposed pretensions. There was no alternative; in ordinary courtesy he was bound to make the attempt, even at the expense of increased wretchedness.

After a delay of some days, during which Warenne persuaded himself that he was detained in Calbury by business, he rode over to Epworth, with a tolerably calm exterior, though with a beating heart. His visit seemed to have been foreseen by Lord Framlingham; for as the servant ushered Warenne into the drawing-room, he entered it by another door; and as his lordship appeared to have correctly calculated the precise moment of Warenne’s calling, so did he seem to have determined to ascertain the exact duration of his stay beneath his daughter’s roof, for he did not quit the drawing-room until Warenne had departed.

This behaviour on the part of Lord Framlingham, though it rather irritated Warenne at the time, yet served to render his visit less painful than he had expected to find it. There was no temptation in the presence of a third person, directly opposed to his wishes, to lay aside the measured friendliness of manner which he had adopted.

A second, and a third time, that Warenne called at Epworth, Lord Framlingham observed a similar system of precaution; but at last, either bored with playing the part of a Duenna, or becoming satisfied with Warenne’s conduct, he relaxed in his vigilance; and one day that the latter had ridden over to Epworth with Frank and Henry, who wished to arrange some shooting excursion with the gamekeepers, he found himself once again alone with Adelaide. He felt his hour of trial to be at last come. He was now to show his self-command, to keep down the tumultuous and passionate thoughts to which he burnt to give utterance. His love had not diminished through the obstacles which fortune had thrown in his path to happiness; on the contrary, it burnt with a stronger and a steadier flame than when he had, without interruption, enjoyed the pleasure of her society in London.

Adelaide, though possessed of every requisite to grace the most refined circles, appeared yet more lovely in the calmer occupations of the country. In the easy intercourse of her immediate friends her shyness forsook her, and she did justice to the beauty of her character. All he had seen of her, all he had heard of her since she came to Epworth, tended to foster his luckless passion. The poor had already learnt to bless her name. With her wonted enthusiasm she had commenced plans for their improvement; and though her schemes might perhaps be a little visionary, Warenne was not inclined to quarrel with their want of practicability, while they developed the benevolent spirit of their author.

Adelaide also had reasons for feeling distressed at the interview. She had perceived her father’s manner to Warenne, and became satisfied that Warenne could not honourably have pursued any other line than that he had chosen; but her conviction on this point, while it took from her the little anger she had conceived against him, made it difficult for her to preserve the coldness of manner which she had latterly assumed; thus both parties felt awkwardly situated. It is true, that one word might have produced a right understanding between them; but that word, Adelaide could not, and Warenne would not, speak. Still the visit could not be passed in silence;—at least so thought Warenne, and acting upon this supposition, in a shy and constrained manner, he asked,

“Have you ridden much, Miss Marston, since your return to the country? I am informed there are beautiful rides in this neighbourhood.”

“No! not much; my father is not able to ride far, and Henry is always out shooting. He has promised, however, to ride with me in a day or two.”

“You must make him keep his promise quickly, or the leaves will be off the trees, and they will have lost their autumnal beauty.”

“I fear so.”

How gladly would Warenne have offered her his escort, had he dared! how gladly would Adelaide have accepted it! But this might not be; and to check the vivid workings of his imagination, he hastily changed the subject.

“I hear we are to have a gay neighbourhood this winter; Frank, who, I believe, has an instinctive knowledge of a ball, as a vulture of a horse that drops in the desert, tells me that the Merivales and Dashworths each mean to have one in the course of the next month.”

“I have not the pleasure of knowing them,” observed Adelaide, coldly.

“Of course they will call upon you, as an act of civility towards a person newly come into the county.”

“Perhaps so; but they have not visited me yet.”

Adelaide’s manner did not contribute to restore poor Warenne to serenity of mind.

I know, thought he, that I have chosen a very stupid subject for conversation, although perhaps a safe one; but what can I do? If I speak on more interesting topics I shall betray the state of my affections, and exactly do that which in honour I am bound not to do. He blundered on: “My brother tells me, that Miss Merivale is extremely pretty and dances beautifully.”

“Does she?” was the reply; “I shall like to see her, if they ask me to their parties.”

Warenne could proceed no further with the tiresome subject; he turned therefore to another upon which, though more attractive to both parties than the former, he thought he might yet converse without emotion. “You are devising, I believe, schemes for the improvement of the condition of your poor.”

Adelaide’s eye brightened.

“If it is not too great a liberty, I should like much to hear what you intend to do.”

“Oh! I fear,” said Adelaide, smiling, “that my views are not quite so practical as they might be. I have not long had the power of playing the Lady Bountiful, but I will tell them to you, and you shall give me your opinion. You have, I know, turned your attention to such matters more than soldiers generally do.”

Warenne thought there could be no harm in her explaining to him her plans, or in his assisting her with his advice upon them; and in a few moments they were busily discussing the merit of Penny Banks, Savings’ Banks, &c.; but after a while he found his thoughts wandering from the charities to the founder of them, and that he was on dangerous ground.

As Adelaide gave herself up, with the full warmth of her kind heart, to the development of her benevolent intentions, and spoke to him again with the freedom of former intimacy (perhaps glad in her inmost soul to have a legitimate reason for resuming it, and perhaps even not without a hope of leading him in turn to throw off restraint), he became conscious, that should he attempt to speak, his voice would falter, and that his eyes were but too ready to tell the forbidden tale of constant unvarying affection. He dared not trust himself further to temptation; making therefore a violent mental effort, and putting even more than his former coldness into his tone, he hastily concluded the conversation by remarking that her goodness in thus considering the welfare of her poor fellow-creatures was above all praise. Adelaide looked up, almost with astonishment, at this formal approbation of her virtue, but said nothing. He coloured, as he felt her eye glance upon him, yet firm to his purpose, would not recur to the subject of the charities again. He sat silent and confused; turned over the leaves of a book lying upon the table, hoping to extract from thence matter for the continuance of their conversation, but in vain; his eyes could neither follow the lines, nor his brain take in their purport. In despair he returned again to the beauty of the country and the weather, and once more there was a sound of voices. Badly, however, as they had succeeded in conversing before their hearts had in some measure opened to each other, now their attempt was ten times worse, and it was a positive relief to both parties when Lord Framlingham accidentally came in. Had he arrived a quarter of an hour sooner, he might not have been satisfied with the aspect of affairs, which was decidedly inauspicious to his schemes; as it was, they seemed to prosper, and he was pleased. He spoke to Warenne with more kindness than usual. This filled the cup of poor Warenne’s misery. He had looked to Lord Framlingham’s marked repulsiveness of manner towards him, as the one circumstance that could give Adelaide a favourable explanation of his own conduct towards her. Muttering, therefore, something about seeking his brother and Henry, he hurried away from Epworth, with the determination of never revisiting a spot where he had endured such utter wretchedness.

Whether he would or could have executed this resolution it is impossible to say, for the position in which he was placed was doomed to undergo a change.