CHAPTER VIII

_Modern Ideas of Duty_

Camilla now felt more permanently revived, because better satisfied with the rectitude of her conduct. She could no longer be accused of interfering between Edgar and Indiana; that affair would take its natural course, and, be it what it might, while absent from both parties, she concluded she should at least escape all censure.

Peaceably, therefore, she returned to take possession of her usual apartment, affectionately accompanied by her eldest sister.

The form and the mind of Lavinia were in the most perfect harmony. Her polished complexion was fair, clear, and transparent; her features were of the extremest delicacy, her eyes of the softest blue, and her smile displayed internal serenity. The unruffled sweetness of her disposition bore the same character of modest excellence. Joy, hope, and prosperity, sickness, sorrow, and disappointment, assailed alike in vain the uniform gentleness of her temper: yet though thus exempt from all natural turbulence, either of pleasure or of pain, the meekness of her composition degenerated not into insensibility; it was open to all the feminine feelings of pity, of sympathy, and of tenderness.

Thus copiously gifted with 'all her sex's softness,' her society would have contributed to restore Camilla to repose, had they continued together without interruption; but, in a few minutes, the room door was opened, and Lionel, rushing into the apartment, called out, 'How do, do, my girls? how do, do?' and shook them each by the hand, with a swing that nearly brought them to the ground.

Camilla always rejoiced at his sight; but Lavinia gravely said, 'I thought, brother, you had been at Dr. Marchmont's?'

'All in good time, my dear! I shall certainly visit the old gentleman before long.'

'Did you not sleep there, then, last night?'

'No, child.'

'Good God, Lionel!--if my mother--'

'My dear little Lavinia,' cried he, chucking her under the chin, 'I have a vast notion of making visits at my own time, instead of my mamma's.'

'O Lionel! and can you, just now----'

'Come, come,' interrupted he, 'don't let us waste our precious minutes in old moralizing. If I had not luckily been hard by, I should not have known the coast was clear. Pray where are they gone, tantivying?'

'To Cleves.'

'To Cleves! what a happy escape! I was upon the point of going thither myself. Camilla, what is the matter with thee?'

'Nothing--I am only thinking--pray when do you go to Oxford?'

'Pho, pho,--what do you talk of Oxford for? you are grown quite stupid, girl. I believe you have lived too long with Miss Margland. Pray how does that dear creature do? I am afraid she will grow melancholy from not seeing me so long. Is she as pretty as she used to be? I have some notion of sending her a suitor.'

'O brother,' said Lavinia, 'is it possible you can have such spirits?'

'O hang it, if one is not merry when one can, what is the world good for? besides, I do assure you, I fretted so consumed hard at first, that for the life of me I can fret no longer.'

'But why are you not at Dr. Marchmont's?'

'Because, my dear, you have no conception the pleasure those old doctors take in lecturing a youngster who is in any disgrace.'

'Disgrace!' repeated Camilla.

'At all events,' said Lavinia, 'I beseech you to be a little careful; I would not have my poor mother find you here for the world.'

'O, as to that, I defy her to desire the meeting less than I do. But come, let's talk of something else. How go on the classics? Is my old friend, Dr. Orkborne, as chatty and amusing as ever?'

'My dear Lionel,' said Camilla, 'I am filled with apprehension and perplexity. Why should my mother wish not to see you? And why--and how is it possible you can wish not to see her?'

'What, don't you know it all?'

'I know only that something must be wrong; but how, what, or which way, I have not heard.'

'Has not Lavinia told you, then?

'No,' answered Lavinia; 'I could be in no haste to give her pain.'

'You are a good girl enough. But how came you hither, Camilla? and what is the reason you have not seen my mother yourself?'

'Not seen her! I have been with her this half hour.'

'What! and in all that time did not she tell you?'

'She did not name you.'

'Is it possible!--Well, she's a noble creature! I wonder how she could ever have such a son as me. And I am still less like my father than her. I suppose I was changed in the cradle. Will you countenance me, young ladies, if some villainous attorney or exciseman should by and by come to own me?'

'Dear Lionel,' cried Camilla, 'do explain to me what has happened. You make me think it important and trifling twenty times in a minute.'

'O, a horrid business!--Lavinia must tell it you. I'll go away till she has done. Don't despise me, Camilla; I am confounded sorry, I promise you.'

He then hurried out of the room, evidently feeling more emotion than he cared to display.

Yet Lavinia had but just begun her relation, when he abruptly returned. 'Come, I had better tell it you myself,' cried he, 'for she'll make such a dismal ditty of it, that it won't be over this half year; the sooner we have done with it the better; it will only put you out of spirits.'

