ABSTRACT
When the mind of Mrs. Marchmont was as much composed as the nature of her situation and the remaining uncertainty would admit, some degree of tranquility, however chastised by fear, was restored to every breast but that of Althea. For her there was not even the semblance of repose to be found; for, released from the extreme concern she had felt for the life of Marchmont, she now turned her thoughts to her future conduct in regard to him, and asked herself, whether on his return it would be prudent or consistent for her to reside in the house which, whether his persecutors allowed him always to be there, or drove him occasionally into concealment, could not but be considered as his home. Yet how could she propose quitting Mrs. Marchmont, because her son was about to return to her? Althea was to this hour ignorant whether she knew of Marchmont’s attachment to her; for she had never once mentioned, or even remotely hinted at it. That Lucy was in possession of her brother’s confidence was certain: but even she had never spoken quite plainly to Althea, who, from all the observations she had made on the mother as well as the daughters, thought she saw, that while they should think of Marchmont as most fortunate in becoming the husband of Althea, they considered her prospects, and even her present fortune, as placing her entirely out of his reach; for the latter was not enough to put it in her power to give even a competent share of affluence to the man she should prefer, if he had himself nothing, as was literally the case with Marchmont; and while the style of life she had been used to, and which she preferred, seemed to assimilate their destinies, Mrs. Marchmont could not bear to have it supposed, that she wished to take advantage of Althea’s partiality to her family, to engage her in an alliance which that of Sir Audley Dacres might deem so unequal on account of the 319indigence and distress to which Marchmont and his family were reduced; though in point of family antiquity they had the advantage. Such Althea fancied were the sentiments of her female friends; and if her ideas were just, she foresaw that her stay might be painful to the disinterested delicacy of Mrs. Marchmont; while on the other hand her partial tenderness for Marchmont was so far from having suffered any abatement, that all she had thought, all she had heard of him; every little anecdote expressive of his heart and manners in his boyish days, which accidentally fell from his sisters; of late, ‘The dangers he had met;’89 and, above all, his manner of supporting them – every circumstance contributed to render indelible the impression she had from their earliest acquaintance conceived of his merit: whatever worldly wisdom, or prudence in its most gentle form, could say, Althea was on examination of her heart convinced, that all that the world could offer of adulation, all it could afford of those pleasures which occupy the lives of the rich or noble, would give to her neither content nor gratification; and that with Marchmont, a retirement in which she thought her fortune might suffice for their support, would be in her opinion the only scheme of happiness. How much such a plan coincided with the sentiments of Marchmont himself, his own letters sufficiently testified, for, though he had too much respectful reserve to name her to Eversley, it was easy to see to whom many expressions in his letters alluded.
