On leaving her carriage, Lady Helen desired to be shown to my mother's apartment, in order to recover herself before she saw the rest of the family; for she dreaded to encounter the thoughtless Mrs. Pendarves, who would say things that wounded the feelings in the most susceptible part.
On the third day, while she was administering a nervous medicine to her widowed guest, she could not help exclaiming,
"Poor dear! what will all the physic in the world do for you, cousin Helen? as the man says in the play--
Here my mother, with a pathetic look, motioned her to be silent--but in vain.
"Nay, my dear Julia!" said she, "I must speak: my dear cousin Helen will not know else how I have cried and lain awake all night with thinking of her miseries."
"She does not doubt your kind sympathy, dear aunt--she does not, indeed!"
"But she cannot be sure of it, Mrs. Charles, unless I tell her of it, and tell her
'I cannot. But remember, such folks were, And were most dear to all.'
and that is quite appropriate, you know, as he died in battle. I mean your poor husband, poor George Pendarves! not your brother--I never saw him."
My mother looked aghast. Since the death of George Pendarves, no one had ever ventured to name him to Lady Helen;
"But fools rush in where angels dare not tread."
And Lady Helen hid her face in agonizing surprise on my mother's shoulder.
"Ah! one may see by your eyes that you have shed many tears. Why, they tell me you never knew what had happened till you saw the poor dear love lying dead and bleeding. There was a shock! Oh! how I pity you, dearest soul! I have often thought it was a mercy that you did not fall over the balusters, and break your neck!"
"It broke my heart!" screamed out Lady Helen, in the voice of frenzy, unable to support any longer the horrible picture thus coarsely brought before her; and in another moment the house resounded with her hysterical cries; while Mrs. Pendarves added, she could not but think Lady Helen was very bad still, as she could not bear to be pitied; though pity was said to be very soothing--and though she,
----"Like pity on one side, Her grief-subduing voice applied."
As my mother expected, Lady Helen now conceived a terror of Mrs. Pendarves, which nothing could conquer; and her health became so visibly worse, that she quitted the place the following week, accompanied by my father and mother, and my mother's uncle, to London, leaving Seymour and myself behind, to be spoiled by our too-indulgent relatives.