Then, sitting down, and taking her hand, he began, 'You must know I was in rather a bad scrape at Oxford last year--'

'Last year! and you never told us of it before!'

'O, 'twas about something you would not understand, so I shall not mention particulars now. It is enough for you to know that two or three of us wanted a little cash!--well, so--in short, I sent a letter--somewhat of a threatening sort--to poor old uncle Relvil!'--

'O Lionel!'

'O, I did not sign it,--it was only begging a little money, which he can afford to spare very well; and just telling him, if he did not come to a place I mentioned, he would have his brains blown out.'--

'How horrible!'

'Pho, pho,--he had only to send the money, you know, and then his brains might keep their place; besides, you can't suppose there was gunpowder in the words. So I got this copied, and took the proper measures for concealment, and,--would you believe it! the poor old gull was fool enough actually to send the money where he was bid?'

'Fie, Lionel!' cried Lavinia; 'do you call him a fool because you terrified him?'

'Yes, to be sure, my dear; and you both think him so too, only you don't hold it pretty to say so. Do you suppose, if he had had half the wit of his sister, he would have done it? I believe, in my conscience, there was some odd mistake in their births, and that my mother took away the brains of the man, and left the woman's for the noddle of my poor uncle.'

'Fie, fie, brother!' said Lavinia again; 'you know how sickly he has always been from his birth, and how soon therefore he might be alarmed.'

'Why, yes, Lavinia--I believe it was a very bad thing--and I would give half my little finger I had not done it. But it's over, you know; so what signifies making the worst of it?'

'And did he not discover you?'

'No; I gave him particular orders, in my letter, not to attempt anything of that sort, assuring him there were spies about him to watch his proceedings. The good old ass took it all for gospel. So there the matter dropt. However, as ill luck would have it, about three months ago we wanted another sum--'

'And could you again--'

'Why, my dear, it was only taking a little of my own fortune beforehand, for I am his heir; so we all agreed it was merely robbing myself; for we had several consultations about it, and one of us is to be a lawyer.'

'But you give me some pleasure here,' said Camilla; 'for I had never heard that my uncle had made you his heir.'

'No more have I neither, my dear; but I take it for granted. Besides, our little lawyer put it into my head. Well, we wrote again, and told the poor old gentleman--for which I assure you I am heartily repentant--that if he did not send me double the sum, in the same manner, without delay, his house was to be burnt to the ground the first night that he and all his family were asleep in bed.--Now don't make faces and shruggings, for, I promise you, I think already I deserve to be hanged for giving him the fright; though I would not really have hurt him, all the time, for half his fortune. And who could have guessed he would have bit so easily? The money, however, came, and we thought it all secure, and agreed to get the same sum annually.'

'Annually!' repeated Camilla, with uplifted hands.

'Yes, my dear. You have no conception how convenient it would have been for our extra expenses. But, unluckily, uncle grew worse, and went abroad, and then consulted with some crab of a friend, and that friend with some demagogue of a magistrate, and so all is blown!--However, we had managed it so cleverly, it cost them near three months to find it out, owing, I must confess, to poor uncle's cowardice in not making his enquiries before the money was carried off, and he himself over the seas and far away. The other particulars Lavinia must give you; for I have talked of it now till I have made myself quite sick. Do tell me something diverting to drive it a little out of my head. Have you seen any thing of my enchanting widow lately?'

'No, she does not desire to be seen by me. She would not admit me.'

'She is frankness itself, and does not pretend to care a fig for any of her own sex.--O, but, Camilla, I have wanted to ask you this great while, if you think there is any truth in this rumour, that Mandlebert intends to propose to Indiana?'

'To propose! I thought it had all long since been settled.'

'Ay, so the world says; but I don't believe a word of it. Do you think, if that were the case, he would not have owned it to me? There's nothing fixed yet, depend upon it.'

Camilla, struck, amazed, and delighted, involuntarily embraced her brother; though, recollecting herself almost at the same moment, she endeavoured to turn off the resistless impulse into taking leave, and hurrying him away.

Lionel, who to want of solidity and penetration principally owed the errors of his conduct, was easily put upon a wrong scent, and assured her he would take care to be off in time. 'But what,' cried he, 'has carried them to Cleves? Are they gone to tell tales? Because I have lost one uncle by my own fault, must I lose another by their's?'

'No,' answered Lavinia, 'they have determined not to name you. They have settled that my uncle Hugh shall never be told of the affair, nor anybody else, if they can help it, except your sisters, and Dr. Marchmont.'

