Camilla; or, A Picture of Youth

'Follow him … seek him … send for him … and do not, a single instant, lose sight of him all day!'

'My dear young lady, what do you mean? I'll send for him, to be sure, if you desire it; but what makes you so good as to think about my son? did you ever see my son? do you know my son? do you know Hal Westwyn?'

'Don't ask now, dear sir! secure him first, and make what inquiries you please afterwards.'

Mr. Westwyn, in evident consternation, walked out, Camilla herself opening the door; but turning back in the passage, strongly said: 'If the boy has been guilty of any misbehaviour, I won't support him; I don't like misbehaviour; it's a bad thing; I can't take to it.'

'O no! no! quite the contrary!' exclaimed the agitated Camilla, 'he is good, kind, generous! I owe him the greatest obligation! and I desire nothing upon earth so much, at this moment, as to see him, and to thank him!'

The old gentleman's eyes now filled with tears, and coming back, and most affectionately shaking hands with her, 'I was afraid he had misbehaved,' he cried; 'but he was always a good lad; and if he has done any thing for the niece of my dear Sir Hugh Tyrold, I shall hug him to my heart!' and then, in great, but pleased perturbation, he hurried away, saying to himself, as he went: 'I'll take him to her, to be sure; I desire nothing better! God bless her! If she can speak so well of my poor Hal, she must be the best girl living! and she shall have him … yes, she shall have him, if she's a mind to him; and I don't care if she i'n't worth a groat; she's niece to my old friend; that's better.'

Camilla speeding, but not hearing him, returned to her seat; yet could not answer one question, from the horrors of her fears, and her shame of the detail of the business.

When the breakfast was over Miss Margland desired everyone would get ready to go to the lodgings; and, with Indiana, repaired herself to visit them, and give general orders. Dr. Marchmont had glided out of the room, in anxiety for Edgar; to the great dissatisfaction, and almost contempt of Dr. Orkborne, with whom he was just discussing some controverted points upon the shield of Achilles; which, that he could quit for the light concerns of a young man, added again to his surmises that, though he had run creditably the usual scholastic race, his reputation was more the effect of general ability and address, than of such sound and consummate learning as he himself possessed. Ruminating upon the ignorant injustice of mankind, in suffering such quacks in literature and philology to carry the palm of fame, he went to his chamber, to collect, from his bolster and bedside, the hoard of books and papers, from which, the preceding night, he had disencumbered his coat, waistcoat, and great coat pockets, inside and out, to review before he could sleep; and which now were again to encircle him, to facilitate their change of abode.

But Eugenia would not quit her afflicted sister, who soon, in her gentle breast, deposited the whole of her grief, her apprehensions, and her plans; charging her instantly to retire, if Edgar should return, that whatever might be the event he should unfold, she might release him immediately from an engagement that his last words seemed to avow did not make him happy, and that probably he now repented. The design was so consonant to the native heroism of Eugenia, that she consented, with applause, to aid its execution.

About half an hour, which seemed to be prolonged to twenty times the duration of the whole day, passed in terrible expectation; Edgar then appeared, and Eugenia, suspending her earnest curiosity, to comply with the acute feelings of her sister, retreated.

Camilla could scarce breathe; she stood up, her eyes and mouth open, her face pale, her hands uplifted, waiting, but not daring to demand intelligence.

Edgar, entering into her distress with a tenderness that drove from him his own, eagerly satisfied her: 'All,' he cried, 'is safe; the affair has been compromised; no duel has taken place; and the parties have mutually pledged themselves to forget the dispute.'

Tears again, but no longer bitter, flowed copiously down her cheeks, while her raised eyes and clasped hands expressed the fervency of her thankfulness.

Edgar, extremely touched, took her hand; he wished to seize a moment so nearly awful, to enforce upon her mind every serious subject with which he most desired it to be impressed; but sorrow was ever sacred to him; and desiring only, at this period, to console her: 'This adventure,' he cried, 'has now terminated so well, you must not suffer it to wound you. Dismiss it, sweet Camilla, from your memory!.. at least till you are more composed.'

'No, sir!' cried Camilla, to whom his softness, by restoring her hope of an ultimately happy conclusion, restored strength; 'it ought never to be dismissed from my memory; and what I am now going to say will fix it there indelibly.'

Edgar was surprised, but pleased; his most anxious wishes seemed on the point of being fulfilled; he expected a voluntary explanation of every perplexity, a clearance of all mystery.

