“I do believe they are,” cried Charles, as a loud ring was heard at the outer bell.
Clementina sprang up eagerly, and hurried to the door—so eagerly, so impatiently, that her little feet tripped, and she fell with some violence to the ground!
“You are not hurt, I hope,” exclaimed both cousins, hastening to Clementina’s assistance, and raising her; for, in her ball-dress, she was more helpless than ever.
“She is hurt, I fear,” cried Ernest, as he saw red drops trickling from her brow, and falling on her lace dress. “Oh, Charles, do call Mrs. Clayton directly.”
The lady’s maid was instantly summoned, and the hurts of the trembling, sobbing, almost hysterical Clementina examined. She had received rather a deep cut on the forehead, and a little contusion under the eye. There was nothing to alarm, but much to disfigure. Charles proposed sending at once for the doctor, but this the young lady would not hear of: she had some vague, terrible idea, of wounds being sewn up, and much preferred the mild surgery of Mrs. Clayton.
In the midst of the confusion occasioned by the accident, two lamps were seen to stop before the door, and the thundering double rap which succeeded announced the return of Mrs. Hope.
The servant who came to say that his mistress was waiting, laid at the same time a box on the table: it contained the much-wished-for pearls.
“I had better go down and tell what has happened,” said Charles, quitting the drawing-room. In two or three minutes he returned with Mrs. Hope.
“My darling child! my sweet Clemmy! what a sad business this is! How could it have happened? Why, you look as though you had been to the wars! you will never be able to go to the ball.”
Clementina leaned her head on the sofa, and sobbed piteously.
“Dear me! I hope, Clayton, that you have put on the plaster carefully. I only dread her being marked for life,” said the mother.
The poor girl’s grief became more violent.
“You must compose yourself, my dear; you will make yourself ill. A fall is a great shock to the nerves.”
Ernest had left the room as the lady entered, and now silently offered to his cousin’s trembling hand a glass of sal volatile and water.
“You had better go to bed at once,” said Mrs. Hope. “’Tis such a pity; all ready dressed for the ball! I must go, for I could not disappoint Lady Fitzwigram, and I believe that the Duchess is to be there. Clayton will take excellent care of you, I am sure. Come, Ernest and Charles, I see that you are ready.”