'I must go,' he said, 'though I am sorry to leave you in perplexity.
I am afraid I can do nothing for you.'
'Nothing--but feel kindly to Gilbert,' said Albinia. 'I can't do so
yet. I don't feel as if I ever could again, when I think what he was
doing with Maurice. Yes, and how easily he could have brought poor
Lucy to her senses, if he had been good for anything! Oh! Maurice,
this is sickening work! You should be grateful to me for not
scolding you for having taken me from home!'
'I do not repent,' said her brother. 'The explosion is better than
the subterranean mining.'
'It may be,' said Albinia, 'and I need not boast of the good I did at
home! My poor, poor Lucy! A little discreet kindness and
watchfulness on my part would have made all the difference! It was
all my running my own way with my eyes shut, but then, I had always
lived with trustworthy people. Well, I wont keep you listening to my
maundering, when Winifred wants you. Oh! why did that Polysyllable
ever come near the place?'
Mr. Ferrars said the kindest and most cheering things he could
devise, and drove away, not much afraid of her being unforgiving.
He was disposed to stake all his hopes of the young man on the issue
of his advice to make a direct avowal to his father. And Gilbert
made the effort, though rather in desperation than resolution,
knowing that his condition could not be worse, and seeing no hope
save in Mr.
Pages:
539
540
541
542
543
544
545
546
547
548
549
550
551
552
553
554
555
556
557
558
559
560
561
562
563