The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 324: what you’re looking at

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

318 —————————— ward; and she looked down in sinister, moody pen- siveness. At length that silence was broken by herself ; for suddenly raising her eyes, and glancing towards the tipsy individ ial to assure herself that he was still slumbering, she leant forward, and said in a deep voice, “The Duke of Marchmont is the greatest villain upon earth!” “You and I saw enough of him, Amy,” e- sponded Christian, “to be enabled to arrive ie no very favourable conclusion with SegUea to his cha- racter.” “You know full well, Mr. Ashton,” she rejoined, “that I was completely innocent of any wilful complicity in that scandalous plot ns “T know it, Amy,” answered our hero. “ You were deceived by appearances: those dresses which were worn by another i “Yes, I was indeed deceived!” resumed Amy Sutton. ‘Never was deception more gross—more abominable !” “T hope that the Duchess did not believe you guilty, and visit you with her displeasure ?” said Christian. “Oh, no! the Duchess of Marchmont treated me most kindly. "Indeed, I have remained in her service until about a fortnight ago:’—then, after another brief pause, she added in a low deep voice, “That miscreant Marchmont has been my—my— ruin !” Christian gazed upon her in astonishment. Such words coming from female lips, naturally conveyed the impression of seduction’s triumph: and our hero was surprised for more reasons than one. He had always heard Amy Sutton spoken of as young woman of unimpeachable virtue, and he indeed would fiercely resent the slightest liberty that was taken with her. Moreover, he had be- lieved that she had detested the Duke on account of that iniquitous affair of which they had been speaking. How, then, was it that her virtue had succumbed? How had her aversion been changed into love? “Do not think, Mr. Ashton,’ she presently re. sumed, “that I have been wilfully and wantonly frail. If that were the case, I should not be ad- dressing you in such a manner. No—with shame should I do my best to conceal my fault! Can you not understand me? I was the victim of the most diabolical atrocity——-and I will be signally re- venged !” Christian was more and more astonished at what he heard: but it was a point on which he would not ask questions: he could only listen to just so much as Amy Sutton might choose to reveal to him. “ Perhaps you consider it indelicate,” she went on to say, “that I should make such a revelation to one of the opposite sex. But itis because you already know so much of the villany of March- mont’s character—and because we were both as it were mixed up in a transaction which so signally exposed his baseness and his turpitude—and per- haps, too, it is a relief to my goaded feelings to be enabled to speak of my wrongs to one who knows their author so well, and knows likewise how fully capable he is of inflicting any wrong, even the worst and most flagrant that one fellow-creature can sustain at the hands of another. It was shortly after the return of the family from Oak- lands to Belgrave Square—he made an overture to me—I rejected it with scorn and indignation— ——— THE MYSTERIES OF THE COURT. he repeated it—he displayed gold before my eyes —and still I rejected his advances with abhor- rence. I threatened to leave my situation the very next day, and to explain to the Duchess wherefore I left Amy Sutton paused for a minute: her counte- ce was perfectly livid with the workings of her feelings and the deep sense of her wrongs, “That same night,’ she continued, in a voice so low that it was’ barely audible, and after having flung another glance towards the slumberer in the corner,—“that very night I was awakened from my sleep by the sensation of something poured between my lips: but between that awakening and a sinking into a state of perfect unconscious- ness, there was only a moment’s interyal—so that it appears like a dream when I think of it! When I awoke in the morning’”’—and here Amy Sutton lowered the veil over her countenance,—* when I awoke in the morning, the Duke was with me— my ruin - The remainder of the sentence was lost ina low, deep, stifling sob. Christian sate aghast at this narrative of diabolic villany. Bad as he knew the Duke of Marchmont to be, yet he could scarcely have fancied that he was capable of such hideous turpitude as this. Amy Sutton sate back in the railway carriage with her veil over her countenance; and in this posture she remained, completely immoveable, for nearly ten minutes,— all her senses and faculties being absorbed in the contemplation of the tremendous wrong which she had sustained and of the vengeance that she a | purposed to wreak whenever the opportunity should serve. “Perhaps you will ask me,” she at length re- sumed,—“ or at all events you will wonder, why I did not drag the Duke of Marchmont before the tribunals and punish him for his flagrant iniquity P But if I had adopted that course, it would have been likewise to expose my own disgrace—to parade my own dishonour ; and I am dependent on my character for my bread. The world might have sympathised with me perhaps; but amongst all those sympathisers, who would give me another situation? who would have received me into his home to attend upon his virtuous wife or his chaste daughters? And then, too, Mr. Ashton,” con- tinued Amy, “ there was another consideration—a consideration suggested by the language which the Duke himself held to me when I reproached and threatened him for the atrocity of his eonduct. It was that against my accusation he would reply that he had been invited to my bed—or at least that I had willingly received him there—and that I subsequently proclaimed a foul charge against him because he would not yield to the exorbitance of my demands for pecuniary reparation.” “And after that, Amy,” said Christian, “you remained for several months in the service of the Duchess ?” “Yes,” she replied—and then remained silent, offering no exp!anation of this portion of her con- duct: nor did Christian like to ask for any. There was a farther pause, which was broken by our hero inquiring whether Amy Sutton was going all the way to Ramsgate ? “T am not,” she answered. “My destination is a small village a little way on this side of Ashford.” 9? 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