She had been awake when he first entered her room, but had kept her eyes closed, so that even her wakefulness should not seem to reproach him.But when he had returned, so soon after herself, too, this timid little heart had felt more at ease, and turning towards him as he stept softly out of the room, she had fallen into a light sleep.George came in and looked at her again, entering still more softly.By the pale night-lamp he could see her sweet, pale face--the purple eyelids were fringed and closed, and one round arm, smooth and white, lay outside of the coverlet.Good God! how pure she was; how gentle, how tender, and how friendless! and he, how selfish, brutal, and black with crime! Heart-stained, and shame-stricken, he stood at the bed's foot, and looked at the sleeping girl.How dared he--who was he, to pray for one so spotless! God bless her! God bless her! He came to the bedside, and looked at the hand, the little soft hand, lying asleep; and he bent over the pillow noiselessly towards the gentle pale face.
Two fair arms closed tenderly round his neck as he stooped down."I am awake, George," the poor child said, with a sob fit to break the little heart that nestled so closely by his own.She was awake, poor soul, and to railings and the beadle: who, if she walked ever so short a distance to buy a ribbon in Southampton Row, was followed by Black Sambo with an enormous cane: who was always cared for, dressed, put to bed, and watched over by ever so many guardian angels, with and without wages? Bon Dieu, I say, is it not hard that the fateful rush of the great Imperial struggle can't take place without affecting a poor little harmless girl of eighteen, who is occupied in billing and cooing, or working muslin collars in Russell Square? You too, kindly, homely flower!
--is the great roaring war tempest coming to sweep you down, here, although cowering under the shelter of Holborn? Yes; Napoleon is flinging his last stake, and poor little Emmy Sedley's happiness forms, somehow, part of it.
In the first place, her father's fortune was swept down with that fatal news.All his speculations had of late gone wrong with the luckless old gentleman.Ventures had failed; merchants had broken; funds had risen when he calculated they would fall.What need to particularize?
If success is rare and slow, everybody knows how quick and easy ruin is.Old Sedley had kept his own sad counsel.
Everything seemed to go on as usual in the quiet, opulent house; the good-natured mistress pursuing, quite unsuspiciously, her bustling idleness, and daily easy avocations; the daughter absorbed still in one selfish, tender thought, and quite regardless of all the world besides, when that final crash came, under which the worthy family fell.
One night Mrs.Sedley was writing cards for a party;the Osbornes had given one, and she must not be behindhand; John Sedley, who had come home very late from the City, sate silent at the chimney side, while his wife was prattling to him; Emmy had gone up to her room ailing and low-spirited."She's not happy," the mother went on."George Osborne neglects her.I've no patience with the airs of those people.The girls have not been in the house these three weeks; and George has been twice in town without coming.Edward Dale saw him at the Opera.Edward would marry her I'm sure: and there's Captain Dobbin who, I think, would--only I hate all army men.Such a dandy as George has become.With his military airs, indeed! We must show some folks that we're as good as they.Only give Edward Dale any encouragement, and you'll see.We must have a party, Mr.
S.Why don't you speak, John? Shall I say Tuesday fortnight?
Why don't you answer? Good God, John, what has happened?"John Sedley sprang up out of his chair to meet his wife, who ran to him.He seized her in his arms, and said with a hasty voice, "We're ruined, Mary.We've got the world to begin over again, dear.It's best that you should know all, and at once." As he spoke, he trembled in every limb, and almost fell.He thought the news would have overpowered his wife--his wife, to whom he had never said a hard word.But it was he that was the most moved, sudden as the shock was to her.When he sank back into his seat, it was the wife that took the office of consoler.She took his trembling hand, and kissed it, and put it round her neck: she called him her John--her dear John--her old man--her kind old man; she poured out a hundred words of incoherent love and tenderness; her faithful voice and simple caresses wrought this sad heart up to an inexpressible delight and anguish, and cheered and solaced his over-burdened soul.
Only once in the course of the long night as they sate together, and poor Sedley opened his pent-up soul, and told the story of his losses and embarrassments--the treason of some of his oldest friends, the manly kindness of some, from whom he never could have expected it--in a general confession--only once did the faithful wife give way to emotion.
"My God, my God, it will break Emmy's heart," she said.
The father had forgotten the poor girl.She was lying, awake and unhappy, overhead.In the midst of friends, home, and kind parents, she was alone.To how many people can any one tell all? Who will be open where there is no sympathy, or has call to speak to those who never can understand? Our gentle Amelia was thus solitary.She had no confidante, so to speak, ever since she had anything to confide.She could not tell the old mother her doubts and cares; the would-be sisters seemed every day more strange to her.And she had misgivings and fears which she dared not acknowledge to herself, though she was always secretly brooding over them.