'And then, Mr Giles, as you very well know, when I asked, if she has money, why don't she pay her debts? you replied, that she had paid them all. Upon which I said, I should be glad to know, then why I was to be the only person left out, just only for my complaisance in waiting so long? and upon that I resolved to come myself, and see how the matter stood. For though I have served you with such good will, Mrs Ellis, while I thought you poor, I must be a fool to be kept out of my money, when I know you have got it in plenty: and Mr Giles says that he counted, with his own hands, ten ten-pound bank-notes. Now I should be glad if you have no objection, to hear how you came by all that money, Mrs Ellis; for ten ten-pound bank-notes make a hundred pounds.'
Oh! absent – unguarded – dangerous Mr Giles Arbe! thought Ellis, how much benevolence do you mar, by a distraction of mind that leads to so much mischief!
'I hope I have done nothing improper?' cried Mr Giles, perceiving, with concern, the disturbance of Ellis, 'in mentioning this; for I protest I never recollected, till this very minute, that the money is not your own. It slipt my memory, somehow, entirely.'
'Nay, nay, how will you make that out, Mr Giles?' cried Miss Bydel. 'If it were not her own, how came she to pay her tradesmen with it, as you told us that she did, Mr Giles?'
Ellis, in the deepest embarrassment, knew not which way to turn her head.
'She paid them, Miss Bydel,' said Mr Giles, 'because she is too just, as well as too charitable, to let honest people want, only because they have the good nature to keep her from wanting herself; while she has such large sums, belonging to a rich friend, lying quite useless, in a bit of paper, by her side. For the money was left with her by a very rich friend, she told me herself.'
'No, Sir, – no, Mr Giles,' cried Ellis, hastily, and looking every way to avoid the anxious enquiring, quick-glancing eyes of Harleigh: 'I did not … I could not say…' she stopt, scarcely knowing what she meant either to deny or to affirm.
'Yes, yes, 'twas a rich friend, my dear lady, you owned that. If you had not given me that assurance, I should not have urged you to make use of it. Besides, who but a rich friend would leave you money in such a way as that, neither locked, nor tied, nor in a box, nor in a parcel; but only in a little paper cover, directed For Miss Ellis, at her leisure?'
At these words, which could leave no doubt upon the mind of Harleigh, that the money in question was his own; and that the money, so often refused, had finally been employed in the payment of her debts, Ellis involuntarily, irresistibly, but most fearfully, stole a hasty glance at him; with a transient hope that they might have escaped his attention; but the hope died in its birth: the words, in their fullest meaning, had reached him, and the sensation which they produced filled her with poignant shame. A joy beamed in his countenance that irradiated every feature; a joy that flushed him into an excess of rapture, of which the consciousness seemed to abash himself; and his eyes bent instantly to the ground. But their checked vivacity checked not the feelings which illumined them, nor the alarm which they excited, when Ellis, urged by affright to snatch a second look, saw the brilliancy with which they had at first sought her own, terminate in a sensibility more touching; saw that they glistened with a tender pleasure, which, to her alarmed imagination, represented the potent and dangerous inferences that enchanted his mind, at a discovery that he had thus essentially succoured her; and that she had accepted, at last, however secretly, his succour.
This view of new danger to her sense of independence, called forth new courage, and restored an appearance of composure; and, addressing herself to Miss Bydel, 'I entreat you,' she cried, 'Madam, to bear a little longer with my delay. To-morrow I shall enter upon a new career, from the result of which I hope speedily to acknowledge by obligation to your patience; and to acquit myself to all those to whom I am in any manner, pecuniarily obliged; – except of the lighter though far more lasting debt of gratitude.'
Harleigh understood her determined perseverance with cruel disappointment, yet with augmented admiration of her spirited delicacy; and, sensible of the utter impropriety of even an apparent resistance to her resolution in public, he faintly expressed his concern that she had no letters prepared for town, and with a deep, but stifled sigh, took leave.
Miss Bydel continued her interrogations, but without effect; and soon, therefore, followed. Mr Giles remained longer; not because he obtained more satisfaction, but because, when not answered, he was contented with talking to himself.
The rest of the day was passed free from outward disturbance to Ellis; and what she might experience internally was undivulged.
CHAPTER XXXVIII
The day now arrived which Ellis reluctantly, yet firmly, destined for her new and hazardous essay. Resolute in her plan, she felt the extreme importance of attaining courage and calmness for its execution. She shut herself up in her apartment, and gave the most positive injunctions to the milliners, that no one should be admitted. The looks of Harleigh, as he had quitted her room, had told her that this precaution would not be superfluous, and, accordingly, he came; but was refused entrance: he wrote; but his letters were returned unread. His efforts to break, served but to fix her purpose: she saw the expectations that he would feed from any concession; and potent as had hitherto been her objection to the scheme, they all subsided, in preference to exciting, or passively permitting, any doubts of the steadiness of her rejection.
Still, however, she could not practise: her voice and her fingers were infected by the agitation of her mind, and she could neither sing nor play. She could only hope that, at the moment of performance, the positive necessity of exertion, would bring with it, as so often is its effect, the powers which it requires.
The tardiness of her resolution caused, however, such an accumulation of business, not only for her thoughts, but for her time, from the indispensable arrangements of her attire, that scarcely a moment remained either for the relief or the anxieties of rumination. She set off, therefore, with tolerable though forced composure, for the rooms, in the carriage of Miss Arbe; that lady, once again, chusing to assume the character of her patroness, since as such she could claim the merit of introducing her to the public, through an obligation to her own new favourite, M Vinstreigle.
Upon stopping at the hotel, in which the concert was to be held, a strange figure, with something foreign in his appearance, twice crossed before the chariot, with a menacing air, as if purposing to impede her passage. Easily startled, she feared descending from the carriage; when Harleigh, who was watching, though dreading her arrival, came in sight, and offered her his hand. She declined it; but, seeing the intruder retreat abruptly, into the surrounding crowd of spectators, she alighted and entered the hotel.
Pained, at once, and charmed by the striking elegance of her appearance, and the air of gentle dignity which shewed such attire to be familiar to her, Harleigh felt irresistibly attracted to follow her, and once more plead his cause. 'Hear, hear me!' he cried, in a low, but touching voice: 'One moment hear me, I supplicate, I conjure you! still it is not too late to avert this blow! Indisposition cannot be disputed, or, if doubted, of what moment would be the suspicion, if once, generously, trustingly, you relinquish this cruel plan?'
He spoke in a whisper, yet with an impetuosity that alarmed, as much as his distress affected her; but, when she turned towards him, to call upon his forbearance, she perceived immediately at his side, the person who had already disconcerted her. She drew hastily back, and he brushed quickly past, looking round, nevertheless, and evidently and anxiously marking her. Startled, uneasy, she involuntarily stopt; but was relieved by the approach of one of the door-keepers, to the person in question; who haughtily flung at him a ticket, and was passing on; but who was told that he could not enter the concert-room in a slouched hat.