Sandra Belloni -- Volume 5

ini on the national business. He heard Georgiana's voice begging him to

with Charlotte?" wa

l tell you on the way

l matter of

none;" and she took

e dark windy street

nfluence with her. Oh, Merthyr! my darling brother! I thank God I love my bro

s nothing else to do," said Me

the difference is absolute." Georgiana dealt first with t

r sex," he rejoined, controlling himself,

ak; she had an object. She wished to cure Emilia of her love for Mr. Wilfrid Pole. Emilia had come down to see him. Charlott

hyr could not understand

gave a kindly sad excl

Georgiana, her heart leaping

ling can I have?" sa

er heart, marvelling at jealousy that could twist so straight a stem as his sister's spirit. T

n act on the stage as she spoke to-night, she will be a great dramatic genius. She was transformed. She uses strange forcible expressions that one does not hear in every-day life. She crushed Charlotte a

king his sister by the elbow: "You speak as if you had observed very coolly. D

Only, how humiliating to hea

that would interfere to stop a natural emotion. Is it tr

as stood in such a position as he did. To see a man made publicly ash

ement put into execution upon him. You wept for him! Do you know, Georgey, that charity of your sex, which makes y

thought-if it had been my brother! and almost at the thought I f

," said Merthyr, with his half-melancholy smile. "Tell me-I can conjure up

that you leave burning in the grate late on winter nights. Was that natural

only shown the accustomed northern retenue, and merely looked all that she had to s

de her feelings, and t

she ought to be ashamed

eard her utte

e that she di

e excesses that prompt-that are i

to be the de

t words, Merthyr; I do

must be

le of it to be had

t this sort of love i

sses,

your defence

e will not reproach him subsequently. Here is the hotel, and that must be Charlotte's room, if I may judge by the lights. What pranks will she always be playing! We seem to hav

dea before of what your Southern women were. One plays decidedly second to them while the fit lasts. Of course, you have a notion that I planned the whole of the absurd business. This is the case:-I found the girl on the beach: she follows him everywhere, which is bad for her reputation, because in this climate people suspect, positive reasons for that kind of female devotedness. So, to put an end to it-really for her own sake, quite as much as anything else-am I a monster of insensibility, Merthyr?-I made her swear an oath: one must be a point above wild animals to feel that to be binding, however! I made her swear to listen and remain there silent till I opened the door

with her secret heart. After some commonplace remarks had passed, she herself urged him to send out men in search for Emilia

ended the only man for whose esteem I care o

elf!'" murmured Geo

So he becomes fascinated by a savage. We all play the game of opposites-or like to, and no woman in his class will ever catch him. I couldn't have believed that he was touched by a girl, but for two or three recent indications. You must have noticed that he has given up read

yly, "You have fallen

rom a similar fatality, Georgey.

be devoted to me

s justified in crying out: "What would I not abandon for my friend in his need?" Meantime her battle in her own behalf looked less pleasing by the light of new advantages. The question recurred: "Shall I care to win at all?" She had to force the idea of a violent love to excuse her proceedings. To get up any flame whatsoever, an occasional blast of jealousy had to be called for. Jealousy was a quality she could not admit as possible to her. So she acted on herself by an agent she repudiated, and there was no help for it. Had Wilfrid loved her the woman's heart was ready. It was ready with a trembli

wo or three of her own deficiencies; whom her station might help to elevate; to whom she might come as a benefactress; feeling so while she accomplished her own desire;-such a youth was everything to her, as she awoke to discover after having played with him a season. If she lost him, what became of her? Even if she had rejoiced in a mother to plot and play,-to bait and snare for her, her time was slipping, and the choosers among her class were wary. Her spirit, be

angled in the mesh of questions, she told all she knew, and nearly as much as she suspected: which fatal step to retrieve, she entreated his secresy. Adela was now seen fluttering hastily up the walk, fresh as a creature of the sea-wave. Before Mrs. Chump could summon her old wrath of yesterday, she was kissed, and to the arch interrogation as to what she

Adela's countenance ch

be enough," she

rd-careless," the capta

ess? I shall walk on that line up to th

g a piece of washed grey rope on the shingle. Soon she had to stretch out her han

fe!" she sa

ed," he rejoined,

er elbow to give a litt

ressed the

ra

N

somebody else to

ld y

st

he is not yet

e warranted to carry little people as far as they ma

for Lady Charlotte, when Wilfrid entered, neat, carefully brushed, and with ready answers, though his face could pu

rarely laughed, was struck by his humorous skill, saying

heart to the sins of the great, whom anon she angrily reproached. Her principal idea was, that as the world was discovered to be so wicked, they were all in a boat going to perdition, and it would be as well to jump out imme

een Lady Charlotte and Wilfrid (who when he ceased to set outrageously, sat like a man stricken by a bolt), produced this reflection: and in spi

were, simmering on her seat to go to him. Wilfrid sent out word for him to appear, which he did, unluckily for himself, even as Mrs. Chump wound up the public description of his character by remarking: "He's

st, poor boy! What have ye been doin'? and why didn't ye return, and not go hoppin' about about all nig

ptly addressed, observed that she

am, ye'll first feel that ye've gone half mad. For it contains averything in the world; and ye'll read ut ten times all through, and not remember five lines runnin'! Oh, it's a dreadful book: and that's th

nfession. No one save Mrs. Chump listened to him until he mentioned the name Miss Belloni; and then it was curious to see the steadiness with which certain eyes, feigning abstraction, fixed in his direction.

