Camilla; or, A Picture of Youth

She could but seek the same pressure; and he continued, 'I would not bring him in with me; I was not aware my dear girl was so rapidly recovered, and I had a task to fulfil to my poor Eugenia that was still my first claim. But I promised within an hour, your Mother, at least, should welcome him. He would walk, he said, for that period. When I met her, I hinted at what was passing, and she followed me to our Eugenia; I then briefly communicated my adventure; and your Mother, my Camilla, lost herself in hearing it! Will you not, … like me!.. withdraw from her all reverence? Her eyes gushed with tears, … she wept, as you weep at this moment; she was sure Edgar Mandlebert could alone preserve you from danger, yet make you happy – Was she wrong, my dear child? Shall we attack now her judgment, as well as her fortitude?'

Only at her feet could Camilla shew her gratitude; to action she had recourse, for words were inadequate, and the tenderest caresses now spoke best for them all.

Respect for the situation of Eugenia, who had desired, for this week, to live wholly up stairs and alone, determined Mr. and Mrs. Tyrold to keep back for some time the knowledge of this event from the family. Camilla was most happy to pay such an attention to her sister; but when Mr. Tyrold was leaving her, to consult upon it with Edgar, the ingenuousness of her nature urged her irresistibly to say, 'Since all this has passed, my dearest Father – my dearest Mother – does it not seem as if I should now myself – '

She stopt; but she was understood; they both smiled, and Mr. Tyrold immediately bringing in Edgar, said, 'I find my pardon, my dear fellow-culprit, is already accorded; if you have doubts of your own, try your eloquence for yourself.'

He left the room, and Mrs. Tyrold was gently rising to quietly follow, but Camilla, with a look of entreaty of which she knew the sincerity, and would not resist the earnestness, detained her.

'Ah yes, stay, dearest Madam!' cried Edgar, again respectfully taking her hand, 'and through your unalterable goodness, let me hope to procure pardon for a distrust which I here for ever renounce; but which had its origin in my never daring to hope what, at this moment, I have the felicity to believe. Yet now, even now, without your kind mediation, this dear convalescent may plan some probationary trial at which my whole mind, after this long suffering, revolts. Will you be my caution, my dearest Mrs. Tyrold? Will you venture – and will you deign to promise, that if a full and generous forgiveness may be pronounced…'

'Forgiveness?' in a soft voice interrupted Camilla: 'Have I any thing to forgive? I thought all apology – all explanation, rested on my part? and that my imprudencies – my rashness – my so often-erring judgment … and so apparently, almost even culpable conduct…'

'O, my Camilla! my now own Camilla!' cried Edgar, venturing to change the hand of the Mother for that of the daughter; 'what too, too touching words and concessions are these! Suffer me, then, to hope a kind amnesty may take place of retrospection, a clear, liberal, open forgiveness anticipate explanation and enquiry?'

'Are you sure,' said Camilla, smiling, 'this is your interest, and not mine?.. Does he not make a mistake, my dearest Mother, and turn my advocate, instead of his own? And can I fairly take advantage of such an errour.'

The sun-shine of her returning smiles went warm to her Mother's heart, and gave a glow to the cheeks of Edgar, and a brightness to his eyes that irradiated his whole countenance. 'Your penetrating judgment,' said he, to Mrs. Tyrold, 'will take in at once more than any professions, any protestations can urge for me: … you see the peace, the pardon which those eyes do not seek to withhold … will you then venture, my more than maternal friend! my Mother, in every meaning which affection and reverence can give to that revered appellation – will you venture at once – now – upon this dear and ever after hallowed minute – to seal the kind consent of my truly paternal guardian, and to give me an example of that trust and confidence which my whole future life shall look upon as its lesson?'

'Yes!' answered Mrs. Tyrold, instantly joining their hands, 'and with every security that the happiness of all our lives – my child's, my husband's, your's, my valued Edgar's, and my own, will all owe their felicity to the blessing with which I now lay my hands upon my two precious children!'

Tears were the only language that could express the fulness of joy which succeeded to so much sorrow; and when Mr. Tyrold returned, and had united his tenderest benediction with that of his beloved wife, Edgar was permitted to remain alone with Camilla; and the close of his long doubts, and her own long perplexities, was a reciprocal confidence that left nothing untold, not an action unrelated, not even a thought unacknowledged.

