CHAPTER XIII.

MISUNDERSTANDING.

Let your fair eyes and gentle wishes go with me to my trial, wherein if I be foiled, there is but one shamed that was never gracious; if killed, but one dead who is willing to be so. I shall do my friends no wrong, for I have none to lament me.-SHAKSPEARE.

THE interview with her father described in the last chapter was the most serious of Lady Constance's life. That life had, till now, been placid and equal; and though lately hurried with dissipation, and ruffled sometimes by circumstances, it was the mere transitory uneasiness which modesty and goodness always feel, when made the object of the public gaze. She had been forced, indeed, to decide upon overtures from others, in a manner unpalatable to their feelings; and this, too, had hurt her own for the time. But, the crisis over, no lasting discomfort remained; and the return to cheerfulness was only the natural effect which will always belong to youth and spirits when accompanied by innocence.

It was but lately that Constance had ever felt clouded, except from external circumstances. Her disappointment at finding that perpetual gayety was by no means perpetual happiness had generated some seriousness; and the talk of the world, as described to her, had made her shrink from the notice of her cousin, like a sensitiveplant. Till this moment, however, her energies had never been much called upon, and she now continued wrapped in sad reflection for many minutes after her father had left her. Strange that this seeming princess of the world should be thus exposed to care, amid halls and bowers, from which, to the common observer, sorrow flies far." Under circumstances so new, and, as it might be feared, so afflicting, it was the generosity of her mind that in the end supported her. The noble nature of Mortimer found too close a pattern in hers to be seriously injured by an accusation which she unhesitatingly pronounced to be groundless. And the consequence was but a just one to herself; for she rose from her revery relieved and

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satisfied, under a communication which it was supposed was to overwhelm De Vere with disgrace and herself with grief.

But though this had completely failed, there is so painful a sensation in delicate minds when they find themselves exposed to the general, perhaps the coarse comments of the world, that Constance was far from happy. She heard of her cousin's intended expedition with an interest which was mixed.

"He is no longer to me the same Mortimer that he was," said she to herself; "nor am I the same friend to him. My father wills it, and I must obey my father. Pity he is so changed towards Mortimer; but he will no longer look grave upon me, when the world no longer talks. Yes, yes; it is right that my cousin should go."

Though this reflection was made with a sigh, the decision of it relieved her from some of the gloom that had come over her mind. The kiss, too, cold and formal as it was, with which her father had taken his leave, awoke in her sensations of filial pleasure, seldom indeed excited, but never raised without holding out to her heart the purest hope of its happiness. This, in her high innate sense of duty, formed, in fact, an anchoring place for her mind; and this will account, too, for much of that decision of conduct which she presently displayed; and explain a demeanour which, to some readers, may prove unexpected.

That Mortimer was superior to all the young men she had ever seen her judgment had often confessed. His loftiness, his rectitude, his contempt of every thing that had a shade of that accommodating spirit which selfinterest prescribed to every one around her, and the contrary of which the universal corruption of the time had made it a fashion to ridicule; all this stamped him in her mind as a person of a higher order, whose caste was by no means diminished by the mediocrity of his fortune. In short, though lowered in all his prospects, she still thought him the honour of her house. But, in thinking so, she had made no surrender of affections, which, as it appeared to her, had never even been sought. So far from this, she even regretted that her cousin was not her brother; a Mowbray instead of a De Vere. Hence, then, she was more open to the effects of a conviction that to think of him in any other light than as a relation would for ever forfeit her father's countenance; and hence, too,

the persuasion which, though not universal among the young women of the time, was with her most peculiarly strong, that even though a father might be in fault, the character of a daughter would for ever want support by acting in opposition to him.

"Ah!" said she, "let me never be put on my defence where my father is a party. It suits neither with my age nor sex; nor would the countenance of the whole world heal the wound I should inflict upon myself in wounding him."

Her merit in this was the greater, because, though the bias of her nature was to love her parent, even with fondness, if he would permit it, she felt too fatally that he did not give the permission; and thus, a mind that was rich in endowments, and a heart formed to be the abode of all the affections, were left wandering and void, deprived of their best interest, and almost a blank in the scale of existence.

Still her highest pleasure had always been in the pride which she saw her father took in her. That pride, indeed, rather than paternal fondness (so sweet to the child where it exists), was the chief, if not the only sign of pleasure which Lord Mowbray ever showed in her. But even this was a comfort with which no inclination she had hitherto felt could stand in competition; and the very notion that she was thought capable of fostering an affection unsought, and unsanctioned by her parent, affected her in a manner to give her the greatest uneasiness. With all her interest, therefore, about De Vere, she was by no means in his power; and it was, upon the whole, a relief to these feelings at least to hear of his intended departure.

