Agnes, or, Beauty and Pleasure — page 101: what you’re looking at

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

AGNES; OR, BEAUTY AND PLEASURE. eee UEEEEEIEEIEEEE SSS 98 with Cicely ;—and thus meeting after meeting took place until the young lady’s honour was sacrificed to Hector’s passion. Still Cicely was full of faith and confidence in her lover; for he continuously vowed in the most sacred and solemn manner that he would make her bis wife so soon as circum. stances should permit. After the lapse of a few months the storm which hung over Mrs. Chick- lade’s head in the metropolis was dispelled; and she returned thither—taking with her, as we have seen, the letters which Hardress had written to her on various occasions, and in which he gave ker minute details how to deal with Cicely. Another elderly woman succeeded Mrs. Chicklade in the occupation of the cottage a few miles distant from Cambridge; and there the meetings of Cicely and Hardress were continued, until the latter left the University. On parting from Cicely, when thus about to enter upon the great world, Hector Hardress re- newed all his vehement protestations of undying love and unchangeable fidelity. He represented to her that inasmuch as he was now of age, he was his own master,—and that if he could not obtain the consent of his parents to an alliance with her, he would sooner prove disobedient to their autho- rity than desert or deceive the being whom he loved so well. And Cicely Neale put faith in all he said : she had no reason for supposing that he was all the time deliberately beguiling her. They parted. He wrote occasionally from London, each letter containing some subterfuge or pretext for delaying his marriage—each letter also growing eolder and shorter. Vague alarms began to arise in the mind of Cicely Neale: but still she endea- voured to cling with desperate tenacity unto hope: for if she were to loosen her grasp thereon, | and endeavour to persuade or compel him to fulfil the solemn pledges he had given her. Besides, even apart from these views and considerations, it became absolutely necessary for Miss Neale to take some decisive step in regard to her own posi- tion, inasmuch as the funds which she had found in her deceased mother’s desk, and on which (to- gether with a gift from Mrs, Timperley) she had economically subsisted for about three years, were now exhausted. She arrived in the metropolis; and beneath the roof of her uncle and aunt she readily found a home; but she had not been many days in London, when, as the reader has seen, she fell in with Mrs. Chicklade. From this woman she learnt that Hector Hardress was accustomed to call at Sidney Villa; and when Cicely herself pro- ceeded thither she endeavoured to ascertain, when in discourse with the beautiful cousins, whether it were really true, as the vile woman had reported, that Hardress was paying his court to one of them. The result of her visit was a complete conviction that the heart of neither Agnes nor Floribel had been won by her own perfidious lover. The reader may perhaps marvel how Cicely had adopted cso firm and bold a bearing towards Mrs. Chicklade on the occasion when they met in the metropolis, Miss Neale’s disposition was peculiar : her character possessed no ordinary degree of strength when circumstances arose to demand the exercise of that vigour. She knew that if she cringed to Mrs. Chicklade—if she exhibited weak- neess or timidity, she should never be enabled to shake off the hateful incubus: but she had flattered herself that by means of a resolute bearing, the adoption of a tone of defiance, and an appearance as if she cared infinitely less for the vile woman’s threats than she in reality did, she would overawe she felt that she should fall into the abysm of | and intimidate instead of being overawed and inti- despair. Circumstances however occurred to | midated herself. Such indeed were her hopes, until strengthen her apprehensions, and to give more | she suddenly found them bafiled by the display of tangible substance to the misgivings that were | inveterate malignity and the proclamation of un- forcing themselves upon her mind. Mrs. Chick- lade again appeared in the neighbourhood of Cambridge: certain reports relative to her true character, accidentally reached Cicely’s ears: she was led to make secret inquiries—and the result was to unveil to her the infamy of the occupation which for many years Mis, Chicklade had pursued. She gave money to the woman to induce her to leave that neighbourhood; and fortunately for Miss Neale’s reputation, the vile woman was always faithful enough in keeping the secrets of those who suffered her to make demands upon their purses, Yet though her eyes were now opened to the iniquity of Mrs. Chicklade’s cha- racter, Cicely was still far from suspecting that her seduction had all along been a deliberate intention and settled plan on the part of her lover: she thought that he also might in reality have been deceived in respect to the exceeding blackness of that woman’s character. Even when his corre- spondence ceased, and weeks grew into months without bringing another letter from his pen to the anxious and suspenseful Cicely, she did not dare permit herself to think that he had proved a wilful and deliberate betrayer of her peace, her innocence, and her happiness. Finally, as he wrote not—and as be returned not—she resolved to pro- ceed to London, that she might ascertain what were his pursuits, obtain an interview with him, compromising hostility which the infamous woman had made during their interview in the lane,—that lane in which Mrs. Chicklade was so soon after- wards found stretched upon the grass, the victim of assassination ! But passing away from that incident—and re- turning to Cicely Neale, after her visit to Norton Street, and after her interview with Hector Hard- ress—we must proceed to state that she no longer laboured under the slightest delusion in resect to the past conduct of her seducer. The letters which she had been perusing, revealed unmistakably the fact that Hector’s love had never been based upon sincerity, but that it was from the first a gross pas- sion, with a perfidious object. All his vows had been wilful perjuries— all bis oaths deliberate blasphemies. The dark iniquity of his proceedings towards her was revealed in all its hideousness ; he had never intended to espous9 her! Oh, it is a bitter, bitter thing) when a woman has to open her eyes to the conviction that she has been but the mere object of a passing amour—the subject of a sensualist’s phantasy—the toy of a heartless libertine! And such was the bitterness that now diffused its gall throughout the soul of Cicely Neale. Con ElooOolkkS (©)