son?" asked the Ho

ugged. "A

y minds your eatin'," cried Mrs. Chump, angrily and encouragingly; "and this lit

d a draught of morning milk, with a handful of damsons apiece, and that nothing would persuade Emilia to turn back from the route to London. Braintop bit daintily at his toast, unwilling to proceed under the discouraging expression of Wilfrid's face, a

become of he

to London, and, blushing, confessed th

her Emilia seemed unhappy or distressed. Braintop's spirited reply, "Not at all," was corrected to: "S

called him away imperiously. To Adela and Mrs. Chump, demanding peculiar personal explanations, he gave reassuring reasons separately, aside. Mrs. Chump understood that this was merely his excuse to get away, that he might see her safe to Brookfield. Adela only required a look and a gesture. Merthyr and Georgiana likewise spoke expected adieux, as did Sir Twickenham, who parted company in his own little yawl. Lady Charlotte, with her head over a map, and one hand arranging an eye-glass, hastily nodded them off, scarcely looking at them. She allowed herself to be diverted from this study for an instant by the unbefitting noise made by Adela for the loss of her brother; not that she objected to the noise particularly

ouse. To Marini he wrote: "Let Giulia guard her as no one but a woman can in such a case. By this time Giulia will know her value. There is dangerous stuff in her now, and my anxiety is very great. Have you seen what a nature it is? You have not alluded to her beyond answers to instructions, but her character cannot have escaped you. I am never mistaken in my estimates of Italian and Cymric blood. Singularly, too, she is part Welsh on the mother's side, to judge by the name. Leave her mind entirely free till i

work at once of a woman-she is all the disease, till it is extinct, or she! What is this disease but a silly, a senseless waste? Giulia-woman that she is!-will not call it so. See her eyes doze and her voice go a soft buzz when she speaks it! As a dove of the woods! That it almost makes it sweet to me! Yes, a daughter of Italy! So Giulia has been:-will be? I know not! So will this your Emilia be in the time that comes to the young people, she has this, as you say, malady very strong-ma, ogni male ha la sua ricetta; I can say it of persons. Of nations to th

mbling strings in the inmost chambers of his heart. That last stage of it-her passionate claiming of Wilfrid before two women, one her rival-slept like a covered furnace within him.

'?" sugges

; that s

d oddly to

, ind

t mo

say, do

ister ashamed

ing that would give y

ain, you kno

est standard: the measure of the qualities brought as usurper and successor. Unconsciously she placed herself in the seat of one who had fulfilled all the great thi

as she had never before been, spiritually tormented and restless. The thought framed itself that Charlotte and Wilfrid were not, by any law of selection, to match. What mattered it? Simply that it in some way seemed to increase the merits of one of the two. The task, moreover, of avoiding to tease her brother was made easier to her by flying to this new refuge of mysterious reflection. At times she poured back the whole flood of her heart upon Merthyr, and then in alarm at the host of little passions that grew cravingly alive in her, she turned her thoughts to Wilfrid again; and so, till they turned witt

they had met, and whom Emilia called her friend; adding: "The other gentleman has called at our

emarking: "Charlotte is no

as if a voice of nature had spoken. Less and less it seemed to her that a woman need feel shame to utter them. She interpreted this as her growth of charity for a girl so violently stricken with love. "In such a case, the more she says the more is she to be excused; for nothing but a frenzy of

emained in Devonshire t

told them that Emil

nishing him. "I understand why; but you may trust to time and scorn

g. "I had my eye on him. It was not a piece of love-play," said Marini: "and today she should have seen my Chief, which would have cured

es me to see you all so excited about her. It must be some attrac

rought her, was, it is Italy he sees in her face-her voice-name-anysing! And a day pass

for an attraction

plain, while his eyelashes met over his eyes-"she is not

uch a child can be?" question

d not rep

nd a home in!

and unpretending person, if people will not insist upon her being more. This morbid ad

him now. So, at all the consultations, she acquiesced in any scheme that was proposed; the advertizings and the use of detectives; the communication with Emilia's mother and father; and the callings at suburban concert-rooms. Sir Purcell Barrett frequently called to assist in the discovery. At first he led them to suspect Mr. Pericles; but a trusty Italian pl

de you have in your organ- boys, Marini? If Em

of his dark eyes, and Merthyr squeezed his sister's hand, thanking her; by wh