Edgar confessed that he no sooner had quitted her, than he suspected the justice of his decision; the turn which of late, he had taken, doubtfully to watch her every action, and suspiciously to judge her every motive, though it had impelled him in her presence, ceased to operate in her absence. – He was too noble to betray the well meant, though not well applied warnings of Dr. Marchmont, yet he acknowledged, that when left to cool reflection, a thousand palliations arose for every step he could not positively vindicate: and when, afterwards, from the frank communication of Lionel, he learnt what belonged to the mysterious offer of Sir Sedley Clarendel, that she would superintend the disposal of his fortune, and the deep obligation in which she had been innocently involved, his heart smote him for having judged ere he had investigated that transaction; and in a perturbation unspeakable of quick repentance, and tenderness, he set out for England. But when, at the half-way-house, he stopt as usual to rest his horses in his way to Beech Park, – what were his emotions at the sight of the locket, which the landlady told him had been pledged by a lady in distress! He besought her pardon for the manner in which he had made way to her; but the almost frantic anxiety which seized him to know if or not it was [she], and to save her, if so, from the intended intrusion of the landlord, made him irresistibly prefer it to the plainer mode which he should have adopted with any one else, of sending in his name, and some message. His shock at her view in such a state, he would not now revive; but the impropriety of bidding the landlady quit the chamber, and the impossibility of entering into an explanation in her hearing, alone repressed, at that agitated moment, the avowal of every sensation with which his heart was labouring. 'But when,' he added, 'shall I cease to rejoice that I had listened to the good landlady's history of a sick guest, while all conjecture was so remote from whom it might be! when I am tempted to turn aside from a tale of distress, I will recollect what I owe to having given [ear to one]!' Lost in wonder at what could have brought her to such a situation, and disturbed how to present himself at the rectory, till fixed in his plans, he had ridden to the half-way-house that morning, to enquire concerning the corpse that Mrs. Marl had mentioned – and there – while he was speaking with her, the little maid brought down two letters – one of them directed to himself. —

'What a rapid transition,' cried he, 'was then mine, from regrets that robbed life of all charms, to prospects which paint it in its most vivid colours of happiness! from wavering the most deplorable, to resolutions of expiating by a whole life of devoted fondness, the barbarous waywardness that could deprive me, for one wilful moment, of the exquisite felicity of my lot!..'

'But still,' said Camilla, 'I do not quite understand how you came in that room this morning? and how you authorized yourself to overhear my confessions to my Mother?'

'Recollect my acknowledged accomplice before you hazard any blame! When I came hither … somewhat, I confess, within my given hour, Mr. Tyrold received me himself at the door. He told me I was too soon, and took me into the front parlour. The partition is thin. I heard my name spoken by Mrs. Tyrold, and the gentle voice of my Camilla, in accents yet more gentle than even that voice ever spoke before, answering some question; I was not myself, at first, aware of its tenour … but when, unavoidably, I gathered it … when I heard words so beautifully harmonizing with what I had so lately perused – I would instantly have ventured into the room; but Mr. Tyrold feared surprising you – you went on – my fascinated soul divested me of obedience – of caution – of all but joy and gratitude … and he could no longer restrain me. And now with which of her offenders will my Camilla quarrel?'

'With neither, I believe, just at present. The conspiracy is so complex, and even my Mother so nearly a party concerned, that I dare not risk the unequal contest. I must only, in future,' added she smiling, 'speak ill of you … and then you will find less pleasure in the thinness of a partition!'

Faithfully she returned his communication, by the fullest, most candid, and unsparing account of every transaction of her short life, from the still shorter period of its being put into voluntary motion. With nearly breathless interest, he listened to the detail of her transactions with Sir Sedley Clarendel, with pity to her debts, and with horrour to her difficulties. But when, through the whole ingenuous narration, he found himself the constant object of every view, the ultimate motive to every action, even where least it appeared, his happiness, and his gratitude, made Camilla soon forget that sorrow had ever been known to her.

They then spoke of her two favourites, Mrs. Arlbery, and Mrs. Berlinton; and though she was animated in her praise of the good qualities of the first, and the sweet attraction of the last, she confessed the danger, for one so new in the world, of chusing friends distinct from those of her family; and voluntarily promised, during her present season of inexperience, to repose the future choice of her connections, where she could never be happy without their approvance.

The two hundred pounds to Sir Sedley Clarendel, he determined, on the very day that Camilla should be his, to return to the Baronet, under the privilege, and in the name of paying it for a brother.

In conference thus softly balsamic to every past wound, and thus deliciously opening to that summit of earthly felicity … confidence unlimited entwined around affection unbounded … hours might have passed, unnumbered and unawares, had not prudence forced a separation, for the repose of Camilla.

CHAPTER XIV

The last Touches of the Picture

Late as Edgar quitted the rectory, he went not straight to Beech Park; every tie both of friendship and propriety carried him first to Dr. Marchmont; who had too much feeling to wonder at the power of his late incitements, and too much goodness of heart not to felicitate him upon their issue, though he sighed at the recollection of the disappointments whence his own doubting counsel originated. Twice betrayed in his dearest expectations, he had formed two criterions from his peculiar experience, by which he had settled his opinion of the whole female sex; and where opinion may humour systematic prepossession, who shall build upon his virtue or wisdom to guard the transparency of his impartiality?

