Belinda’s fears of Lady Delacour, as a dangerous rival, were much quieted by the artful insinuations of Mrs. Stanhope, with respect to her age, &c.; and in proportion as her fears subsided, she blamed herself for having written too harshly of her ladyship’s conduct. The idea that whilst she appeared as Lady Delacour’s friend she ought not to propagate any stories to her disadvantage, operated powerfully upon Belinda’s mind, and she reproached herself for having told even her aunt what she had seen in private. She thought that she had been guilty of treachery, and she wrote again immediately to Mrs. Stanhope, to conjure her to burn her last letter; to forget, if possible, its contents; and to believe that not a syllable of a similar nature should ever more be heard from her: she was just concluding with the words —“I hope my dear aunt will consider all this as an error of my judgment, and not of my heart,” when Lady Delacour burst into the room, exclaiming, in a tone of gaiety, “Tragedy or comedy, Belinda? The masquerade dresses are come. But how’s this?” added she, looking full in Belinda’s face —“tears in the eyes! blushes in the cheeks! tremors in the joints! and letters shuffling away! But, you novice of novices, how awkwardly shuffled! — A niece of Mrs. Stanhope’s, and so unpractised a shuffler! — And is it credible she should tremble in this ridiculous way about a love-letter or two?”
“No love-letters, indeed, Lady Delacour,” said Belinda, holding the paper fast, as her ladyship, half in play, half in earnest, attempted to snatch it from her.
“No love-letters! then it must be treason; and see it I must, by all that’s good, or by all that’s bad — I see the name of Delacour!”— and her ladyship absolutely seized the letters by force, in spite of all Belinda’s struggles and entreaties.
“I beg, I request, I conjure you not to read it!” cried Miss Portman, clasping her hands. “Read mine, read mine, if you must, but don’t read my aunt Stanhope’s — Oh! I beg, I entreat, I conjure you!” and she threw herself upon her knees.
“You beg! you entreat! you conjure! Why, this is like the Duchess de Brinvilliers, who wrote on her paper of poisons, ‘Whoever finds this, I entreat, I conjure them, in the name of more saints than I can remember, not to open the paper any farther.’— What a simpleton, to know so little of the nature of curiosity!”
As she spoke, Lady Delacour opened Mrs. Stanhope’s letter, read it from beginning to end, folded it up coolly when she had finished it, and simply said, “The person alluded to is almost as bad as her name at full length: does Mrs. Stanhope think no one can make out an inuendo in a libel, or fill up a blank, but an attorney-general?” pointing to a blank in Mrs. Stanhope’s letter, left for the name of Clarence Hervey.
Belinda was in too much confusion either to speak or think.
“You were right to swear they were not love-letters,” pursued her ladyship, laying down the papers. “I protest I snatched them by way of frolic — I beg pardon. All I can do now is not to read the rest.”
“Nay — I beg — I wish — I insist upon your reading mine,” said Belinda.
When Lady Delacour had read it, her countenance suddenly changed —“Worth a hundred of your aunt’s, I declare,” said she, patting Belinda’s cheek. “What a treasure to meet with any thing like a new heart! — all hearts, now-a-days, are second-hand, at best.”
Lady Delacour spoke with a tone of feeling which Belinda had never heard from her before, and which at this moment touched her so much, that she took her ladyship’s hand and kissed it.
Chapter 2. — Masks
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“WHERE WERE WE WHEN all this began?” cried Lady Delacour, forcing herself to resume an air of gaiety — “O, masquerade was the order of the day —— tragedy or comedy? which suits your genius best, my dear?”
“Whichever suits your ladyship’s taste least.”
“Why, my woman, Marriott, says I ought to be tragedy; and, upon the notion that people always succeed best when they take characters diametrically opposite to their own — Clarence Hervey’s principle — perhaps you don’t think that he has any principles; but there you are wrong; I do assure you, he has sound principles — of taste.”
“Of that,” said Belinda, with a constrained smile, “he gives the most convincing proof, by his admiring your ladyship so much.”
“And by his admiring Miss Portman so much more. But whilst we are making speeches to one another, poor Marriott is standing in distress, like Garrick, between tragedy and comedy.”
Lady Delacour opened her dressing-room door, and pointed to her as she stood with the dress of the comic muse on one arm, and the tragic muse on the other.
“I am afraid I have not spirits enough to undertake the comic muse,” said Miss Portman.
Marriott, who was a personage of prodigious consequence, and the judge in the last resort at her mistress’s toilette, looked extremely out of humour at having been kept waiting so long; and yet more so at the idea that her appellant jurisdiction could be disputed.
“Your ladyship’s taller than Miss Portman by half ahead,” said Marriott, “and to be sure will best become tragedy with this long train; besides, I had settled all the rest of your ladyship’s dress. Tragedy, they say, is always tall; and, no offence, your ladyship’s taller than Miss Portman by half a head.”
“For head read inch,” said Lady Delacour, “if you please.”
“When things are settled, one can’t bear to have them unsettled — but your ladyship must have your own way, to be sure — I’ll say no more,” cried she, throwing down the dresses.
“Stay, Marriott,” said Lady Delacour, and she placed herself between the angry waiting-maid and the door.
“Why will you, who are the best creature in the world, put yourself into these furies about nothing? Have patience with us, and you shall be satisfied.”
“That’s another affair,” said Marriott.
“Miss Portman,” continued her ladyship, “don’t talk of not having spirits, you that are all life! — What say you, Belinda? — O yes, you must be the comic muse; and I, it seems, must be tragedy, because Marriott has a passion for seeing me ‘come sweeping by.’ And because Marriott must have her own way in every thing — she rules me with a rod of iron, my dear, so tragedy I needs must be. —Marriott knows her power.”
There was an air of extreme vexation in Lady Delacour’s countenance as she pronounced these last words, in which evidently more was meant than met the ear. Upon many occasions Miss Portman had observed, that Marriott exercised despotic authority over her mistress; and she had seen, with surprise, that a lady, who would not yield an iota of power to her husband, submitted herself to every caprice of the most insolent of waiting-women. For some time, Belinda imagined that this submission was merely an air, as she had seen some other fine ladies proud of appearing to be governed by a favourite maid; but she was soon convinced that Marriott