Chapter XVII: A Disagreeable Interruption

Mr. Mordaunt fulfilled his intention of starting quite early the next morning for Langdale Priory, intending to sleep at the inn in the nearest town, and return on the following day.

Lady Horatia never came down before luncheon, so I made use of the piano in the drawing-room, under the guidance of the little Brownie. In the middle of one of my songs, in which the little girl kept up a kind of acting accompaniment, the door opened, and, to my dismay, Mr. Henry Mordaunt was announced. I had hoped never to see him again, and wondered how he could venture to seek me out in this manner. I therefore took it for granted that he wished to see Mrs. Mordaunt, and I said I would go and find her. I hastily left the room. Could the man be really in love with me that he thus persevered, now that I had lost my property, I thought. I then wished that Lady Horatia had been made acquainted with his insolent proposal, for I dreaded lest she might good-naturedly ask him to dinner, or to some party. So I whispered to Brownie that I should like, if possible, to have a few words with her mother.

“You don’t like that man, I see,” said the shrewd child; “and I hate him, because he interrupted our song, and made you look angry and unhappy; and I am sure mamma won’t like him. She never does like people who look so pretentious and disagreeable as that man does. She will not ask him, I am certain.”

“I hope not. And that is just what I want--to try and prevent her. He is related to us, and I am afraid she might.”

We were now at the top of the stairs, and Brownie opened Lady Horatia’s door, and I heard her say that I wished to speak to her.

“You won’t want me, I know--she has got something very particular to say, I see by her anxious face, so I’ll go and finish my lessons.”

Yes, I had something very particular to say; and, impelled by the kind sympathy of her face, I told her of the persecution to which my guardian had always subjected me, and of his infamous offer to keep the matter secret and allow me to retain possession of my property, if I would consent to marry him. I also told her of the still greater horror I had experienced at his surmise that the world would blame my father, and imagine that he had suppressed the fact of his elder brother’s marriage after becoming acquainted with it.

“Impossible!--he was too well known for that,” said Lady Horatia, indignantly; and then added, while she kissed me tenderly--“My poor child, you have indeed suffered, and I do not now wonder at your being in an excited and perhaps somewhat perverse state. You must think no more about all this, but try to enjoy yourself and your triumphs. And now I must see about your dress for to-night. I want you to be more beautiful than ever, for you will meet a rival beauty to-night--a marvellous beauty, and, strange to say, also a half Italian--the Countess Rossi.”

“Oh! I have heard of her; and, indeed, she is related to my mother; and I have also heard of the mysterious disappearance of her husband’s intended wife, Dorina, the very night before the marriage was to have taken place. So she has come to London?”

“Yes; she was presented at Court last week--for she has succeeded to a fine old place and property, Castle Hill--and the sensation she created at the Drawing-room was most astonishing. Never was anything like it since the last century, and the days of the Gunnings. People were breathless with admiration, and quite mobbed her.”

“Yes, she is partly Italian; she is related distantly to”--Carlo, I was going to say, but checked myself; “but she is more German, and, from what I hear, she must be a most dreadful person.”

“I can quite imagine that: there is something quite diabolical in her splendid eyes; she gave me the idea of an evil spirit in the form of an angel of light--yes, light as well as beauty; for there was something so strangely dazzling about her--the quick play of expression, the most brilliant complexion and colouring I ever saw, a hue of indescribable shiningness all over her, a Venus de’ Medici kind of figure--she reminded me of those quaint lines of Herbert’s--

‘O Rose, whose hue, angry and brave,
Makes the rash gazer wipe his eye,
Thy root is ever in its grave,
And thou must die.’”

I felt much curiosity to see her, and yet a kind of vague dread, for Lady Horatia’s description exactly tallied with what I had heard; and, in fact, it had been whispered that she made away with her cousin and rival by causing her to fall into some deep chasm in the Hohenstein caves; but I would not repeat this to Lady Horatia, as I would never believe that it could possibly be true.