'Well, they are good souls,' cried he, attempting to laugh, though his eyes were glistening; 'I wish I deserved them better; I wish, too, it was not so dull to be good. I can be merry and harmless here at the same time,--and so I can at Cleves;--but at Oxford--or in London,--your merry blades there--I can't deny it, my dear sisters--your merry blades there are but sad fellows. Yet there is such fun, such spirit, such sport amongst them, I cannot for my life keep out of their way. Besides, you have no conception, young ladies, what a bye word you become among them if they catch you flinching.'

'I would not for the world say anything to pain you, my dear brother,' cried Lavinia; 'but yet I must hope that, in future, your first study will be to resist such dangerous examples, and to drop such unworthy friends?'

'If it is not to tell tales, then, for what else are they gone to Cleves, just at this time?'

'For my mother to take leave of Eugenia and my uncle before her journey.'

'Journey! Why whither is she going?'

'Abroad.'

'The deuce she is!--And what for?'

'To try to make your peace with her brother; or at least to nurse him herself till he is tolerably recovered.'

Lionel slapped his hat over his eyes, and saying, 'This is too much!--if I were a man I should shoot myself!'--rushed out of the room.

The two sisters rapidly followed him, and caught his arm before he could quit the house. They earnestly besought him to return, to compose himself, and to promise he would commit no rash action.

'My dear sisters,' cried he, 'I am worked just now only as I ought to be; but I will give you any promise you please. However, though I have never listened to my father as I ought to have listened, he has implanted in my mind a horror of suicide, that will make me live my natural life, be it as good for nothing as it may.'

He then suffered his sisters to lead him back to their room, where he cast himself upon a chair, in painful rumination upon his own unworthiness, and his parents' excellence; but the tender soothings of Lavinia and Camilla, who trembled lest his remorse should urge him to some act of violence, soon drew him from reflections of which he hated the intrusion; and he attended, with complacency, to their youthful security of perfect reconciliations, and re-established happiness.

With reciprocal exultation, the eyes of the sisters congratulated each other on having saved him from despair: and seeing him now calm, and, they hoped, safe, they mutually, though tacitly, agreed to obtrude no further upon meditations that might be useful to him, and remained silently by his side.

For some minutes all were profoundly still; Lionel then suddenly started up; the sisters, affrighted, hastily arose at the same instant; when stretching himself and yawning, he called out, 'Pr'ythee, Camilla, what is become of that smug Mr. Dubster?'

Speechless with amazement, they looked earnestly in his face, and feared he was raving.

They were soon, however undeceived; the tide of penitence and sorrow was turned in his buoyant spirits, and he was only restored to his natural volatile self.

'You used him most shabbily,' he continued, 'and he was a very pretty fellow. The next time I have nothing better to do, I'll send him to you, that you may make it up.'

This quick return of gaiety caused a sigh to Lavinia, and much surprise to Camilla; but neither of them could prevail with him to depart, till Mr. and Mrs. Tyrold were every moment expected; they then, though with infinite difficulty, procured his promise that he would go straight to Dr. Marchmont, according to an arrangement made for that purpose by Mrs. Tyrold herself.

Lavinia, when he was gone, related some circumstances of this affair which he had omitted. Mr. Relvil, the elder brother of Mrs. Tyrold, was a country gentleman of some fortune, but of weak parts, and an invalid from his infancy. He had suffered these incendiary letters to prey upon his repose, without venturing to produce them to any one, from a terror of the menaces hurled against him by the writer, till at length he became so completely hypochondriac, that his rest was utterly broken, and, to preserve his very existence, he resolved upon visiting another climate.

The day that he set out for Lisbon, his destined harbour, he delivered his anonymous letters to a friend, to whom he left in charge to discover, if possible, their author.

This discovery, by the usual means of enquiries and rewards, was soon made; but the moment Mr. Relvil learnt that the culprit was his nephew, he wrote over to Mrs. Tyrold a statement of the transaction, declaring he should disinherit Lionel from every shilling of his estate. His health was so much impaired, he said, by the disturbance this had given to his mind, that he should be obliged to spend the ensuing year in Portugal; and he even felt uncertain if he might ever return to his own country.

Mrs. Tyrold, astonished and indignant, severely questioned her son, who covered, with shame, surprise, and repentance, confessed his guilt. Shocked and grieved in the extreme, she ordered him from her sight, and wrote to Dr. Marchmont to receive him. She then settled with Mr. Tyrold the plan of her journey and voyage, hoping by so immediately following, and herself nursing her incensed brother, to soften his wrath, and avert its final ill consequences.