in perfect health; and but half an hour ago in perfect spirits,” said Belinda.
“I seem to you and to all the world, what I am not — I tell you I am dying,” said her ladyship in an emphatic tone.
Not a word more passed till they got home. Lady Delacour hurried up stairs, bidding Belinda follow her to her dressing-room. Marriott was lighting the six wax candles on the dressing-table. —“As I live, they have changed dresses after all,” said Marriott to herself, as she fixed her eyes upon Lady Delacour and Miss Portman. “I’ll be burnt, if I don’t make my lady remember this.”
“Marriott, you need not wait; I’ll ring when I want you,” said Lady Delacour; and taking one of the candles from the table, she passed on hastily with Miss Portman through her dressing-room, through her bedchamber, and to the door of the mysterious cabinet.
“Marriott, the key of this door,” cried she impatiently, after she had in vain attempted to open it.
“Heavenly graciousness!” cried Marriott; “is my lady out of her senses?”
“The key — the key — quick, the key,” repeated Lady Delacour, in a peremptory tone. She seized it as soon as Marriott drew it from her pocket, and unlocked the door.
“Had not I best put the things to rights, my lady?” said Marriott, catching fast hold of the opening door.
“I’ll ring when you are wanted, Marriott,” said Lady Delacour; and pushing open the door with violence she rushed forward to the middle of the room, and turning back, she beckoned to Belinda to follow her —“Come in; what is it you are afraid of?” said she. Belinda went on, and the moment she was in the room, Lady Delacour shut and locked the door. The room was rather dark, as there was no light in it except what came from the candle which Lady Delacour held in her hand, and which burned but dimly. Belinda, as she looked round, saw nothing but a confusion of linen rags; vials, some empty, some full, and she perceived that there was a strong smell of medicines.
Lady Delacour, whose motions were all precipitate, like those of a person whose mind is in great agitation, looked from side to side of the room, without seeming to know what she was in search of. She then, with a species of fury, wiped the paint from her face, and returning to Belinda, held the candle so as to throw the light full upon her livid features. Her eyes were sunk, her cheeks hollow; no trace of youth or beauty remained on her death-like countenance, which formed a horrid contrast with her gay fantastic dress.
“You are shocked, Belinda,” said she; “but as yet you have seen nothing — look here,”— and baring one half of her bosom, she revealed a hideous spectacle.
Belinda sunk back into a chair; Lady Delacour flung herself on her knees before her.
“Am I humbled, am I wretched enough?” cried she, her voice trembling with agony. “Yes, pity me for what you have seen, and a thousand times more for that which you cannot see:— my mind is eaten away like my body by incurable disease — inveterate remorse — remorse for a life of folly — of folly which has brought on me all the punishments of guilt.”
“My husband,” continued she, and her voice suddenly altered from the tone of grief to that of anger —“my husband hates me — no matter — I despise him. His relations hate me — no matter — I despise them. My own relations hate me — no matter, I never wish to see them more — never shall they see my sorrow — never shall they hear a complaint, a sigh from me. There is no torture which I could not more easily endure than their insulting pity. I will die, as I have lived, the envy and admiration of the world. When I am gone, let them find out their mistake; and moralize, if they will, over my grave.” She paused. Belinda had no power to speak.
“Promise, swear to me,” resumed Lady Delacour vehemently, seizing Belinda’s hand, “that you will never reveal to any mortal what you have seen and heard this night. No living creature suspects that Lady Delacour is dying by inches, except Marriott and that woman whom but a few hours ago I thought my real friend, to whom I trusted every secret of my life, every thought of my heart. Fool! idiot! dupe that I was to trust to the friendship of a woman whom I knew to be without principle: but I thought she had honour; I thought she could never betray me — O Harriot! Harriot! you to desert me! — Any thing else I could have borne — but you, who I thought would have supported me in the tortures of mind and body which I am to go through — you that I thought would receive my last breath — you to desert me! — Now I am alone in the world — left to the mercy of an insolent waiting-woman.”
Lady Delacour hid her face in Belinda’s lap, and almost stifled by the violence of contending emotions, she at last gave vent to them, and sobbed aloud.
“Trust to one,” said Belinda, pressing her hand, with all the tenderness which humanity could dictate, “who will never leave you at the mercy of an insolent waiting-woman — trust to me.”
“Trust to you!” said Lady Delacour, looking up eagerly in Belinda’s face; “yes — I think — I may trust to you; for though a niece of Mrs. Stanhope’s, I have seen this day, and have seen with surprise, symptoms of artless feeling about you. This was what tempted me to open my mind to you when I found that I had lost the only friend — but I will think no more of that — if you have a heart, you must feel for me. — Leave me now — tomorrow you shall hear my whole history — now I am quite exhausted — ring for Marriott.” Marriott appeared with a face of constrained civility and latent rage. “Put me to bed, Marriott,” said Lady Delacour, with a subdued voice; “but first light Miss Portman to her room — she need not — yet — see the horrid business of my toilette.”
Belinda, when she was left alone, immediately opened her shutters, and threw up the sash, to refresh herself with the morning air. She felt excessively fatigued, and in the hurry of her mind she could not think of any thing distinctly. She took off her masquerade dress, and went to bed in hopes of forgetting, for a few hours, what she felt indelibly impressed upon her imagination. But it was in vain that she endeavoured to compose herself to sleep; her ideas were in too great and painful confusion. For some time, whenever she closed her eyes, the face and form of Lady Delacour, such as she had just beheld them, seemed to haunt her; afterwards, the idea of Clarence Hervey, and the painful recollection of the conversation she had overheard, recurred to her: the words, “Do you think I don’t know that Belinda Portman is a composition of art and affectation?” fixed in her memory. She recollected with the utmost minuteness every look of contempt which she had seen in the faces of the young men whilst they spoke of Mrs. Stanhope, the match-maker. Belinda’s mind, however, was not yet sufficiently calm to reflect; she seemed only to live over again the preceding night. At last, the strange motley figures which she had seen at the masquerade flitted before her eyes, and she sunk into an uneasy slumber.
Chapter 3. — Lady Delacour’s History.
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MISS PORTMAN WAS AWAKENED by the ringing of Lady Delacour’s bedchamber bell. She opened her eyes with the confused idea that something disagreeable had happened; and before she had distinctly recollected herself, Marriott came to her bedside, with a note from Lady Delacour: it was written with a pencil.
“DELACOUR—my lord!!!! is to have to-day what Garrick used to call a gander feast— will you dine with me tête-à-tête, and I’ll write an excuse, alias a lie, to Lady Singleton, in the form of a charming note — I pique myself sur l’éloquence du billet— then we shall have the evening to ourselves. I have much to say, as people
