"
The tears of Hermione here flowed so fast as to threaten the
interruption of her narrative. When she resumed it, it was with a kind
of apology to Margaret.
"Every circumstance," she said, "occurring in those moments, when I
still enjoyed a delusive idea of happiness, is deeply imprinted in my
remembrance, which, respecting all that has since happened, is waste
and unvaried as an Arabian desert. But I have no right to inflict on
you, Margaret, agitated as you are with your own anxieties, the
unavailing details of my useless recollections."
Margaret's eyes were full of tears--it was impossible it could be
otherwise, considering that the tale was told by her suffering
benefactress, and resembled, in some respects, her own situation; and
yet she must not be severely blamed, if, while eagerly pressing her
patroness to continue her narrative, her eye involuntarily sought the
door, as if to chide the delay of Monna Paula.
The Lady Hermione saw and forgave these conflicting emotions; and she,
too, must be pardoned, if, in her turn, the minute detail of her
narrative showed, that, in the discharge of feelings so long locked in
her own bosom, she rather forgot those which were personal to her
auditor, and by which it must be supposed Margaret's mind was
principally occupied, if not entirely engrossed.
"I told you, I think, that one domestic followed the gentlemen," thus
the lady continued her story, "the other remained with us for the
purpose, as it seemed, of introducing us to two persons whom M--, I
say, whom my husband's signal had brought to the spot.
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