The following day, the Westwyns presented themselves at Etherington; hurried from a tour they were taking through Devonshire and Cornwall, by intelligence which had reached them that Sir Hugh Tyrold was ruined, and Cleves was to be let. They met, by chance, with Edgar alone in the parlour; and the joy of the old gentleman in hearing how small a part of the rumour was founded in fact, made him shake hands with him as cordially for setting him right, as Edgar welcomed his kindness, from the pleasure afforded by the sight of such primitive regard. But when, presuming upon his peculiar intimacy in the family, as ward of Mr. Tyrold, though without yet daring to avow his approaching nearer affinity, Edgar insisted upon his superior claim for supplanting them in taking charge of the debt of his guardian; Mr. Westwyn, almost angrily, protested he would let no man upon earth, let him be whose ward he pleased, shew more respect than himself for the brother of Sir Hugh Tyrold; 'And Hal thinks the same too,' he added, 'or he's no son of mine. And so he'll soon shew you, in a way you can't guess, I give you my word. At least that's my opinion.'

He then took his son apart, and abruptly whispered to him, 'As that pretty girl you and I took such a fancy to, at Southton, served us in that shabby manner, because of meeting with that old Lord, it's my opinion you'd do the right thing to take her sister; who's pretty near as pretty, and gives herself no airs; and that will be shewing respect for my worthy old friend, now he's down in the world; which is exactly that he did for me when I was down myself. For if he had not lent me that thousand pounds I told you of, when not a relation I had would lend me a hundred, I might have been ruined before ever you were born. Come, tell me your mind Hal! off or on? don't stand shilly shally; it's what I can't bear; speak honestly; I won't have your choice controlled; only this one thing I must tell you without ceremony, I shall never think well of you again as long as ever I live, if you demur so much as a moment. It's what I can't bear; it i'n't doing a thing handsomely. I can't say I like it.'

The appearance of Lavinia relieved the immediate embarrassment of Henry, while the modest pleasure with which she received them confirmed the partiality of both. The eagerness, however, of the father, admitted of no delay, and when Sir Hugh entered the room, the son's assent being obtained, he warmly demanded the fair Lavinia for his daughter-in-law.

Sir Hugh received the proposition with the most copious satisfaction; Mr. and Mrs. Tyrold with equal, though more anxious delight; and Lavinia herself with blushing but unaffected hopes of happiness.

Whatever was known to Sir Hugh, no cautions, nor even his own best designs, could save from being known to the whole house. Eugenia, therefore, was unavoidably informed of this transaction; and the generous pleasure with which she revived from the almost settled melancholy left upon her, by continual misfortunes, justified the impatience of Edgar to accelerate the allowed period for publishing his own happy history.

Eugenia wept with joy at tidings so precious of her beloved sister, through whom, and her other dear friends, she was alone, she said, susceptible of joy, though to all sorrow she henceforth bid adieu, 'For henceforth,' she cried, 'I mean to regard myself as if already I had passed the busy period of youth and of life, and were only a spectatress of others. For this purpose, I have begun writing my memoirs, which will amuse my solitude, and confirm my – I hope, philosophical idea.'

She then produced the opening of her intended book.

SECTION I

'No blooming coquette, elated with adulation and triumphant with conquest, here counts the glories of her eyes, or enumerates the train of her adorers: no beauteous prude, repines at the fatigue of admiration, nor bewails the necessity of tyranny: O gentle reader! you have the story of one from whom fate has withheld all the delicacy of vanity, all the regale of cruelty – !'

'Here,' interrupted the young biographer, 'will follow my portrait, and then this further address to my readers.'

'O ye, who, young and fair, revel in the attractions of beauty, and exult in the pride of admiration, say, where is your envy of the heiress to whom fortune comes with such alloys? And which, however distressed or impoverished, would accept my income with my personal defects?

'Ye, too, O lords of the creation, mighty men! impute not to native vanity the repining spirit with which I lament the loss of beauty; attribute not to the innate weakness of my sex, the concern I confess for my deformity; nor to feminine littleness of soul, a regret of which the true source is to be traced to your own bosoms, and springs from your own tastes: for the value you yourselves set upon external attractions, your own neglect has taught me to know; and the indifferency with which you consider all else, your own duplicity has instructed me to feel.'

Camilla sought to dissuade her from reflexions so afflictive, and retrospections so poignant; but they aided her, she said, in her task of acquiring composure for the regulation of her future life.

Edgar now received permission to make his communication to the Baronet.

The joy with which Sir Hugh heard it, was for some time over-clouded by doubt. 'My dear Mr. young Edgar,' he said, 'in case you don't know your own mind yet, in the point of its not changing again, as it did before, I'd as leave you would not tell me of it till you've taken the proper time to be at a certainty; frettings about these ups and downs, being what do no good to me, in point of the gout.'

