ABSTRACT
The day was wearing away. Dinner was announced, but nobody seemed disposed to partake of it. Lady Newenden remained in her bed-chamber, and Mrs. Maltravers attended her; Ethelinde, with an heart breaking through anxiety and incertitude, had hardly strength to get down stairs; Chesterville was lost in the contemplation of his own misery; and Montgomery so restless at the loss of time, that he neither had spirits or appetite. They all however attended at table at the request of Mr. Mal-travers, whose solicitude seemed to be to stifle as much as possible the reports which he feared would go forth of the transactions of the morning. Lady Newenden was so frequently indisposed, that her absence, and that of her mother, appeared not extraordinary to the servants. Chesterville could neither eat, nor force himself into conversation; being wholly occupied by the situation of his son, and of the journey he proposed to begin immediately after dinner for his relief. Ethelinde, with fearful apprehension, the tears frequently rising to her eyes, watched the looks of her father, and could not throw any degree of cheerfulness into her own; Sir Edward appeared calm, but his face sufficiently told that he was ill at ease; he endeavoured however to keep up something like a conversation with Mr. Maltravers, who now frequently addressed himself to Montgomery, whom at another time he would probably have overlooked or neglected.
