"Oh, Frank, I am so glad you are come!" said Louisa through her tears. "I felt sure you would come when you got my letter. Your father thinks I make a fuss about nothing, and Cuthbert and Guy do nothing but laugh at me, as if they could possibly know; but you always understand me, Frank. I knew it was just as good as sending for a brother of my own; indeed better," said Mrs Wentworth, wiping her eyes; "for though Gerald is using me so badly, I would not expose him out of his own family, or have people making remarks--oh, not for the world!"
"Expose him!" said the Curate, with unutterable astonishment. "You don't mean to say you have any complaint to make about Gerald?" The idea was so preposterous that Frank Wentworth laughed; but it was not a laugh pleasant to hear.
"Oh, Frank, if you but knew all," said Louisa; "what I have had to put up with for months--all my best feelings outraged, and so many things to endure that were dreadful to think of. And I that was always brought up so differently; but now," cried the poor little woman, bursting into renewed tears, "it's come to such a pass that it can't be concealed any longer. I think it will break my heart; people will be sure to say I have been to blame; and how I am ever to hold up my head in society, and what is to be my name, and whether I am to be considered a widow--"
"A widow!" cried the Perpetual Curate, in utter consternation.
"Or worse," sobbed Gerald's poor little wife: "it feels like being divorced--as if one had done something wrong; and I am sure I never did anything to deserve it; but when your husband is a Romish priest," cried the afflicted woman, pressing her handkerchief to her eyes, "I would just ask anybody what are you? You can't be his wife, because he is not allowed to have any wife; and you can't go back to your maiden name, because of the children; and how can you have any place in society? Oh, Frank, I think I shall go distracted," said poor Louisa; "it will feel as if one had done something wicked, and been put out of the pale. How can I be called Mrs Wentworth any more when my husband has left me? and even if he is a priest, and can't have any wife, still he will be alive, and I shall not have the satisfaction of being a widow even. I am sure I don't know what I say," she concluded, with a fresh outburst; "for to be a widow would be a poor satisfaction, and I don't know how I could ever, ever live without Gerald; but to feel as if you were an improper person, and all the children's prospects in life!--Oh, Frank!" cried the weeping Louisa, burying her face in her handkerchief, "I think I shall go distracted, and my heart will break."