'I am sensible that I have appeared to you,' she resumed, 'in many points reprehensible; in some, perhaps, inexcusable…'

'Inexcusable? O no! never! never!'

'The letters of Sir Sedley Clarendel I know you think I ought not to have received…'

Edgar, biting his nails, looked down.

'And, indeed, I acknowledge myself, in that affair, a most egregious dupe!..'

She blushed; but her blush was colourless to that of Edgar. Resentment against Sir Sedley beat high in every vein; while disappointment to his delicacy, in the idea of Camilla duped by any man, seemed, in one blow, to detach him from her person, by a sudden dissolution of all charm to his mind in the connection.

Camilla saw, too late, she had been too hasty in a confession which some apologising account should have preceded; but what her courage had begun, pride now aided her to support, and she continued.

'For what belongs to that correspondence, and even for its being unknown to my friends, I may offer, perhaps, hereafter, something in exculpation; … hereafter, I say, building upon your long family regard; for though we part … it will be, I trust, in amity.'

'Part!' repeated Edgar, recovering from his displeasure by amazement.

'Yes, part,' said she, with assumed firmness; 'it would be vain to palliate what I cannot disguise from myself … I am lessened in your esteem.' She could not go on; imperious shame took possession of her voice, crimsoned her very forehead, blushed even in her eyes, demolished her strained energy, and enfeebled her genuine spirit.

But the conscious taciturnity of Edgar recalled her exertions; struck and afflicted by the truth she had pronounced, he could not controvert it; he was mute; but his look spoke keen disturbance and bitter regret.

'Not so low, however, am I yet, I trust, fallen in your opinion, that you can wonder at the step I now take. I am aware of many errours; I know, too, that appearances have often cruelly misrepresented me; my errours you might have the candour to forget, and false appearances I could easily clear in my own favour – but where, and what is the talisman which can erase from my own remembrance that you have thought me unworthy?'

Edgar started; but she would not give him time to speak; what she had last uttered was too painful to her to dwell upon, or hear answered, and rapidly, and in an elevated manner, she went on.

'I here, therefore, solemnly release you from all tie, all engagement whatever with Camilla Tyrold! I shall immediately acquaint my friends that henceforth … we Both are Free!'

She was then retiring. Edgar, confounded by a stroke so utterly and every way unexpected, neither answering nor interposing, till he saw her hand upon the lock of the door. In a voice then, that spoke him cut to the soul, though without attempting to stop her, 'This then,' he cried, 'Camilla, is your final adieu.'

She turned round, and with a face glowing, and eyes glistening, held out to him her hand: 'I knew not if you would accept,' she said, 'a kinder word, or I should have assured you of my unaltered regard … and have claimed the continuance of your friendship, and even … if your patience is not utterly exhausted, of your watchful counsel… Farewell! remember me without severity! my own esteem must be permanent as my existence!'

The door, here, was opened by Miss Margland and Indiana, and Camilla hastily snatched away the hand which Edgar, grasping with the fondness of renovated passion, secretly meant to part with no more, till a final reconciliation once again made it his own; but compelled to yield to circumstance, he suffered it to be withdrawn; and while she darted into the chamber of Eugenia, to hide her deep emotion from Indiana, who was tittering, and Miss Margland, who was sneering, at the situation in which she was surprised, he abruptly took leave himself, too much impressed by this critical scene, to labour for uninteresting discourse.

CHAPTER VI

Ideas upon Marriage

While, in the bosom of her faithful sister, Camilla reposed her feelings and her fears, alternately rejoicing and trembling in the temerity of the resolution she had exerted; Edgar sought his not less faithful, nor honourable, but far more worldly friend, Dr. Marchmont.

He narrated, with extreme emotion, the scene he had just had with Camilla; asserting her possession of every species of excellence from the nobleness of her rejection, and abhorring himself for having given her a moment's doubt of his fullest esteem. Not a solicitude, he declared, now remained with him, but how to appease her displeasure, satisfy her dignity, and recover her favour.

'Softly, softly!' said the Doctor; 'measure your steps more temperately, ere you run with such velocity. If this refusal is the result of an offended sensibility, you cannot exert yourself too warmly in its consolation; even if it is from pride, it has a just claim to your concessions, since she thinks you have injured it; yet pause before you act, may it not be merely from a confidence of power that loves to tyrannize over its slaves, by playing with their chains? or a lurking spirit of coquetry, that desires to regain the liberty of trifling with some new Sir Sedley Clarendel? or, perhaps, with Sir Sedley himself?'

