Agnes: A Tale of the Streets — page 225: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

174 AGNES; OR, BEAUTY AND PLEASURE. forgotten how on a particular day, nineteen years quivering all over. “I heard that she died ago, I listened at the door of Waldron’s private | within 4 year after the date of my flight and her room-——this room!—t¢hat door ! and heard | father’s self-destruction. Yes--this intelligence you and him disputing together, eo that all the | reached me by some accident in the far-off tremendous villanies which had been concocted ; American clime to which I had fled ;—and though between you suddenly burst upon my knowledge | I naturally guessed it was of a broken heart, yet with an effect that was all but annihilating.” methought—methought ”"— and here Ormsby’s “And yet,” ejaculated Mr. Timperley, “ you ; voice grew more and more tremulous — “ me- were the real heir of the Ormsby property after sll {you were the rightful Evelyn!” “Yes: but you did not know it thes—neither lid you think 60,” rejoined the nobleman sternly. ‘And, Ah! Mr. Timperley, think you tha¢ I have forgotten another scene which took place a few noure later on that very same day? Let me re- mind you of it! It was a handsome drawing- room at the West End. There stood Mr. Wal- jron, shrinking and trembling before me; and there was a gloriously handsome woman it was my own wife Honoria turning disdainfully away from me because I would not yield to her pajolerics and becume a villain! And then the door opened—and the accomplice of all that vil- lany appeared; and this accomplice was you, Mr. Timperley! — you, the now respectable solicitor thougkt, I say, that it was through blighted ambi- tion—defeated hopes of aggrandizement—bafiled pride——” “No, my lord! no!” interjected Timperley. “ I¢ was through despair on your account that the loving heart was broken !” The lawyer looked with frankness, candour, and sincerity in Ormsby’s face as he thus spoke. There was now something very different in tho expression of Mr. Timperley’s countenanco from what it usually was; so that Ormsby could not possibly entertain the slightest doubt as to the man’s truthfulness in the present instance. The nobleman shook with the violence of those emo- tions which he endeavoured alike to curb and to conceal: but stronger and stronger grew thoso feelings—and at jongth, sinking upon a seat, he who rolls in his carriage, who gives splondid enter- | said in a half-dying tone, “Toll mo—tell me how tainments, who has become well connected, and | whose niece will in due timo shine as a peercss in England’s aristocratic galaxy !” Honoria’s last days were spent?” The lawyer also rosumed his seat; and he pro- ceeded to describe to Lord Ormsby how Honoria “But why, my lord—why,” asked Timperley, | had rushed after him on the day when he had fled “revert to scenes so disagreeable and to periods | so precipitately, crying “ Morton, Murton! dear which it wero better to banish from the me- mory P” “‘Your.gnostion does indeed make me ask my- elf,” said Ormsby, in his deep-toned voice, “ why [ am remaining hero to wasto words upon you, and wherefore I am extending to an hour that appointment which needed not to have occupied Morton! come back !” And ho went on to tell tho nobleman how dreadfully Honoria felt his flight and mysterious silence; and ho said, “1 saw her weep over the infant Agnos, my lord, as she had never wept before!—and she used to strain it to her bosom, murmuring your name !” Lord Ormsby groaned : he rose from his scat— more than a duzen minutes? But perhaps it is | ho pressed his hand to his brow—his lips quivered that the long pent-up feelings of my svul required | violently for a few moments. But to some extent this vent!—perhaps it is that I am now taking mastering his emotions, he sat down again, saying, my revenge upon you, such as it may be, by “ Goon. What else have you to toll me P” forcing you to retrospect upon scones stamped “ I havo but little more to say, my lord,” con- with the black iniquity a portion of which has | tinued Timperley—‘ unless it be that during the cast its shadow upon your own soul! And you! year which your wife survived your sudden flight, rovollect that sceno which I was last describing ? | she never bold up her head; and I frequently —you remember how I burst from the roomP beard Mr. Lister say that it was not disappointed And then you know,” added Ormsby, with the deupest solemnity, and with a voice so sepulchral that it did really seem as if it camo from the dead, “I was heard of no more!” “Ab, my loed! if you had come back,” ejacu- lated Timperley,—“ or if you had only written a single line to alleviate the horrible suspense——”’ ‘‘SuapenseP Ab!” interposed Ormsby; “tho suspense of those who endured the poignant griof which their tremendous selfishness deserved when they beheld all their golden visions fading from their view! Ah, Mr. Timperley! there have boon times when I have known, when I have felt, and when I have also said that it was no light thing for a man ty flee away from his home, from his wife, and from his child! But when I found that ambition which was killing hor, but it was bo- cause now that it was tvo late, her eyes wore opened to a comprehension of all your good and noble qualitics, my lord !" “‘Is this true, Mr, Timporley? is this true?” asked Ormsby in a tremulous voice. “ As I have a soul to be saved!” exclaimed the lawyer emphatically. “My God!’—and now Lord Ormsby’s omo-. tions burst forth beyund the power of control; the strong man wept and sobbed like a child: the rock was smitten—tho waters were gushing forth: the stone was rolled away from the sepulchre of his heart, and light dawned in upon it! For several minutes did that ebullition of feel- ing last; and during this interval Oruisby’s coun- the wife whom I loved and of whom 71 was proud, | tenance was concealed from Timporicy’s view, had become imbued with the wickedness of hor | eithor being averted when he wept so bitterly, or iather~—--"’ = “ My lord, you are wrong! you aro wrong!” pxcluimed Timperloy. ‘I swear it!” he udded, pm phatically. being buried in his hands when he subbed so con- | Vulsively. And now, as ho wiped away his tears and slowly turned his luoks upon the lawyer, thy | latter was struck by the idea that somo great and “ Do Hof attempt to deceive me,’ said Ormsby | signal change had peen place in Ormsby’s aspect. Comiclooo SS CO