16. CHAPTER XVI.
AN ENGAGEMENT.
Before leaving London, Ainslie called at the late
residence of Mrs. Franklin, and was surprised to
find the house in other hands. On making further
inquiries of his father, he learnt that she had embarked
for New York with the whole of her family.
On reflection he was satisfied that this was the most
natural and proper course for her. America was
the land of her nativity, and the scene of all the
happiness she had enjoyed in early life. England,
the country where she had known nothing but misfortune
and trial. Her young sons, too, would be able
to figure with great advantage in the new country
and its existing friendly relations, with that to which
her oldest son owed allegiance, prevented her feeling
any uneasiness on the score of his present employment
in the India service. Edward's father also
informed him that Mrs. Franklin's affairs in England
were intrusted to the most responsible agents.
Being satisfied that there was nothing further
which friendship required of him in that quarter he
set out for Hampshire with rather different feelings
from those which oppressed him, on his last visit
there.
We will not attempt to analyze his feelings at this
time; but rather follow him to the Rectory, whither
he hastened after a half hour spent at his father's
seat. On entering the parlour, he found Mrs. Matthews
and Mrs. Cavendish, and learnt from them that
the young ladies were gone to visit Lucy's favourite
school.
He determined to take a short cut to this place;
and accordingly strolled along a shaded pathway
which led from the garden towards the spot. The
sun was just approaching the horizon and shed a
rich splendour over a pile of massy clouds which
reposed in the west. As he passed rapidly along a
turn in the path revealed to him the solitary figure
of Aura Melville, in strong relief against the western
sky as she stood on the edge of a bank and gazed
upon the last footsteps of the retiring sun. He
approached unobserved, and just as he was on the
point of speaking, heard her say in a low voice, as
though thinking aloud,
“How beautiful! How much more beautiful it
would be, if a certain friend were with me to pronounce
it so!”
Laying his hand gently upon her arm, he murmured
in the same soliloquizing tone, “How happy
should I be If I might flatter myself that I were
that friend!”
She turned and the “orient blush of quick surprize,”
gave an animation to her features which made
her lover own to himself that he had never seen her
half so lovely.
We have already hinted at Aura's partiality for
Edward and when we apprize the reader that he
had long loved her with a respectful and devoted
attachment, which he had only been prevented from
declaring by his dependent situation and uncertainty
with regard to his pursuits in life, it will readily be
supposed that they were not many minutes after this
in coming to a perfect understanding.
With lingering steps and many a pause, they
turned towards the Rectory long after the shadows
of twilight had begun to fall. The rapture of those
moments, the ardent expressions of the youth, the
half uttered confessions, the timid glances and averted
looks of the maiden, and the intervals of silence—
silence full of that happiness which is never known
but once—all these must be imagined by the reader.
On their arrival at the Rectory they found that
Lucy, who had been left at the school by Aura, had
returned by the more frequented road, and the family
were waiting their coming, while the smoking tea
urn sent forth its bubbling invitation to the most
cheerful, if not the most sumptuous of all entertainments.
