HENRIETTA.

BOOK THE FIFTH.

CHAP. I.

Contains an adventure, in which our heroine is more than ordinarily interested.

In the mean time, our fair travellers, having regulated their affairs in the best manner the extreme hurry they were in would admit, set out for Dover in miss Belmour’s coach. That young lady, still agitated with the violence of her resentment, which Henrietta took care should not abate, and elated with the hope of reducing her lover to despair, by thus leaving him, thought the horses went too slow for her impatience. She wished for wings to convey her at once far from him, and declared that she never desired to see him more; yet Henrietta observed that she frequently looked out of the windows with an air of anxious expectation, and would sigh when she drew in her head again, as if she had been disappointed—Doubtless she had conceived hopes that her lover would follow her; and considering this neglect as a new proof of his indifference, it redoubled her rage, and strengthened a resolution in which reason and virtue had very little share.

This thought gave Henrietta extreme concern: her conversion promised no great permanency, since it was founded on such motives; but all she could now do was to manage her passions, for the time was not yet come, to touch her heart by sentiments of piety and virtue.

On their arrival at Dover, they found the Calais packet-boat ready to sail. Miss Belmour, who would fain have lingered at Dover a day, was not much pleased with this circumstance, but her pride was concerned not to betray any irresolution; accordingly she embarked with a tolerable good grace; and the wind continuing fair, they soon landed at Calais.

Miss Belmour having made the journey before, was under no embarrassment how to conduct herself. She proceeded to the inn she had formerly been at; and having hired a post-chaise for herself and Henrietta, and a horse for her servant, she set out immediately after dinner, and reached Boulogne that evening.

As the chaise stopped at the inn they put up at, two gentlemen alighted at the same time; one of whom hearing they were English ladies advanced, and respectfully offered them his hand to help them out. Miss Belmour, pleased with the graceful appearance of this stranger, politely accepted his assistance, which he likewise tendered to Henrietta, whose charms, at the first glance, made a powerful impression on his heart.

His eyes told her this so intelligibly, that she was under some confusion; yet she found in herself a kind of satisfaction at the attention with which he gazed on her, and was now for the first time sensible to the pleasure of charming: but, accustomed to watch carefully over the motions of her own mind, she checked this rising vanity; and a little ashamed of the folly she discovered in herself, she hastily withdrew her hand, which he still held, as not being master enough of himself to part with it, though she was already out of the chaise; and thanking him by a graceful courtesy for his civility, she followed miss Belmour into the room the landlady had conducted her to.

The young gentleman stood gazing after her as long as she was in sight; then turning to his friend, who was giving some orders to their footmen,

“Oh, Charles!” cried he, with a look half serious, half gay, “my fatal hour is come.”

“What! I’ll warrant you,” said the other, “you are shot through the heart with the glances of the younger of those ladies; I observed how you gazed on her.”

“Is she not a charming creature?” exclaimed the first; “what features! what a complexion! what elegance in her whole form!—I am sure she has wit; I saw her soul in her eyes.”

“Faith! I am half concerned for you,” interrupted Charles, with an affected seriousness: “this will be an unfortunate encounter, I am afraid.”

“Can we not think of some method to introduce ourselves to them?” cried the other, without minding what he had said: “I shall not rest till I find out who they are.”

“What will it signify to you to know,” replied Charles: “they are going to Paris, and we to London.”

“Why aye, that is true,” said the other, “we shall go different ways in the morning; and yet—what think you, my dear Charles, of going back to Paris for a few days, and we shall have an opportunity of escorting these fair travellers?—Come, it will be but a frolick, and I know you are no enemy to them.”

“I don’t like this frolick,” replied Charles; “it has too serious an air: sure you are strangely charmed with this girl—Just upon the point of seeing your father and your family, after a long absence, and so suddenly to resolve upon protracting your stay from them—I don’t half like it I confess; and this once, my lord, I must oppose your inclinations.”

“Oh, sir, you are grave!” replied his lordship, a little sullenly, “you have a mind to exert the governor28 too; but let me tell you, that, considering the equality of our years and the terms we have hitherto lived upon, this wisdom is very unseasonable.”

The young lord, having said this with some emotion, hastily entered the house; and calling to the inn-keeper to shew him a room, went away, without taking any farther notice of his governor, who stood musing for some time after he was gone, and then followed him with an intention to bring him, if possible, to reason.

Upon his entering the room, he found his pupil leaning on a table, with a discontented air. He just raised his head to see who it was that came in; and immediately resumed his former posture, without speaking a word.

