Ellen Percy; or, The Memoirs of an Actress — page 224: what you’re looking at

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ELLEN PERCY; OR, THE MEMOIRS OF AN ACTRESS. 211 business, my good girl,” I said. “And now have | of Mademoiselle Angeline, as she started on be- the kindness to show me up-stairs.” holding me and gave vent to that half-stifled “Lor, ma’am! it’s quite easy to find the way!” | shriek to which I have already alluded. I heard eried the servant. “Go straight up the stairs— | the servant girl come rushing up the stairs: for the second floor—door facing you ¢t .| though that shriek was low, yet it had met her “ Enough!” I said: and I began ascending the | ears, the house being so small and the sound there- staircase, wondering what effect my presence | fore having so» short a distance to travel. But would produce upon Jane Churchill—for this, be | instantaneously recovering my presence of mind, it remembered, was the name which she had given | I stepped back upon the landing, exclaiming, “ It Mr. Richards as her real one. is nothing!—merely the suddenness of recogni- On reaching the landing of the second floor, I | tion!” 3 hesitated for an instant whether to proceed any I then entered the room, closing the door behind farther; for I feared lest my conduct should | me. savour of an impertinent intrusion. But then 7 “Miss Percy,’ cried Angeline, hastening to- recalled to mind all the reasons which I had | wards me, half in consternation and half witha grouped together as a motive for the adoption of | look of ill-concealed rage, “if you still possess the this course: I hesitated no longer, but knocked at | power or the inclination to injure my unhappy the door. father ° “Come in,” said a voice which I instanta- “Your father” I ejaculated, in renewed asto~ neously recognised as that of Miss Churchill. nishment: and [ flung a look upon Parks, doubt- I opened the door: but at the very moment | ing whether it could possibly be the fact: but I that I appeared on the threshold, I was transfixed | saw that he was all pale and trembling, as with the wildest degree of astonishment; for in | miserable and woe-begone a wretch as on that the man who suddenly started up from a chair | memorable night when be stood in the presence of near the fireplace, I recognised Mr. Parks ! Gilderoy Hemp, in the midst of the awfui tribunal which had reminded me of the dark inquisitorial | chambers and vehme-gerichts of the middle ages. “Yous, my father!” said Angeline—or rather Jane Parks, for this was indeed her proper name. “No, no! Miss Percy will not hurt me!” said WHAT words can express the wonderment which | Parks, in a tremulous tone and with looks of the thus seized upon me? Yes—there he was, that | most abject entreaty. “She promised Zarah that man of unmistakable appearance,—ugly and sin- | she would not—Gilderoy himself told me go! ister-faced—his red hair mingled with white—his She likewise pledged herself to that stern old cheeks coyered with freckles, as they were always; man! They were vows solemnly taken! I per- wont to be! He had on spectacles:—he always | formed all the conditions imposed upon me; and used to wear them during the earlier years of | if she did not recover possession of her fortune, it my knowledge of him; he had then left them off | was not my fault.” for an interval; but now it seemed he had taken! If was astonished at the words he had last to them again. Yes—there was Mr. Parks the | spoken; and I exclaimed, “ But as you survived attorney!—the man concerning whose fate I had; the fire, was it not you that received tke for many months past been altogether dubious,— | money ?” wondering whether he had perished in the confla-; “I? No!” he ejaculated. “DoT look like a gration, or whether he had survived it !—but now | man possessing wealth? Ask my poor daughter having this uncertainty dissipated all in a mo- | to tell you what we have suffered! She knows ment—for there stood that man ! it—she has felt 16 all! She has earned the A half-stifled shriek had indicated the sudden | bread which for some little time we have eaten surprise, and perhaps apprehension, of the young | with a comparative degree of comfort !” lady; but it was a scarcely audible ejaculation A light darted in unto my brain. All the re- which had burst from the lips of Mr. Parks him- | proaches, so bitter and yet so mysterious, which self. I should observe that it was a tolerably | Angeline had leveiled against me, two months decent room on the threshold of which I had| back in my dressing-room at the theatre, were stopped short; but while thus describing it, I, now completely intelligible. She bad looked upon am speaking comparatively. What I mean to be| me as her father’s unrelenting and remorseless inferred, is that it was a sufficiently respectable | enemy—the authoress of his ruin—the cause of apartment for a ready furnished lodging in ajhis misery. This was now compretensible somewhat poor street leading out of the York | enough; and it was not difficult to conceive that Road. There was a certain evidence of femi- | he had given his own version of past transactions nine taste in the room,—a neatness which struck | and had told a tale after his own fashion. the eye at a glance. There is an expressive * You, Miss Parks,’ I therefore at once said, though somewhat commonplace English word | “ have wronged me by the evil opinion which you ‘ which will better convey my meaning: it is the| have entertained; but that is a matter which word “ tidiness.’ ‘There was a large nosegay of |can be cleared up presently. In reference to artificial flowers in a plaster of Paris vase: and | yourself, Mr. Parks, I do not hesitate to admit a bird was chirruping in a cage girt with a piece| that [ gave to Zarah the pledge of which you of yellow muslin, At the moment when I entered,| have spoken—I renewed the same vows to a pink gauze dress—tbe unmistakable transparent | Gilderoy. I flatter myself that 1 am a woman of garment of the dansewse—slipped from the hands |truth; and even though I thus made pledges CHAPTER CI. EXPLANATIONS. 1)? . ECORNICLOOC) (E©)