CHAPTER XXI

As my patient began to acquire strength, I demanded of him his name and family, that I might inform his friends of his situation. On his answering 'Harley,' I enquired, smiling--

If he remembered hearing his mother speak of a little _Protegé_, Emma Courtney, whom she favoured with her partial friendship?

'Oh, yes!'--and his curiosity had been strongly awakened to procure a sight of this lady.

'Behold her, then, in your nurse!'

'Is it possible!' he exclaimed, taking my hand, and pressing it with his lips--'My sister!--my friend!--how shall I ever pay the debt I owe you?'

'We will settle that matter another time; but it is now become proper that I should inform your excellent mother of what has happened, which I have hitherto delayed, lest surprise should be prejudicial to you, and retard your recovery.'

I then recounted to him the particulars of the late occurrences, of which he had before but a confused notion; adding my surprise, that I had neither seen, nor heard, any thing from Mr Morton.

He informed me, in his turn, that, having received an express, informing him of his mother's alarming situation, he immediately quitted the seat of his friend, where he was on a visit, to hasten to her; that, for this purpose, riding late, he by some means bewildered himself through the darkness of the evening, by which mistake he encountered our chaise, and he hoped was, in some measure, notwithstanding the accidents which ensued, accessary to my preservation.

I quitted him to write to my friend, whom I, at length, judged it necessary to acquaint with his situation. On the receipt of my letter, she flew to us on the wings of maternal tenderness--folded her beloved Augustus, and myself, alternately to her affectionate bosom, calling us 'her children--her darling children!--I was her guardian angel--_the preserver of her son!_--and _he_ only could repay my goodness!' I ventured to raise my eyes to him--they met his--mine were humid with tears of tenderness: a cloud passed over his brow--he entreated his mother to restrain her transports--he was yet too enfeebled to bear these emotions. She recollected herself in an instant; and, after again embracing him, leaning on my arm, walked out into the air, to relieve the tumultuous sensations that pressed upon her heart.

Once more she made me recite, minutely, the late events--strained me in her arms, repeatedly calling me--

'Her beloved daughter--the meritorious child of her affections--the preserver of her Augustus!'

Every word she uttered sunk deep into my soul, that greedily absorbed the delicious poison, prepared for me by the cruel hand of more than maternal fondness.

I mentioned to her my having written to Mr Morton, and my astonishment at his silence.

He had not yet returned, she informed me, to Morton Park; and intimated, that some malicious stories, respecting my sudden disappearance, had been circulated by Mrs Morton through the neighbourhood. She had herself been under extreme solicitude on my account. It was generally believed, from the turn Mrs Morton's malice had given to the affair, that I had eloped with Mr Montague:--the accident which had befallen him had been rumoured; but the circumstances, and the occasion of it, had been variously related. Confiding in my principles, she had waited with anxiety for the elucidation of these mysterious accounts; lamenting herself as the innocent occasion of them, yet assured they would, eventually, prove to my honour. She commended the magnanimity, which her partial friendship imputed to my behaviour, with all the enthusiasm of affection, and execrated the baseness of Mrs Morton, who, having received my letter, must have been acquainted with the real truth.

Her narration gave me many complicated, and painful, sensations; but the good opinion of the world, however desirable it may be, as connected with our utility, has ever been with me but a secondary consideration. Confiding in the rectitude of my own conduct, I composed my spirits; depending on that rectitude, and time, for removing the malignant aspersions which at present clouded my fame. The tale of slander, the basis of which is falsehood, will quietly wear away; and should it not--how unfounded, frequently, are the censures of the world--how confused its judgments! I entreated my friend to say nothing, at present, to her son on this subject; it was yet of importance that his mind should be kept still and tranquil.

We rejoined Augustus at the dinner hour, and spent the day together in harmony and friendship. The physician calling in the evening, Mrs Harley consulted him, whether it would be safe to remove her son, as she was impatient to have him under her own roof. To this the doctor made no objection, provided he was conveyed in an easy carriage, and by short stages. On Mrs Harley's thanking him for his polite and humane attention to his patient, smilingly pointing to me, he replied--'Her thanks were misplaced.' His look was arch and significant; it called a glow into my cheeks. I ventured, once more, to steal a glance at Augustus: his features were again overspread with a more than usual seriousness, while his eyes seemed designedly averted. Mrs Harley sighed, and, abruptly changing the subject, asked the physician an indifferent question, who soon after took his leave.