The governor looked at him a moment in silence; at last,

“This pensiveness (said he) and this causeless resentment; are they not strong arguments against my complying with your proposal? The impression this girl has made on your heart must needs be very great, since it can make you already forget that friendship you have vowed for me, and in which I placed so much happiness.”

“It is you, not I, who seems to have forgot our mutual friendship,” replied the young nobleman, melted at those last words: “Why did you, my dear Charles, lose the beloved friend and companion in the austere governor? is not this strange affectation!”

“Indeed, my lord,” replied the governor, “I should be unworthy the title of your friend, if I was not attentive to your interest.”

“Was there ever any thing so absurd,” interrupted his lordship, “to make a serious affair of a little idle curiosity!”

“Don’t you make a serious affair of it,” replied the governor, “and I shall be contented.”

“Well, then, you consent to go back to Paris with me,” said the pupil.

“If you are resolved to go,” answered the governor, “to be sure I will go with you.”

“Now you are my friend again,” said the young lord, hugging him: “I promise you, I will not stay long in Paris; but we must be Freeman and Melvil once more, my dear Charles—Ah, how many pleasant adventures have we had under those names!”

“If this proves of no greater consequence,” resumed the young governor, “I shall not regret coming into your scheme; but I confess I am alarmed at your eagerness to follow this young woman. She seems to have made no slight impression on your heart: there is danger in these sort of attachments; how do you know how far this may lead you?”

“What strange notions have entered your head!” said the young nobleman; “it is hardly worth while to make a serious answer to them: but this you may depend upon, that I never will follow my inclinations in opposition to the duty I owe my father. And now, what do you think will become of this dangerous attachment? but (added he, smiling) we must make our fellow-travellers a visit; these inns are charming places for shortening the ceremonies of a first introduction.” He rang the bell, without waiting for his friend’s answer, and, one of his servants appearing, he ordered him to present Mr. Freeman’s and his compliments to the two English ladies, with a request that they would permit them to wait upon them.

Henrietta felt her heart flutter at this message; yet her natural reserve made her wish miss Belmour would decline the visit of these young gentlemen. However, that lady returned a civil answer, and permission for them to come.

Henrietta, sensible of an agitation which she had never known before, would have chosen not to have shared this visit; but it was not possible to avoid it: miss Belmour had obliged her to throw off the character of a servant, and to live with her upon the footing of a friend and companion; to which Henrietta was induced to consent, by the hope she had, that this familiarity would furnish her with opportunities to guard her unhappy mistress against the evils into which her blind passion was hurrying her.

To this mark of consideration and esteem miss Belmour added a most affectionate behaviour, which entirely won the heart of the tender and grateful Henrietta: for nothing so much resembles true friendship, as those connexions which lovers form with persons whom they make the confidants of their passion.

Thus circumstanced, Henrietta was obliged to receive the compliments of Mr. Melvil and his friend, as well as her lady, who, soon after, fell into a fit of musing, that made it necessary for our fair heroine to keep up the conversation with the two gentlemen, which she did with that sprightliness and vivacity so natural to her.

The graces of her wit, the easy elegance of her manners, and the modest dignity of her deportment, formed new chains for the heart of Melvil. He looked on his friend with an exulting air: his eyes challenged his admiration of the woman, whose merit justified the sentiments he entertained for her.

At parting, he told the ladies, that, since he was going to Paris, as well as they, he hoped they would allow him the pleasure of escorting them; and that he would regulate his journey entirely by theirs.

Henrietta, who well remembered to have seen these travellers taking the very contrary route, was a little surprised at this declaration; but miss Belmour, absorbed in her own reflections, was wholly ignorant of that circumstance; and, considering this offer in no other light than that of general politeness, she received it with her usual complaisance.

The youth and beauty of the two ladies made their apparent independent situation a matter of curiosity to Mr. Freeman, as well as the profound melancholy in which one of them seemed buried.

Melvil was little concerned in these enquiries; all his thoughts were taken up with the perfections he found in her who had charmed him; and he was much less solicitous to discover who she was, than how to make himself agreeable to her. He found she was not married, by the other lady’s giving her the title of miss when she spoke to her; and he was perfectly satisfied with this knowledge. Conscious of the ardor with which he already loved this fair stranger, he was apprehensive of awakening the fears of his friend, by dwelling too long on her praises; but he received the testimony, which Freeman could not help giving to her merit, with such an undisguised transport, as drew from him some serious admonitions, which he rallied off with a sprightly air, and then changed the discourse to a less interesting subject.