Weak from inanition, confused from want of sleep, hara.s.sed with fatigue, and exhausted by perturbation, she felt now so ill, that she solemnly believed her fatal wish quick approaching.

The landlord of the inn entered to say that the chaise she had ordered was at the door; and put down upon the table the bill of what she had to pay.

Whither to turn, what course to take, she knew not; though to remain longer at an inn, while persuaded life was on its wane, was dreadful; yet how present herself at home, after the letter she had received? what asylum was any where open to her?

She begged the landlord to wait, and again read the letter of Lavinia, when, startled by what was said of abandoning herself to her feelings, she saw that her immediate duty was to state her situation to her parents. She desired, therefore, the chaise might be put up, and wrote these lines:

'I could not, unhappily, stay at Eugenia's; nor can I return to Mrs. Berlinton; I am now at the half-way-house where I shall wait for commands. My Lavinia will tell me what I may be ordered to do.

I am ill,--and earnestly I pray with an illness from which I may rise no more. When my Father--my Mother, hear this, they will perhaps accord me to be blest again with their sight; the brevity of my career may, to their kindness, expiate its faults; they may pray for me where my own prayers may be too unsanctified to be heard; they may forgive me ... though my own forgiveness never more will quiet this breast! Heaven bless and preserve them; their unoffending daughters; and my ever loved uncle!

'CAMILLA TYROLD.'

She then rang the bell, and desired this note might go by express to Etherington.

But this, the waiter answered, was impossible; the horse on which the messenger had set out to Belfont, though it had only carried him the first stage, and brought him back the last, had galloped so hard, that his master would not send it out again the same day; and they had but that one.

She begged he would see instantly for some other conveyance.

The man who was come back from Belfont, he answered, would be glad to be discharged, as he wanted to go to rest.

She then took up the bill, and upon examining the sum total, found, with the express, the chaise in which she came the last stage, that which she ordered to take her to Etherington, and the expence of her residence, it amounted to half a crown beyond what she possessed.

She had only, she knew, to make herself known as the niece of Sir Hugh Tyrold, to be trusted by all the environs; but to expose herself in this helpless, and even pennyless state, appeared to her to be a degradation to every part of her family.

To enclose the bill to Etherington was to secure its being paid; but the sentence, _Camilla most of all must now see the duties of oeconomy_, made her revolt from such a step.

All she still possessed of pecuniary value she had in her pocket: the seal of her Father, the ring of her Mother, the watch of her Uncle, and the locket of Edgar Mandlebert. With one of these she now determined to part, in preference to any new exposure at Etherington, or to incurring the smallest debt. She desired to be left alone, and took them from her pocket, one by one, painfully ruminating upon which she could bear to lose. 'It may not, she thought, be for long; for quick, I hope, my course will end!--yet even for an hour,--even for the last final moment--to give up such dear symbols of all that has made my happiness in life!----'

She looked at them, kissed and pressed them to her heart; spoke to them as if living and understanding representatives of their donors, and bestowed so much time in lamenting caresses and hesitation, that the waiter came again, while yet she was undetermined.

She desired to speak with the mistress of the house.

Instinctively she now put away the gifts of her parents; but between her uncle and Edgar she wavered. She blushed, however, at her demur, and the modesty of duty made her put up the watch. Taking, then, an agitating last view of a locket which circ.u.mstances had rendered inappreciable to her, 'Ah! not in vain,' she cried, 'even now shall I lose what once was a token so bewitching.... Dear precious locket! Edgar even yet would be happy you should do me one last kind office! generously, benevolently, he would rejoice you should spare me still one last menacing shame!'--

When Mrs. Marl, the landlady, came in, deeply colouring, she put it into her hand, turning her eyes another way, while she said; 'Mrs. Marl, I have not quite money enough to pay the bill; but if you will keep this locket for a security, you will be sure to be paid by and by.'

Mrs. Marl looked at it with great admiration, and then, with yet greater wonder, at Camilla. ''Tis pretty, indeed, ma'am,' she said; ''twould be pity to sell it. However, I'll shew it my husband.'

Mr. Marl soon came himself, with looks somewhat less satisfied, 'Tis a fine bauble, ma'am,' cried he, 'but I don't much understand those things; and there's n.o.body here can tell me what it's worth. I'd rather have my money, if you please.'

Weakened now in body, as well as spirits, she burst into tears. Alas!

she thought, how little do my friends conjecture to what I am reduced!

She offered, however, the watch, and the countenance of Mr. Marl lost its gloom.

'This,' said he, 'is something like! A gold watch one may be sure to get one's own for; but such a thing as that may'n't fetch six-pence, fine as it looks.'

Mrs. Marl objected to keeping both; but her husband said he saw no harm in it; and Camilla begged her note might be sent without delay.

A labourer, after some search, was found, who undertook, for handsome pay, to carry it on foot to the rectory.

CHAPTER IX

_A Spectacle_

The messenger returned not till midnight; what, then, was the consternation of Camilla that he brought no answer! She suspected he had not found the house; she doubted if the letter had been delivered; but he affirmed he had put it into the hands of a maid-servant, though, as it was late, he had come away directly, and not thought of waiting for any answer.

It is not very early in life we learn how little is performed, for which no precaution is taken. Care is the offspring of disappointment; and sorrow and repentance commonly hang upon its first lessons. Unused to transact any sort of business for herself, she had expected, in sending a letter, an answer as a thing of course, and had now only herself to blame for not having ordered him to stay. She consoled herself, however, that she was known to be but nine miles distant from the rectory, and that any commands could be conveyed to her nearly in an hour.

