Rosa Lambert — page 242: what you’re looking at

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

q _—_ _.._ —_ .~ ~ ROSA LAMBERT. 231 EE _—_—S- to undergo when borne to the convict-ship? As is ever present in my memory? And such being for the use, he replied, I might rest assured he the case, you need no longer feel surprised that I would render the cash available for some purpose ‘thus seek your presence P” or another; and as for the task of concealing it, “Surely your lordship,’ I tauntingly rejoined, that was his business and not mine. He spoke | “must have had suflicient experience, at Rams- with an admixture of flippancy and brutality, of | gate, of the value which I set upon your love and cold-blooded doggedness and hardened recklessness, | admiration fg which shocked me profoundly. I however con- “Oh, then, if you mean to be bitter and sarcas« cealed my emotions as well as I was able; and | tic,” he cried, “I should perhaps do as well to managed, unseen by any one else, to slip fifty | assume a high tone at once. Look you, Rose # pounds in bank-notes and gold-into his hands. “How dare you, my lord, address me thus We then parted; and I returned, with tears in | familiarly ?’ 1 demanded, my cheeks flushing with my eyes.and woe in my heart, to my own re-| indignation. “Do you possess the feelings of a sidence—while he remained within the ominous | man that you can thus come hither to insult one walls ot Newgate, to be thence conveyed on the | who is friendless and unprotected ?” following morning, along with a number of other “Tt is precisely because I do possess the feelings delinquents, to his destination at Woolwich. I | of aman that Iam here now. Those feelings,” he wrote to my father, acquainting him with the | continued, “have made me both love and hate you. result, and expressing a hope that Cyril’s infamy | I love you because you are beautiful: I hate you had not come to the knowledge of the people at | because you treated me most mercilessly. But Tiawthorn. Anxiously did I await my father’s , give me your love now—and all my hatred vanishes response: because if it should prove favourable to | in a moment. Rose, I am come to renew the offers my hopes, I purposed to pay Hawthorn a visit; | which I made you at Ramsgate, and which you for my soul craved for change of scene, and the | then rejected. Let the past be buried in oblivion. company of some one to relieve me from a solitude | You say that you are friendless:—in me behold a which was becoming intolerable. But, alas! I! friend. You say that you-are unprotected :—I was doomed to be disappointed: the newspapers | offer myself as your protector. Give me your de- had so fully reported Cyril’s case, that it was | cision.” gencrally known throughout the country; and I “Ts there another wager dependent upon the dared not return to Hawthorn to become the result?” I inquired, with a malicious look. object of attention on the part of all my father’s | “T know that you are fully acquainted with all neighbours. " the circumstances of that wager,’ responded the It was one afternoon—a week having elapsed | Marquis, unmoved and unabashed. ‘ Your cousin since the trial—that I was seated in the parlour at | Haverstock e the villa, wrapped in gloomiest meditation, and “The villain!” I could not help ejaculating: and half vacantly gazing forth upon the trees on which | T added bitterly, ‘“‘ He shall yet repent the fiend- ‘the snow of winter now rested,—when I beheld a | like outrage he perpetrated against me! Yes—I gentleman approaching the house, one of the ser- | can full well conjecture that not a syllable which vants having just given him admittance by the | passed between him and me on that occasion, re- garden-gate. A second glance showed me that he | mained uncommunicated to your lordship was the Marquis of Belmore; and starting up | And, Oh! was it not a glorious achievement—that from my seat, l-was on the point of ringing the | foul treachery practised towards his own cousin! bell to deny myself, when the thought suddenly | And was it not a magnanimous exploit on your struck me that such a proceeding would seem! lordship’s part—to crouch, and lurk, and hide strange to the domestics, inasmuch as the Marquis | amongst the trees to watch how long he remained had evidently been already informed that I «as at | within these walls? What sublime chivalry! home, I therefore resumed my chair; and when | Truly the English people should be proud of their he was announced, I received him with the most | aristocracy, when its worth or its capacities are glacial manner I could possibly assume. ‘The ser- | illustrated in the deeds thus performed by a Mar- vant retired: Belmore quietly took a seat; and quis and a Baronet !” gazing upon me with a look of cool libertine inso- “Wherefore so much bitterness?” inquired Jence, he observed in a half careless manner, “(So | Belmore. “I really hoped and fancied 2 you seem surprised at this visit ?” “That I might be induced to receive you more “I ought not to be surprised at any deed of un- | favourably *’’? I exclaimed. “Ah! by the bye, gentlemanly daring which your lordship may take | my lord—previous to that outrage consummated it into your head to perform :’’—and as I thus/| by your worthy companion in iniquity, was I not spoke, | flung upon him a glance of indignation | right in suspecting that in a certain transaction and scorn. your handiwork was recognisable ?” “That air becomes you as admirably as any other,| » For a moment the Marquis looked confused : my dear Mrs. Beaumont,” he said: “ but really, if | but almost immediately an insolent smile appeared you will put it off fora moment, I shall be enabled} ypon his lips; and then he laughed outright,— to enter with all the more satisfaction on the busi- | exclaiming, “ Ah! you saw through it, did you? neas which has brought me hither.” That stupid old procuress Mother Brough—or 2 There is no possible business,” I answered, rather her son Mark spoilt the whole affair by which your lordship can have to transact with carrying off the wrong person.” me; and if I were not alone here, and unpro- “Then it was your lordship,” I ejaculated, rage tected, you would not dare force yourself upon my | flushing my countenance with the deepest crimson, presence.” “who set that iniquitous machinery to work! _ “think you not, beautiful Rose,” he asked, fix- | And yet you dare come into my presence now ?— ing his libertine gaze upon me, “that your image | you dare obtrude yourself thus? 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