'Dr. Marchmont! how wretchedly ill you think of women!'

'I think of them as they are! I think of them as I have found them. They are artful, though feeble; they are shallow, yet subtle.'

'You have been unfortunate in your connexions?'

'Yet who had better prospects? with energies as warm, with hopes as alive as your own, twice have I conducted to the altar two beings I thought framed for my peculiar felicity; but my peace, my happiness, and my honour, have been torn up by the root, exactly where I thought I had planted them for my whole temporal existence. This heart, which to you appears hard and suspicious, has been the dupe of its susceptibilities; first, in a creature of its own choice, next, where it believed itself chosen. That first, Mandlebert, had you seen her, you would have thought, as I thought her myself … an angel! She was another Camilla.'

'Another Camilla!'

'Grace, sweetness, and beauty vied in her for pre-eminence. Yes, another Camilla! though I see your incredulity; I see you think my comparison almost profane; and that grace, sweetness, and beauty, waited the birth of Camilla to be made known to the world. Such, however, she was, and I saw and loved at once. I knew her character fair, I precipitately made my addresses, and concluded myself beloved in return … because I was accepted!'

Edgar shrunk back, and cast down his eyes.

'Nor was it till the moment … heart-breaking yet to my recollection!.. of her sudden death, that I knew the lifeless, soulless, inanimate frame was all she had bestowed upon me. In the private drawer of her bureau, I then found a pocketbook. In the first leaf, I saw a gentleman's name; … I turned over, and saw it again; I looked further, and still it met my view; I opened by chance, … but nothing else appeared: … there it was still, traced in every hand, charactered in every form, shape, and manner, the wayward, wistful eye could delight to fashion, for varying, yet beholding it without end: while, over the intermediate spaces, verses, quotations, short but affecting sentences, were every where scattered, bewailing the misery of disappointed hope, and unrequited love; of a heartless hand devoted at the altar; of vows enchaining liberty, not sanctifying affection! I then … alas, too late! dived deeper, with, then, useless investigation, … and discovered an early passion, never erased from her mind; … discovered … that I had never made her happy! that she was merely enduring, suffering me … while my whole confiding soul was undividedly hers!..'

Edgar shuddered at this picture; 'But why, then,' he cried, 'since she seemed amiable as well as fair, why did she accept you?'

'Ask half the married women in the nation how they became wives: they will tell you their friends urged them; … that they had no other establishment in view; … that nothing is so uncertain as the repetition of matrimonial powers in women; … and that those who cannot solicit what they wish, must accommodate themselves to what offers. This first adventure, however, is now no longer useful to you, though upon its hard remembrance was founded my former caution: but I am even myself satisfied, at present, that the earliest partiality of Camilla has been yours; what now you have to weigh, is the strength or inadequacy of her character, for guiding that partiality to your mutual happiness. My second melancholy history will best illustrate this difficulty. You may easily believe, the last of my intentions was any further essay in a lottery I had found so inauspicious; but, while cold even to apathy, it was my inevitable chance to fall in the way of a pleasing and innocent young creature, who gave me, unsought and unwished-for, her heart. The boon, nevertheless, soon caught my own: for what is so alluring as the voluntary affection of a virtuous woman?'

'Well,' cried Edgar, 'and what now could disturb your tranquillity?'

'The insufficiency of that heart to its own decision. I soon found her apparent predilection was simply the result of the casualty which brought me almost exclusively into her society, but unmarked by any consonance of taste, feeling, or understanding. Her inexperience had made her believe, since she preferred me to the few who surrounded her, I was the man of her choice: with equal facility I concurred in the same mistake; … for what is so credulous as self-love? But such a regard, the child of accident, not selection, was unequal, upon the discovery of the dissimilarity of our dispositions, to the smallest sacrifice. My melancholy returned with the view of our mutual delusion; lassitude of pleasing was the precursor of discontent. Dissipation then, in the form of amusement, presented itself to her aid: retirement and books came to mine. My resource was safe, though solitary; hers was gay, but perilous. Dissipation, with its usual Proteus powers, from amusement changed its form to temptation, allured her into dangers, impeached her honour, and blighted her with disgrace. I just discerned the precipice whence she was falling, in time to avert the dreadful necessity of casting her off for ever: … but what was our life thence forward? Cares unparticipated, griefs uncommunicated, stifled resentments, and unremitting weariness! She is now no more; and I am a lonely individual for the rest of my pilgrimage.