The Amazing Marriage, Complete

lfilled, was he not convinced of his misfortune by a dark anticipation that rarely erred? Descending the hills, he remembered several omens: the sun had sunk when he looked down on the villas and clus

pish tripping. And what moved

re his baggage had already been delivered. The manager was deploring t

nything. He gave her the letter to read by herself while preparing to sit at table, unwilling to ask her for a further tax on her energies-but i

the first t

carriage as in a bed: I shall enjoy driving at night,' she said immediately, and stron

read the words, delicious in their strangeness to her, notwithsta

turesque

these mar

ppeal from

them not foreign to me. Why does the master tarry? Sir, of your valliance you should have held to your good vow,-quoth the damozel, for now you see me sore perplexed and that you did not your devoir is my affliction. Where lingers chivalry, she should have proceeded, if not wit

ming a new arrival-you can hear him. She ran down the stairs quicker than any cascade of this district, she would have made a b

unhappy and would like to chide the innocent, I am full of compassion for the poor gentleman inheriting my legitimate

sin full a week. She has Captain Abrane and Sir Meeson Corby in attendance-her long shadow and her short: both devoted to Lord F., to win her smile, and how he drives them! The capt

d, this letter has to be concealed.

countess. No! sooner with a Will-o'-the-wisp, my friend. Who could ever know where the man was when he himself never knows where he is. He is the wind that bloweth as it listeth-because it is without an aim or always with a new one. And am I the one to direct him? I need direction. My lord and sovereign must fix m

suspected? or seen certain boxes bearing a name? Livia has no suspicion, though she thinks me wonderfully contented in so dull a place, where it has rained nine days in a fortnight. I ask myself whether my manner of greeting him betrayed my expectation of another. He has brains. It is the greatest of errors to suppose him at all like the common run of rich young noblemen. He seems to thirst for brilliant wits and original sayings. His ambition is to lead all England in everything! I readily acknowledge that he has generous ideas too; but try to hold him, deny him his liberty, and it would be seen how desperate and relentless he would be to get loose. Of this I am convinced: he would be either the most abject of lovers, or a woman (if it turned out not to be love) would find him the most unscrupulous of yoke-fellows. Yoke-fellow! She woul

write in it except the pair of commas under the last line

idol, to correct her extravagant idolatry! I long for he

such comical haughtiness, incline to speak well of him, and Methuen Rivers-here for two days on his way to his embassy at Vienna-assured us he is the rarest of gentlemen on the point of honour of his word. They have stories of him, to confirm Livia's e

milita

from the most dreadful of distances.-Chillon! it would kill me!-Writing here and you perhaps behind the hi

m yo

HENR

sister. It is

that last line. It seemed to he

written speech; and her recollection of the contents perpetually hurried to the close, whi

hought that she would be with her dearest all night, touching him asleep, and in the sweet sense of being near to the beloved of the fairest angel o

he dark highway moved Chillon to say: '

, "Let none these marks efface," at the commencemen

d who was a poet, addressed to the castle

ll

d to wound him and he was very sensitive. Wrapped in Henrietta, she slept through the joltings of the carriage,