But when thoroughly re-assured, 'Well,' he cried, 'this is just the thing I should have chose out of all our misfortunes, being what makes me happier than ever I was in my life; except once before on the very same account, which all turned out to end in nothing: which, I hope, won't happen any more: for now I've only to pay off all our debts, and then I may go back again to Cleves, which I shall be glad enough to do, it being but an awkward thing to a man, after he's past boyhood, having no home of his own.'

A sigh at the recollection of the change in his situation, since his plan was last agitated, checked his felicity, and depressed even that of Edgar, who, with the most tender earnestness, besought his leave to advance the sum requisite to return him tranquilly to his mansion; but who could not prevail, till Camilla joined in the petition, and permitted Edgar, in both their names to entreat, as their dearest wish, that they might be united, according to the first arrangement, from Cleves.

This the Baronet could not resist, and preparations were rapidly made for re-instating him in his dwelling, and for the double marriages destined to take place upon his return.

'Well, then, this,' cried he, as he poured upon them his tenderest blessings and caresses, 'is the oddest of all! My dear little Camilla, that I took all my fortune from, is the very person to give me hers as soon as ever she gets it! as well as my own house over my old head again, after my turning her, as one may say, out of it! which is a thing as curious, in point of us poor ignorant mortals, as if my brother had put it in a sermon.'

'Such turns in the tide of fortune,' said Mr. Tyrold, 'are amongst the happiest lessons of humanity, where those who have served the humble and helpless from motives of pure disinterestedness, find they have made useful friends for themselves, in the perpetual vicissitudes of our unstable condition.'

'Why, then, there's but one thing more, by what I can make out,' said the Baronet, 'that need be much upon my mind, and that I've been thinking some time about, in point of forming a scheme to get rid of, which I think I've got a pretty good one: for here's Lavinia going to be married to the very oldest friend I have in the world; that is, to his son, which is the same thing in point of bringing us all together; and my own dear little girl, to the best gentleman in the county, except for that one thing of going off at the first, which I dare say he did not mean, for which reason I shall mention it no more: and Indiana, to one of those young captains, that I can't pretend I know much of; but that's very excusable in so young a person, not having had much head from the beginning; which I always make allowance for; my own not being over extraordinary: and Eugenia, poor thing, being a widow already; for which God be praised; which I hope is no sin, in point of the poor lad that's gone not belonging to any of us, by what I can make out, except by his own doing whether we would or not; which, however, is neither here nor there, now he's gone; for Eugenia being no beauty, and Clermont having as good as said so, I suppose she thought she must not be too difficult; which is a thing young girls are apt to fall into; and boys too, for the matter of that; for, by what I can make out of life, I don't see but what a scholar thinks a girl had better be pretty than not, as much as another man.'

'But what, my dear brother,' said Mr. Tyrold, 'is your new distress and new scheme?'

'Why I can't say but what I'm a little put out, that Indiana should forget poor Mrs. Margland, in the particular of asking her to go to live with her; which, however, I dare say she can't help, those young captains commonly not over liking having elderly persons about them; not that I mean to guess her age, which I take to be fifty, and upwards; which is no point of ours. But the thing I'm thinking of is Dr. Orkborne, in the case of their marrying one another.'

'My dear brother!.. has any such idea occurred to them?'

'Not as I know of; but Indiana having done with one, and Eugenia with the other, and me, Lord help me! not wanting either of them, why what can I do if they won't? the Doctor's asked to go to town, for the sake of printing his papers, which I begged him not to hurry, for I'm but little fit for learned conversation just now; though when he's here, he commonly says nothing; only taking out his tablets to write down something that comes into his head, as I suppose: which I can't say is very entertaining in the light of a companion. However, as to his having called me a blockhead, it's not what I take umbrage at, not being a wit being a fault of no man's, except of nature, which nobody has a right to be angry at. Besides, as to his having a little pride, it's what I owe him no ill-will for; a scholar having nothing else but his learning, is excusable for making the most of it. However, if they would marry one another, I can't but say I should take it very well of them. The only thing I know against it, is the mortal dislike they have to one another: and that, my dear brother, is the point I want to consult you about; for then we shall be got off all round: which would be a great thing off my mind.'

When the happy day arrived for returning to Cleves, Sir Hugh re-took possession of his hospitable mansion, amidst the tenderest felicitations of his fond family, and the almost clamorous rejoicings of the assembled poor of the neighbourhood: and the following morning, Mr. Tyrold gave the hand of Lavinia to Harry Westwyn, and Dr. Marchmont united them; and Edgar, glowing with happiness, now purified from any alloy, received from the same revered hand, and owed to the same honoured voice, the final and lasting possession of the tearful, but happy Camilla.