What they might be, became now, therefore, her sole anxiety. Would not her Mother write? After an avowal such as she had made of her desolate, if not dying condition, would she not pardon and embrace her? Was it not even possible she might come herself?

This idea mingled emotions of a contrariety scarcely supportable. 'O how,' she cried, 'shall I see her? Can joy blend with such terrour? Can I wish her approach, yet not dare to meet her eye?--that eye which never yet has looked at me, but to beam with bright kindness!--though a kindness that, even from my childhood, seemed to say, Camilla, be blameless--or you break your Mother's heart!... my poor unhappy Mother!

she has always seemed to have a presentiment, I was born to bring her to sorrow!'

Expectation being now, for this night, wholly dead, the excess of her bodily fatigue urged her to take some repose: but her ever eager imagination made her apprehensive her friends might find her too well, and suspect her representation was but to alarm them into returning kindness. A fourth night, therefore, pa.s.sed without sleep, or the refreshment of taking off her cloaths; and by the time the morning sun shone in upon her apartment, she was too seriously disordered to make her illness require the aid of fancy. She was full of fever, faint, pallid, weak, and shaken by nervous tremors. 'I think,' she cried, 'I am now certainly going; and never was death so welcomed by one so young. It will end in soft peace my brief, but stormy pa.s.sage, and I shall owe to its solemn call the sacred blessing of my offended Mother!'

Tranquillised by this hope, and this idea, she now lost all sufferings but those of disease: her mind grew calm, her spirits serene: all fears gave way to the certainty of soothing kindness, all grief was buried in the solemnity of expected dissolution.

But this composure outlived not the first hours of the morning; as they vainly advanced, producing no loved presence, no letter, no summons; solicitude revived, disappointment sunk her heart, and dread preyed again upon her nerves. She started at every sound; every breath of wind seemed portentous; she listened upon the stairs; she dragged her feeble limbs to the parlour, to be nearer at hand; she forced them back again to her bed-room, to strain her aching eyes out of the window; but still no voice demanded her, and no person approached.

Peggy, who repeatedly came to tell her the hour, now a.s.sured her it was dinner time: unable to eat, she was heedless of the hint this conveyed, and it obtained from her no orders, till Peggy gave her innocently to understand the expectations of her host and hostess; but when, at five o'clock, the table was served, all force and courage forsook her. To be left thus to herself, when her situation was known; to be abandoned at an inn where she had confessed she thought herself dying; 'My Mother,'

she cried, 'cannot forgive me! my Father himself deserts me! O Edgar!

you did well to fly so unhallowed a connexion!'

She left her dinner for Peggy, and crawling up stairs, cast herself upon the bed, with a desperate supplication she might rise from it no more.

'The time,' cried she, 'is past for consolation, and dead for hope! my parents' own prayers have been averted, and their prognostics fulfilled.

_May the dread forfeiture_, said my dearest Father, _not extend through my daughters_!--Alas! Lionel himself has not brought upon him a disgrace such as I have done!--_May Heaven_, said my honoured Mother, _spare me evil under your shape at least_!--but under that it has come to her the most heavily!'

Dissolving, then, in sorrowing regret, recollections of maternal tenderness bathed her pillow with her tears, and reversing all the inducements to her sad resignation, abolished every wish but to fall again at the parental feet. 'To see,' cried she, 'once more, the dear authors of my being! to receive their forgiveness, their blessing ... to view again their honoured countenances!--to hear once more their loved speech.... Alas! was it I that fled the voice of my Mother? That voice which, till that moment, had been music to my mind! and never reached my ear, but as the precursor of all kindness! why did I not sooner at once kneel at her feet, and seek my lost path under my first and best guide?'

Shocked and contrite in this tardy view of the step she ought to have taken, she now languished to pet.i.tion for pardon even for an offence unknown; and rising, took up a pen to relate the whole transaction. But her head was confused, and the attempt shewed her she was more ill than she had even herself suspected. She thought all rapidly advancing, and enthusiastically rejoiced.

Yet a second time she took the pen; but it had not touched the paper, when a buzzing, confused, stifled sort of noise from without drew her to the window.

She then perceived an immense crowd of people approaching slowly, and from a distance, towards the inn.

As they advanced, she was struck to hear no encrease of noise, save from the nearer trampling of feet. No voice was distinguishable; no one spoke louder than the rest; they seemed even to tread the ground with caution. They consisted of labourers, workmen, beggars, women, and children, joined by some accidental pa.s.sengers: yet the general 'hum of many' was all that was heard; they were silent though numerous, solemn though mixt.

As they came near, she thought she perceived something in the midst of them like a bier, and caught a glimpse of a gentleman's habit. Startled, she drew in; but soon, upon another view, discerned clearly a well-dressed man, stretched out his full length, and apparently dead.

Recoiling, shuddering, she hastily shut the window, 'Yet why,' she cried, the next moment, 'and whence this emotion? Is not death what I am meeting?--seeking?--desiring?--what I court? what I pray for?'

She sighed, walked feebly up and down the room, breathed hard and with effort, and then forced herself again to open the window, determined to contemplate steadily the antic.i.p.ating object of her fervent demand.

Yet not without severe self-compulsion she flung up again the sash; but when she looked out, the crowd alone remained; the bier was gone.