But though devotion to filial duty and to delicacy might be said to form the most essential part of Constance's character, and whenever it came in competition with other feelings she had neither choice nor hesitation as to decision, yet she felt not the ease which she wished at the prospect of a separation, indefinite both as to time and place, and pregnant, perhaps, with personal danger. It was not, therefore, altogether without perturbation that she soon after heard a message delivered from De Vere to his uncle, requesting to take leave of him and his cousin before he set out.

This made it necessary to call up all her firmness, and she did it so successfully that, though the softness of her demeanour was resumed, De Vere (for so we are obliged

to own) was even mortified at the manner in which she allowed him to take leave of her.

There was, indeed, sweetness in it, because sweetness was so interwoven in her nature that it could not fail her. But it was not that sweetness which (according to the beautiful thought) seemed, in bidding him adieu, to bid him return. It was too kind to make him accuse her of caprice, but far too self-possessed for him to discover a feeling beyond what relationship warranted.

In truth, whatever we may think or have heard of the power of early bias and secret affection, the predominating rectitude and determination of her character were, in reality, equal to the conquest of even this strong inclination, when called upon to attempt it, as she felt she was, by duty to her father and respect for herself. It was this, then, that had enabled her lately to be near her cousin, and now to part from him in the manner we have described.

With respect to De Vere, the mine laid by Lord Cleveland, as we before related, had been actually sprung; and however completely he rejected, as incompatible with her lovely character, the malignant report of her supposed contempt, the fact that such contempt of his pretensions, should he entertain them, was felt by his uncle, filled him with uneasiness mixed with resentment. Nor do we disguise that no little anxiety in respect to Constance herself was the offspring of these uncertainties; or that his pulse beat quick on entering the drawing-room, at finding that Lord Mowbray was absent, and that for the first time for many weeks he was alone with his cousin.

Her late distance towards him, unexplained as it was, had sent him to the interview in that doubtful mood, which might or might not be appeased-might be all turned to tenderness, or be chilled to coldness, according to the circumstances that arose.

In the commencement he watched her with anxiety, to detect, if he could, any thing like an emotion similar to his own; but in vain.

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"I go," said he at last, in answer to her question upon the length and object of his absence, "too little charmed with what the world has lately exhibited, to be very anxious about my return. I go with the man I most, if not the only man I greatly admire: nor have I much object beyond being of use to him in his melancholy; except to forget, if I can, myself and all that has befallen me during the last eight months."

"Forget yourself, Mortimer! forget your friends?" said Constance, with kindness, but of a sort so collected and natural that De Vere wished it had been less.

"I seem to have no friends," replied he, "except her I have left at Talbois and him I accompany."

"Indeed!" exclaimed Constance, somewhat shaken. "And is this house no longer your uncle's? And are we relations only in blood? I thought it had been otherwise." "Heaven knows I thought so too," replied De Vere, scrutinizing her face and manner with an air of composure, which the thought of the change in his uncle enabled him to assume. "But where the highest interests of the state are frustrated and lost from changes of opinion, it little boots us to hope that private connexions should remain without estrangement.

"Mortimer," said Constance, with a look of dignity and softness mixed, "you are not kind to us, or to yourself, in this. God knows I have deplored many things as well as you; but there has been no estrangement."

And here, spite of her resolution, her beautiful lip would have betrayed that it quivered, had she not turned to the open balcony to conceal it. Recovering, and aided, perhaps, by a feeling that to her at least Mortimer was not perfectly just, she continued, "You have been ill used, my cousin; but we will not let you part with us in ill-humour."

"I have no ill-humour," said De Vere, somewhat loftily, "nor" (and he here felt still more erect) "have I a complaint to make. From some, indeed, I have received injury, in return for benefits-"

"That you too certainly have," interrupted Constance, but checked herself again, while she thought of her father.

"With others," continued he, "I have been deemed of no consequence when found without power, after being flattered with notice under a different impression."

"Those who have acted thus are beneath you, my cousin," exclaimed Constance.

"In many things I trust they are,” replied De Vere; "and if there are others still, of a better order, who think I am in the way-" and he stopped.

"Think you in the way!" cried Constance; "to whom can you allude?"

"To those, dear Constance, too near me in connexion for me to wish to go on. I mean merely to observe,